In mid-August, the New Haven, Connecticut Register reports, more than 70 people suddenly fell ill at a local park, collapsing and losing consciousness. Terror attack? Accidental industrial release of a deadly chemical? No. The culprit was “K2,” aka “synthetic marijuana,” laced with fentanyl. The victims were revived by first responders and at the local hospital. Thankfully no one died and an alleged drug dealer was quickly arrested.

But, as law enforcement likes to tell us, getting a single dealer off the street does little good. We need to move up the food chain and nab the people at the origins of this thing.

Who are those top dogs? Whose names can be presented to a grand jury for indictments in the conspiracy to put “synthetic marijuana” on our streets? Here are two: Uttam Dhillon and Scott Gottlieb.

Dhillon is the Acting Administrator of the US Drug Enforcement Agency. Gottlieb heads the US Food and Drug Administration.

Together, Dhillon and Gottlieb oversee the “scheduling” of drugs under federal law. And, like their predecessors, they have conspired to create a market for “synthetic marijuana” by putting REAL marijuana on Schedule I, fraudulently claiming that it has a “high potential for abuse,” “no currently acceptable medical use,” and a “lack of accepted safety.”

In point of fact, marijuana is about as “abused” as caffeine, is demonstrably an effective treatment for various medical conditions (Queen Victoria drank it as a tea for menstrual cramps), and isn’t even in the same league as alcohol or tobacco when it comes to safety — year after year, the number of marijuana overdose deaths in the US totals a big whopping zero. It’s a common, benign plant, with numerous useful attributes, that grows in all fifty states.

So, why do Dhillon and Gottlieb conspire to keep marijuana on Schedule I? When you have to ask why, the answer is usually “money.”

Dhillon’s DEA employs more than 10,000 people at an annual cost of nearly $3 billion.  Gottlieb’s FDA employs nearly 15,000 people at an annual cost of more than $5 billion.

De-scheduling marijuana would mean fewer jobs and lower budgets at those agencies. That is the sole plausible reason to keep marijuana on Schedule I. The other reasons are, simply, lies. And that makes conspiring to do so a matter of theft by deception, aka fraud.

The New Haven overdoses and incidents like them are an aggravating factor. The DEA/FDA conspiracy to keep marijuana off the legal market, and to make it less available illegally through violent law enforcement action, creates the market for unsafe substances like “synthetic marijuana.”

If not for Dhillon and Gottlieb, the 70-plus New Haven victims would have been able to purchase the real thing — an eminently safe substance no more dangerous, and possibly less dangerous, than an everyday energy drink — at their local stores of choice. They’d have had pleasant, euphoric, brief highs before going about their business instead of collapsing and requiring medical attention.

It’s time to put these racketeers out of business. Indict, convict, and de-schedule.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY

In a recent tweet, US Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT) warned that “Infowars is the tip of a giant iceberg of hate and lies that uses sites like Facebook and YouTube to tear our nation apart.” His solution: “These companies must do more than take down one website. The survival of our democracy depends on it.”

Yes, odd as it might seem, Senator Murphy believes that the future of America can only be secured by suppressing information and discussion he doesn’t like. That sentiment seems to be going around. David McCabe  of Axios reports on a leaked policy paper from the office of US Senator Mark Warner (D-VA). Two of its most dangerous proposals:

“[N]ew federal funding for media literacy programs that could help consumers sort through the information on online platforms. ” In other words, well-financed government propaganda to make sure we hear what Mark Warner wants us to hear (and think what he wants us to think about what we hear elsewhere).

“[R]equiring web platforms to label bot accounts or do more to identify authentic accounts, with the threat of sanction by the Federal Trade Commission if they fail to do so.” America’s long tradition of anonymous and pseudonymous political speech — not least among it the Revolution-era pamphlets of Thomas Paine — shouldn’t be subject to the veto of Mark Warner or Chris Murphy.

Then, a good laugh: “The size and reach of these platforms demand that we ensure proper oversight, transparency and effective management of technologies that in large measure undergird our social lives, our economy, and our politics.”

Since when has government ever produced proper oversight, transparency, or effective management of anything? And what could possibly go wrong with eviscerating the First Amendment to give these jokers “oversight” or “management” powers over technologies that undergird our politics? What’s really going on here?

Political blogger Michael Krieger answers that question with a simple headline: “Censorship Is What Happens When Powerful People Get Scared.” The American political establishment has spent the last decade quaking in its boots over the next potential disclosure from WikiLeaks, Edward Snowden, or whistleblowers yet unknown. This isn’t about “our democracy.” It’s about “their power.”

The US government’s use of putatively “private sector” social media outlets as proxy censors has been going on for some time, but the Russiagate scandal lent it new momentum. And it’s not just some alleged lunatic fringe that they’re after. Recent victims of Twitter’s ban policy include non-interventionist foreign policy analysts like Scott Horton (editorial director of Antiwar.com), former Foreign Service Officer Peter Van Buren, and Ron Paul Institute director Daniel McAdams.

We don’t need “more government oversight” of social media. What we need is for it to be recognized, and treated, as a criminal abuse of power (and a violation of US Code Title 18  § 241 — “conspiracy against rights”) for government officials or employees to attempt to “oversee” or “manage” social media’s content standards.

Let me reconfigure Chris Murphy’s authoritarian statement to name the stakes: The survival of our freedom depends on it.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY

Paul Manafort, who briefly served as US president Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign chairman, faces two criminal trials, the first of which began on July 31. While the second trial (involving allegations that Manafort acted as an unregistered agent of a foreign principal) will be of more interest to those following the “Russiagate” probe, this first trial really should interest all Americans.

In headlines, media coverage generally refers to the charges against Manafort as involving “fraud.” In this case, he’s charged with bank fraud, tax evasion, and conspiracy, words which shed some more light on what he’s actually accused of. In English:

Manafort allegedly worked in Ukraine, earned money in Ukraine, and then did various things (including omitting assets in bank loan applications — that’s the “bank fraud” part) with various accomplices (that’s the “conspiracy” part) to keep that money hidden from the Internal Revenue Service (that’s the “tax evasion” part).

If you’re wondering why on earth the US government would consider money earned in a foreign country any of its business, or think itself entitled to grab some of that money for itself, you’re not alone.

The United States is one of only three governments on Earth — the other two are Kim Jong Un’s dictatorship in North Korea and Isaias Afwerki’s dictatorship in Eritrea — that demand payment of income taxes on money earned abroad by “their citizens.”

The US government is unique among western democracies in declaring itself entitled to steal not just part of one’s income earned within its jurisdiction, but also part of one’s income earned anywhere and everywhere.

Paul Manafort allegedly hid his money from extortionists. Now the extortionists want him put in a cage for trying to avoid their racket. Whatever else he may have done, that’s the sum total of this case.

He shouldn’t have HAD to hide his money. He shouldn’t be blamed for trying to do so. The IRS didn’t earn that money. He did. And he earned it in a place where he wasn’t availing himself of the services US taxes supposedly pay for.

The prosecution’s strategy, so far, seems to be to make the jury hate Paul Manafort by demonstrating that he’s a rich guy who buys expensive stuff and lives a lavish lifestyle. Smart move. If the jury considered the true nature of what he’s actually charged with, they’d likely be inclined to acquit him. Which, in fact, is what they should do.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY