by Russel Norman
The Greens are founded on a series of interdependent principles – sustainability, justice, peace and democracy. This piece from Grist nicely illustrates the way that the four of them are linked in a regime which is not democratic or just, uses violence against its citizens, and is destroying forests. We are probably importing the forests illegally cut down in Myanmar, sent to China, made into furniture, then sold at a store near you.
How Green Was Myanmar’s Valley?
Myanmar quickly being deforested for world timber trade, quick cash
Posted at 11:32 AM on 17 Oct 2007
Ever wonder what the military government of Myanmar is up to when it’s not quashing peaceful, pro-democracy protests? According to environmental groups, the regime has allegedly been profiting from large-scale illegal logging operations that feed sawmills across the border in China. Green group Global Witness estimates that up to 95 percent of Myanmar’s timber exports to China are illegal. Trade in imperiled-species body parts and extensive mining for precious metals and gems are also lucrative deals allegedly supported or aided by the junta. In the past 10 years, over 20 dams have either been built in Myanmar or are planned; at least a few dams in the works would provide electricity to China and Thailand. A dam planned for the Irrawaddy River is expected to displace some 10,000 residents and also harm fish. “This region is one of the world’s biodiversity hot spots,” said environmentalist Naw La. “If this dam is built on the Irrawaddy, the fish populations will decrease. A lot of people will be suffering because their livelihoods will disappear.” All of which makes for a catchy bumper sticker: If you want biodiversity, work for justice … Or something like that.
Published in Environment & Resource Management by Russel Norman on Thu, October 18th, 2007
Tags: environment
More posts by Russel Norman | more about Russel Norman
on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
New Zealand property mass marketed to foreigners, (despite an overloaded energy infrastructure) to line the pockets of the rich property developer backers of ACT and National.
Same thing but different
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This is an example of a correlation, not cause and effect – Burma’s rulers are unjust and are decimating the environment. It is conceivable you could have a socially just regime also damaging the environment. In fact you could almost argue that the two dont go hand in hand because to give people a better standard of living and build infrastrucuture you need to initially hock of your raw materials. And why shouldn’t they use their raw material to overcome poverty? If you argued the opposite you would be neocolonialist, paternalistic and patronising wouldnt you?
What is needed is for thee developed nations to put their money where their mouths are and give targeted assistance to grow a clean green economy in their country in return for assurances on social justice and envrionmental responsibility. But that will be the frosty friday because we cant even do that here ourselves because the elfties are hell bent on wasting all the money we could be using to grow our own infrastruture. If we were a wealthy nation we could now be helping Burma in a postive way.
JH I share some of the philophies of those two parties and I dont know any rich property developer backers of those parties. I dont really get your outburst in the context of this post, but putting an end to our exporting our land to hide our no good successive leftie governments’ inability to provide sustainable long term proper clean green employment to its people is one of the most serious environmental issues facing this country I agree.
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There is an elephant in the room (a taboo/stigma which means the thread isnt followed constructively) every time this linkage is made, but here we go again:
Burma is world #2 supplier of opium (after Afganastan). Notice the ‘War on Drug’s links into the general social ecology (or lack thereof) once again.
and here in the so called democrisy of NZ-where 3000 extra police are recruited (but here is no real reduction in crime);
where cannabis law review supporters get shafted big time (actually all of nz got shafted because were all paying for blackmarket and defective health promotion, repression etc etc);
where the Green Party (despite having two Normlites on board) is too feeble to advocate decriminalisation as a health law and order initiative, while more and more grossly overpriced prisons are built to house dope-growing Maori;
and where hemp is not on the agenda as carbon-neutral environmental tonic, drought resistant, erosion and nitrite ameliorating, rich in potential for biofuel, and as a food source (seed in particular);
and where the ministry of health reputedly has a ‘gagging order’ to stop experts investigating cannabis POLICY or gps discussing med use with patients……
It never ceases to amaze me how un-holistic the Green Party is when it comes to DRUG (incl alc and tob) policy in NZ, or should i say SOCIAL policy. The justice spokesperson has opinion on ‘the way were drinking’ but never mentions pot anymore (having swallowed advice from media and other political parties to let it go), the co-leader actively discoruages advocacy becaue it might cost votes, and keith lock has not mentioned cannabis since he got on television the night he got elected by it in 1999.
