The newz is rife with heroin stories....

[HankRicther12]

I am not a fan of the drug war, and likely there is some agenda behind the coverage, but at the same time you guys need to stop acting like there aren't actual negative consequences to drugs. A city right near me called Monroe I always thought was a nice little farming type city, I was shocked to find it is now the 10th most violent city in MI and most of it is due to heroin.

Yes, I know, the fact that it is illegal makes up a big part of the violence, but much of it is also people stealing to get the drugs or doing things while they are high. If you are honestly going to tell me you think Heroin is the same MJ you seriously need to look into it more. Again, I am not saying the govt is the answer, but let's quit pretending drugs are all sunshine and lollipops.

[tod evans]

I am not a fan of the drug war, and likely there is some agenda behind the coverage, but at the same time you guys need to stop acting like there aren't actual negative consequences to drugs. A city right near me called Monroe I always thought was a nice little farming type city, I was shocked to find it is now the 10th most violent city in MI and most of it is due to heroin.

Yes, I know, the fact that it is illegal makes up a big part of the violence, but much of it is also people stealing to get the drugs or doing things while they are high. If you are honestly going to tell me you think Heroin is the same MJ you seriously need to look into it more. Again, I am not saying the govt is the answer, but let's quit pretending drugs are all sunshine and lollipops.

Where are you reading this?

[Todd]

I am not a fan of the drug war, and likely there is some agenda behind the coverage, but at the same time you guys need to stop acting like there aren't actual negative consequences to drugs. A city right near me called Monroe I always thought was a nice little farming type city, I was shocked to find it is now the 10th most violent city in MI and most of it is due to heroin.

Yep, because all heroin addicts are inherently violent.

Like some of these laid back cool cats who could wail some hot licks.






Some of us remember before their was a drug war. Addiction is a terrible thing, but without the black market most drug addicts aren't inherently violent.

[AuH20]

I am not a fan of the drug war, and likely there is some agenda behind the coverage, but at the same time you guys need to stop acting like there aren't actual negative consequences to drugs. A city right near me called Monroe I always thought was a nice little farming type city, I was shocked to find it is now the 10th most violent city in MI and most of it is due to heroin.

Yes, I know, the fact that it is illegal makes up a big part of the violence, but much of it is also people stealing to get the drugs or doing things while they are high. If you are honestly going to tell me you think Heroin is the same MJ you seriously need to look into it more. Again, I am not saying the govt is the answer, but let's quit pretending drugs are all sunshine and lollipops.

Bah, we're only dealing with alteration of one's brain chemistry. The stuff is harmless. [/s]

[tod evans]

Bah, we're only dealing with alteration of one's brain chemistry. The stuff is harmless. [/s]

All opiates "alter brain chemistry" that's how pain relief works, and coincidently what causes a physical addiction.

Most folks understand that about heroin, some understand about the plethora of synthetic opiates too.

But the MSM is using heroin as a tool to justify kops/courts and prisons preying on the ignorant or easily manipulated by fear mongering....

[HankRicther12]

Where are you reading this?

Obviously it was a bit of an exaggeration which I would think is obvious, I'm only trying to point out that while sure the media manipulates things I think it is silly to immediately jump into conspiracy land.

Yep, because all heroin addicts are inherently violent.

Like some of these laid back cool cats who could wail some hot licks.

Some of us remember before their was a drug war. Addiction is a terrible thing, but without the black market most drug addicts aren't inherently violent.

Mmmmm, yeah, show me where I ever said anything remotely like that....oh, that's right, I didn't.

[Carlybee]

All opiates "alter brain chemistry" that's how pain relief works, and coincidently what causes a physical addiction.

Most folks understand that about heroin, some understand about the plethora of synthetic opiates too.

But the MSM is using heroin as a tool to justify kops/courts and prisons preying on the ignorant or easily manipulated by fear mongering....

While Big Pharma gets away with legally pushing meds that are just as addicting and debilitating as heroin.

