Daily Archives: February 26, 2022

Adam Granduciel doesn't think he's seen the sun in 30 days. And he's OK with that because the trade off has been so rewarding.

In exchange for the subzero temperatures that can come with a "basically deep-winter tour," as he calls it, Granduciel and his bandmates have beenplaying almost every night, reconnecting with fans after more than a year on the sidelinesthanks toCOVID-19.

When The War on Drugs hit the stage for a headlining set at the Desert Daze festivalin California last November, they hadn't done aproper concert since the previous December.

They'd been looking forward to returning to the road "eversince it was taken away from us and everybody else," Granduciel says. "And the band sounds better than it ever has."

Innings Festival 2022 survival guide: Everything you need to know before you go

Theyput a lot of work into sounding that much better when finallygettingtogetherin July to beginthe process of learning how to bring the songs on last year's"I Don't Live Here Anymore" to life.

A cinematic masterstroke of deeply felt reflections with a grandeur built to translate all that introspectiontothe back rows of a stadium,the album had been in the making since early 2018.

And very little of that making had been done by Granduciel and his bandmates in the same room at the same time.

Innings Festival scouting report: 6 must-see bands you may not know you must see

"We were just dipping our toes into the new songs," Granduciel recalls of those rehearsals.

"Because we didn't really make the album as a band per se,we kind of had tofigure out how to not reinterpret but to play these songs in real life, not just track them. That was challenging, but we got over that hump pretty quickly."

By the time they got to Desert Daze, they hadalready woodshedded those songs more than they'd done for any previous release.

And there were more rehearsalsprior to mid-January, when they launched the tour that makes its way to Innings Festival at Tempe Beach Park on Sunday, Feb. 27, having made the rounds of year-end critics lists.

"It's been incredibly satisfying," Granduciel says. "I feel like the band is really firing on all cylinders. And it's been a real joy to kind of stretch the songs out every night."

Some songs are sounding better live than Granduciel would have thought the song "Victim" for instance, which was built on tape loops.

"I would normally have said that one will be impossible for us to play," he says. "But it has actually been somehow the most natural sounding.We just kind of figured out the essence of it."

The same thing happened with another highlight of the album, "I Don't Wanna Wait."

"Instead of trying to recreate the track exactly, we just kind of found the spirit," Granduciel says. "It was challenging to learn to play these songs. Their tapestry is rich. But we really cracked the code."

Granduciel started work on "I Don't Live Here Anymore" in March 2018 while still on the road in support of The War on Drugs'fourth album, 2017's "A Deeper Understanding."

The pandemic hitting when it did in early 2020 had a major impact on that stage of the creative process, with members recording parts in their own studios.

"It kind of made the record go in a different direction, because I had more time at home to mess with certain ideas or approaches,"Granduciel says.

"And it gave everybody the ability to work at their own pace andspend as much time as they wanted in their studioinstead of flying them out to LA. It let everybody get inside the songs in a way that maybe they don't really get the opportunity to."

As a result, he got some "really spirited performances and cool ideas" from his bandmatesthat maybe they wouldn't have spent that kind of time on in LA."

The limitations of working remotely"kind of expanded the palate of the record," Granduciel says.

"It wasn't the hi-fi studio experience we did on the last record. But I think it was better for having those moments."

When Granduciel and co-producer/engineerShawn Everett got together at Sound City in Van Nuys in October 2020 after six or seven months of working by remote, it was "a jumping off point" for the rest of the recordings.

"It was weird because everyone had to wear masks, but it was me and Shawn diving back in with a renewed sense of urgency and a renewed love of what it means to work togetherin person."

Asked how they knew when the record was done after three years, Granduciel says it's more a matter of logistics and accepting the idea that you need to turn a record in at some point if you want to book a tour around it.

"You never really sit back and listen and say, 'Oh, my God, it's so good! We're so done!'" hesays.

"You just kind of accept a level of doneness. You can always keep going. But I think it was ready to be done. It's not about making it sonically perfect. It's about making sure these 10 songs live together in a way that feels real."

Arizona music festivals: Mark your calendars for these upcoming festivals

Midway through the album-making process, Granduciel became a father. At first, that just meant carving out the time he planned to spend recording so that he could be there for his family when he wasn't actively engaged in working on the record.

As his son, who's two and a half now,got a little older, he started wanting to hang with his dad in the studio, which had an unanticipated impact on how Granduciel came to look at the recording process.

"I would give him a keyboard and he'd hit the buttons," Granduciel says.

"Andit would just remind me that a lot of this stuff should be filled with a certain level of wonder and naivete. I was like 'Oh yeah, this should just be fun. Don't forget about having fun with sound.' There's no right or wrong when it comes to sound, you know."

It's very likely that the songs on "I Don't Live Here Anymore" will keep evolving as the tour goes on, in much the same way songs they've played for years continue to evolve.

"Sometimes maybe we'll try a different key or a little bit of a different arrangement," Granduciel says.

"We've been doing that with our song 'Brothers.' We kind of changed the key, which is cool, but now we had to get back to the song. It's always trying to stay true to the material and just have fun with it and see what works in the set."

Which older songs work in the set can change from tour to tour.

"Because everything changes around you," Granduciel says.

"Thewhole sonic infrastructure of the band kind of suits the newer material in a way, and you adapt it for other material. Sometimes,you're like, 'I don't really know how to play that song with the sounds that I have curated for this tour.'"

What they play can also come down to what fans are yelling.

"We open up the floor a lot to people just yelling requests towards the end of the show, which I love," Granduciel says.

Sometimes, he'll joke about a certain older song not really going anywhere.

"To me, sometimes, the earlier material, a lot of it doesn't have the same kind of songwriting that maybe we got known for on the last couple albums," he says.

"I was still learning how to do a lot of different things. But it is cool to play a song like 'Come to the City' and have people really respond to it."

There are times when playing older songs inspires Granduciel to reflect on how his writing has evolved on the road from 2008's "Wagonwheel Blues" through their breakthrough with "Lost in the Dream" in 2014 to "I Don't Live Here Anymore."

"Itjust reminds me that it's been a journey and that at every step, there's different things that you're obsessed with as someone trying to enjoy himself and make music," he says.

"I mean, obviously, when we do stuff from 'Lost in the Dream,' you just remember that that was the record that gave us so many opportunities to grow and that people are very attached to that record."

It's not uncommon for their shows to end with a handful of highlights from "Lost in the Dream."

"I'm like, 'Whatever.... People love that record,'" Granduciel says. "And that's just how we're gonna close the show."

When:12:30 p.m. Saturday-Sunday, Feb. 26-27. (The War on Drugs play from7:15-8:20 p.m. on Sunday).

Where:Tempe Beach Park, 80 W. Rio Salado Parkway.

Admission:$105 a day; $179 for weekend pass.

Details:inningsfestival.com.

Reach the reporter at ed.masley@arizonarepublic.com or 602-444-4495. Follow him on Twitter @EdMasley.

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The War on Drugs reflect on the making of 'I Don't Live Here Anymore' as tour hits Innings - The Arizona Republic

Fifteen years ago, Mexico declared war on drugs. However, the country must still reflect on the factors that lead drug traffickers to engage in violence, and reconsider their strategy to break this long cycle of abuse, arguesKarina Garca Reyes (University of Bristol).

Read this article in Spanish

(Editors note: This article includes descriptions of violence)In December 2006, former president Felipe Caldern declared war on drugs, but fifteen years later, drug-related violence has been escalating alarmingly.

