Thanks to a tip from our friends at LEAP, I reported on Tuesday about Iowa Senator Charles Grassley offering an amendment to Senator Jim Webb’s prison reform bill that forbids the commission from recommending the legalization of marijuana or even studying what effect legalization might have on society.  Well, thanks once again to the Tom Angell, blogging for Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, we now have audio of Senator Grassley defending this censorship of science, even as he talks about putting “all options on the table.”  (Catch the audio on tonight’s Stash.)

QUESTION: I hear there was an amendment to a bill tomorrow that would legally prevent some of the government’s top advisers from — according to some of the memos we’ve seen — even discussing the idea of legalizing or decriminalizing drugs.

Can you talk a little bit about that? I understand that you pulled that amendment, but, nonetheless, I wanted to ask you what your intent is with that.

GRASSLEY: Well, my intent on that amendment isn’t any different than any other amendments that are coming up. The Congress is setting up a commission to study certain things. And the commission is a — is an arm of Congress, because Congress doesn’t have time to review some of these laws.

And — and — and the point is, for them to do what we tell them to do. And one of the things that I was anticipating telling them not to do is to — to recommend or study the legalization of drugs.

Their — their program would be what we tell it it is. …

Senator Webb wants to understand why we have 5% of the world’s population but 25% of the world’s imprisoned.  Sen. Webb understands that the War on (Certain American Citizens Using Non-Pharmaceutical, Non-Alcoholic, Tobacco-Free) Drugs™ has a lot to do with it.  Sen. Webb understands that discussion of marijuana legalization must be on the table. I’m not sure which concept is more misunderstood by Senator Grassley: science, democracy, free speech, or justice.  Wait, maybe it’s compassion:

QUESTION: Would your amendment have even stopped the discussion of legalized marijuana for medical purposes?

GRASSLEY: I think that would not — let’s see. Yes, the extent to which it would be decriminalization, the answer is yes.

(Rolling Stone) Political pressure to end the War on Drugs is building in surprising quarters. In recent months, three distinct rationales have converged to convince a growing number of politicians – including many on the center-right – to seriously consider the benefits of legalizing marijuana.

For Webb, a Democrat from Virginia who served as secretary of the Navy under President Reagan, it’s a crisis of incarceration. “Incarcerated drug offenders have soared 1,200 percent since 1980,” the senator says. “Yet the illegal-drug industry and the flow of drugs have remained undiminished.” For Schwarzenegger, who says it is “time for a debate” about legalization, it’s a crisis of cost: A bill in the California legislature to legalize and tax cannabis – the state’s largest cash crop – would provide more than $1 billion annually to balance the state’s busted budget. And for Terry Goddard, the attorney general of Arizona, it’s a crisis of violence: With Baghdad levels of bloodshed raging in Tijuana and other border towns, legalization would deprive Mexican cartels of as much as 65 percent of their illegal income. “Much of the carnage in Mexico is financed because of profits from marijuana,” Goddard told reporters in April. Last month, a Zogby poll that presented all three rationales found, for the first time ever, that a majority of Americans – 52 percent – say they support decriminalizing marijuana.

Legalization is also backed by a growing number of veteran drug warriors. “The War on Drugs is a constantly expanding and self-perpetuating policy disaster,” says Jack Cole, a former undercover narcotics agent who now serves as president of a group called Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, which includes hundreds of former drug agents, police officers and judges. “If all drugs were legal and regulated we could have exactly the same demand for drugs in the U.S., but there wouldn’t be any killings. Mexico’s 7,500 deaths since the beginning of last year – all those murders just wouldn’t exist.”

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In an interview with the Huffington Post, Webb said that everything should be considered. And he means everything.

“I think everything should be on the table, and we specifically say that we want recommendations on how to deal with drug policy in our country. And we’ll get it to the people who have the credibility and the expertise and see what they come up with,” said Webb.

What about legalizing, taxing and regulating marijuana?

Webb paused. “I think they should do a very careful examination of all aspects of drug policy. I’ve done a couple of very extensive hearings on this, so we’ll wait to see what they say about that,” he said.

So it’s on the table? Webb flashed a wry grin, laughing mischievously.

The last government study group to look at drug policy, the 1972 Shafer Commission, recommended that President Richard Nixon decriminalize marijuana. He didn’t.

via Jim Webb: Pot Legalization Could Be Part Of Criminal Justice Overhaul.

It’s the obvious solution nobody can say out loud.  Rep. Rohrabacher said if there was a “blind vote”, marijuana legalization would pass easily.  The Senate, the House, and the President all know it, but they can’t say it for fear of the “soft on crime / soft on drugs” backlash they think would result.

That’s where we come in.  Enough of the public is still mired in “drugs’r'bad mmmkay?” thinking and can’t tell the difference between heroin and marijuana that the prohibitionists are still able to frighten them with “what about the children?” and “pot is a gateway drug”.  We are the ones who have to educate our friends, family, and co-workers about the differences and show them — by example preferably — that they have nothing to fear from legalized marijuana and its users.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Give this honest man your honest support by asking your Senator to support him!

Indeed, even within the United States, not all states have chosen the same path. Louisiana, the state with the highest incarceration rate, locks up more than six times as many of its residents on a per capita basis as Maine. Even neighboring states can differ dramatically – Wisconsin imprisons people at twice the rate of Minnesota, and Arizona’s rate is more than double Utah’s. These state-by-state differences make clear that there is nothing natural or inevitable about high incarceration rates. They are the result of specific policy choices, and those policies can be changed.