[dannno]

I am not a fan of the drug war, and likely there is some agenda behind the coverage, but at the same time you guys need to stop acting like there aren't actual negative consequences to drugs. A city right near me called Monroe I always thought was a nice little farming type city, I was shocked to find it is now the 10th most violent city in MI and most of it is due to heroin.

Yes, I know, the fact that it is illegal makes up a big part of the violence, but much of it is also people stealing to get the drugs or doing things while they are high. If you are honestly going to tell me you think Heroin is the same MJ you seriously need to look into it more. Again, I am not saying the govt is the answer, but let's quit pretending drugs are all sunshine and lollipops.

If drugs were legal, then they would be about 1/100th the cost and people wouldn't need to steal to obtain them. Some drug addicts will spend hundreds of dollars a week, others upwards of $1k or more a week on their habit. They could be spending $10 or less per week in a free market and this would reduce the need to steal upwards of thousands each month per addict.

[thajuggla]

Nope, not really, ever:



Source A: http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-spo...eroin-trade/91
Source B (Yes, those are U.S. Military personnel guarding the poppy fields): http://www.thelibertybeacon.com/2014...-heroin-trade/

Ohh come on! I mean, I know you are showing me PICTURES of our military guarding poppy fields, and there are graphs showing where Afghanistan seemed to blow up production of poppy after 2001, but are you sure that's not photo shopped by a conspiracy theorist?!?

How can you people think that government is all bad?!? They always just do things that are for our benefit, you know, like guarding poppy fields and spending our money trying to topple other governments that don't believe in blowing up people for freedom!

[tod evans]

While Big Pharma gets away with legally pushing meds that are just as addicting and debilitating as heroin.

This is where a lot of the older junkies come from...

The politically correct crowd chides doctors to curtail pain meds so they do.

Doesn't matter if the patient "needs" the medication for pain or a buzz the fact of the matter is he's been cut off.

If/when I ever get ill enough to need pain medication on a regular basis my intention is to start with opium and if/when that doesn't suffice I'll move up to heroin. The intention being to not deplete son's inheritance by giving any of it to the medical/pharmaceutical industrial complex.

[Christopher A. Brown]

Well DEA controls the cocaine market coming from south america might as well control the heroin trade, wait…….we already do. Nvrmd. We might as well control the huge gun trafficking ring going to criminal enterprises while we're at it. Oh yeah, we control that too.

With a government like this who needs evil empires to fight?

This should mean you support a lawful and peaceful revolution. That is unless your comment was to bump the thread rather than object to what heroin is doing to our populations.

If you do object to what heroin is doing, and the apparent fact that America is controlling its production in Afghanistan covertly, AND are a sincere American, then agreeing with these 2 questions and accepting constitutional intent as it can function for us will be easy.

Do you agree and accept that the framers of the founding documents intended for us to alter or abolish government destructive to our unalienable rights?

Do you agree and accept that the ultimate purpose of free speech is to enable the unity adequate to effectively alter or abolish?

[tod evans]

Here we go again, Boogity-boogity.

Exclusive: DEA chief says heroin ‘back with a vengeance,’ drugs a national security threat

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015...?intcmp=hplnws

“Not much of a gambler,” Chuck Rosenberg says about himself, a tad sheepishly. Indeed, in the seven deadly sins department, the new chief of the Drug Enforcement Administration is something of a zero: He’s never smoked marijuana, doesn’t drink alcohol, and lists as his only vice an excessive intake of Diet Dr. Pepper.

Such abstemiousness may be a prized attribute in the head of the lead agency in the War on Drugs, which kicked off with the founding of DEA, under a measure signed by President Nixon, in July 1973. From his office headquarters in Northern Virginia, Rosenberg oversees nearly 5,000 federal agents in 220 U.S. cities and nearly 90 other locales around the world. These are some of America’s toughest and bravest uniformed – and undercover – officers, men and women who risk their lives to take down the most ruthless and heavily-armed narco-trafficking cartels.

