Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Ever more influential people question the war on drugs

...like Richard Branson, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter.

Sir Richard Branson has never sat on an idea. A frenetic 40-year career in the public eye has seen him launch Virgin Group, with its 400 companies, while juggling time between world record attempts, Hollywood cameos and humanitarian drives. Lately, Branson has embarked on a new adventure, one no less challenging than attempting to circumnavigate the globe in a balloon. As a member of the Global Commission on Drug Policy, Branson is sharing the spotlight with the burgeoning movement to end the U.S.-led war on drugs.

That crusade brought him to New York this week for the premiere of Breaking the Taboo, a documentary film asserting that the 40-year-old drug war, centered on prohibition rather than rehabilitation, has failed on all fronts. Narrated by Morgan Freeman, the film splices images of brutal violence with interviews with global leaders, including former U.S. Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, who lambast the $1 trillion global war for overcrowding prisons while doing little to curtail drug use among an estimated 230 million people around the world. “Obviously, if the expected results were that we would eliminate serious drug use in America and eliminate the narco-trafficking networks, it hasn’t worked,” says Mr. Clinton during the film.


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Hat-tip Future Freedom

3 comments:

thor42 said...

I agree.
I hate drugs myself, but if someone else wants to poison their body with cannabis or whatever, then I don't have a problem with that.

Legalising dope-growing could even be a new source of taxes!

Redbaiter said...

You might consider these three pathetic liberals as helpful to your cause but I'm damned if I am impressed.

Carter and Clinton are just completely odious.

Branson is an advocate for the global warming myth.

Influential????

Laffable more like it.

Anonymous said...

Drugs per-se are big business.

Addictive drugs are good if you are a legit drug company. Bad if you are a backyard do it yourself type.

Bad drugs are good business for the police, politicians. lawyers, therapists, car dealers, real estate people who sell mansions and get paid in cash. and all the hanger on types which flock to the cause. The illegal economy keeps the legal economy in business.

I have many friends who are mental health professionals and ninety per cent of them are on prescription medication which they prescribe for each other. The inmates have taken over the asylum.

back in 1969 i smoked weed with the then head of the Wellington Drug squad in his office at the Warring Taylor street police station. (Its a long story)but i was fascinated by the flair with which this bloke rolled his joints. Especially since he wasnt in a hurry to give me a puff.

Drugs aint going anywhere anytime soon. except out to the market place.

Dirk