Issue In Focus

“As has been well documented, I smoked pot as a kid, and I view it as a bad habit and a vice, not very different from the cigarettes that I smoked as a young person up through a big chunk of my adult life. I don’t think it is more dangerous than alcohol.” That is a direct quote from President Barack Obama, from an interview with David Remnick in the January 27, 2014 edition of the New Yorker Magazine. That may be the only part of the interview that a lot of folks have heard about. It's an incredible interview, well worth the read, and it's available for free online at
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2014/01/27/140127fa_fact_remnick?cur…

The new Drug War Facts Podcast is online! This week we speculate about tonight's state of the union address, hear from US Attorney General Eric Holder about federal sentencing reform, learn how states are reducing their prison populations, and find out about sexual violence behind bars. Download, listen, and subscribe from:
http://www.podcastgarden.com/podcast/drugwarfacts
The RSS feed to subscribe is
http://www.podcastgarden.com/podcast/podcast-rss.php?id=1642
And the URL to listen to and download the new podcast, Ep #12, is

The new Drug War Facts Podcast is online! This week: President Richard Nixon talks with Art Linkletter about drugs and how alcohol is better than marijuana; research shows blacks more likely to be arrested than whites; school drug testing ineffective. Listen, download, and subscribe!

Issue In Focus

The new Monitoring the Future Survey results for 2013 were released recently.

In discussing the new data in a video released on YouTube, Dr. Nora Volkow, the director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, said this: “If we compare the numbers that were, for example, in 2000 regular users, and now in 2013, we have seen increases in those numbers. But in 2000, at the 2000 level of 9 THC was at least half of the levels that we observe now, at least half. So that means that not just were there less kids taking the drug regularly, but even those that were taking it regularly were taking a much less potent drug.”

The new Drug War/Drug Policy Facts podcast is dedicated to the 55,014 people now in state prison serving time for drug possession. This week: a new prisoner report; survey shows majority support for marijuana legalization; Playing Safe(ly) with Eddie Einbinder; harm reduction & drug user organizing with Ruth Kanatser; and talking weed with Mickey Martin. Download and subscribe from http://www.podcastgarden.com/episode/drug-policy-facts-9_8866