From current problems to past abuses

Tramadol is the least effective prescription-only pain medications.

It’s also the least likely to be abused, because its pleasurable effects are only achieved at a dose that is dangerously close to causing Serotonin Syndrome. This is extremely important if you also take antidepressants.

While I recognize the “Opioid Epidemic” as real, it should be relabeled. The Fentanyl Epidemic would be more precise.

Unfortunately, law makers are idiots. The first steps taken were to impose stronger regulations to prescription opiates that are very common and have a very low addiction rate.

This includes Hydrocodone, Oxycodone, dihydrocodeine, codeine, meperdine, and several others.

By forcing doctors to limit their prescriptions for these medications became scarce.

So, very suddenly, someone with a manageable addiction to a chemical that has a very low chance of side effects, was cut off from their source. And in the pains of withdrawal, no longer under the supervision of a doctor, they have to turn to the local dealer.

Now, with no way, legal or illegal, to get their medication, the drug dealer on the corner offers to ease the pains of withdrawal with a needle and some heroin and/or fentanyl. Addiction is now intense, and occurs within a couple of days.

In an incredibly short time, a person is forced into dangerous IV drug use. All thanks to the US government. Someone with a manageable addiction(Which is also far safer to detox), becomes a junkie for the really dangerous stuff. Thank the DEA and FDA for managing things so poorly that a person with a solvable problem turns into a full blown junkie.

This is just the latest attempt for the US Government to try to convince tax payers and voters that there exists a ‘War on Drugs.’ This so-called war is the longest in US History. It has failed, on every front, in every way, every day since its original inception.

Why will my opinion and insight continue to be ignored? Because the ‘War of Drugs’ brings in more money for the agencies executing it than any other source.

This war has been waged by police departments, sheriffs, the DEA, the FDA, and others, and it is making them all more money than you can imagine.

If a search warrant is issued for your home, and they find the smallest piece of illegal drugs, they can seize anything you own claiming it was paid for by the profits from selling drugs. Even if the charges are dropped, or you are found innocent at trial, you never get your stuff back. EVER.

This war that we’ve never even experienced any sort of victory in, is promoted by the use of propaganda. Propaganda taught in schools, on TV, the radio, and physical posters everywhere, don’t help anything at all, and they are lies.

“Marijuana is a gateway drug”
FALSE. Alcohol is far more likely to act as a gateway to hard drugs.

“Marijuana kill brain cells.”
FALSE. Proven false by countless scientific studies.

WHO was ready to publish the results of a test that proved cocaine was healthy, if used every six months, for a day or two, at most. This whole study was buried because the US government threatened to withhold funding. The documents were leaked several years later.

In summary, fuck the government. They are always abusing you. It has nothing to do with political alignment. Governments feed on their citizens poverty. Poverty means less education & less healthy foods, while making sure the individuals in poverty never have access to the tools to change it.

Support sensible and appropriate drug laws.

Ask yourself if the punishment is equal to the crime. Most people imprisoned under drug charges have never hurt anyone. The only reason they are there is because they were unlucky enough to get pulled over.

In 2002, I was pulled over by a county deputy. He claimed I crossed the line, drifting into the other lane. He asked to search my car. I said yes, because saying No means they can say that they saw drugs inside the car. They always get their search. The deputy found a glass pipe(Which, full honesty, I thought I’d lost months prior), and then they found a film container with seeds and stems in it. I’m not saying it was planted, but to this day, I have no clue whose film canister that was.

In many places, cannabis seeds and stems are perfectly legal because they contain no THC. There was less than 1gram of seeds and stems in the container.

My sentence was 24 hours in lock up, a $1000 fine, a year’s probation, and 10 weeks in rehab. If you’ve never been on probation, let me explain it a bit. Once a month for the time you are required, you go into a very small office and hand them a check(Yes, even more money, roughly another $1000 in total), and walk back out.

Does anyone think that was a punishment equal to the crime??

Legalize Cannabis!

Support the complete and total rewriting of drug laws.

RANT MODE: OFF

• Jack Lhasa
• “No one sells drugs. Drugs sell themselves.

If you‘d like to help change these probelm, but dont knw where to start, try NORML.Org