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Policy makers ignore alcohol in drug combat
The Daily Herald (UT) ^ | January 31, 2003 | Rick Soulier

Posted on 02/03/2003 9:54:04 AM PST by MrLeRoy

As law enforcement lobbies members of Congress and state legislators coast-to-coast for more funds to finance the war against illicit drugs, Utah's Legislature considers liberalizing Utah's liquor laws.

As leaders obsess over how governments will help pay for the costs of medical treatment, Utah's Legislature is considering liberalizing Utah's liquor laws.

Someone should teach Utah's legislators that alcohol is the most abused drug.

Pretend for a minute that humankind had not discovered alcohol until Drexel distilled it in 2000. After years of testing, would the Federal Drug Administration allow it to be sold as a drink? At best, the FDA would place it under a restrictive prescription schedule, complete with a list of warnings against side effects and addiction potential.

Studies that tout alcohol's benefit on heart health illustrate that some "scientific" testing is actually designed to justify our habits. If Drexel had discovered alcohol and tried to market it as a heart medication, the FDA would have denied the proposal because of its dangerous and addictive side effects.

Ancient beers and wines had minor food value. In specific times and places, they were safer to drink than the waters. Through the ages, humans experimented with wines and spirits, not to improve their food value, but to increase their alcohol jolt.

The snobbishness surrounding wine consumption is misleading, for vintners are just as obsessive about high alcohol contents as are the distillers of whiskey.

Alcohol, with tobacco and marijuana are the big-three hypocrisies in the American war on drugs. Proponents of these substances would have us believe they are really good for us because they are (in the popular cliché) "natural."

This logic is laughable. Mankind has so hybridized the plants involved in wine and the various types of cigarettes that nothing is natural about any of the products.

For example, mankind has so thoroughly hybridized marijuana in the past four thousand years that the original plant probably does not exist anywhere on earth. People tinkered with it -- especially since the late 1970s -- to increase the psychoactive buzz, not its dubious medical properties.

Neither the war on drugs nor the medical crisis can be taken seriously when billions are squandered to treat conditions and illnesses caused by culturally accepted drug abuse. When we are really serious about decreasing medical costs and drug abuse, we will end recreational consumption of alcohol, tobacco and marijuana.


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; News/Current Events; US: Utah
KEYWORDS: alcohol; boycottutah; drug; drugskill; wod; wodkills; wodlist
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To: tacticalogic
Hard drug users are often possessed by evil sprits.

Those are just unwanted engrams. Nothing a good auditing won't fix.

So interesting you would say this. L Ron Hubbard took a ton of drugs in post war Los Angeles and palled around with Satanists before he invented Scientology

 


http://216.239.51.100/search?q=cache:2IeO7mEMXDMC:www.ezlink.com/
~perry/Co%24/Christian/gormez.txt+L+Ron+Hubbard++break+sex+drugs
+soul&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

Ron Hubbard Jr. remembers that when he was ten years old, his father, in an attempt to get his son in tune with his black magic worship, laced the young Hubbard's bubble gum with phenobarbital. According to Ron Jr. drugs were an important part of Ron Jr.'s growing up, as his father believed that they were the best way to get closer to Satan--the Antichrist of black magic.

http://www.forteantimes.com/articles/132_parsons.shtml

In August 1945, on leave from his less than spectacular naval career, Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard was introduced to Parsons. Jack was impressed by Ron's exuberance and energy and wrote in a letter to Crowley: "I deduced that he is in direct touch with some higher intelligence. He is the most Thelemic (Crowley's branch of magic) person I have ever met and is in complete accord with our own principles". Hubbard moved in and promptly gained the affections of Parsons' main squeeze, 19-year-old Betty Northrop. He was soon initiated into the secrets of the OTO and made Parsons' magical partner.

In January 1946, the two commenced a long and complex magical ritual called the "Babalon Working" (sic). This was intended to create nothing less than an elemental being. As far as Parsons? was concerned, the invocation worked. The elemental turned up two weeks later in the form of the beautiful blue-eyed, red-haired Marjorie Elizabeth Cameron, who became, after Parsons' death, the star of Kenneth Anger's 1965 cult-film Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome, friend of Dennis Hopper and Dean Stockwell, and prototype witch-biker. It is interesting to note that Cameron?s two brothers, her sister and also her father were to work at JPL, as if Project and People were knit by associations. As John Carter says in Sex and Rockets, Cameron was "sprung from Parsons' head like Sophia from the Godhead or Pallas Athena from Zeus". On February 26th, Parsons wrote to Crowley: "I have my elemental!"

