Meanwhile, U47700 remains relatively un-noticed by legislation & causes about a thousand times more damage with zero medical benefit & a growing userbase.

The U.S. government is a bunch of freakin clowns.

It's all about money and for the agency to justify their existence.

There were 14,000 deaths reported with prescription painkillers in the year 2014 alone the news reported today, compare that with the 15 total deaths reported with natural kratom (and these were reported to have been with combinations of kratom with other drugs, many research chems). You tell me which is safer.

The news also reported that addicts can go to their doctor and get buprenorphine prescribed or methadone prescribed and stay on those drugs for a lifetime, think about how much $$$ the prescription drug pushers make! and the doctors! Kratom cannot be patented as it is natural, no money to be made.

Progress of human civilization in the area of defining human freedom is not made from the top down. No king, no parliament, no government ever extended to the people more rights than the people insisted upon. And I think we've come to a place with this psychedelic issue. And we have the gay community as a model, and all the other communities, the ethnic communities. We simply have to say, Look: LSD has been around for fifty years now, we just celebrated the birthday. It ain't going away. WE are not going away. We are not slack-jawed, dazed, glazed, unemployable psychotic creeps. We are pillars of society. You can't run your computers, your fashion houses, your publishing houses, your damn magazines, you can't do anything in culture without psychedelic people in key positions. And this is the great unspoken truth of American Creativity. So I think it's basically time to just come out of the closet and go, "You know what, I'm stoned, and I'm proud, and if that's a problem for you, then buddy, you got a problem"

You see, the hidden issue, and it need not be hidden among us...the government always tries to paint itself as the mother hen, concerned about her errant chicks. And so, to keep you from crashing into other people on the freeway, to keep you from leaping out of buildings or committing society, we have to control these drugs. As a matter of fact, you know, this is absurd. More people die because of alcohol than all illegal drugs combined in a given year. The government is not your friend on this issue.
-terence mckenna

When I wrote this book, I did a lot of research on an area I didn't know that much about, which is, let's say from 1500 to the present, drugs of addiction. And what I discovered is drug smuggling is like assassination. If the government isn't involved, it never seems to really happen. And governments have been using drugs for centuries as forms of secret revenue. This whole sugar thing that I laid out to you, those were decisions made by the crown heads of Europe in collusion with the Pope. It wasn't common people who set those policies in place.

During the 1960's, when the black ghettos began to come apart, suddenly number three China white heroin was cheaper and more available than it had ever been in any time in this history of the heroin problem in the United States. Why? Because the CIA saw, you know, all these black guys are getting up, a bunch of uppity niggers as the government calls them, you just smother it in heroin. Get everybody either hooked or making money...

And they don't care really about the effects of drugs, and one group, one faction will work against another. For example, I'm a great afficianado of hashish, and hashish became very hard to get in the United States in the late 70's. But as soon as the Russians invaded Afghanistan, suddenly there was massive amounts of excellent Afghani hashish, at prices that nobody had seen for fifteen years. Well, the reason was, the CIA knows that hashish is not really a problem. But what they wanted is, they wanted an income for the mujahadin. And they had to pay for all these weapons. So they just started bringing it in wholesale. And it wasn't even a smuggling operation. I mean, I received reports from people who said, you know, 'Smuggling? They're not smuggling. They're unloading it on pier 39, union local 1030 is taking off, you know, five hundred pound blocks of hashish by the tens of thousands.' And the day the Afghan war ended? They staged an enormous series of interlocking busts on their own infrastructure, and they closed it down, and they pulled it to pieces.

When Khomeni kicked out the Shah, the Iranian heroin business then fell under the control of the mulahs, and at that point, suddenly cocaine emerges as a major problem in the United States, because we just switched our supply lines. We could no longer depend on Iranian heroin, because we couldn't depend on these screwy Islamic fundamentalists, so we just turned toward all of these company assets in Honduras and Ecuador and Columbia. Very, very cynical.

You know, it's only been a hundred and twenty years since the so called opium wars. Very few people know what the opium wars, what was the issue in the opium wars. Well, it turns out the British government wanted to deal opium in China, and the Chinese Emperor told them to get lost. And they flipped. And they sent naval units, and they laid siege to several Chinese cities, and they forced the Chinese imperial court to agree that they could deal as much opium as they wanted on the wharves of Shanghai...

The Japanese, when they invaded Manchuria in the Second World War, they immediately began producing heroin and opium in vast amounts, not then as an economic strategy, but as a strategy to break the will of the Chinese population by encouraging addiction, and there was vast amounts of opium addiction. If any of you saw 'The Last Emperor,' you recall that his mistress was severely addicted to opium, and it depicted it in a number of scenes.