There are signs that change may be on the way. Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA), long a critic of America’s love affair with incarceration, has called the US criminal justice system “a national disgrace” and urged “a major nationwide recalculation of who goes to prison and for how long.” On March 26, he led a bipartisan group of Senators in introducing the National Criminal Justice Commission Act of 2009. The bill would create a blue-ribbon commission to conduct a comprehensive review of the criminal justice system, and make recommendations for changes in policies and laws to “reduce the overall incarceration rate while preserving public safety, cost-effectiveness, and societal fairness.”

Our dysfunctional criminal justice system has been a long time in the making, and no one should have any illusions that it will be fixed overnight. But a National Criminal Justice Commission would be an important first step toward ending our shameful status as the world’s leading prison nation.

via – The Huffington Post “Prison Nation“

America’s criminal justice system needs repair. Prisons are overcrowded, sentencing policies are uneven and often unfair, ex-convicts are poorly integrated into society, and the growing problem of gang violence has not received the attention it deserves. For these and other reasons, a bill introduced last week by Senator Jim Webb, Democrat of Virginia, should be given high priority on the Congressional calendar.

Mr. Webb has enlisted the support of not only the Senate’s top-ranking Democrats, including the majority leader, Harry Reid, but also influential Republicans like Arlen Specter, the ranking minority member on the Judiciary Committee, and Lindsey Graham, the ranking member of the crime and drugs subcommittee.

There is no companion bill in the House, and one needs to be written. Judging by the bipartisan support in the Senate, a national consensus has emerged that the criminal justice system is broken.

via – The New York Times “Reviewing Criminal Justice“

Senator Webb’s getting more and more air time on his recently submitted bill. Please contact your elected officials and let them know you support a re-evaluation of our criminal justice system especially in how it pertains to non-violent drug offenders.

With so many of our citizens in prison compared with the rest of the world, there are only two possibilities: Either we are home to the most evil people on earth or we are doing something different–and vastly counterproductive. Obviously, the answer is the latter.

Drug offenders, most of them passive users or minor dealers, are swamping our prisons. According to data supplied to Congress’ Joint Economic Committee, those imprisoned for drug offenses rose from 10% of the inmate population to approximately 33% between 1984 and 2002. Experts estimate that this increase accounts for about half of the dramatic escalation in the total number imprisoned over that period. Yet locking up more of these offenders has done nothing to break up the power of the multibillion-dollar illegal drug trade. Nor has it brought about a reduction in the amounts of the more dangerous drugs–such as cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamines–that are reaching our citizens.

Justice statistics also show that 47.5% of all the drug arrests in our country in 2007 were for marijuana offenses. Additionally, nearly 60% of the people in state prisons serving time for a drug offense had no history of violence or of any significant selling activity. Indeed, four out of five drug arrests were for possession of illegal substances, while only one out of five was for sales. Three-quarters of the drug offenders in our state prisons were there for nonviolent or purely drug offenses. And although experts have found little statistical difference among racial groups regarding actual drug use, African-Americans–who make up about 12% of the total U.S. population–accounted for 37% of those arrested on drug charges, 59% of those convicted, and 74% of all drug offenders sentenced to prison.

via -  Parade Magazine “Why We Must Fix Our Prisons“

I urge you to hit the link to check out the rest of this great article from a Senator from my state of Virginia that most definitely ‘gets it’. Note that that are a few key items in the piece – namely the distinction between hard drugs (cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamines) and soft drugs (marijuana) and that the enforcement of drug laws are racist in nature and implementation.  If your state is acting on or considering prison and sentencing reform, please let Senator Webb’s office know about it.

[This story fits perfectly with my mantra that it's not how wonderful legalizing marijuana could be, it's how awful prohibition of marijuana is that will bring about the change we seek. -- "R"R]

I’m glad Jim Webb didn’t get picked for the VP job last summer, because we need him right where he is.

On Thursday, Webb, along with the ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), introduced a bill to create a commission that would undertake an 18-month study of the criminal justice system and come back with legislative recommendations.

“I think everything should be on the table, and we specifically say that we want recommendations on how to deal with drug policy in our country. And we’ll get it to the people who have the credibility and the expertise and see what they come up with,” said Webb.

What about legalizing, taxing and regulating marijuana?

Webb paused. “I think they should do a very careful examination of all aspects of drug policy. I’ve done a couple of very extensive hearings on this, so we’ll wait to see what they say about that,” he said.

We know what the commission will say about legalizing marijuana. The Shafer Commission recommended decriminalization in 1972, and that’s without the tons of new science on marijuana and it’s health effects. It will be no different this time.

Webb isn’t dismissing our failed war on drugs with some smirk and a chuckle, he knows the score and brought some Congressional Charts to prove his point. He recognizes that our drug laws have been implemented in a racist manner, and that most incarcerated for drug charges are non-violent. In a word, Webb “gets it”.

He expects a “pretty broad range of legislative priorities to come out of it [covering] not just incarceration but the entire panorama of criminal justice.”

“We’ve got a good chance to get this (the commission legislation) done this year,” said Webb, suggesting that the “dramatic” growth of the prison population makes it an issue that needs to be addressed. Webb cited “the exponential growth of incarceration since 1980,” saying that “a huge percentage of that growth has been nonviolent crimes associated with drugs.”

The Webb Sentencing commission might be the best venue for decriminalizing marijuana we have in the next few years. Given the 18 month lag, It’s suggestions would be taken up probably in the 2011 session of congress making the 2010 congressional cycle one of legalizations most important.