In April 1946, Parsons, Cameron, and Hubbard, acting as scribe, attempted the second part of the Babalon Working, which was intended to raise a "moonchild" in the manner described in Crowley?s novel of the same name, with Cameron the vessel for Parsons' magical seed. The mundane world intruded however, and the tricky Hubbard, despite his intense and apparently sincere involvement with the Babalon working, vanished with $10,000 of Parsons' money and Betty, who was no doubt peeved at Parsons' involvement with Cameron. Parsons eventually located the fleeing pair at sea, rented a room in Florida, and cast a spell upon them, whereupon Hubbard and Betty were nearly drowned in a storm. In 1955, the widowed Cameron, in the company of a group of bikers, severed her ties to the past and destroyed the Black Box of the Babalon Working that Parsons believed had brought her to him.

Wizards of the Coast:
Amongst the many areas in which Parsons' influence was felt, and one that further cemented the bond between him and Hubbard, was the burgeoning West Coast science fiction scene. Many key SF writers could be found gathered at the Parsons household in the early '40s, including Jack Williamson, A.E. Van Vogt (who would become head of the Los Angeles Dianetics Foundation), Robert Heinlein, (a libertarian hero) Alva Rogers and Forrest J. Ackerman. Ackerman ran the LA SF Society, where Parsons also met Ray Bradbury who professed to being fascinated by "his ideas about the future". Parsons was particularly fascinated by Williamson's Darker Than You Think, the tale of an ancient lycanthropic race who seek to regain power amongst men through the birth of a magical child, "The Child of Night". It has also been suggested that Parsons' ideas influenced Heinlein in writing Stranger in a Strange Land.


Hubbard's intense curiosity about the mind's power led him into a friendship in 1946 with rocket fuel scientist John Whiteside Parsons. Parsons was a protege of British satanist Aleister Crowley and leader of a black magic group modeled after Crowley's infamous occult lodge in England.

 


141 posted on 02/04/2003 10:11:25 AM PST by dennisw ( <Nemo Me Impune Lacessit> http://www.littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/weblog.php)
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To: MrLeRoy
"... in the context of drug use"

Using a pain killer when you're not in pain. Medical marijuana "patients" do this all the time.

C'mon, MrLeRoy, even you can think of a number of examples.

142 posted on 02/04/2003 10:14:27 AM PST by robertpaulsen
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To: robertpaulsen
Using a pain killer when you're not in pain.

So all recreational drug use is abuse?

143 posted on 02/04/2003 10:15:56 AM PST by MrLeRoy ("That government is best which governs least.")
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To: dennisw
Slow down there,I was asking about driving while intoxicated. I never suggested that alcohol was more dangerous than meth. However, if I had a choice, I'd rather one be doing meth in their own home than be driving drunk, endangering me and my family.

Actually you're too pussy to do so.

I don't get it, the fact that the only drug I choose to consume is alcohol makes me a wussy? Seriuosly though, what other crimes deserve capital punishment? Armed Robbery? Assault with a weapon? DWI?
144 posted on 02/04/2003 10:16:05 AM PST by jmc813 (Do tigers sleep in lily patches? Do rhinos run from thunder?)
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To: dennisw
I think (hope) he was kidding around with the Scientology references.
145 posted on 02/04/2003 10:17:13 AM PST by jmc813 (Do tigers sleep in lily patches? Do rhinos run from thunder?)
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To: dennisw
Hard drug users are often possessed by evil sprits.

"Often"? You have statistics on this?

146 posted on 02/04/2003 10:20:13 AM PST by MrLeRoy ("That government is best which governs least.")
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To: dennisw
And by the way, FReepers with thinner skin than I might have responded to the name you called me with a click of the abuse button, so you may want to be careful about your language in the future.

I, on the other hand, prefer to use the "you are what you eat" defense.
147 posted on 02/04/2003 10:20:57 AM PST by jmc813 (Do tigers sleep in lily patches? Do rhinos run from thunder?)
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To: jmc813
I, on the other hand, prefer to use the "you are what you eat" defense.

LOL! (Took me a minute ...)

148 posted on 02/04/2003 10:23:15 AM PST by MrLeRoy ("That government is best which governs least.")
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To: MrLeRoy
"So all recreational drug use is abuse?"

