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Judge takes swing at war on drugs
Rocky Mountain News ^ | January 29, 2003 | Karen Abbott

Posted on 01/30/2003 6:38:26 AM PST by MrLeRoy

America's war on drugs is costly, ignorant and doesn't work, a federal judge said Tuesday.

Denver U.S. District Judge John Kane Jr., who has been speaking and writing against the nation's drug policy for about five years, won a standing ovation from a packed City Club luncheon at the Brown Palace Hotel.

"I don't favor drugs at all," Kane said.

"What I really am opposed to is the fact that our present policies encourage children to take drugs."

Ending the present policy of interdiction, police action and imprisonment would eliminate the economic incentives for drug dealers to provide drugs to minors, Kane said.

He said the government has no real data and no scientific basis for its approach to illegal drug use.

Since the policy began in the early 1970s, drugs have become easier to obtain and drug use has only increased, he said.

Last summer, Kane said, a friend in his 60s was being treated for cancer. The man joked to his family that he wished he knew where to get marijuana to help him bear the effects of chemotherapy.

The next day, the man's 11-year-old grandson brought him three marijuana cigarettes, Kane said.

"Don't worry, Grandpa - I don't use it myself, but if you need any more just let me know," the judge quoted the boy as saying.

Although officials vow zero tolerance for drugs, even children know that's not reality, Kane said.

"Our national drug policy is inconsistent with the nature of justice, abusive of the nature of authority, and wholly ignorant of the compelling force of forgiveness," he said. "I suggest that federal drug laws be severely cut back."

The federal government should focus on keeping illegal drugs out of the country and regulating the manufacture of drugs transported across state lines.

Each state should decide how to regulate sales and what should be legal or illegal, he said, and the emphasis for government spending should be on treatment.


TOPICS: Heated Discussion
KEYWORDS: wodlist
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To: dirtboy
That, in the end, is the true positive of the entire pot debate - states are fighting to regain their 10th Amendment right to set their own laws regarding matters that do not cross state lines.

All flowery rhetoric, hiding behind the skirt of the 10th amendment when the true cause of the marijuana lobby is to make pot legal nationwide. Some of pot's biggest boosters on FR stated to me that they "use" medical marijuana as a cover for the cause, basically calling medical patinets, "useful idiots".

You may see a 10th amendment issue, I see stopping the spread of the drug culture in which marijuana use is a big component. You may say you are winning but look at last years election results and the pro-drug lobby lost big time. I know you don't like those facts, but they are the facts.

You can write all the pompous "holier than thou" rhetoric you want but the fight against drug abuse and validation is a here and now issue and considering last year's drubbing the pro-por intitatives took last year, looks like you lost.

Huh if reason means accepting a tenet of the modern American left, drug validation, then you can count me out.

61 posted on 01/30/2003 8:12:18 AM PST by Dane
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To: MrLeRoy
From a column on Kane in the Denver Post:

Kane eschews being labeled a liberal or conservative, seeing the core issue as a struggle between the rights of the invididual versus the state. "Nine times out of 10, I'll come down on the side of the individual," he said. "That makes me a libertarian, with a lower-case 'L."'

No wonder Dane hates his guts.

62 posted on 01/30/2003 8:12:52 AM PST by dirtboy
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To: dirtboy
Oh boy, you just threw a log on the fire!
63 posted on 01/30/2003 8:16:17 AM PST by Hemingway's Ghost
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To: dirtboy
Whoops, wait a minute. That looks like something Scalia could have written. What gives?!??

Huh I guess Scalia isn't on Kane's side when it comes to medical marijuana and drug validation.

There was that 2000 decision where the Supreme Court voted 8-0 against a California "medical marijuana" club.

64 posted on 01/30/2003 8:16:23 AM PST by Dane
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To: Dane
All flowery rhetoric, hiding behind the skirt of the 10th amendment when the true cause of the marijuana lobby is to make pot legal nationwide.

I care about nationwide legal marijuana about as much as I care about dry counties in Utah---very little. Dane, do you support states' 10th Amendment rights to set their own marijuana policies without federal interference or preemption?

65 posted on 01/30/2003 8:17:40 AM PST by MrLeRoy ("That government is best which governs least.")
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To: dirtboy
Kane eschews being labeled a liberal or conservative, seeing the core issue as a struggle between the rights of the invididual versus the state. "Nine times out of 10, I'll come down on the side of the individual," he said. "That makes me a libertarian, with a lower-case 'L."'

And Kane according to his rhetoric would probably throw out any partial birth abortion ban that crossed his desk.

66 posted on 01/30/2003 8:18:02 AM PST by Dane
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To: Dane
All flowery rhetoric, hiding behind the skirt of the 10th amendment when the true cause of the marijuana lobby is to make pot legal nationwide.

Please demonstrate where the marijuana lobby such as NARAL, let alone individuals acting on their own accord and conscience, have lobbied for national legislation mandating that states cannot prohibit the use or cultivation of marijuana. Heck, seven decades after the repeal of Prohibition, there are still myriad dry counties scattered about the Repubic. So your straw man is weak even by the limited architectural standards of that craft, and your claims of a grand marijuana conspiracy carry about as much validity as the claims of Arabs and DUers that Bush knew about 9-11 - and for the exact same reason - a complete lack of proof.