The irony for the mild-mannered, bespectacled Rosenberg, a career federal prosecutor and former FBI official, is that someone so averse to gambling now spends his days grappling with the very thing gamblers court most assiduously. “We incur a lot of risk in our operations: legal risk, personal risk, all sorts of risk,” the DEA chief said at his agency’s headquarters. “And managing that risk in a smart way – figuring out where we ought to be and what we ought to be doing, prioritizing our work without stepping on the creativity and the passion of the men and women in the field – that’s a challenge.”

Foremost on Rosenberg’s agenda – the issue that every one of his 21 special agents in charge, fanned out across the country, cite as the number one problem in their respective jurisdictions – is the surge in heroin use in the United States over the past few years. The Centers for Disease Control reports that heroin usage or dependency surged by nearly 150 percent between 2007 and 2013, and that casualty rates from the drug nearly doubled in the last two years of that span.

“It’s back, and it’s back with a vengeance,” Rosenberg told Fox News in his first TV interview since taking the reins of the agency in May. “There's an enormous supply of heroin; it's cheap. In fact, it's a lot cheaper than prescription pills. If you take oxycodone and hydrocodone for a football injury and you get hooked, you're going to pay a dollar a milligram on the street for a pill – thirty milligrams, thirty dollars, give or take. Heroin is probably one-fifth the price, and because it has a similar chemical effect, a similar pharmacological reaction, folks make that transition.”

Asked if he sees substance abuse as a national security threat, Rosenberg at first demurred, seeking the reporter’s definition of a threat to national security. Encouraged to employ his own, Rosenberg replied: “Potentially. This is a multi-billion dollar industry. What are the bad guys doing with the money that Americans are paying for drugs? What's it funding overseas? I'm sure some of it's going to terrorist organizations; we've seen that. And so that worries me quite a bit.”

U.S. officials note that drug overdoses claim the lives of approximately 44,000 Americans each year – more than firearms or car accidents – and that half of those deaths are attributable to prescription pills. Asked if legal or illegal drugs pose the greater threat, Rosenberg said “both dimensions” are creating major problems for law enforcement and society in general. The acting administrator would not say outright that legal drugs are over-prescribed, but he hinted at his harboring such views, saying: “I’m not a doctor but I do know this … We’re about 5 percent of the world’s population. We use about 95 percent of the world’s hydrocodone. So draw your own conclusion.”

The recent decriminalization of marijuana usage in selected jurisdictions across the United States – Colorado and Washington state, most notably – has created a conflict between local law enforcement, sworn to uphold local laws, and federal law enforcement officers, for whom the federal statutes outlawing marijuana remain very much in effect. “I’ve been very clear to my special agents in charge: If you have a big marijuana case, if that in your jurisdiction is one of your biggest problems, then bring it,” Rosenberg said.

With new ballot measures on marijuana cropping up in almost every election cycle, and decriminalization appearing to be gaining broader support, Fox News asked Rosenberg about the continued inclusion of the drug in the federal government’s harshest category of narcotics:

ROSEN: Two of the last three presidents of the United States have acknowledged having used marijuana. Bill Clinton famously said that he didn't inhale. Barack Obama has written fairly extensively about his marijuana use, has been photographed with marijuana; and others have explicated on that subject even further. Isn't that itself – the fact that here we have two men who used marijuana, in varying degrees, and who then went on to become president of the United States – a kind of a prima facie argument that it is time to remove marijuana from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act?

ROSENBERG: Yeah, I don't think so.

ROSEN: Why not?

ROSENBERG: Marijuana is dangerous. It certainly is not as dangerous as other Schedule I controlled substances; it's not as dangerous as heroin, clearly, but it's still dangerous. It's not good for you. I wouldn't want my children smoking it. I wouldn't recommend that anyone do it. So I don't frankly see a reason to remove it. We, by the way, support, and have supported, a lot of legitimate research on marijuana, fully behind that; I think it's great. If we come up with a medical use for it, that would be wonderful. But we haven't.