Recent studies show that Mexico is the fourth country with the highest rate of violence globally. Although the last administrations of Enrique Pea Nieto (2012-2018) and Andrs Manuel Lpez Obrador (2018-2024) have tried to combat this phenomenon with a military strategy, they have not achieved the two main objectives of this war, namely to reduce trafficking and to lower the homicides, kidnappings and disappearances.Mexico remains the world leader in the production and trafficking of illegal drugs such as heroin, marijuana, methamphetamines and synthetic opioids such as fentanyl.

With these figures, it is clear that the strategy has failed. Hence, many people advocate for abandoning a prohibitionist paradigm and legalising drugs instead, which is an approach that I agree with, even though it does not provide a magic solution. Drug trafficking is only one of the various businesses involved in organised crime, which also profits from organ and arms trafficking and human trafficking, so we cannot expect a sharp reduction in violence in countries where these crimes occur.

But the most important aspect to consider in places like Mexico is identifying the systemic conditions which enable violence linked to organised crime to spread. There is no use in deploying the army on the streets if there are many children and young people who are willing to replace those who have been killed and die in combat if necessary. In this context, rather than using violence against the perpetrators, it is more relevant to understand their motivations and to design policies that interrupt this cycle of violence from its roots.

Which factors determine drug traffickers to consider the option of killing, kidnapping and/or torture as a job option?I addressed this question in my doctoral dissertation by analysing 33 life stories of former drug traffickers by interviewing them in northern Mexico between October 2014 and January 2015.

In my analysis, I found that the participants had three common features. Most were victims of domestic violence, child abuse or domestic and gang violence, dropped out of school or were expelled before completing primary school, and had several suicide attempts.

In my book, Morir es un alivio (published in Spanish), I focus on a dozen of the more than thirty stories and share with readers one of the most important learnings from my research: the perpetrators desensitisation process was long and painful. Most of my interviewees were victims of appalling violence. The case of Cholo (not his real name) is one of the ones that had the greatest impact on me. Cholo was born and grew up in extreme poverty, and he told me that he and his 14 siblings almost starved to death. His father was an extremely violent and alcoholic man who beat him, his mother and his siblings daily.

Life was unbearable for Cholo, and he constantly asked God, Why did you allow me to live like this?As a teenager, tired of so much suffering, Cholo tried to kill his father and then eat him in broth, but he couldnt. He stabbed him with a knife, but instead of killing him, Cholo burst into tears, and his father beat him until he broke his ribs. That time, Cholo decided to report him, but the local authorities ignored him. That was when the young man stopped trusting institutions, and a year later, he found protection by joining a well-known cartel in his city. As an adult, Cholo became one of the most violent hitmen in northern Mexico: I liked seeing the blood, knocking out teeth, pulling out hair and scalp.

As a result of the abuse he suffered, Ruperto believes that he grew up with an inferiority complex and resentment for the condition in which we lived and to see that other people were happy

Rupertos (not his real name) childhood was also difficult. He did not know his father, and his mother was very violent; in the interview, he recalled how she beat me with light cables, burned my hands, burned my feet and tied me up like a little animal to the leg of a bed with a chain.Ruperto lived under these conditions until he was 7 when his uncle realised what was going on and took him to live with him. He had already been expelled from primary school for violent behaviour by then. As a result of the abuse he suffered, Ruperto believes that he grew up with an inferiority complex and resentment for the condition in which we lived and to see that other people were happy

Ruperto is also aware that his uncle was not a good influence, although he did not beat him. He took him to help him in his illegal cannabis growing business, and that is how Ruperto got into drug trafficking as a child. At the age of 12, he was already addicted to cocaine and was already engaging in violent acts as a cartel member. At 18, he became the leader of his group because he dared to commit crimes that others could not. In the interview, he admitted that he liked to inflict pain on others as revenge for what he had suffered.

These stories help me illustrate three points that I believe are crucial to understanding violence in Mexico. First, gender-based violence and child abuse are perpetrated by structural violence, which is state neglect. Through institutions such as public schools and the DIF (National System for Integral Family Development), administrations systematically fail to intervene timely and prevent them.

Moreover, this violence, considered micro because it occurs in social spaces such as homes, schools, and neighbourhoods, is the key to understanding how macro violence, such as organised crime violence, is sustained.

Ultimately, these stories confirm that violent criminals are not born but made.To explain graphically how drug violence sustains itself, I use the example of an iceberg. Until now, through military strategy, governments have only focused on attacking the tip of the iceberg, ignoring the multiple forms of violence and socio-economic conditions that make it possible.

Suppose administrations redirect their resources to address and prevent the violence at the bottom of the iceberg. In that case, it will be possible to break the cycles of abuse and suffering that allow the workforce willing to work for organised crime.

Notes: Translation by Mara Clara Montoya The views expressed here are of the author rather than the Centre or the LSE Please read our Comments Policy before commentingBanner image: Pepe Rivera (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

See the article here:

A thin line divides victims and perpetrators in the war on drugs in Mexico | LSE Latin America and Caribbean - LSE Latin America and Caribbean

Since Michiganders voted to legalize recreational cannabis in 2018, the industry has skyrocketed to new highs. Thats obvious. What isnt always so obvious is how people who were disproportionately affected by the war on drugs *cough* minorities and poor people *cough* can participate in the new money-making industry.

To help level the playing field, several cannabis companies in Michigan are working on social equity programs, including JARS Cannabis and grow facility Terrapin. The two have paired up to fund over 20 scholarships to Higher Learning Institutions, Michigans first licensed vocational and technical school for cannabis in Pontiac.

The scholarship program, called the Cannabis Community Social Equity Scholarship, will be available to those who reside in disproportionately impacted communities and have plans to operate a marijuana establishment there; those who have marijuana-related convictions; or people who have been registered as Primary Caregivers in Michigan.

The war on drugs disproportionately affected many groups and communities in Michigan, Terrapin CEO Chris Woods said in a press release. We feel a responsibility to help right those wrongs, and create pathways into the legal cannabis industry for those who were targeted the most.

Scholarship recipients will undergo a year-long professional development program focusing on subjects like cultivation, extraction, budtending, and licensing. The program will also offer facility tours, guest lecture seminars, and one-on-one mentorship with industry professionals.

Since opening in February of 2020, Higher Learning Institutions has had about 100 graduates so far. While this particular scholarship is only available to those affected by the war on drugs, enrollment in the school is open to anyone interested in learning the technical side of building a cannabusiness.

In addition to the social equity program, JARS Cannabis will also offer a general admission scholarship for Higher Learning Institutions students that can be used for individual courses.

More information, including the scholarship application, can be found here.

Stay connected with Detroit Metro Times. Subscribe to our newsletters, and follow us on Google News, Apple News, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or Reddit.

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JARS Cannabis and Terrapin offer scholarships to cannabis school for those affected by the war on drugs - Detroit Metro Times

[imagesource: Silvia Izquierdo / AP]

In 2018, as he geared up to run for the Brazilian presidency, Jair Bolsonaro was dubbed the Trump of the Tropics.

He won and is in with a decent shot at reelection ahead of Brazils October election. Former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is slightly ahead in the polls but his lead has narrowed.

The list of Bolsonaros failings is too long to run through in full (Brazil has in excess of 645 000 COVID-19 deaths for a start), and his strongman rhetoric has actually backfired when it comes to fighting crime.

A case in point is the countrys war on drugs. The president has signed multiple decrees promising to crack down on the scourge with little to no success.

VICE is on the case:

This is how Brazils deadly drug wars have been fuelled by a president who thinks the solution is to throw more guns at the problem.

Who would have thought, hey?

After watching the video below I suddenly feel inclined to watchCity of Godagain.

