Aaron Russo's - America: From Freedom to Fascism

September 25, 2006

School Drug Testing Sounds Like Witch Hunt

Filed under: Marijuana | Dictatorship | Drug Trade

NORML | St. Petersburg Times
FLORIDA–It is time for the Hernando County School Board to refocus superintendent Wendy Tellone’s curious fixation on testing students for drugs.

In the past two years Tellone and her staff have brought three proposals to the board that would randomly select certain groups of students to submit urine samples, which then are tested for a variety of drugs, including alcohol. After initially opposing the recommendation because it is fundamentally unfair and oppressive, the board eventually authorized the administration to pursue a $418,000 federal grant that would pay for a drug counselor to oversee the program.

At first, Tellone wanted to test all high school and middle school students who participated in any extracurricular activity or drove a motor vehicle on campus. Now she has cast a slightly smaller net in her exploitative fishing expedition: All high school students who are athletes, cheerleaders or drive on campus.

(Read more…)

Panelist Say 40-Year Term Harsh For Girl, 16

Filed under: Drug Trade

NORML
TEXAS - Area educators, health-care professionals and lawyers gathered Saturday to discuss a decision by the county attorney’s office to seek a tougher punishment for a 16-year-old El Paso girl accused of trying to smuggle cocaine into the U.S. 

“Our correctional system is so imperfect,” said Cristina Cruz-Grost, a child psychiatrist and forensic expert.  “We need to come together to educate and rehabilitate people who go through the system.   To place a 16-year-old in the correctional department of Texas with up to a 40-year sentence erases the potential for rehabilitation and destroys her life.”

July 13, 2006

The Truth About The USA, Drugs and Afghanistan

Filed under: Afghanistan | Drug Trade

Amongst the major reasons given by the West when invading Afghanistan shortly after 9/11 was the connection between drugs and terrorism.

“We act also because the al-Qaida network and the Taliban regime are funded in large part on the drugs trade. Ninety per cent of all heroin sold in Britain originates from Afghanistan. Stopping that trade is, again, directly in our interests.” –Prime Minister Blair in an address to the British people on the ongoing attacks on Afghanistan, 10/7/01

Tony Blair again used this excuse recently to justify sending more troops to Afghanistan.

Whilst in the US enormously costly ads bought by the US government informed American’s that to buy cocaine or heroin is to help terrorism.

The truth is that since the invasion of Afghanistan’s the opium production has skyrocketed. Although the Taliban had virtually stamped out poppy production, the country now accounts for two-third of the world’s heroin.