(also see post 13)
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Posted on 07/13/2007 6:25:51 PM PDT by SubGeniusX
The nation's top anti-drug official said people need to overcome their "reefer blindness" and see that illicit marijuana gardens are a terrorist threat to the public's health and safety, as well as to the environment.
John P. Walters, President Bush's drug czar, said the people who plant and tend the gardens are terrorists who wouldn't hesitate to help other terrorists get into the country with the aim of causing mass casualties. Walters made the comments at a Thursday press conference that provided an update on the "Operation Alesia" marijuana-eradication effort.
"Don't buy drugs. They fund violence and terror," he said.
After touring gardens raided this week in Shasta County, Walters said the officers who are destroying the gardens are performing hard, dangerous work in rough terrain. He said growers have been known to have weapons, including assault rifles.
"These people are armed; they're dangerous," he said. He called them "violent criminal terrorists."
Walters, whose official title is director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, said too many people write off marijuana as harmless. "We have kind of a reefer blindness,' " he said.
No arrests have been made so far in the four days of raids, the opening leg of what Shasta County Sheriff Tom Bosenko has promised will be at least two straight weeks of daily raids.
He said suspects have been hard to find because their familiarity with their terrain makes it easy for them to flee quickly.
Although crews doing the raids are using Black Hawk and other helicopters to drop in on some of the gardens, Bosenko said they don't want to give the growers any warning of a raid.
"We try to move in under stealth," he said.
As of Thursday morning, Operation Alesia raids had resulted in the yanking of 68,237 young marijuana plants from public lands in Shasta County. Raids already have been conducted in Whiskeytown National Recreation Area, as well as on land managed by the U.S. Forest Service north of Lake Shasta and other public land near Manton.
The operation is being led by the sheriff's office and has involved 17 agencies, including the California National Guard and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. It's believed to be the largest campaign of its kind in the state, Bosenko said.
The operation is named after the last major battle between the Roman Empire and the Gauls in 52 B.C. That battle was won by the Romans.
With the blitz of marijuana gardens around Shasta County, Bosenko said officials hope to not only get rid of the pot, but also win back the land for the public that owns it.
"These organizations are destroying our lands and wildlife," he said.
Bernie Weingardt, regional forester for the Forest Service's Pacific Southwest Region, said the 28,000 acres believed to house illegal marijuana grows on national forest land throughout the state would cost more than $300 million to
revive.
"These lands must be cleaned and restored," he said.
His estimate is based on a National Park Service study that found it costs $11,000 per acre to pull the plants, clear irrigation systems, reshape any terracing and replant native vegetation, said Mike Odle, Forest Service spokesman.
While Walters didn't give specific goals for Operation Alesia, he said anti-drug agencies aim to cripple the organized crime groups that he said are behind the marijuana cultivation.
"This business we intend to put into recession, depression and put its leaders into jail," Walters said.
Powerful governments have killed a lot more people than marijuana has.
And as near as I can tell from the information given, it's possible that all of this was done to eradicate about a city-block sized patch of feral hemp.
This boy’s been in the evidence locker.
“No kidding. This kind of verbal overkill sounds like Reefer Madness to a lot of us and is just impossible to take seriously.”
It sure is! Why am I having flashbacks to Waco, Ruby Ridge??
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I really have to wonder what the drug Czar has been smoking.We ned to turn the war on drugs into a war on terrorism.
Bumpkin.
Just the opposite.
The War on Unpatented Drugs creates huge profits for outlaw groups, including terrorists.
Ending the War on Consenting Adults would remove a funding source of the Taiban.
Politicians come and go. The career bureaucrats, like Walters, that inhabit the beltway are much better entrenched. I think overall they are responsible for, and contribute to the problem more than the politicians.
The drug war has gotten messy enough to be controversial, and the bureaucracy lets them keep it at arm's length. "At arm's length" is generally the posture that affords the least amount of control.
I rest assured that perhaps the majority of home grown hydroponic raised sinsemilla doesn't fund terrorists. ;-)
To add to that, not only is the “war on drugs” an infringement on the rights and civil liberties of all Americans it is stupidly hypocritical as it does note include alcohol, which is the source of more damage, more murders, more mayhem, more wrecked lives than all the others combined.
Can’t touch it though — it’s the drug of choice of the people in power.
Another frightening side effect of the “war” has been the proliferation of anti-narcotics nomex-clad strumtruppen armed with advanced weaponry and no-knock warrants.
It used to be a rare thing, but it’s getting to where not a week or a month goes by when these thugs descend on the wrong address, burst through the door, totally terrorize the occupants at gunpoint and then, upon finding they are at the wrong place, simply leave — often with only the most insincere and useless of apologies.
Alas, there’s no way to get this genie back in the bottle. Too many petty bureaucratic empires and been founded, nurtured and expanded to take advantage of it. Too many coffee cups depend on it.
Sure hope the “War on Terror” goes better than the “War on Drugs” and “War on Poverty” did.
As of Thursday morning, Operation Alesia raids had resulted in the yanking of 68,237 young marijuana plants from public lands in Shasta County.
Would have been better if it has read:
As of Thursday morning, Operation Alesia raids had resulted in the deportation of 68,237 young illegal aliens from public lands in Shasta County.
Is there anybody in the Bush administration with any intelligence? Condi, Speedy, Skeletor and now a new nit-wit.
just have to ping you ...
enjoy...
If the US wanted to stop the flow it's simple, and would require very little money.
We could buy the entire Afghani opium crop directly from the farmers, and give them a better price than do the heroin cartels. We could then sell what was needed to US and/or foreign pharmaceutical companies to make legitimate derivatives (morphine and such), and destroy the rest.
In addition, we could offer more money for other crops to the same farmers.
Of course, too many important people are making a profit in the war on (some) drugs for that to happen.
They say it takes a year to grow a crop, so this was probably no more than half grown at best. When they quote the value of the estimated marijuana traffic, to translate that into drug volume, it appears they're figuring the value of each plant at around $3,200.00.
People who smoke are terrorists.
People who (Fill in the blank) are terrorists. /s
Bush appointed this imbecile?
“people who plant and tend the gardens are terrorists who wouldn’t hesitate to help other terrorists get into the country with the aim of causing mass casualties.”
Get these people out of office. Enough is enough.
This suprises you?
Appointing imbeciles is Bush's special gift.
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