[source:vice]

Read more:

From Bad To Worse In Brazil's Drug Wars [Video] - 2oceansvibe News

In early February, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Menendez (and the ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee for the Western Hemisphere, Marco Rubio), introduced legislation designed to counter the growing meddling of Russia and China in Latin America and the Caribbean. Unfortunately, beyond some language on human rights and civilian defense management, the Western Hemisphere Security Strategy Act strikingly resembles the U.S. approach during the Cold War, the last time that great-power competition guided U.S. foreign policy in the Western Hemisphere. The bills response to the harmful and malign influence of China and Russia hinges on bolstering longstanding State and Defense Department military and police aid programs. Making no mention of economic assistance, trade ties, civil society, or democracy promotion, the bill covers only a small piece of what renewed engagement should entail. A security first response was insufficient and harmful during the Cold War, and it is absolutely not enough today.

As the senators bill language makes clear, competition with China, Russia, and other powers has supplanted the Global War on Terror (and, in Latin America, the war on drugs) as the top-tier foreign policy frame. Todays reality, though, is not quite a new Cold War. The influence of a less stable, polarized United States isnt what it was, and the Soviets werent making Americans phones, computers, and other consumer goods like the Chinese do today. Still, the senators arent alone in their view: The Cold War urge remains strong across Washington. It would be unfortunate for U.S. diplomats and defense planners to slip into a familiar rut of backing friendly dictators and militaries in a misguided effort to preserve access and influence in this hemisphere.

That Cold War rut may offer comfort as authoritarianism, social unrest, and mass migration rise in Latin America, but it should be resisted. This time, the United States ought to contend with China, Russia, and other extra-regional dictatorships in a way that upholds Latin Americas brave reformers and insists on democratic norms. That would require a degree of creativity, courage, and coherence that have been scarce lately in U.S. politics.

The Lure of the Familiar

The turn to great-power rivalry in U.S. security policy toward Latin America has been sudden.

Every three years or so, the Defense Department sends the Senate a nominee to head U.S. Southern Command, the combatant command responsible for military operations in most of Latin America and the Caribbean. The Senate Armed Services Committee then sends that nominee, a four-star officer, a questionnaire. The 2015 nominee, Adm. Kurt Tidd, filled out the questionnaire mentioning the word China or Chinese three times. In 2018 the nominee, Adm. Craig Faller, mentioned China or Chinese 15 times. In 2021, Gen. Laura Richardson did it 33 times.

Longtime concerns like drugs, organized crime, and terrorism the former two having dominated security planning in the 2000s, since the hemisphere was never a central theater of the war on terror still appear in nominees answers but get less emphasis than before. Instead, China, Russia, and Iran (in descending order of importance) are a dominant theme in defense officials public remarks about Latin America. Legislators of both parties voice concern about those countries in congressional hearings. These malign external actors are regular fixtures on the website of Dilogo, Southern Commands online magazine.

The quick shift follows the U.S. defense establishments new worldwide priorities: The 2018 National Defense Strategy put great-power competition at the top of its list. Latin America is not a central theater of this competition, although rival powers have become more active in the past 20 years.

China is increasing its economic investments, trade, and grants for big-ticket items like infrastructure projects, as well as competing on 5G network hardware and on access to lithium and other strategic raw materials. Russia, with a much smaller economy (today the size of South Koreas), exercises influence more through targeted military aid programs, hacking, and propaganda and misinformation. Irans activities are marginal, but examples of its outreach to Latin American authoritarians do exist. All three relate most deeply to the hemispheres three most dictatorial regimes Venezuela, Cuba, and Nicaragua though China has major investments, and Russia is a top arms vendor, in numerous other countries.

These states activities challenge the quality of democracy and human rights in Latin America. The Chinese model of surveillance-state totalitarianism, the Russian brand of hyper-nationalist kleptocracy, and Teherans intolerant theocracy would cause human misery and harm civic life if they were to replicate across the continent. They could accelerate an ongoing reversal of nearly four decades of transition to democracy a transition that followed a period of brutal military dictatorships in most of the hemisphere. Most of these dictatorships, its important to recall, got important U.S. backing during the Cold War.

The Kirkpatrick Reflex

While concern about extra-regional powers behavior is not misplaced, neither are concerns about a repeat of big Cold War mistakes. In a 1979 essay that influenced Ronald Reagan, Jeane Kirkpatrick warned against alienating authoritarians by pushing them too hard to liberalize and respect human rights, as she believed Jimmy Carter did with the Somoza regime in Nicaragua. Weakening pro-U.S. dictatorships, she argued, could work to the advantage of totalitarian great-power rivals. It would mean losing access to friendly territory.

Many in Washington still believe this mis-learned lesson of the Cold War. When the stakes shift to great-power competition, this view holds, protecting democracy can become a luxury. States that offer access and cooperation deserve U.S. assistance including military aid regardless of their adherence to liberal norms.

It was in that vein that the Heritage Foundation hosted Guatemalas president in December 2021 when the Biden administration refused to invite him to its Democracy Summit that same week. Heritage argued that Alejandro Giammattei was a critical U.S. partner against the rising threat of China. Heritage portrayed the Guatemalan president as leading one of the regions remaining democracies even as he faces serious corruption allegations, and as he presides over attacks on the judiciary and anti-corruption reformers, driving many into arrest and exile.

Though Giammatteis absence from the December summit was appropriate, the Biden administration did include Brazils President Jair Bolsonaro, despite his persistent efforts to politicize the armed forces and growing concerns about the integrity of the countrys October elections (the results of which Bolsonaro has said hed reject if he lost). That invitation, which raised eyebrows at the time because it seemed so incongruous, likely resulted from a desire not to alienate Brazil, which has an economy 20 times the size of Guatemalas and is entering a tense election campaign. Still, Bolsonaro, who hasnt had a bilateral conversation with Joe Biden, ended up visiting Moscow the week of Feb. 14.

A corollary to this view is that regimes on the political right are more likely to offer access and cooperation to the United States than are left-of-center governments. The prior behavior of the democratic left in Latin America, writes U.S. Army War College Professor Evan Ellis in a January report for Center for Strategic and International Studies, suggests that they will be more resistant to work with the United States in multilateral forums against populist regimes who are also left-oriented and more likely to work with China and other extra-hemispheric actors of concern to the United States.

Dont Repeat This Mistake

The idea that the United States should go easy on authoritarian-trending regimes of the right that offer access, while viewing the democratic left as suspect, led policymakers to commit some historic mistakes. During the 45-year struggle against the Soviet Union, administrations of both parties aided coups and dictators because they were anti-communist and open to cooperating.

U.S.-backed leaders like Chiles Gen. Augusto Pinochet, Paraguays Gen. Alfredo Stroessner, Haitis Francois and Jean-Claude Duvalier, and juntas from Brazil to Guatemala to Argentina carried out systematic torture, disappeared tens of thousands, and sacked treasuries. They eliminated their political opponents, including human-rights defenders, reporters, and jurists. As a result, countries that were already among the worlds most unequal, with tiny, unaccountable economic and racial elites who refused to invest in their societies, lost decades in which they could have been building functioning, accountable institutions, and establishing strong civil societies.

When states finally transitioned to democracy in the late 1980s and 90s, many were missing a generation of civic and political reformers, who had been murdered or driven into exile. Hollowed-out, under-resourced governments could not control organized crime or move national economies away from commodity dependence. They lacked the wherewithal to bring basic services to vast sectors of the population. Impunity for corruption remained the norm. Illicit economies flourished. Racial and ethnic minorities remain marginalized. Despite some progress, these problems persist, and polling today shows broad skepticism about democracys ability to deliver.

The decades lost to Cold War-era misrule arent the only reason that Latin America is today the most violent region in the world, experiencing about a third of the worlds homicides. This periods hangover isnt the only reason why two million or more people migrated last year away from, or around, the region. The Cold War legacy, though, is an important factor. To repeat even a faint echo of it, in the name of renewed great-power competition, would do grave harm.