When the questioning took a slightly different tack, he stood firm:

ROSEN: I’ve never seen two guys get thrown out of a bar because they started fist-fighting after smoking a joint. All right? But we’ve seen [that] every Friday and every Saturday night brings just such occasions as a result of the legal distribution of alcohol. Isn’t there some common-sense disparity, or irony, or disconnect in that?

ROSENBERG: Probably, yeah. Right? So I don’t know that you’re arguing that they’re both good; you may be arguing that they’re both bad. As I said earlier, marijuana is less dangerous – clearly less dangerous – than heroin. It’s easy to draw that line. But I’m not willing to say that it’s good for you, or that it ought to be legalized. I think it’s bad for you and that it ought to remain illegal.

ROSEN: From that answer, one might infer that you think alcohol should also be illegal.

ROSENBERG: No, I’m not going to say that. We – we tangled with that as a society in the 1930s. And we know how that went. That’s the law of the land; I get it. I choose not to drink alcohol but I’m not going to impose that on anyone else.

Since Mexico is a primary point of origin for illegal drugs consumed in the United States, including heroin, our neighbor to the south exercises an outsized claim on the attention of the DEA administrator. The brazen escape from a Mexican prison in July of the Sinaloa cartel druglord Joaquín Archivaldo Guzmán, also known as “El Chapo” – one of the world’s most ruthless and dangerous criminal kingpins, now at large – underscored the challenges for U.S. law enforcement in collaborating with a nation-state where official corruption is so widespread. “Not that I can share with you,” Rosenberg answered when pressed on whether U.S. authorities have any better idea of El Guapo’s location today than the day after his escape.

Asked if there is a single sector of the Mexican state apparatus that is free of corruption, Rosenberg answered: “I don't know. I would hope so.” Later, he cited the Mexican agents who work with DEA task forces and called them “good and trusted allies,” their very existence evidence that “pockets” of integrity in the Mexican system exist.

With his cautious demeanor, Rosenberg shrewdly steers away from any question that smacks, or even faintly reeks, of controversy. Though he is perhaps in a better position than any other U.S. official to corroborate or refute the charge, he will not comment on Donald Trump’s recent assertion that the Mexican government is deliberately sending rapists and gang members across the U.S. border. Nor will Rosenberg say whether a “spiritual deficit” is partly to blame for the skyrocketing rates of heroin dependency. And he will not answer questions about his role in an epic controversy of the Bush-Cheney era: when an internal clash over reauthorization of a surveillance program critical to the War on Terror, in March 2004, nearly triggered mass resignations at the Department of Justice.

“Happy to talk about the Washington Nationals and their diminishing chances of making the playoffs this year,” he’ll say instead, with a sly smile.

Controversy, it turns out, is not one of the risks the DEA chief is willing to manage.

[tod evans]

//

[dannno]

“Not much of a gambler,” Chuck Rosenberg says about himself, a tad sheepishly. Indeed, in the seven deadly sins department, the new chief of the Drug Enforcement Administration is something of a zero: He’s never smoked marijuana, doesn’t drink alcohol, and lists as his only vice an excessive intake of Diet Dr. Pepper.

Honestly, Diet Dr. Pepper is probably worse for you than all the drugs they just listed... and maybe heroin too.

[tangent4ronpaul]

There is a epidemic of heroin use in this country right now. It's driven by the war on pot. Heroin is easier to smuggle and commands a higher markup. No brainer.

You could kill the profitability just by teaching the junkies to garden

-t

[JK/SEA]

yeah, well, its pretty clear he has a FINANCIAL interest in keeping the drug war going. Either way. He gets a paycheck, and might be a shareholder in a few prisons here and there...

this guy ain't foolin' anybody.