(and pooh poohs the idea that the War on Drugs is instrumental in the War on Terror)
That is foolish because:
1. it set the precedent, and normalised the erosion of civil liberties.
2. it has the same bogus rhetoric
3. it provokes the problem (black market/alienation)
4. it features the same law enforcement stakeholders and ‘get tough’ poli’s.
5. the black market funds the ‘terrrorists’/or is traded for arms.
6. it ‘crops up’ in the same geographical locations (eg even BAYOFPLENTY)
7. it is rotten to the core
That sounds pretty fundmental to me Greens. Cannabis should be your number one issue, not number 42 (if it’s even that much attention given).
Forget Burma, China and Achmed Zowrie. the real insidious policy is going on right under our Noses in NZ and its called ‘prohibition’.
Come on frog bloggers. most of you dont like cannabis (wrongly) i’m sure but please face the fact that half a million kiwis do, and prohibition’s total failure is generating a hell of a lot of negative karma in NZ, socially and ecologically. IT is also Helen Clarks big social justice ‘archilles heel’ because she know as well as I do what a gross fraud is underpinning her coalition support agrements.
regards,
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weedeater, you certainly talk like one who reads norml, though thats not a bad thing.
cannabis and certain other drugs should be legalised, if not because of the intrusion on liberties, then on the basis of the amount of money spent combatting the drugs, i am certainly in favour of regulation, but prohibition doesint work, hasint another high ranking british cop just said something on the matter?
on the topic of our liberties i wouldint support the election finance bill now, though intitaly i seem to remmeber making a submission for it. people have a right to promote what they like so long as it does not harm others, even if it is unfair, ultimatly its up to the people to decide who to vote for, not the person with the most money, if the voters knew enough about politics then the amount of money wouldint matter (and the national vote would be substantialy lower)
and on another off topic topic, the national party was accualy quite onto it with the school lunches thing, even if their goal was realy quite different, the provision of school lunches, maybe breakfast and such aswel, would be much more effective in helping under privledged children.
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The war on drugs doent work because the first world expects the third world to do their dirty work for them. We should help these countries become modern global partners and combine forces to fight drugs. There is accumulating evidence that marijuana is a dangerous drug. The same people who want pot leaglised want smoking banned because “multinationals make money out of people’s suffering”. Pathetic hypocrits, ban them both.
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true sapient. i read norml and im not called weedeater for nothing youknow! No doubt the herb is not unknown in Myanmar either, along with the opium poppy (billions of them).
yes prohibition costs heaps, doesnt work, funds organised crime, is the bread and butter of the nz crime scene, and terrorism, hurts people, alienates non-voting kiwis and invades liberties (and restricts our environmental options viz hemp), but also corrupts law enforcement and renders politics a nasty little ‘get tough’ dumbed-down game, and underpins global insecurity and the inability of our leaders to put genuine solutions in place for just about every problem.
(and i resent my taxes going into thousands of extra police and prison beds while michael cullen says we cant have tax cuts without reductions in ‘essential services’ . Is criminalisation an essential service? No thanks I’ll pass on that one in favour of hospitals, schools and conservation.
you mention the elections finances bill Sapient. What was the big stink about last election? – um… exclusive brethren. And what was key to their attack on the green party? – um a cannabis ‘irresponsibility’ insinuation was certainly in there. I still have their pamphlet- it was bullshit but the greens never defended that aspect of the EB propaganda. Cannabis was key also to United Future’s big success in 2002,and now underwriting NZ1 and UF coalition support agreements.
An issue that wont go away Russel.
too often the soloution proffered to states with big illicit crops(be it opium, cocaine or hash) is ‘target assistance and crop substitution, empowering people etc etc’.