Rising Authoritarianism Adds to the Risk

As recently as 15 years ago, authoritarian-trending governments were still a rarity in Latin America. Those that existed (mainly Cuba and Venezuela) were on the left, and not interested in U.S. collaboration. Venezuelas Hugo Chvez (19982013) drafted a blueprint for coming to power through the electoral process, remaining popular through populist rhetoric and handouts, courting the armed forces, and all the while steadily dismantling democratic checks and balances as well as choking opposition parties, the free press, and civil society.

Elements of that blueprint would show up in the programs of leaders across the political spectrum worldwide, from Hungary to the Philippines. In Latin America, theyve been on the left, like Ecuadors Rafael Correa and Nicaraguas Daniel Ortega, and on the right, like Brazils Bolsonaro and Honduras Juan Orlando Hernndez, now awaiting extradition to the United States to face drug-trafficking charges. Still others have cast themselves as centrist or beyond ideology, like Nayib Bukele in El Salvador. Leaders in Mexico (left-ish), Colombia (right), Bolivia (left), Guatemala (right), and elsewhere have shown worrying strongman and anti-institutionalist tendencies. All have shrunk civic space, attacked the media, and sought to politicize the military.

Donald Trump also showed these authoritarian tendencies, and his administration courted populist regimes of the center and right. Bolsonaros Brazil became a major non-NATO ally, a status established by the Arms Export Control Act to ease some forms of weapons transfers. U.S. support for anti-corruption reform and clean elections in Honduras and Guatemala disappeared, as pro-U.S. populists received lavish praise for their modest efforts to halt U.S.-bound migration. Relations became so close with the now-ruling rightist party of Colombian ex-president lvaro Uribe (who, later in his 20022010 presidency, would seek a third term and speak often of a rule of [popular] opinion instead of a rule of law) that Biden backers would call out the partys members for campaigning for Trump in Florida in 2020.

How to Engage Without Renewing Cold War Errors

Neo-cold warriors are correct that the U.S. government needs to be engaging more, and more audaciously, with the nations to its south. But it needs to do so on a much different set of terms, and in a much more coherent and comprehensive way. Here are some principles and actions that should guide future diplomatic, security, economic, judicial, and social engagement.

First, U.S. policymakers need to stop fixating on the right-left axis and focus instead on the authoritarian-democratic axis. Authoritarians on the left are not friends of the United States. Authoritarians on the right are not either, regardless of the access they might transactionally offer.

Fortunately, the region offers examples of rules-respecting democratic leaders across the spectrum. Few accuse the conservative leaders of Ecuador and Uruguay of dismantling liberal democratic traditions. There is, meanwhile, a wavelet of left-of-center leaders who show few authoritarian inclinations. Two won elections in recent months: Xiomara Castro in Honduras and Gabriel Boric in Chile. In Brazil, ex-president Luis Incio Lula da Silva, who is trouncing Bolsonaro in polls for the October elections, left institutions intact when his eight years ended in 2010. In Peru, leftist Pedro Castillo has been governing haphazardly and is unpopular, but he has also criticized leftist authoritarians in Nicaragua and Venezuela.

Now, 40 years after its transitions to democracy, Latin America has a robust democratic left, often with deep roots in social movements. A second guideline, then, is that when this democratic left does well at the ballot box, Washington needs to stop viewing it as a setback. This means ditching the old reflex of viewing a country as lost and deepening ties with traditional elites and the armed forces (which risks exacerbating military politicization and worsening civil-military relations).

The election of a democratic left candidate (or democratic right, for that matter) should be viewed as an opportunity for institutional stability and regional order. Such a candidate can more effectively and peacefully channel popular demands for economic and social reforms. The United States might have to work a bit harder to forge a working relationship with them, but there is no reason to write them off from the start.

Third, this means being clear that democratic left does not equal pro-China. A leftist leader may be more skeptical of the unfettered free markets ability to deliver and more wary of aligning unconditionally with the United States. He or she is probably no fan of the Monroe Doctrine. But that doesnt translate into an affinity toward other great powers.

There is nothing leftist about the Xi and Putin governing models, which are free market-based, socially conservative, and increasingly colonialist or imperialist. It makes little sense, then, to assume that victories like Borics or Castros carry any benefit to Moscow or Beijing though if U.S. policymakers insist on assuming that and hold those leaders at arms length from the beginning, it could be self-fulfilling. Instead, even if he or she meets with Russia and China, and perhaps even accepts goods and services from them, a democratic left leader should not be viewed as irretrievably lost to the other side. Signing on to the Belt and Road Initiative is not the same as becoming part of the Soviet bloc 50 years ago: It may just be a rational response to a generous offer, one that the U.S. government is only recently trying to measure up to with initiatives like the new Development Finance Corporation and the Biden administrations Build Back Better World plan.

Fourth, it would be unwise to view the regions armed forces as a bulwark against foreign influence or against certain political views. In a region where civilian control over the military is unfinished business, assistance or messaging needs to avoid politicizing armed forces. Under no circumstances should messages conveyed through training courses, exchanges, exercises, engagements, or defense diplomacy align armed forces with authoritarian leaders agendas, whether directly or inadvertently. Assistance and messaging ought to avoid encouraging militaries assumption of new internal roles like policing, as Mexico has done with its new National Guard, or crowd control, a role presidents have urged on reluctant militaries in Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, and elsewhere. And it would be most dangerous for training curricula and other, less formal messaging to propagate hybrid threat or gray zone warfare doctrines that portray legitimate social protests as the work of internal adversaries duped by foreign interestsunless the intelligence implicating a foreign power is overwhelmingly clear.

Fifth, U.S. engagement with the region needs to happen not only with a broader universe of elected democratic governments, but also with a far broader spectrum of institutions and social actors within countries. A vibrant democracy is more than just political leaders, business elites, and security forces. A more multidimensional approach to security cooperation, for instance, would involve more than just a partner nations soldiers, police, intelligence agents, and prosecutors. It would place equal importance on helping to strengthen a broader security sector encompassing judges, legislators, local governments, oversight bodies, and even non-governmental security experts, human-rights defenders, womens groups, ethnic communities, and security-focused journalists.

Finding a Narrative: Why Work with the United States Today?

Senators Menendez and Rubio are right about one thing: The U.S. government sorely needs a coherent policy and narrative to guide its assistance to, and relations with, Latin America. Unlike 30 years ago, that narrative is playing out in a context of reduced U.S. power and influence. Nations will no longer choose to work with Washington simply because of its military and economic might. Today, the U.S. government has to make its case, and in more spheres than security alone.

Right now, its difficult to pin down U.S. priorities in Latin America. Take Colombia, the regions largest recipient of assistance. What are the reigning U.S. priorities there right now? To the State Departments Western Hemisphere bureau, they appear to be public security and reducing drug supplies, containing Venezuela, and worrying about outside meddling in this years elections. For Southern Command, they are countering great-power influence, weakening armed groups, and interdicting cocaine. For the Justice Department, they are taking down kingpins and having them extradited. For U.S. Agency for International Development, they are implementing the peace accord with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia and protecting endangered social leaders. For the State Departments migration bureau, it is accommodating Venezuelan migrants. Homeland Security officials are concerned about migrants transiting Colombia.

There is nothing wrong with having a long list of priorities, but when seeking to build a community of like-minded democracies in the region, it would help to convey a hopeful vision, or at most a few pillars. For all its flaws, Plan Colombia (the aid framework of the 2000s) had a coherent narrative: strengthening Colombias state, weakening armed groups, and reducing drug supplies. Today, the U.S. government communicates to Colombians a welter of diverging messages and priorities, depending on the agency.