All flowery rhetoric, hiding behind the skirt of the 10th amendment when the true cause of the marijuana lobby is to make pot legal nationwide

Dane, Dane, Dane. The 10th Amendment is coming back to life, and it means a lot of sacred cows are going to have to work for a living instead. If your arguments are so pervasive, they will work fine on the state level (as it appears they have with some states). That's the way it should be under the 10th. But you can't have it both ways if a state defies the feds (although, like the hypocrite you are, you will want it that way).

Better sane than Dane...

67 posted on 01/30/2003 8:18:19 AM PST by dirtboy
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To: IncPen
Actually it's a liberal cause

The WOD is NewDeal/Great Society liberalism.

It is based on an expansive view of the General Welfare Clause and Commerce Clause, which is is the same basis for Federal control of education, health care, the environment, welfare, and health care.

Supporters of the WOD are of the same constitutional philosophy as Algore's living, breathing Constitution.

68 posted on 01/30/2003 8:18:56 AM PST by Ken H
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To: Dane
And Kane according to his rhetoric would probably throw out any partial birth abortion ban that crossed his desk.

Please demonstrate, Dane. Please research his comments and rulings and show where he has indicated such. Oh, that's right, you're DANE - you don't need to, your opinion is sufficient.

Better sane than Dane...

69 posted on 01/30/2003 8:19:25 AM PST by dirtboy
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Comment #70 Removed by Moderator

To: Nathaniel Fischer
Sounds like FDR's New Deal; he couldn't let the Constitution get in the way of programs designed to actually help people. So he tried to pack the court with his supporters and ushered in an era where the Judicial system completely disregarded the Constitution.

Exactly. But somehow our position is the liberal one.

Better sane than Dane...

71 posted on 01/30/2003 8:23:15 AM PST by dirtboy
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To: dirtboy
Please demonstrate, Dane. Please research his comments and rulings and show where he has indicated such. Oh, that's right, you're DANE - you don't need to, your opinion is sufficient.

Uh no, if someone is going to state publicly that,

Kane eschews being labeled a liberal or conservative, seeing the core issue as a struggle between the rights of the invididual versus the state. "Nine times out of 10, I'll come down on the side of the individual," he said. "That makes me a libertarian, with a lower-case 'L."'

That a core "principle" of his would be to protect a woman from the state, "on her right to choose".

72 posted on 01/30/2003 8:23:16 AM PST by Dane
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To: Dane
That a core "principle" of his would be to protect a woman from the state, "on her right to choose".

Hardly. Little "l" libertarian Ron Paul has written a compelling anti-abortion argument based upon the same starting philosophy, because in his view the fetus is also an individual and therefore deserving of protection under the law. So you need to do better than that, Dane-boy. I did some research, now you need to do the same, or just admit that you pull all your material from a place normally visited only by doctors with flashlights.

Better sane than Dane...

73 posted on 01/30/2003 8:26:14 AM PST by dirtboy
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To: dirtboy
Sounds like FDR's New Deal; he couldn't let the Constitution get in the way of programs designed to actually help people. So he tried to pack the court with his supporters and ushered in an era where the Judicial system completely disregarded the Constitution

Are the 60's a lost decade to you all? That was the decade when the drug validation cause was taken up by such rabid leftists as Abbie Hoffman and others of such politcal persuasion.

Wow it must be so convienent for you all to lose all recollection of a decade that contradicts your world.

74 posted on 01/30/2003 8:27:28 AM PST by Dane
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To: Dane
Some of pot's biggest boosters on FR stated to me that they "use" medical marijuana as a cover for the cause, basically calling medical patients, "useful idiots".

Dane useful idiots is your term,
and all the replys we have seen, say that if Medical MJ, helps end the WOD so be it
and whatever it takes to stop this insane war.
but again twist everyone's words around.
Medical MJ benefits people with AIDS, severe pain, and many other uses.
all you can say is there are better drugs out there.
But if it works for someone why can't they choose what works for them,

Oh that's right because it's illegal.
75 posted on 01/30/2003 8:27:57 AM PST by vin-one (I wish i had something clever to put in this tag)
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To: dirtboy
I'm surprised Dane hasn't tried to make a "Kane" connection with the Bible to discredit the judges views as being evil.
76 posted on 01/30/2003 8:28:00 AM PST by FreeTally (How did a fool and his money get together in the first place?)
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To: Dane
Are the 60's a lost decade to you all? That was the decade when the drug validation cause was taken up by such rabid leftists as Abbie Hoffman and others of such politcal persuasion. Wow it must be so convienent for you all to lose all recollection of a decade that contradicts your world.

Interesting that you have to reach all the way back to the 1960s to make your point, whereas I can name all kinds of modern-day conservatives from all ranges of the conservative spectrum. And, once again, please show where I have tried to advocate or validate drug use, Dane. Hint: I haven't, but that doesn't stop you from lying about my positions and motivations.

Better sane than Dane...

77 posted on 01/30/2003 8:30:12 AM PST by dirtboy
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To: FreeTally
I'm surprised Dane hasn't tried to make a "Kane" connection with the Bible to discredit the judges views as being evil.

He'd have to read the Bible first, that involves research, and he doesn't want to set the precedent of backing up his opinions with facts.

78 posted on 01/30/2003 8:31:14 AM PST by dirtboy
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To: Dane
"drugs are benign" "super" jurist, Judge Kane.

Show where Judge Kane said anything remotely like "drugs are benign"; that appears to be merely your baldfaced lie.

79 posted on 01/30/2003 8:31:35 AM PST by MrLeRoy ("That government is best which governs least.")
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Comment #80 Removed by Moderator


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