So governments have very cynically manipulated drugs, so that the drugs which make it possible for capitalism to function are cheap and freely available, and the drugs which erode dominator values, or cause people to question their situation, are savagely supressed.

This article was first published on August 31, 2008.

1947 to 1951, FRANCE

According to Alfred W. McCoy in The Politics of Heroin in Southeast Asia, CIA arms, money, and disinformation enabled Corsican criminal syndicates in Marseille to wrestle control of labor unions from the Communist Party. The Corsicans gained political influence and control over the docks — ideal conditions for cementing a long-term partnership with mafia drug distributors, which turned Marseille into the postwar heroin capital of the Western world. Marseille’s first heroin laboratones were opened in 1951, only months after the Corsicans took over the waterfront.

EARLY 1950s, SOUTHEAST ASIA

The Nationalist Chinese army, organized by the CIA to wage war against Communist China, became the opium barons of The Golden Triangle (parts of Burma, Thailand and Laos), the world’s largest source of opium and heroin. Air America, the ClA’s principal airline proprietary, flew the drugs all over Southeast Asia. (See Christopher Robbins, Air America, Avon Books, 1985, chapter 9)

1950s to early 1970s, INDOCHINA During U.S. military involvement in Laos and other parts of Indochina, Air America flew opium and heroin throughout the area. Many Gl’s in Vietnam became addicts. A laboratory built at CIA headquarters in northern Laos was used to refine heroin. After a decade of American military intervention, Southeast Asia had become the source of 70 percent of the world’s illicit opium and the major supplier of raw materials for America’s booming heroin market.

1973-80, AUSTRALIA

The Nugan Hand Bank of Sydney was a CIA bank in all but name. Among its officers were a network of US generals, admirals and CIA men, including fommer CIA Director William Colby, who was also one of its lawyers. With branches in Saudi Arabia, Europe, Southeast Asia, South America and the U.S., Nugan Hand Bank financed drug trafficking, money laundering and international arms dealings. In 1980, amidst several mysterious deaths, the bank collapsed, $50 million in debt. (See Jonathan Kwitny, The Crimes of Patriots: A True Tale of Dope, Dirty Money and the CIA, W.W. Norton & Co., 1 987.)

1970s and 1980s, PANAMA

For more than a decade, Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega was a highly paid CIA asset and collaborator, despite knowledge by U.S. drug authorities as early as 1971 that the general was heavily involved in drug trafficking and money laundering. Noriega facilitated ”guns-for-drugs” flights for the contras, providing protection and pilots, as well as safe havens for drug cartel otficials, and discreet banking facilities. U.S. officials, including then-ClA Director William Webster and several DEA officers, sent Noriega letters of praise for efforts to thwart drug trafficking (albeit only against competitors of his Medellin Cartel patrons). The U.S. government only turned against Noriega, invading Panama in December 1989 and kidnapping the general once they discovered he was providing intelligence and services to the Cubans and Sandinistas. Ironically drug trafficking through Panama increased after the US invasion. (John Dinges, Our Man in Panama, Random House, 1991; National Security Archive Documentation Packet The Contras, Cocaine, and Covert Operations.)

1980s, CENTRAL AMERICA

The San Jose Mercury News series documents just one thread of the interwoven operations linking the CIA, the contras and the cocaine cartels. Obsessed with overthrowing the leftist Sandinista government in Nicaragua, Reagan administration officials tolerated drug trafficking as long as the traffickers gave support to the contras. In 1989, the Senate Subcommittee on Terrorism, Narcotics, and International Operations (the Kerry committee) concluded a three-year investigation by stating:

“There was substantial evidence of drug smuggling through the war zones on the part of individual Contras, Contra suppliers, Contra pilots mercenaries who worked with the Contras, and Contra supporters throughout the region…. U.S. officials involved in Central America failed to address the drug issue for fear of jeopardizing the war efforts against Nicaragua…. In each case, one or another agency of the U.S. govemment had intormation regarding the involvement either while it was occurring, or immediately thereafter…. Senior U S policy makers were nit immune to the idea that drug money was a perfect solution to the Contras’ funding problems.” (Drugs, Law Enforcement and Foreign Policy, a Report of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Subcommittee on Terrorism, Narcotics and Intemational Operations, 1989)

In Costa Rica, which served as the “Southern Front” for the contras (Honduras being the Northern Front), there were several different ClA-contra networks involved in drug trafficking. In addition to those servicing the Meneses-Blandon operation detailed by the Mercury News, and Noriega’s operation, there was CIA operative John Hull, whose farms along Costa Rica’s border with Nicaragua were the main staging area for the contras. Hull and other ClA-connected contra supporters and pilots teamed up with George Morales, a major Miami-based Colombian drug trafficker who later admitted to giving $3 million in cash and several planes to contra leaders. In 1989, after the Costa Rica government indicted Hull for drug trafficking, a DEA-hired plane clandestinely and illegally flew the CIA operative to Miami, via Haiti. The US repeatedly thwarted Costa Rican efforts to extradite Hull back to Costa Rica to stand trial. Another Costa Rican-based drug ring involved a group of Cuban Amencans whom the CIA had hired as military trainers for the contras. Many had long been involved with the CIA and drug trafficking They used contra planes and a Costa Rican-based shnmp company, which laundered money for the CIA, to move cocaine to the U.S. Costa Rica was not the only route. Guatemala, whose military intelligence service — closely associated with the CIA — harbored many drug traffickers, according to the DEA, was another way station along the cocaine highway.