If the U.S. government is truly concerned about great-power competition in the Americas, this incoherence and inaction are a strange way to show it.

It doesnt help that the U.S. Congress can barely pass a budget or approve nominees, nor that the U.S. brand has taken a self-inflicted beating as the commitment to democratic principles that the United States wants to see from Latin American leaders is in serious danger of deteriorating at home.

This drift could lead right back into the Cold War 2.0 rut that Washington so badly needs to avoid. Avoiding it means partnering with governments and civil societies to build a regional community of open democracies not, as in the past, a regional community of conservative, unquestioningly pro-U.S. regimes. That, in turn, means partnering with leaders of the elected, democratic left, rejecting the notion that a leader like Chiles Gabriel Boric might belong anywhere near the same category as Venezuelas Nicols Maduro. At a time of complex migratory, economic, climate, and public health challenges in the hemisphere, privileging security assistance for like-minded regimes would be a waste of resources and a recipe for failure.

Adam Isacson runs the Defense Oversight program at the Washington Office on Latin America, a human rights advocacy and research organization. He has monitored the U.S. security relationship with Latin America and the Caribbean since the 1990s.

Image: U.S. Navy (Photo by Mass Communication Spc. 3rd Class Aaron Lau)

Read more from the original source:

Great-Power Competition Comes for Latin America - War on the Rocks

Snowfall

Comet/Commitment

Season 5 Episodes 1 and 2

Editors Rating 4 stars ****

Photo: Ray Michshaw/FX

The season-five premiere ofSnowfallbegins with the fall of a star on the rise. Opening up to a scene at the University of Maryland, a group of young college athletes is doing lines of cocaine. One of the bunch is identified to be none other than Len Bias the first-team All-American college-basketball player who the Boston Celtics selected as the second overall NBA draft pick in 1986. A bright future ahead of him, a 22-year-old Bias holds his green jersey up to his chest and saunters before his teammates with pride. After a few more lines, he grows quiet and grabs his chest. Panic washes over the scene as his friends scramble for help. Soon it is announced: Len Bias has died of cocaine-induced tachycardia on June 19, 1986, just two days after his draft selection.Snowfallpulls from this cultural archive of the 80s and situates the death of Bias within a larger story of shifting geopolitics, crime syndicates, and the War on Drugs as they facilitate the increased accessibility of cocaine within the U.S. The tragedy of Biass premature death reveals the tensions that heighten the seasons stakes: Last seasons drug game is not this seasons drug game.

The entire landscape for the drug trade has changed. With the opening of the southern border, the price of cocaine has decreased drastically. What the show argues once began asan operation intended to fund the overthrow of the Nicaraguan governmentis at risk of jeopardizing its viability. The flow of arms to Nicaragua has slowed, and as a result, the Sandinistas, also known as El Frente Sandinista de Liberacin Nacional, have been holding their own against the U.S.-backed Contras rebel group. In the first two episodes of the season, Comet and Commitment, we see how the shows most beloved (and loathed) characters have been holding up under these circumstances and across a varied spectrum of allegiances to the state and one another.

First things first, we have to talk about Franklin Saint. At the end of season four, Franklin must stand on his own two feet, literally and figuratively. For starters, he begins to walk without his cane, an accessory and aid that he acquired after being shot back in season three. And once his parents, Cissy and Alton, flee to Cuba to avoid retaliation for Altons whistleblowing, Franklin ends season four without a stable support system in place. And yet, as he has done time and time again, Franklin rebounds. At the start of season five, we see that our boy Franklin has moved up in the world, having established a few legitimate shell companies in real estate, bought a new home, and earned his pilots license. The infamous Family man has even begun to build a family of his own thanks toa new addition to the cast(!): his current boo, Veronique, a charismatic woman with a law degree who runs the real-estate operations for Franklins company and is revealed to be pregnant with their first child.

Now, we know that Franklin hasnt had much luck in the past with lovers. If there was ever a Franklin Saint edition ofGhost of Girlfriends Past,I would be tuned in but also very afraid (Melody shot him in the back, so shed undoubtedly be the final boss hed have to face at the end). Still, I am hopeful that Veronique will break the curse. What we know about her so far is promising: Shes a planner (Veronique has meticulously organized their lives in preparation for the baby, even color-coding their calendar!), and shes got a strong sense of self. When discussing Franklins fidelity to the promises he makes, she states that a man worth his word is a man worth me. Bonus points: Shes pretty funny. They just canceledDiffrent Strokes; Im really sensitive right now, she exclaims when Franklin springs some big news on her. Overall, Veronique seems like a safe bet. Fingers crossed Franklin will do right by her and I wont have to eat my words.

As for the state of the most stable couple on the show, Aunt Louie and Jerome, things seem to be going strong. In Comet, Jerome buys himself and Louie their own personal horses to support her growing passion for equestrianism. Flirtatious as ever, throughout the premier episodes we see moments of tenderness and desire between them, which suggests that the flame between them is still lit. Their love has survived a lot throughout the shows run, and chances are it will endure whatever comes to pass this season as well. Still, its hard not to worry, given Franklins assessment that nothing tears a family apart like money.

Speaking of family: In the premiere we also reconnect with Wanda, Leons ex, who finally got clean after being shot and hospitalized in season four. Despite the odds, she has maintained her sobriety and is still following the rules of her recovery. Though committed to honesty, she has found transparency with employers to be an obstacle to employment. Wandas saving grace, as it turns out, is a gig as a phone-sex operator. Forced to manage her financial frustrations and the sexual frustrations of her clientele, Wanda spends her days fielding horny calls that end too quickly and managing kinky requests that shock her (one caller asks her to step on his balls!). Her boss offers her a word of advice on teasing callers to keep them on the line: Hold the cream to make the green (OMG!). Later, when he cuts her checks to cover FCC fines and attempts to coerce her into a sexual relationship for her missing pay, she quits, frustrated by the way her life has become increasingly vulnerable to the judgments, grace, and desires of others.

Among the many recurring characters who returned for season five, a few familiar faces from Franklins past show up unexpectedly. Rob Volpe, a former classmate of Franklins who introduced him to Avi and helped his crew move product, reemerges this season in crisis. Rob witnesses a mutual friend of theirs, Thad Brenner, shoot and kill a teenager at a party in North Hollywood after the kid tries their cocaine without asking. As a statewide search for the young murderer ensues, Peaches and Franklin set out looking for Thad and pick up Rob to aid in the manhunt. Their reunion is cut short by Franklins realization that Rob has been using. Unwilling to trust him going forward, Franklin and Peaches go with Rob to confront (read kill) Thad, who is hiding in Palm Springs and knows more about their CIA affiliations than they previously thought. In the end, after Rob smokes from a crack pipe during Thads burial, Franklin decides to kill his old friend, who has become a liability. In a scene reminiscent of the look at the flowers moment inThe Walking Dead, Franklin urges Rob to look up at the sky to see Halleys comet (which last appeared in 1986)before he shoots him. R.I.P. Rob!

This season also sees the return of Teddy/Reed, the shows resident CIA operative and the guy that almost went down with the ship at the end of season four. After having his identity revealed by Alton, Teddy walks away from the agency only to be promptly replaced, leaving behind Franklin and Gustavo to interface with a new supplier. However, once new agent Grady Williamson is brought in to replace him, Teddy becomes restless and eager to get his job back. Armed with a bad wig and a new alias, Teddy goes back to L.A. disguised as a worker for the citys Water and Power Department (LADWP) so that he can check out his replacements new digs without arousing suspicion. As he discovers, Grady has been skimming money off the sales, causing discrepancies in supply and profit which have had major geopolitical consequences. Making matters worse, Teddy learns that Grady has been crossing boundaries with Franklin and his team, immersing himself in inappropriate ways. Teddy goes as far as to declare Grady has gone native (Note: this phrase carries weight and must be situated within the broader history ofU.S. settler colonialism and Indigenous sovereignty).