Not in the strict definition. If a drug has no other "use" than recreation, how can it be ab-used?

What's on your mind? Why do I get the feeling that you're more interested in trying to trip me up, rather than trying to understand what I'm saying.

Say something that will make me want to continue with you on this thread.

149 posted on 02/04/2003 10:25:18 AM PST by robertpaulsen
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To: robertpaulsen
"So all recreational drug use is abuse?"

Not in the strict definition. If a drug has no other "use" than recreation, how can it be ab-used?

So what constitutes misuse/abuse of recreation-only drugs?

What's on your mind? Why do I get the feeling that you're more interested in trying to trip me up, rather than trying to understand what I'm saying.

Because you're paranoid. "Abuse" and "misuse" are vague terms; I want to know what you mean by them.

150 posted on 02/04/2003 10:30:19 AM PST by MrLeRoy ("That government is best which governs least.")
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To: jmc813
I didn't call you a name. It's an adjective. Hit the grammar books instead of the drug legalization tracts. There's no hope with dope, nor legalizing it.
151 posted on 02/04/2003 10:30:40 AM PST by dennisw ( <Nemo Me Impune Lacessit> http://www.littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/weblog.php)
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To: dennisw
And now the official Scientology party line on drugs is pretty much in line with yours, albeit with some adjustments in nomenclature. Go figure.
152 posted on 02/04/2003 10:32:12 AM PST by tacticalogic (Controlled application of force is the sincerest form of communication.)
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To: MEGoody
"Do you think alcohol should be banned on a national level?"

Yep, I do.

Perhaps there is no such thing as a failure so dismal that no one wants to ever try it again.

-Eric

153 posted on 02/04/2003 10:36:53 AM PST by E Rocc
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To: dennisw; jmc813
I didn't call you a name. It's an adjective.

You lose.

To call names: to apply opprobrious epithets to

epithet: An abusive or contemptuous word or phrase

154 posted on 02/04/2003 10:37:08 AM PST by MrLeRoy ("That government is best which governs least.")
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To: dennisw
From dictionary.com...

1.Informal. A cat.
2. Botany. A fuzzy catkin, especially of the pussy willow.
3. Vulgar Slang. The vulva. Sexual intercourse with a woman.
4. Offensive Slang. Used as a disparaging term for a woman.
5. Slang. A man regarded as weak, timid, or unmanly.


Don't see an adjective in there. No worries, though, I was not offended in the least. I just don't want to see you get in trouble, even if we do disagree on this topic.
155 posted on 02/04/2003 10:38:57 AM PST by jmc813 (Do tigers sleep in lily patches? Do rhinos run from thunder?)
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To: jmc813
He did use it as an adjective---"you're too pussy to do so"---although I'm sure no dictionary supports that useage.
156 posted on 02/04/2003 10:43:55 AM PST by MrLeRoy ("That government is best which governs least.")
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To: dennisw
"There's no hope with dope..."

Say, you're a speech-writer for Al Sharpton, aren't you?
157 posted on 02/04/2003 10:45:15 AM PST by headsonpikes
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To: MrLeRoy
Walters was in Las Vegas to convince Nevadans that legalizing the possession of small amounts of marijuana is a bad idea. [...] He said baby boomers might think it's harmless that their kids are experimenting with marijuana as they did. He said the marijuana sold to teenagers today is more potent and dangerous than the strain their parents used when they were young."
This of course is like saying that beer should be banned because swilling grain alcohol can kill you. Obviously, in a free market reputable companies would properly label their products, but that never occurs to statists.

-Eric

158 posted on 02/04/2003 10:45:58 AM PST by E Rocc (if totalitarianism ever comes to the U.S. it will be "for our own good")
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To: E Rocc
They did have forfiture during alcohol prohibition.

It failed anyhow. First the states stopped enforcing the booze laws (started with NY for booze CA for pot). After that it was only a matter of time.

159 posted on 02/04/2003 10:50:47 AM PST by Dinsdale
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To: MrLeRoy
Technically, there is no abuse of a drug if the drug's raison d'etre is recreation (unless of course you took a "recreation-only" drug to, say, keep you focused at your job).

Society might call it "drug abuse', but it should just be called "illegal drug use".

160 posted on 02/04/2003 10:52:18 AM PST by robertpaulsen
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