Additionally, the Medellin Cartel’s Miami accountant, Ramon Milian Rodriguez, testified that he funneled nearly $10 million to Nicaraguan contras through long-time CIA operative Felix Rodriguez, who was based at Ilopango Air Force Base in El Salvador. The contras provided both protection and infrastructure (planes, pilots, airstrips, warehouses, front companies and banks) to these ClA-linked drug networks. At least four transport companies under investigation for drug trafficking received US govemment contracts to carry non-lethal supplies to the contras. Southern Air Transport, “formerly” ClA-owned, and later under Pentagon contract, was involved in the drug running as well. Cocaine-laden planes flew to Florida, Texas, Louisiana and other locations, including several militarv bases Designated as ‘Contra Craft,” these shipments were not to be inspected. When some authority wasn’t clued in and made an arrest, powerful strings were pulled on behalf of dropping the case, acquittal, reduced sentence, or deportation.

1980s to early 1990s, AFGHANISTAN

ClA-supported Moujahedeen rebels engaged heavily in drug trafficking while fighting against the Soviet-supported govemment and its plans to reform the very backward Afghan society. The Agency’s principal client was Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, one of the leading druglords and leading heroin refiner. CIA supplied trucks and mules, which had carried arms into Afghanistan, were used to transport opium to laboratories along the Afghan Pakistan border. The output provided up to one half of the heroin used annually in the United States and three-quarters of that used in Western Europe. US officials admitted in 1990 that they had failed to investigate or take action against the drug operabon because of a desire not to offend their Pakistani and Afghan allies. In 1993, an official of the DEA called Afghanistan the new Colombia of the drug world.

MlD-1980s to early 199Os, HAITI

While working to keep key Haitian military and political leaders in power, the CIA turned a blind eye to their clients’ drug trafficking. In 1986, the Agency added some more names to its payroll by creating a new Haitian organization, the National Intelligence Service (SIN). SIN was purportedly created to fight the cocaine trade, though SIN officers themselves engaged in the trafficking, a trade aided and abetted by some of the Haitian military and political leaders.

http://www.globalresearc...-in-the-drug-trade/10013

Canada lists kratom as a Natural Health Product, the DEA’s actions not only put it in conflict with the RCC but also with the FDA.

What I don't get is: why does the letter writer only cites Canada's drug laws with respect to Kratom, stating, in idiot's terms to the DEA, that "Just because this is legal over there, means that it should be legal over here."

I'm wondering why the author(s) only mentioned kratom when they made that crybaby argument? If we want to be in-line with our (USA) Northern neighbor, then why not allow codeine to be sold OTC, make MMJ a nationwide thing (and/or as well as move it to our least-restrictive category) and just about adopt the same damn drug policy as they have (which, IMO would be pretty damn cool)? Hell, why not beg the DE-friggin-A to follow Mexico's example, and let the almighty dollar buy us whatever we want at the pharmacy (OTC or not)?

I don't like the logic of this particular argument, and mostly wanted to state that this argument makes the author sound like a spoiled rotten child begging their parents to let them have their favorite toy just because their bestest friends' parents' let them play with it, too. Please, bitchslap me across the PFC if i'm wrong here with all the word sperm you can piss my way, but I must insist that I find this particular "just because they get to play with Kratom, we should, too, mummy" style of juvenille beggary dressed up as a formal complaint does nothing but weaken their pleas Before the Law to keep kratomaholics on the streets, and out of the Sheriff's Station.

So load up if that's your plan

The United states uses their political influence to insure that the rest of the world conforms to their drug laws...

a good deal of it ties into my last rant regarding government manipulation of drugs and their contraband status.

Obviously regulation and legalization is the answer, my last rant explains why the United states government is fighting it, even though it's clearly the logical choice.

You can't have a free society and a drug free society.

I honestly hope kratom avoided scheduling, does anybody have an update on this plants currant status?

-eg

Soooo Should we petition the DEA to adopt Canada's drug policy as well, or what?

With a week to go, the We The People petition has gathered the requisite number of votes to get a response from the Whitehouse. I doubt it'll do any good, but it sends a message that this isn't a fringe issue and that people actually care about this.

https://petitions.whiteh...tom-schedule-i-substance

I've got to say, the petition could have been much better written.