Amongst the many breaches of conduct that characterize Gradys lax approach to engaging with assets, there is perhaps none quite as staggering as his relationship with Black Diamond one part of the duo Black Diamond and Dallas, the strippers turned mercenaries who switched sides (remember when they set up Khadijah after Franklin offered them more money and job security?) last season. If Black Diamonds relationship with Grady suggests anything, it is that the girls have been wholly integrated into Franklins affairs. As promised, the pair are now gainfully employed and find themselves interwoven into the well-oiled machine of Franklins crew. Ultimately, this intimacy proves deadly for Grady, who, upon being confronted by Teddy, is killed for his extravagance and poor judgment so that Teddy can resume his role.

Throughout the premier episodes, the issue of drug pricing is a crucial one. As the market has become oversaturated, the need to stay competitive has intensified. Franklin negotiates with Grady to get the price down and increase the buy, which Grady agrees to in exchange for a joyride in Franklins private plane. However, in his first act of duty as the returning supplier, Teddy visits Franklin and lays out the new stakes, overturning Gradys agreement: Now that there is no more Grady, there will be no more price cuts and no more tolerance for loose ends. Franklin has no choice but to abide. Its your world, man; I just sell dope in it, Franklin retorts. Will there be any limits to Teddys flexing this season?

Drip Alert: Shoutout to one of Big Deon and Leons low-level runners who stole a pair of sneakers from them and, even after they teach him a lesson by bludgeoning one of his feet, boldly opts to wear the shoe opposite his cast-bound foot. He had to get his fit off by any means necessary!!!

Sunny in Suburbia: Even though he finally received that long-awaited file on Lucia in season four, Gustavo a.k.a. El Oso is certainly not out searching for his lost love. Apparently, hes been hanging out in the L.A. suburbs and cozying up with Xiamara, the sister-in-law of his deceased brother, and their nephews Carlo, Ernesto, and Cedro. I guess Franklin aint the only one playing house this season. (El Oso for PTA President has a nice ring to it, dont you think?)

Storms Ahead: At Louies club, we see her talk to a cop who explains that the police are in a frenzy these days. He agrees to protect Louie and her girls from the barrage in exchange for a scapegoat to serve up to the cops who are hungry for fresh meat. More busts, more arrests, more headlines, he explains is the new LAPD motto. Who will Louie sacrifice for safety?

Cold Front: At the end of season four, we see Teddy follow Alton and Cissy to Cuba despite agreeing to leave them be if they left the country. It has not yet been confirmed if he killed Alton or not. Franklin has had a difficult time communicating with his mom internationally, so he may not know the situation just yet. Did Teddy kill Alton? How will Franklin react if he finds out Teddy killed his father? Can he even afford to retaliate with so much at stake?

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Original post:

'Snowfall' season 5 episode 1 and 2 premiere recap - Vulture

Despite COVID-19 and the extreme coverage of the pandemic by American mainstream media, the main cause of hospital admissions in the United States of America remains excessive consumption of alcohol, usually by adults.

The younger generation, however, finds itself flooded with novel synthetic drugs, highly potent and easily available on the black market, the likelihood of overdosing on dangerous drugs persists and Americans continue living with a very serious drug problem.

The destructive aspects of the illicit drugs available in the American drug market have been exacerbated by the popularity of synthetic drugs such as Fentanyl, for example, which is similar to morphine, but is reportedly 50 to 100 times more potent.

This offers another explanation for the rise in the number of overdose deaths.

And I just realised that maybe, maybe I'll give sobriety a shot because the worst thing that could ever happen; maybe I'll be happy. The worst thing that could happen if I keep going is I'll die.

Former Addict 1

In this article, we shall delve into the various aspects of a much less reported epidemic in America, drug overdoses.

We shall consider how much the drug overdose epidemic in the US has changed, who's the most impacted, but more importantly, what could be done about it by the government, the individual states and the people.

I can tell you that in the height of my addiction, my little brother overdosed. And when I say overdosed, I mean, me and him shot heroin together. And I realised he wasn't breathing, his lips started turning blue.

Former Addict 2

A most important factor in the spiking overdose deaths is the opioid crisis which has afflicted the USA and has been tearing apart families and communities in recent years.

The crisis began with the over prescription of drugs such as OxyContin to average Americans seeking treatment for health problems like chronic headaches. The move had been promoted by Big Pharma, by companies such as Purdue Pharma.

While the company was brought down in court, the powerful Sackler family has managed to escape all accountability. The Sackler family still stands accused of helping fuel the US opioid epidemic.

How much are powerful entities such as the Sackler family to blame for the skyrocketing addiction and overdose rates in America?

I want to blame the Sackler family almost completely for this but they also had a lot of help. The Sackler family had a lot of deep ties to the FDA and local law enforcement and the Sackler family wanted to make a lot of money.

They developed this so called time release painkiller. They got the FDA to do something unprecedented. They put it on the label that it was non-addictive, and a lot of the doctors that they were, and then they used aggressive marketing techniques where the sales representatives for Purdue pharmaceuticals, the Sackler family's pharmaceutical company, were taught how to lie to people, how to lie to the doctors, and they told [the] doctors that it was not addictive and the doctors are like, Well, I never heard of an opioid that was not addictive, and at that time there was a crisis with painkillers, people getting addicted to painkillers.

Cindy Sheehan, Social Justice Activist

Opioid overdoses are especially tragic as they tend to affect people who are less prone to addiction; people who consulted their doctors for mostly normal and benign health issues.

It is therefore safe to say that they are victims of the medical industrial complex in the US, which has been obsessed with reaping benefits from the pharmaceutical industry with no regard for its repercussions.

It is really tragic. You know, we've seen cases in our own community, that people who get addicted to these painkillers, eventually their source dries up and when my sister, for example, was suffering from cancer she couldn't get painkillers for her cancer pain, which was real.

Cindy Sheehan, Social Justice Activist

Unfortunately, Americans are facing a very serious crisis which emanated from the complex internal politics of the healthcare Juggernaut, Perdue, where the men at the top make decisions about how to lead the sector in order to gain the most profits for themselves and their shareholders.

How could the rising number of overdoses in the United States affect the current public health crisis?

Well, you know, the opiate epidemic has a lot to do with prescription drugs. And that's the very key to drugs period. Right now, a lot of young people have been taking drugs. So it definitely will affect you know, people being able to function at work and provide for their families.

Drug addiction in this country is almost like Heroin used to be, you know, heroin was the epidemic, [which] was very dangerous because people did anything to just get a needle.

But these days, they're doing anything to get a pill right now, even when it comes to the selling their family, if they have.

So this is very important and they hurt a lot of elders because they go to their parents and ask for so much money over and over again, just to continue to get the drug.

Steven Young, Activist and Commentator

To this day, families in America have had to pay the price for what Big Pharma has done. Overdoses also occur on the more powerful synthetic substances such as Fentanyl and methamphetamine, which are smuggled into America or made illegally inside the country.

The response to the epidemic by the administration of US President Joe Biden has been deemed inadequate.

I think that it's tragic that almost everybody in the United States, including my family, has lost, maybe not a family member, but a close person that might as well have been a family member, have died from overdoses.

Our friend, as a matter of fact, died from [a] Fentanyl overdose but the president's son you know, heroin and crack, and so it's a widespread problem.