[tod evans]

Nearly 75 people reportedly overdose on laced heroin in 3-day span in Chicago

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2015/1...?intcmp=hplnws

Nearly 75 people reportedly overdosed on dangerous narcotics, possibly heroin laced with painkiller fentanyl, in Chicago over a three-day span, according to city health and fire officials.

The Chicago Tribune, citing hospital officials, reported by Friday afternoon at least 14 people were rushed to Mount Sinai Hospital in Chicago to be treated for possible heroin overdoses, and some patients still had needles in their arms.

Larry Langford, a spokesman for the Chicago Fire Department, told the Tribune that from Tuesday to Friday, emergency crews had responded to 74 cases.

Diane Hicks, a registered nurse and emergency room director at Mount Sinai, told the Tribune that some of the 14 patients at the hospital had collapsed as soon as they injected themselves with the deadly concoction.

"We suspect what is happening is the same thing that happened in 2006 when people were getting heroin that was cut with fentanyl, which is a very strong narcotic," she told the newspaper. “That’s what we think is happening.”

The Drug Enforcement Administration and Chicago police are teaming up to try and find the source of the batches.

Chief Mary Sheridan, head of the Fire Department’s emergency medical services division, said all the victims were stabilized with a single dose of Narcan, a heroin antidote carried by paramedics in the city, and then, transported to hospitals. However, fire officials say the victims needed more than one dose of Narcan.

"They're taking double and triple the doses of Narcan in order to bring them out of their stupor," Hincks told the newspaper.

Fentanyl-laced heroin has caused overdoes across the nation. The DEA issued a health alert in March.

Fentanyl is used for painful surgical operations, Dr. Steven Aks, chief toxicologist at Stronger Hospital, told the Tribune. The power painkiller adds a potent kick to heroin, making it attractive to buyers seeking better edge.

The last major outbreak of fentanyl-related deaths took place between 2005 and 2007. The outbreak killed more than 1,000 people across the country and dozens specifically in Chicago.

[vita3]

Kid on my lane died of Heroin overdose this winter & good friends nephew OD'd 2 weeks ago.

F yourself if you continue to think its all media & not a real problem.

[DevilsAdvocate]

I think sometimes Libertarians fail to understand that drugs are actually horrible.

[tod evans]

Drugs just are.

People misuse everything from hammers to heroin.

Blaming a chemical compound for how a human uses it points to how media has programmed the idiots.

F yourself if you continue to think its all media & not a real problem.

And a great big Sunday morning "$#@! you too" For not only repeating, but actually believing, that chemicals did the people not the other way around...Idiot!

[vita3]

You're an idiot & a gr8 example as why many solid folks see the "Ron Paul movement" as loons.

[tod evans]

You're an idiot & a gr8 example as why many solid folks see the "Ron Paul movement" as loons.

Because I type the truth or because you disagree with it?

It's a shame people you knew decided to consume drugs but it's even a bigger shame that you're ignorant enough to blame the drugs.

Educate yourself and maybe you can keep some of the other idiots in your circle from killing themselves.

Or you could continue to blame inanimate objects and cry for government to regulate them...Afterall people in your circle of influence are powerless to abstain from harmful behavior...

[DevilsAdvocate]

Because I type the truth or because you disagree with it?

It's a shame people you knew decided to consume drugs but it's even a bigger shame that you're ignorant enough to blame the drugs.

Educate yourself and maybe you can keep some of the other idiots in your circle from killing themselves.

Or you could continue to blame inanimate objects and cry for government to regulate them...Afterall people in your circle of influence are powerless to abstain from harmful behavior...

It's a shame that people aren't speaking up more about the how truly horrible drugs are for human beings. It's a shame that kids are encouraged to "experiment". That drugs have become an avenue for easy sex. That political and cultural leaders openly admit to drug use. That celebrities who are role models and icons, engage in the most disgusting rampant degenerate behavior of the lowest order.

I think that Libertarians in general have not been vociferous enough in their repudiation of drug use. They always appear to be on the wrong side of this issue. Always defending drug freedoms, and keeping their repudiations as an asterisk.

