THE PURPOSE OF GREEN

Post- Modern Reefer Madness

              After days of sobriety combined with prednisone, I’ve finally solved the puzzle of the green tongue.  It is a natural consequence of our addictive society.   We usually think of addicts as green-eyed monsters, hiding from public eye, secretive in their ways, lying, cheating and stealing in a desperate attempt to get their next fix, while preying on our innocent children, stealing our property, leering at our wives, daughters and girlfriends, generally instilling fear in hearts of all.  Creepy like the beginning of the radio show “Inner Sanctum” or mystical like “The Shadow”.

              The problem with the popular perception or addiction is that the media only applies this definition to the “other.”  But, as any idiot can see, there is another group that isn’t “the other” that fits this definition.  They are universally feared and every bit as dangerous to our society as heroin addicts.  It is this group that needs to be discussed, particularly in the context of the mythical self-regulating “free market” invented by the rulers to maintain their power.  This group of addicts is addicted to money.  Their addiction causes them to lie, cheat, steal, murder, and act in a generally lawless fashion in a mad power grab on behalf of our occupiers.  These addicts have manipulated their way into our society and now act like a cancer on it, feeding and growing on our irrational fear and collective insecurities.  The more fearful they can make us, the more they can extort to feed their ugly money habit.  They have built up an extortionate infrastructure to aid in this shake down.  It is not based upon science of reason, it is based upon fear, panic and an attempt to appear to be doing something about perceived problems to show control.

              For instance, programs reports in the news show that the DUI treatment programs set up in response to the MADD hysteria are in trouble.  With designated drivers, and more moderation, there are fewer arrests for drunk driving.  The public is starting to question the rationale and basis for some of the arrests for drunk driving.  The fraud on the public is ongoing and gets more brazen by the year.  This started twenty years ago when police had videos in their stations, filming arrestees performing sobriety tests.  The problem was that after the testimony of the officer, the jury saw the film.  Inevitably, the videos showed the exaggeration by the police. Prosecutors, learned that they could achieve more convictions without the films than with them.

              With the advent of programs paid for by the arrestees and not the government, and with reporting and record keeping replacing any correctional counseling, turning ancillary court services such as probation into profit centers, the system needed paying bodies to keep it going and to support the false premises of privatization of crime and citizen control.  Privatization is a failure and extremely antidemocratic.  It brings out the predatory nature of business and destroys the traditional altruism of the civil servant.  It shifts the cost of governing from the rich who need protecting to the poor, who can least afford it.  Such is the Oligarchy.

              So, what the hell am I talking about?  What has all this have to do with green tongue?  To what green am I referring?  Is it the money that turns tongues green.  I need a few drinks to really think this through, but, since I am on meds that proscribe it, I will try.  At least I hope so.   I may be trying, but what the hell.

              There have been many accounts of warnings to police that more bodies are needed to keep these programs running.  There are programs for addiction, alcohol use, domestic violence, anger management, assertiveness training and other programs waiting to be fed. This wasn’t a problem when the government was running them.  The government did not have to make a profit then.  Now, not only does a government have to make a profit, it has to operate in a way to prove that privatization is efficient and good for the people and making the corporate masters both beneficiary and in control for our protection.  (defined as the occupation force) 

              Alcohol related traffic enforcement has been a good source of income for the state and private entrepreneurs working in tandem.  To keep the assembly line going, the legislatures co-operated by continually lowering the alcohol level necessary for conviction to keep the privateers in business.  Bolstered by the advertising, groaner tales and public relations of MADD, programs have opened and expanded all over the country. 

              Additionally, science and math is deliberately falsified and erroneously presented to reinforce the problem and solution.  The police PR department and MADD report “alcohol related” offenses.  The question doesn’t inquire or require any facts because, just like Anthony’s description of Caesar, the cop is an honorable man.  He should be praised.  He should be rewarded.  He should be followed with unquestioning loyalty.  If not, he will contract blue flu or some other loathsome disease that threatens the funding and the furtherance of the police state.  What isn’t reported is the number of accidents CAUSED by drunk drivers.  They reporters are very clever.  They report data as “alcohol related.”  Many traffic violations are alcohol related because the victim had a drink, not the driver.  The lying bastards don’t even explain the term alcohol related driving.  additionally, there is no records kept on the conditions of the roads, grades, or physical condition of the drivers.  Using this form of logic, one can say that all traffic fatalities are related to breathing.

              In addition, there are the great crackdowns like the Heat is On to shuffle money to the predatory program owners, which rewards such cooking of the books.  Obviously, the police and Court PR learned this from watching Wall Street manipulate the stock market.  Additionally, the push against alcohol has closed one of the great community centers for the exchange of political opinion and information, the bar.  A Wisconsin Criminologist did a 9 volume tome about the function of bars as a point of transmitting culture and of socialization.  With the pressure in bars and taverns, more and more people are drinking at home in isolation from society, bonding with their TV sets and stagnating socially and intellectually.

               Some don’t drink at home.  They toke at home.  However, this activity is generally a solo activity and not a part of social discourse.  We know why this isolation leading policy has been encouraged by the government.  It is to make certain that information is transmitted by television and that TV commentators and advertisers set agendas and transmit well formulated ideas to serve the corporate masters.

              However, it takes money as well as power to fund a police state and to control a population.  And the money is the necessary by-product of these programs.  It is generated and the flow sustained by increasing the nature and substance of crime. 

              Additionally, the Court system is set up to shake down the citizen.  Trials are the exception, not the norm, creating absolutely no feedback to the rulers.  Citizens are forced to abandon and denounce rights guaranteed under any Constitution by creating a legal fiction that to be allowed to drive a car, one has to waive his rights under the constitution which was intended to prohibit just that sort of thing by a State.