Cindy Sheehan, Social Justice Activist

The US presidential budget request for the fiscal year 2022 calls for a $41 billion investment in national drug programme agencies.

The budget request offers a nearly $670 million increase over the previous year, which the administration claims will be spent on evidence based prevention, treatment, harm reduction and recovery support services

... the people that it has affected the most have been dealing the drugs as well as using the drug. They have more experience than the doctors that have degrees. They have more experience than the people that went to school and college and university to learn about this and study about it.

The average person has been using that drug for or 30 years, 10 years, five years or a year and how the affect was and then you can start turning it around because they can tell you from their experience[sic].

One thing you cannot take away from anyone or give anybody is experiencing and you cannot take that away from them and that's priceless and we need to start using that towards the solutions in this country.

Steven Young, Activist and Commentator

It's still not clear whether the sum proposed could effectively turn the tide of the overdose epidemic in America. However, the administration acknowledges that getting rid of the pandemic and collaboration between federal, state, and local law enforcement, as well as public health officials, is of great importance.

Generally speaking, what is your assessment of the so called War on Drugs by the US administration?

Well, as you all know, when the United States declares war on anything, it gets worse. So there was a war on cancer; cancer has grown exponentially in the United States.

There's a war on terrorism, which you know, didn't do anything to defeat terrorism, but in fact caused many people to rebel or to rise up against the United States because of the United States actions and this war on drugs is the same thing.

I believe Nancy Reagan was really influential in starting the war on drugs and since the war on drugs began it's only gotten worse.

And we can really combine the War on Terror with the war on drugs, because since the United States invaded Afghanistan, the opiate supply has been much larger.

Cindy Sheehan, Social Justice Activist

Now according to some statistics the US has seen a 50% rise in the cases of overdoses compared to the 1990s. This is in line with a sharp spike in recent street crimes, gun violence, and a widening political rift across the nation.

Just like with big oil and big tech, the US government is failing the people once again by failing, or refusing, to take on Big Pharma.

We don't have a national health care plan here in the United States. In fact, my state, California, just shot down another chance to have some kind of public health plan here and the bottom line is that the United States is captured by big Pharma.

Big Pharma pays tens of hundreds of millions of dollars to influence the media; they sponsor almost all of the legacy media here in the United States.

Cindy Sheehan, Social Justice Activist

A plethora of corrupt politicians appear to be duty bound to merely bow to the demands of the formidable industry and act like puppets in the face of their intense quest for profit.

How do such overdoses impact the victims communities and families?

These drugs have been out here for years. But it wasn't until it started in the white community that they started doing something about it, when you had a lot of white people dying from overdoses such as judges' children and lawyers' children and so forth.

When they started dying from overdoses and opioids and everything, all of a sudden, it became a lot of rehabs for people, for everybody; they had to make it equal now, try to make it equal, they didn't make it equal, but they stop a lot of things such as a lot of arrests and how long you stay in jail and start giving them rehab.

Well, we we've been asking for that for a long, long time.

Steven Young, Activist and Commentator

Roughly 17,000 Americans died of an overdose in the year 2000 which rose to over 100,000 in 2021. The situation appears to be spiraling out of control as demonstrated by the National Centre for Health Statistics report which was released in the last week of 2021.

That shocking increase remains the largest year over year rate increase on record. And it's not difficult to assume the hidden epidemic has impacted certain portions of society harder, poor people, as well as communities of color.

What should authorities do to address overdoses and the issue of addiction in America?

A lot of people come by their addictions because they got injured. Right? They got injured at work, they got injured in a car accident, and they got injured however people get injured.

And so they're prescribed these very addictive painkillers, which everybody was lied to, saying that they weren't addictive. And then what your body does is it creates pain so you can get the painkiller, right, and your body gets used to the to the dosage, so you have to take more and more and more and more.

Cindy Sheehan, Social Justice Activist

Overdoses and other drug related complications keep inundating the more vulnerable members of society with no immediate remedy in sight. The consumption of drugs is targeted towards young children, who are the most prized possessions of America. As more and more young kids die due to overdose, new adolescent arrivals are brought into the fold by the legal and illegal drug industry.

According to the 2020 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, 14.5% of Americans, that's roughly 40,300,000 people, had a substance abuse disorder in 2020. And the figure is expected to grow rather than shrink.

There are some serious things that we have solutions to but working with the people who have the solutions, the solutions usually with the grassroots people, the Foundation, the ones unheard of, the ones who are not at the tables making these decisions. But like these young people [who] hit the street with Black Lives Matter, They have solutions to a lot of things, but are they being listening to?

I've been out here for what 30 or 40 years you know as a young man,you have to listen to the solutions to be unable to plan a city and create a home ownership and get rid of the poverty so we can have peace throughout the land. So as long as we have solutions there should not be these problems in America.

Steven Young, Activist and Commentator

With hard drugs sold on the streets and traffickers reportedly increasing the amount pouring into the country, it should not come as a big shock that the overdoses have increased following a rise in the amount of hard drugs smuggled into the country. This trend simply signifies an increase in demand, which translates into a spike in overdose related deaths.

The Opioid crisis is one of the number one health issues in the United States; there are over 100,000 overdoses every year now. There's over a billion dollars being spent on addressing addiction.

Cindy Sheehan, Social Justice Activist

The hidden epidemic is indeed a grave national security and public health challenge for the United States and its officials. More people die from drug overdoses than in car crashes, incidents involving firearms, suicide or homicide.

The FDA, the Sackler family, law enforcement who refused to prosecute the Sackler family or to even investigate the addiction, they're all involved in the crisis. There were some people who really wanted this looked into and they were stonewalled by by the FDA ... and it's just very interesting here in the United States.

Cindy Sheehan, Social Justice Activist

The US must rush to disrupt the flow of the illegal drugs into the country from overseas and crackdown on middlemen as well as drug cartels who maintain the supply chain for the illicit substances.

America always had a war on a lot of things, mostly a war against black people. It did a war on drugs, a war on (video) games, ... but they do a war on everything but poverty.

So if you don't speak out (against) the poverty in this country, how you going to cure the violence and have peace? And that's one issue that America spends and wastes a lot of millions and millions of dollars, giving it to the same people, mainly to millionaires.

In this country, it is called corporate welfare when they get tax breaks for coming into poor neighborhoods and making a profit.

Steven Young, Activist and Commentator

Not all overdose cases are fatal, yet the incident could still cause suffering for the addicts themselves, as well as their families and friends for quite a long time. The lasting impact of such an experience adds to the burden of societal issues emanating from addiction in general.

We must stop using people to experiment with these types of drugs as well. COVID-19 is shut down the entire world because nobody knew. The pure no one knew where it came from. How can that be without again, you can go to the middle, but you can't figure out what happens right here on this earth.

Steven Young, Activist and Commentator

How the CIA put drugs into the black community

The US brought cocaine into the black community as part of a larger genocidal war on black people as well as to fully destroy the Black Power movement.

The United States of America's illegal imperialist regime is actually the biggest drug trafficker in the world, and even the CIA itself is known as the Cocaine Intelligence Agency.

At the CIA they literally funnel drugs into the country to destroy revolutionary movements, as well as to destroy black communities.

The United States had declared an all out war on the Black Panther Party.

The government was willing to do anything and everything to destroy the party and labeled the party as the biggest threat to national security.

The US government used the illegal FBI COINTELPRO programme to assassinate, to launch character assassinations, to torture black revolutionaries for seeking to put power into the hands of the people, where it truly belongs.

The Central Intelligence Agency also had a major role in destroying the Black Panther Party. The United States, with the Cold War going strong, declared war on socialism, whether domestic or international, and began launching coups and proxy wars to protect the corporate interests of imperialist America.