[vita3]

There is plenty of blame to go around when a 20 something dies from Heroin. Certainly the foolish kids are main culprit

I don't call out to GOV to solve this so you can stuff that automatic response in your sock

I will agree with above posters that Libertarians are not on solid footing when they cant acknowledge the dangers of heavy drugs

[tod evans]

It's a shame that people aren't speaking up more about the how truly horrible drugs are for human beings. It's a shame that kids are encouraged to "experiment". That drugs have become an avenue for easy sex. That political and cultural leaders openly admit to drug use. That celebrities who are role models and icons, engage in the most disgusting rampant degenerate behavior of the lowest order.

I think that Libertarians in general have not been vociferous enough in their repudiation of drug use. They always appear to be on the wrong side of this issue. Always defending drug freedoms, and keeping their repudiations as an asterisk.

Drugs do what they were designed to do, I don't view that as good or evil.

I can't speak for libertarians because I'm not one but I don't think repudiating drugs is the correct approach any more than repudiating the hammer that blackened your nail.

[TheTexan]

If drugs were legal, then they would be about 1/100th the cost and people wouldn't need to steal to obtain them. Some drug addicts will spend hundreds of dollars a week, others upwards of $1k or more a week on their habit. They could be spending $10 or less per week in a free market and this would reduce the need to steal upwards of thousands each month per addict.

It would probably also reduce the number of addicts, as they would die from OD quicker

[tod evans]

There is plenty of blame to go around when a 20 something dies from Heroin. Certainly the foolish kids are main culprit

I don't call out to GOV to solve this so you can stuff that automatic response in your sock

I will agree with above posters that Libertarians are not on solid footing when they cant acknowledge the dangers of heavy drugs

What is a "heavy drug"?

Is it a drug that's addictive? Physically or psychologically or both?

Is it a drug that can kill? Immediately or after prolonged use? What of "drugs" that only kill some people but not others, are they "heavy"?

Or does the MSM and the courts decide which drugs are "heavy"?

Pharmaceutical drugs kill more people every year than black market or naturally occurring substances, are they "heavy"?

People, kids and adults, have sought to alter their consciousness since recorded history but in modern societies infinite wisdom these people are now "evil" and need others to control their behavior...Which leads back to the reason for this thread; To point out how media justifies government and policing by demonizing drugs, heroin specifically.

[TheTexan]

It's a shame that people aren't speaking up more about the how truly horrible drugs are for human beings. It's a shame that kids are encouraged to "experiment". That drugs have become an avenue for easy sex. That political and cultural leaders openly admit to drug use. That celebrities who are role models and icons, engage in the most disgusting rampant degenerate behavior of the lowest order.

I think that Libertarians in general have not been vociferous enough in their repudiation of drug use. They always appear to be on the wrong side of this issue. Always defending drug freedoms, and keeping their repudiations as an asterisk.

Yes, drugs are a blight on our great society, and drugs cause irreparable harm to one's both mental and physical health. Drugs are extremely bad and people should not do them recreationally ever.

I have a lot more to say on this subject but I need to grab another beer, be right back.

[Occam's Banana]

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to tod evans again.

Yes, drugs are a blight on our great society, and drugs cause irreparable harm to one's both mental and physical health. Drugs are extremely bad and people should not do them recreationally ever.

I have a lot more to say on this subject but I need to grab another beer, be right back.

Just as long as you don't have any guns.

People die because of guns.

Guns are BAD!

Government shouldn't try to solve this, but libertarians who don't acknowledge that guns are horrible and awful are a bunch of loons ...

[tod evans]

Just as long as you don't have any guns.

People die because of guns.

Guns are BAD!

Government shouldn't try to solve this, but libertarians who don't acknowledge that guns are horrible and awful are a bunch of loons ...

Don't forget the damned hammers!

Hammers are evil! They hurt thumbs every day, don't you care about thumbs?