              So, the problem is how to keep these programs going in light of an aging population and decline in drinking and socialization.  Well, our masters have solved the problem.  The  solution is to charge drivers with driving under the influence of marijuana.  This has not been serious problem or offense, but that doesn’t matter.  The monster has to be fed.  And no amount of science, statistics, justice or any other obstruction is going to stop the feeding frenzy.

              Driving under the influence of drugs is the new scourge on our society, according to the chicken littles. The flock does not recall the days of the hippy van with the stoner driving down the street, impeding traffic. The press has cited some estimates by government, but no hard data based upon valid research design.  Instead, the problem is created, so that a magic bullet can be found to treat it and more money extracted from the peasantry. This writer does peer review for the International Journal of Drug Policy,  and recalls a recent review concerning drug policy in the European Community.  The European Community has enacted a policy that social policy and law must be research based.  The UK tried to increase penalties for marijuana possession after a change in administration.  It couldn’t be done.  There was no research on which to base the policy.  In fact, research tends to prove the opposite.  It is pointed out that legislatures in the United States are not bound by such restrictions.  In the US, the authorities go to the press, print an anecdotal story and apply it as the common condition, appeal to jealousy, hysteria and fear, thereby greasing the legislative procedure for passage through the legislatures, executive branch and a Court endorsement.  That is because no one in the system has the courage or possibly the intellect to challenge the process.

              So, without any research or reason other than a request by the occupation to do so, legislation is being proposed to put a numerical value on tests for cannabis.  With a magic number of THC in the blood, proof of a driver’s behavior isn’t necessary.  The number product of the test becomes the guilt determinate and can’t be cross-examineded or questioned.  The council of Chief Judge, Public defender and District Attorney will meet and determine how to implement the policy and what reasonable dispositions will be.  There will be no debate or test cases.  There will be no research.  Someone will come up with a rehab treatment for marijuana.  The monster gets fed.

              Ironically, the legislation is being proposed by a State Legislator from Boulder.  One has to wonder if the legislator slept through her school days and afterlife in Boulder.  Upon checking, it is easy to explain her position.  She wasn’t in Boulder when hippies in psychedelic looking Volkswagen busses wandered around town. She was too young.  She didn’t pay any attention to the Stoners driving because they didn’t constitute a problem.  Suddenly, they are a problem.  Why?  Because, the programs are in trouble.  No one has noticed a problem.  There is no data to rely on.  There is just the need to control, the need for money and the need to project the illusion of someone doing something.

              There is one small problem that has not been addressed, however.  That is how to design a program to treat the marijuana problem and how to counter the research from the UK and Canada departments of transportation, as well as the experience of a great percentage of the public who know better.  Also, how can the impairment be established without any discernable erratic driving.  Well the answer is simple.  Stop the car and tell the driver that marijuana is smelled.  When asked if the he has as patient card the cop can then ask when the last time the person medicated.  At that point, the driver is told to stick out his tongue and is told that it is green.  Since the driver can’t see his tongue and the color is imaginary, the officer can confront the driver and he will confess.  He will then fail “voluntary” roadside tests, to then be passed on to a drug recognition expert, trained by prosecutors to get convictions with unassailable testimony and conferred with voodoo science credentials. He then will be told he must submit to a bodily fluid test or immediately lose his driver’s license and “privileges.” 

The test will show a certain content of drugs and a conviction becomes automatic without any relationship to driving ability or performance. Of course, there is no visual record of any of this.  The defendant must rely on the absolute honesty and integrity of the arresting officer.  They are honorable men.  That is, of course until a program becomes threatened or if the electorate votes something into law that the police don’t agree with or approve of.  The officer reads from a script about the stop and tests. Unlike science experiments, these tests can’t be redone by others. They can’t be replicated or even questioned in any objective fashion.  Then comes the Drug Recognition Expert, who testifies that, as an expert the driver was a menace to himself and society. 

              The interesting thing about this procedure is that the proposed test is for either THC or the inactive cannabinoid, THE-COOH, which can stay in the system for weeks.  .  Urine tests, which are relatively cheap, only tests for the cannabinoid, and not the active ingredient will be the test of choice of greedy counties.  Therefore, if anything shows up, there can be a prosecution.

              The other good thing for the police and prosecutors about the numerical value is that the body’s tolerance level  and other factors won’t be considered.  Most pain management physicians, and in fact, most MDs and pharmacologists know about the adjustment factor with medications.  That is why most FDA warning labels caution against operating machinery until the effects can be measured and use adjusted to the dosage.  There are many instances, for instance, where addicts on methadone and oxycotin operate vehicles and even precision machines without incident.  But, that fact can be ignored as inconvenient.  Also, metabolic rates can be ignored.  There is a relatively simple calculation that can be made to calculate the last dosage of THC, which is commonly ignored..  That would be disastrous.  The sole purpose is to make money and justify the billions spent over the last few decades on the drug war.  It isn’t about drugs, it is about a philosophy and belief structure. Marijuana is irrelevant.  Cultural survival is at stake.  We know what reality is.  We experience what we believe and then we confirm with our minds.  The true believers actually see green tongue.  They actually see a drug threat.  They actually see danger and feel compelled to kill for protection.  There is no answer in light of the overwhelming prejudice and ignorance.  The only answer is to recognize things as a structural matter and strive to change the structure.  A good place to start would be to just vote no on all judges.  Next, abolish all the oppressive legislation of the last five decades. Policy should be research based.  And, it should be a felony to lie to a citizen like it is for a citizen to lie to a policeman or Federal agent.  Then maybe there will be some benefit of law to the people and not the occupation force and rulers.  If not forfeit their pensions.