(the media is full of this one sided prohibitoin predicated advocacy)
bollacks, if there was any genuine mechanism for this Afganastan wouldnt be back at Number one for opium completely out of control, despite ‘occupatoin forces’.
let them grow the plants and let there be regulated markets with proper health infromation about the risks of drug use (as we do with alcohol and tobacco). I dont care if people shoot up and function well in society, and dont spread aids and hep c. Prohibition makes all these negatives happen. when the swiss provided heroin for addicts, there was a massive increase in employment, stable housing,reduction in overdoses, disease etc,and they were also hugely more likely to cease the habit. Look at asia and the problems with drugs under prohibiton – death penalty not uncommon either. Deforestation for opium poppy fields in Myanmar…WORK IT OUT RUSSEL.
in the case of pot in NZ, there are half a million people in covert defiance precisely because the nanny state is trying to tell them they are too stupid to handle the risks and make an informed choice.
The greens were so sensitive about pot last 2 elections they failed to include this in their campaigns, which has weakend their overall credibility, empowered the conservative bigots, and gave liscence to the ongoing abuse of the evidence base for harm minimisation (which again the greens have nothign to say about). even their med pot bill sells short the real cause and keeps being delayed because ‘they cant get the numbers in the house to pass it’. Well youre never going to get the numbers if you dont ADVOCATE.
the more silent the greens are on cannabis the more of an albatross around their necks it becomes, and the harder it gets to deconstruct prohibition and get that bloody useful plant back into our environment.
bring back the rasta mp who once claimed to be a ‘social ecologist’, I reckon….
if you want ecological sustainability Russel, Nandor and Keith, start looking at the glaring ‘social justice’ ommission in your range of issues. Russel, you present well, and have a good brain. How about using it? – and how about engaging us pot people who really want to support you and get you votes, but cant while youre playing chicken
regards, Weedeater
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Cannabis is a plant Kevin. so is the poppie, so is the cocoa tree. it is a bit silly to fight plants when it only creates a big, dangerous black market.
read my earlier posting again. there are many reasons prohibiotn is bad news. your claim that legalisers want tobacco banned is a feeble ‘straw man’ argument. I would like to see both regulated r18 along with alchohol in harm reduction context that means people are empowered to say no and cananbis doesnt need to be smoked (ive not smoked it for 10 years or so but still manage to get high most days – can you guess how?)
as for accumulating evidence.
the researchers and media, prevention groups, police and politicians all reinforce each other on this have a vested interest in prohibiton. researchres get funding, media get ‘stories’ which means they get $$$ etc etc. (and in the case of mental health effects they pretend repression and persecution and lies and hypocrisy dont affect mental health…)
You are pretty niave to think its about 1st and 3 worlds. its about a stupid, dysfunctional, corrupt and socially unjust way to handle a major health issue.
thanks Sapient for your comments. Russel you are lucky frogblog sometimes chews up my posts because I had anohter go at pointing the bone at you..just think about the fact that they are growing poppies where there was forest in Myanmar, and no doubt happy to use the death penalty for addicts as is common practice in Asia.
cheers
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The illicit trade in green and white agricultural substances, currently subject to free trade embargoes courtesy of the UN will be going under the spotlight in Vienna 2008. Weedeater is right. It’s Prohibition stupid. A global trade (hang on, isn’t banned) worth more than the economy of ALL of China. And only to Arms themselves. Bigger than textiles, Bigger than Oil. Firchrissake Greens, ‘drop the double standards’ and kick the elephant out of the room.
More Elephants in the Room….
* Former British Drug Czar Mo Mowlam Calls for Total Global Legalization, Cites Need to Quit Funding Political Violence
* Legalising cannabis ‘would break terrorist link’
* General Public: Opinion August – December 2002 New research shows public bear the brunt of drug policy failure
yadda yadda….
Lets see if the Green heirachy (esp: Keith Lock) can Google “Mo Mowlam” and “drug Policy” and avoid the words terrorism and foreign policy!
try this one http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle-old/256/mowlam.shtml
Or very relevant to NZ Scoop: David Lange – Mo Mowlam – Peace heroes remembered Mo Mowlam contributed to a peace accord after 400 years of secular warfare and terrorism in Ireland, and bravely advocated the logic of genuine, … http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO0508/S00257.htm
The Elephant in the ‘terrorism’ room IS DRUG POLICY.
As is DRUG POLICY = CRIMINAL POLICY.
