I am going to steal some of what "greatwhitebuffalo" wrote over at Dkos, which got very little attention, and add some current updates.

This is the story of medical marijuana, the law of unintended consequences and the astonishing obtuseness on the part of physicians who in acquiring godlike authority over life and death seem to have lost touch with their own basic humanity.

It's a heck of a story. Got time to make a difference? Read on.

Meet Seattle musician Timothy Garon. Check out his video. He's really good.

Here is Tim Garon's MySpace site, there is some wonderful music of his here:
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fus eaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=20 4896115

More below...

We have  a record number of citizens in jail. A significant percentage are in for minor drug offenses. We are on the verge of electing a president who has used marijuana and cocaine. In order to do that he has possessed these drugs at some point in time. It is a tremendous credit to him that he overcame those addictions. To be fair, would he promise to pardon all those currently in jail for either use of or possession of small amounts of theses two drugs?

New York Times

June 16, 2004

''Coalition forces, including many brave Afghans, have brought America, Afghanistan and the free world its first victory in the war on terror,'' Mr. Bush said. ''Afghanistan is no longer a terrorist factory sending thousands of killers into the world.''

Joining the president in the Rose Garden was an unusual display of his high command. Along with Vice President Cheney were Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld; Secretary of State Colin L. Powell; Condoleezza Rice, the national security adviser; Karen P. Hughes, an adviser to the president; and Laura Bush.

School children from both Colombia and neighboring Ecuador actually drew these pictures included in this diary. The United States government's primary strategy for combating the narcotics industry and the leftist FARC guerillas that control an area of Colombia the size of SWITERLAND involves aerial crop spraying with a deadly poison sold on the market as Roundup weedkiller. The spray not only kills coca plants, but any other, legal, crops in the vicinity. Sadly it also kills livestock and far worse it has also killed many children.

Nevermind, Barack Obama Wants to Arrest Marijuana Users After All For one brief glorious moment, we thought Barack Obama supported marijuana decriminalization. He said so in 2004 and his campaign reiterated it yesterday, only to subsequently retreat and pledge support for current marijuana laws. At first, Obama spokesman Tommy Vietor said that the candidate had "always" supported decriminalizing marijuana, suggesting his 2004 statement was correct. Then after the Times posted copies of the video on its Web site today, his campaign reversed course and declared he does not support eliminating criminal penalties for marijuana possession and use. "If you're convicted of a crime, you should be punished, but that we are sending far too many first-time, non-violent drug users to prison for very long periods of time, and that we should rethink those laws," Vietor said. The spokesman blamed confusion over the meaning of decriminalization for the conflicting answers. [Washington Times]

Last fall during a nationally televised presidential debate, Sen. Barack Obama hesitantly raised his hand and joined with most of his Democratic rivals to declare that he opposed decriminalizing marijuana.

Razali Ahmad , 33 , of  Gombak , Malaysia

Drug trafficker breaks down in court

THIRTY-THREE-YEAR-OLD Razali Ahmad wept in court yesterday, when the Shah Alam High Court sentenced him to the gallows after finding him guilty of drug trafficking.

Razali, a despatch rider, was charged under Section 39B of the Dangerous Drugs Act with trafficking 858 grams of cannabis at a house in Jalan Dewan Gombak Setia on Aug 6, 2003, at 5.45pm.

DEATH Penalty for DRUGS also here in USA

I should have said so called "Liberal Press" because it's just not true it's a myth that's been used by the conservatives for propaganda so long that they have talked themselves into believing their own lie. The truth is at least on the TV Network News when you take out the extreme right wing Fox News from the rest of the mainstream media then you still have a center-right orientated TV press with a few notable exceptions such as Keith Olbermann.

The surge is a complete failure simply because when you remove your armed forces from the war in Afghanistan to prevent losing the other war in Iraq it can't in anyway be called a success especially when it causes you to lose the war in Afghanistan this is exactly what is occurring yet sadly that's not even the worst aspect of the Bush Administrations doomed Afghan policy. The map of Afghanistan pictured below is six months old the Taliban has furthered their territorial gains since then.

The topic below was originally posted on my blog, the Intrepid Liberal Journal, as well as The Peace Tree, The Independent Bloggers Alliance and Worldwide Sawdust.

The "war on drugs" doesn't consume as much oxygen in the public square as it used to. In September 1989, President George Herbert Walker Bush, spoke from the Oval Office, held up a plastic bag filled with white contents and announced,

"This is crack cocaine seized a few days ago in a park across the street from the White House . . . It could easily have been heroin or PCP."