The CIA, also known as the corporate intelligence agency, did everything, everything in its power to destroy socialism. The CIA already had a war on the Black Panther Party, and in 1979, the people of Nicaragua had a successful revolution against the US backed Somoza dictatorship. The CIA lost the war on the Sandinistas who were a left wing socialist revolutionary organization which just came into power.

The US Central Intelligence Agency, figured they can use one stone for the same target. The US needed to fund the right wing Contras to fight against the left wing Sandinistas.

But to fund the CIA proxy war they needed money.

The Contras began funneling drugs to the CIA then the CIA began selling drugs to dealers within different black communities, not only to disseminate violence and terrorism against the people of Nicaragua, but it ultimately led to the defeat of the Sandinista government.

But in the black community crack cocaine became an epidemic.

Now if we put the culture war and the destruction of the Black Panther Party into the proper historical context, we can begin to see the connection. In 1979 as the Contra war started, cocaine began being smuggled into the USA by the CIA. And then what do we do three years later, three years later, in 1982, the Black Panther Party was dissolved.

The CIA put the final touches on the tactical defeat of the Black Panther Party, by using chemical {narcotic} warfare against the black community and its effects can still be felt today.

The CIA itself admitted this, claiming that they "overlooked the Contra drug sales in the US". They also admitted to working with Contras, who were the ones dealing drugs.

A DEA field agent, Hector Morales, said, "I believe that elements working for the CIA were involved in bringing drugs into the country".

Another DEA agent claimed that in the 1980s the Ilopango International Airport in El Salvador was used by the country to smuggle drugs into the US. He said that his "attempts to investigate the Contra drug smuggling were stymied by the DEA management, the US Embassy in El Salvador and the CIA.

Original post:

CIA: The Cocaine Intelligence Agency - Press TV

MADISON The ACLU of Wisconsin today denounced consideration of a proposal in the Wisconsin State Assembly that would prevent local governments from restricting the use of no-knock warrants by law enforcement.

Assembly Bill 834 would strip local jurisdictions of their authority to restrain an officers ability to carry out a no-knock warrant a tactic that allows law enforcement to enter an individuals residence without first announcing their presence.

Between 2010 and 2016, 81 civilians and 13 law enforcement officers died during no-knock and quick-knock raids across the country.

For the Wisconsin State Legislature just weeks after police in Minnesota fatally shot 22-year-old Amir Locke within 10 seconds of unexpectedly raiding his home to take up legislation prohibiting local jurisdictions from regulating no-knock warrants shows a callous disregard for the senseless casualties that unannounced searches have caused, said Abby Kanyer, community engagement manager of the ACLU of Wisconsin.

Following the nationwide outcry over the unjust killing of Breonna Taylor, a Black woman shot by police who entered her apartment during an unannounced raid, the Milwaukee Fire and Police Commission moved to ban Milwaukee police from executing no-knock warrants.

No-knock raids are a relic of the racist War on Drugs, and conducting them puts both the safety of the public and the police at unnecessary risk. We believe no-knock tactics should be done away with altogether, let alone not shielded from any attempt at reform. As Black History Month comes to a close, we hope state leaders can take a moment to reflect on the grim history of no-knock warrants and how they have been used in a way that actively harms Black communities across this country, said Melinda Brennan, executive director of the ACLU of Wisconsin.

An ACLU report found that in 35% of the reported drug raids conducted via no-knock warrants, only small amounts of drugs were located; in 36% of the raids, law enforcement found nothing.

Additionally, no-knock warrants disproportionately impact poor communities of color. Between 2011 and 2012, 39% of raids affected Black people, 11% affected Hispanics, 20% white Americans, and 30% were unknown because of insufficient police data.

Read more here:

ACLU of Wisconsin Opposes Assembly Bill That Would Prevent Restrictions of No-Knock Search Warrants - aclu-wi.org

In November 2020, Oregon voters approved a ballot initiative, Measure 109, to legalize psilocybin for therapeutic use. Were now well into a two-year implementation phase. On February 8, the Oregon Health Authority (OHA) gave us the first look at a set of proposed rules for psilocybin therapyincluding, as Filter previously reported, the kind of mushroom products that may be permitted. But the proposal also contains detailed requirements for how psilocybin healersor facilitatorswould be trained to work with patients.

Some rules were already set. You dont need a doctors or psychologists license to be a facilitator, just a high school education. And clients dont need any medical diagnosis to get the drugthey can seek therapy for any reason.

The OHAs release describes the training process facilitators would need to pass. It includes 125 hours of instruction on several topics, a 40-hour practicum where they will practice techniques, and a mandatory final exam.

The instruction component includes a wide range of subjects like psilocybin history, science and safety. Notably, facilitators will also be required to study areas like longstanding Indigenous psilocybin use, prohibition and the War on Drugs, and racial injustice and inequity.

This work isnt something you can just learn in a book, do a couple of practice sessions then be good to go.

Rebecca Martinez is the executive director of Alma Institute, which is working to create a training and certification program for facilitators under Measure 109 on a nonprofit basis. She told Filter that she is pleased, overall, with the draft rules. But she recommended increasing the instruction to 160 hours, and at least doubling the practicum to 80 hours. Her institute plans to focus especially on training people of color and people from disadvantaged backgrounds.

The nature of this work isnt something you can just learn in a book, do a couple of practice sessions then be good to go, she said. You need ongoing mentorship, you need really more of an apprenticeship model to practice in a lot of different scenarios and get those core skills down.

Martinez also encouraged the health authorities to make the requirements more specific, and emphasize topics like safety and ethics.

This all makes sense to me. I well remember holding my best friend in my arms on the occasion of his first psilocybin mushroom trip some years ago, endlessly repeating, I got you, bro. I got you, bro. I wont let anyone hurt you. He stared back at me, his eyes wide with fear. I was tripping tooand it took me several minutes to realize that I was probably making things worse.

Facilitators ought to be better equipped than I was to address negative side effects during a trip. And first of all, they should make sure that patients understand any possible risk factorslike pre-existing conditions or potential interactions with other medications, as well as the variability of trip experiencesbefore they take the drug.

The draft rules mention using nondirective facilitation, which means [Avoid] giving the client direct advice or directly interpreting a clients statements or behaviors. Thats because on psychedelics, youre in a highly vulnerable state. A good facilitator should exercise patience and gentleness.

Martinez praised the OHA for requiring instruction on social equity topics, specifically around racial and cultural traumas. But Oregon has yet to accompany that with further steps, she notedlike, for example, investing in the training and hiring of facilitators from diverse racial, gender, cultural or income backgrounds.

We need to have folks represented.

This is an important point, when clinical research of psilocybin as a treatment for depression or other conditions has been conducted primarily by and with white people. Plus, Oregons pursuit of this quasi-medical modelas opposed to outright legalizationsignificantly raises the costs of the treatment, which will exclude marginalized populations.

We need to have folks represented and you need to be able to choose a facilitator you feel comfortable with, and oftentimes that means choosing someone who has some shared identifier, Martinez said.

She explained that while the OHA has seemed open to and interested in addressing equity issues, it can only do so much.

OHA doesnt have a lot of authority in what they can require of training programs or license holders around social equity plans, she said. Right now a lot of that is falling to community organizations like Alma, which leaves us working the philanthropic angle to get resources to diversify the field.

All of this trainingplus product testing and other requirementswill be expensive for businesses to comply with, and those costs will be passed on to clients. If Oregon is serious about making sure everyone can easily and fairly access psilocybin treatment, it will have to pay to help lower-income clients receive it.

Photograph via Department of Justice/Drug Enforcement Administration

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How Will Oregon Teach and Train Psilocybin Healers? - Filter