(this from my blog http://mildgreens.blogspot.com)
The Chief Constable of North Wales Police Richard Brunstrom, recommends in a report published today, that his Police Authority officially support his call for the legalisation and regulation of drugs, as part of their submission to the drug strategy consultation being conducted by the [UK] Government. He also recommends that they affiliate to Transform Drug Policy Foundation [Founder, top cop Eddie Ellison who visited NZ see LEAP TOUR] The Authority meets on Monday 15 October to discuss the recommendations.
Danny Kushlick, Transform Director said:
“We are absolutely delighted at Mr Brunstrom’s paper. The Chief Constable has displayed great leadership and imagination in very publicly calling for a drug policy that replaces the evident failings of prohibition with a legal system of regulation and control for potentially dangerous drugs”.
“Mr Brunstrom’s call is less surprising when you consider that prohibition, and the illegal markets it creates, is the single largest cause of crime in the UK , generating £100 billion in crime costs alone over the last ten years.
see Transform Drug Policy Foundation: Media Blog: Drugs prohibition is ‘unworkable and immoral’ says Chief Constable
Firchrissake.. some holistic advocacy.
I didnt go to the protests today.. because the media played the race card.
And I’ll have no part of it. The reporting is white privilege through and through. When they are ready to ‘report’ the real story… then we can fix what’s broken.
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How many NZ pot smokers are you going to jail Kevin?
All 500,000 of us?
The war on drugs is a war on drug users. It is a war that can never be won no matter how much wishful thinking you do. Consider, everything that could be done to prohibit cannabis is already being done, and it doesn’t work – pot is very available, and very highly used. What more will YOU do to make the war on drugs work? Increase penalties? Increase customs staff? Spray crops with pesticides? Confiscate people’s property? All being done already – but only a drop in the ocean. Maybe you could have checkpoints on the street with drug tests to pass and interment camps for people who fail a test? That might make a dent in usage rates.
Also, there is no accumulating evidence that marijuana is a dangerous drug, all the real evidence, i.e. that which is published in peer reviewed journals, shows that pot is a relatively harmless drug, especially when compared to the legal drugs. Tell me Kevin, do you also believe there is accumulating evidence that anthropogenic global warming doesn’t exist? Because the evidence that says that pot is dangerous is of a similar standard to the global warming skeptic evidence, i.e. both are a load of cobblers that is then agressively promoted by vested interests and the MSM.
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right on stuey and blair.
(-Bad news for the NZ tax payer. To jail half a million ‘criminals’ is going to require an additional 996 new prisons…. )
my post that got chewed up, Russel appeared there after all, so apologies for duplication and putting the boot in so much about the Greens feeble cannabis stance (or total lack thereof), but no doubt you get the general drift about prohibition being as close as we get to the root of all evil in hte modern age.
hope everyones having a good three day break. It is a pity its called Labour weekend because the ‘labour’ govenment is now full of knobs who havent done a days real work in their lives. Similarly who was the pro right wing spark who named our ‘independent’ public radio ‘Radio New Zealand National’. Amazing helen and co swallowed that, but then the labour party is New National anyway.
speaking of which:
Kevin -on the basis of your facile ‘drug fighting’ stance, I was wondering if you were a National party plant (if you forgive the pun). maybe work for John Key as cheif press secretary or something?
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Nup, way off although its fun to see someone accusing me of that when I’m so used to seeing people being accused of 9th floor sttoges on kiwiblog.
I’ve seen the damage done by drugs to family (my sister’s death), friends and of course Maori. There’s got to be a better way but its not crazy ideas of “get it leaglised under very restricitve conditions and then we can chip away at liberalising it further”. Drugs destry lives and keep people down where the politicians want them.
How about legalising all pharmaceuticals for over 18s? Many of those actually do some good. Anyone sitting on the fence on this issue should seriously question the motives of the people above if they dont agree with this idea.
If you agree to restricitve and unchangebale conditions then I will reconsider my stance and perhaps even support you. Here are some conditions to get the ball rolling: life=life for anyone who kills or maims while under the influence of drugs; full restoration for victims even if the person has to work the rest of their life to pay it of and drug/alcohol/tobacco users pay the full cost of their health services.