Given his past statements on the drug war, I'm sort of hoping that maybe Obama will direct the DEA to stand down. This is one area where he actually has executive control, since kratom has not been banned by the legislature.

That said, the right would tear into him (and possibly Sec. Clinton) as pandering to drug addicts, which probably isn't politically expedient.

I expect we'll get thrown under the bus.

Blessings
~ND

Progress of human civilization in the area of defining human freedom is not made from the top down. No king, no parliament, no government ever extended to the people more rights than the people insisted upon. And I think we've come to a place with this psychedelic issue. And we have the gay community as a model, and all the other communities, the ethnic communities. We simply have to say, Look: LSD has been around for fifty years now, we just celebrated the birthday. It ain't going away. WE are not going away. We are not slack-jawed, dazed, glazed, unemployable psychotic creeps. We are pillars of society. You can't run your computers, your fashion houses, your publishing houses, your damn magazines, you can't do anything in culture without psychedelic people in key positions. And this is the great unspoken truth of American Creativity. So I think it's basically time to just come out of the closet and go, "You know what, I'm stoned, and I'm proud, and if that's a problem for you, then fella, you got a problem"

Patterson makes it sound as if the DEA had no idea Americans were using kratom for medical purposes, even though it discusses those uses in its explanation of the ban. The storm of protest from medical users of kratom, which included a demonstration near the White House on Tuesday, "was eye-opening for me personally," Patterson says. "I want the kratom community to know that the DEA does hear them. Our goal is to make sure this is available to all of them." And what better way to do that than banning all kratom products?
Patterson's comments are surprising, not least because they contradict conclusions the DEA already has reached about kratom, a pain-relieving leaf from Southeast Asia that recently gained a following in the United States as a home remedy and recreational intoxicant. Explaining why it decided to ban kratom, the DEA says "available information indicates that [mitragynine and 7-hydroxymitragynine, kratom's main active ingredients] have a high potential for abuse, no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States, and a lack of accepted safety for use under medical supervision." Those are the criteria for Schedule I, which Patterson now says is not appropriate for kratom.

Although the DEA does not have to demonstrate that kratom meets the criteria for Schedule I to put it there temporarily, it goes to great lengths to show that kratom has "a high potential for abuse," mainly by classifying everything people do with it as abuse. Under the CSA, drugs in the top two schedules are all supposed to have a "high potential for abuse," while drugs in lower schedules (III through V) are supposed to have progressively less abuse potential. Patterson suggests a drug cannot have a high potential for abuse unless it is "highly addictive," which kratom is not. Yet neither are many other substances in Schedule I, including marijuana, qat, LSD, psilocybin, mescaline, MDMA, and dimethyltryptamine, assuming addictiveness is measured by the percentage of people who become heavy users after trying a drug. Evidently a drug need not be highly addictive to be placed in Schedule I.

Nor does the DEA define abuse potential based on the hazards a drug poses. Chuck Rosenberg, the agency's acting administrator, notes that "Schedule I includes some substances that are exceptionally dangerous and some that are less dangerous (including marijuana, which is less dangerous than some substances in other schedules)." Emphasis mine, because people tend to assume that Schedule I is a list of what the DEA considers to be the world's most dangerous drugs. The DEA does not see it that way. "It is best not to think of drug scheduling as an escalating 'danger' scale," Rosenberg says.

If "high potential for abuse" does not refer to addictiveness or to danger, what does it signify? Nothing more than the DEA's (or Congress's) arbitrary preferences. "High potential for abuse" is a political concept, not a medical or scientific assessment. If the DEA (or Congress) does not like a particular kind of drug use, that use is abuse by definition. Since the DEA does not recognize any legitimate medical or recreational use for marijuana, LSD, or kratom, the abuse potential of these drugs is demonstrated by the fact that humans consume them.

In addition to applying a highly elastic definition of drug abuse, the DEA says a controlled substance must be placed in Schedule I, regardless of its abuse potential, unless it has "a currently accepted medical use." So even though marijuana is less dangerous and less addictive than drugs in lower schedules, it has to stay in Schedule I until the DEA decides there is enough evidence to demonstrate its medical utility. Likewise with kratom.

Although Patterson, the DEA spokesman, says "kratom's at a point where it needs to be recognized as medicine," the DEA says otherwise. It notes that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has not approved kratom as a treatment for any medical condition. Nor is the FDA considering any applications to approve kratom as a medicine. "Kratom does not have an approved medical use in the United States and has not been studied as a treatment agent in the United States," the DEA says. As far as the DEA is concerned, that means kratom cannot possibly have a currently accepted medical use.
http://reason.com/blog/2...atom-dea-says-it-might-b