After reading this particular article, I focused in on ‘Alternative Treatment Centers…’ Everybody knows that Google is the de facto perferred Search Engine, and looking up ‘Alternative Treatment Centers,’ in Google brings up Rehab bullshit! Not Medical Marijuana approved treatment centers of America.

It’s probably to late…but I wouldn’t call it that! Hopefully it gets thrown out and re-reviewed.

RE:
“Treatment” implies “drug TREATMENT”,
Try “alternative MEDICINE” as google search-term
instead…

for the update on it also post a comment on there . Look forward to seeing you all on AC360 this Monday at 10pm est.

IL senate medical bill better not be dead ! But knowing this state, the house will drag their feet and postpone. We need to educate the house this summer and keep them talking about it. My friends mom is dying of cancer right know and doesnt have another year to wait to get her medicine.

Senator Specter introduced the bill and Lindsay Graham (R-SC) also supports the bill. I was a bit puzzled when he mentioned alternate systems to prisons, but he would not elaborate. I wonder what his thoughts are on alternative systems for cannabis users.

Chief Bratton from Los Angeles stated that the focus when reforming our criminal justice system needs to be in prevention. So far no complaints, but how far are you willing to go to prevent crime? Chief Bratton also mentioned that human behavior needs to be influenced by police. Well, I’d rather it wouldn’t be, since unless I break the law, police has neither right nor business interfering with my life. Strangely, Chief Bratton mentioned that we got it right in the 90’s. While that may be true, it is also true that drug arrests saw a steep increase in the 90’s. 1990 saw about 300,000 cannabis arrests and 1999 just under 700,000 cannabis arrests. As far as pot is concerned we didn’t get it right in the 90’s! Chief Bratton mentioned “fractured” drug policy but didn’t expand. He did however make a valid point that we can’t arrest ourselves out of the problem. It will be interesting to see if the commission when formed will make the distinction between cannabis which is less addictive than that double espresso you get a Starbuck’s and the truly dangerous stuff like heroin.

Next on the panel was Professor Ogletree and he started out by calling an end to the term “war on crime”. I couldn’t agree more and while we are at it, lets retire all the other wars while we are at it. War has never been the answer and that holds true when talking about anything from the war on obesity to the war on crime. Professor Ogletree hit the nail on the head when he mentioned how unsuccessful we are at this war and how much it had cost. He also mentioned that we had not looked at alternatives. Another thing he mentioned was an anecdote about a judge who on his own started to impose the same penalties for powder and rock cocaine, as making a distinction between the two is discriminatory. We need to be smart on crime and no more children left behind bars were a couple of other noteworthy mentions.

Brian Walsh from the Heritage Foundation was also on hand, but he stressed at the outset that he was there on his own behalf and not representing the heritage foundation. Mr. Walsh stressed that what we need is principled non-partisan crime reform and that too often the mere mention of crime reform has been interpreted as soft on crime. This feeling of not wanting to appear soft on crime could become a roadblock to a more diversified panel. He also mentioned States’ Rights and their needs would have to be considered by the panel and that Washington can’t adequately address each State’s needs. A reduction in incarceration numbers is also advisable according to Mr. Walsh. As far as drug policy is concerned Mr. Walsh made the assertion that incarceration and recidivism to drug abuse are co-related. His call for full attention to the drug problem makes sense only if all sides are represented and special interests take a back seat to us, the people. Laws need to be re-written that now cause people to be incarcerated for simply being at the wrong place at the wrong time or for infractions where the person never intended to break the law.

Last on the panel is Pat Nolan , President of the Prison Fellowship . Pat served on the California Legislature until he got busted for a campaign violation and did 29 months in prison. His stint in prison showed Pat that most often the overcrowded prisons make an inmate more dangerous when he gets out then when he (or she) entered the “correctional” facility. Over crowded prisons lead to violence and rape as well as diseases and the mere warehousing of inmates without focus on re-integration into society only lead to more recidivism. The current annual price tag for housing prisoners is $ 68 billion and is the fastest growing of many State budgets! At $ 30,000.00 per inmate per year we are not getting enough bang for our buck when we consider the recidivism rate we currently experience. Another travesty are the “mercy bookings” by police when dealing with mentally ill people. These people belong in a medical facility, not the prison system

After these introductions, Senator Specter asked Chief Bratton on how crime prevention works. Chief Bratton wants to accomplish this based on timely intelligence so as to cover areas where crime is to occur more quickly. Relentless follow up of former suspects and the attitude that; Crime won’t go away, so we wont, and; we (the police) control behavior and change behavior. Incarceration is important but crime prevention is more important. Now the scary part comes… Chief Bratton said that in a few years we’d be able to not only prevent but also predict crime in the near future. Wow! Where is this dude going?!

Senator Specter than asked Professor Ogletree about the tremendous cost to the public for recidivism as well as the cost for treatment and how to sell the program to the public. To this Prof. Ogletree responded that re-integration into society is the tough part with too much ‘not in my back yard’ ism and the key here is to work with the public prior to release of a prisoner and to lay the ground work. The easier it is for some one just out of prison to get a decent job, the less chance of recidivism. That one during these tough times is going to be hard, as well as convincing the public of this. Specter than asked about the underlying causes to crime and Professor Ogletree mentioned an important part that’s missing in our society is a system of mentors for many of the kids and that needs to change. Also, too many kids are suspended or expulsed from schools and when they are unsupervised are prone to get into trouble.

After that Minnesota’s single Senator, Amy Klobuchar got into the mix. I got the distinct impression that she likes most of the system and from the ones on the sub-committee appears at this time least likely to embrace many changes, especially when it comes to jail time.

That’s about the gist of today’s sub committee meeting and it looks like a good start. I wonder who will present our side? I hope to see some folks from MPP , LEAP and NORML to be on the commission, but I’m not holding my breath. This commission will be sitting for 18 months and even if approved and signed into law this year, we’ll have to wait until sometime in the middle of 2011 before much gets done. 2011 will also be the beginning of Obama’s run for a second term, so any of the changes proposed may have to wait as they could easily and most likely will be exploited during the campaign for 2012. If past campaigns and run’s for office are any indication, that part could get ugly. We need to stay plugged in and see where this goes.