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The attribution that ‘drugs’ keep people down where politicians like them is just so much twaddle… substitute ‘alcohol and tobacco, use or vending’ and you’ll see how stupid Kevin’s postulates appear. The stakeholder interest is maintaining the status quo is entirely the art of politics today. It drive the half witted ‘sensible sentencing crowd into a frenzy pf applause but lacks any common sense. The locked up forever mentality that pervades contemporary politics is completely at odds with what is right, proper and effective let alone cost efficient, conduct In a civil society.
I [partially] recall Winston Churchill made an impressive speech on this when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer (circa about 1910) – ‘we shall be measured as a civilisation by how we treat those who have erred against us’ (or some such) and went on to espouse the merits of restorative justice. If we can do that for ‘the incarcerated’ then it follows that we can also do that for the ill, even if it was a lifestyle choice. To say a given case of prostate cancer IS caused by ‘lifestyle’ in any one case is to lack any notion of fundamental science OR justice. The concept ‘there being justice’ in so doing beggers belief.
If one was to have a referendum, doubtless the baying for blood would see a >51% (recall Sensible Sentencing got 96% on even a badly worded question) support for lockem-up-forever… none of which has ever been shown to work.
Whereas ALL the evidence now points to politics complicit in the crime industry (judges, corrections, lawyers, police, treatment, etc… )
I have in the past called this malfeasance. I reassert same here and now.
The evidence is increasingly supportive of the complicit nature of politics in its perpetual (chronic) failure to protect (and deliver justice to) the wider community.
see http://mildgreens.blogspot.com/2007/10/drugs-strategy-debate-is-sham.html
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Blair you can spin the truth all you like but no-one has ever argued that pot smokers be locked up. But anyone who does harm to another through malice or irresponsibility should be made to fix it.
And as for this claptrap about judging a society on how well it treats those that have erred….never mind what it does to the majority of society eh?
A better Winston quote:
“Any man who is under 30, and is not a liberal, has not heart; and any man who is over 30, and is not a conservative, has no brains.” – Winston Churchill, Sir (1874-1965)
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Maybe the feedback on censored comment needs to be improved here – when a laborious (no relation) letter got scrapped I over-reacted – and that one got printed! Oh My!!!
Incidentally, Stuey, those checkpoints are on their way – might be here by Christmas….I think there are too many abridging issues involved to rush ANY Legislation through without carefull study and Public Deposition.
If there is a financial outlay involved in getting it right, it would be dwarfed by the cost of getting it wrong.
As far as recreational use goes, I prefer the idea of Decriminalization instead of outright Legalization.
Why? Simply because it has worked and worked well – right next door in two electorates in Australia. We have examples to study.
Maybe insead of 60 Minutes running with completely red-necked scare-mongering – they could do a genuinely interesting and informative piece on just how this is working. It hasn’t made the MSM simply because there has been nothing to report by way of harm done – no scandal – and I assure you, they draw the longest bow in trying to sensationalize and make anyone or anything look bad.
Maybe you saw the piece where they found this woman who fell asleep at the wheel. Because there was THC in her system they got her to break down on National (no relation) TV and confess to the evils of pot. Too much Chrissy Cake (all that sherry) can make you fall asleep too – perhaps that stuff should be banned!
It is already incumbent (I hope) on every driver to make sure they are clear-headed and focussed enough to drive well – certainly I check this most carefully before say, hopping on my motorbike (or driving a car) – I’ll pay a life sentence for any mistakes there, and a trip through the Spinal Ward of a big Australian Hospital was one of the more sobering experiences of my life. The place was full of teenaged quadriplegics. Sad sad sad.
And yeah – decriminalization de-moneyed organised crime there on a scale that no one expected – that’s why I say it worked real well.
Currently – large quantities of pot is handled by some people who trade in every kind of vice imaginable – it is their money base – pure and simple.
I am anti-drug/tobbacco/alcohol abuse (total prohibition for many many dangerous chemicals) as I hope most people would be.
The Medical Dose of THC for pain is approximately one tenth the dose that a casual recreational user might consume – no these people are NOT ‘stoned’.
I did see a program on the pre-Med testing programme in the UK. A couple of happy elderly women who had been delivered from their crippling pain.
As a volunteer on call-out (a former life now), there wasn’t one trauma I attended where our old friend booze wasn’t the central culprit. Casually talking to our thin Blue Line, and attending court to see what happened only confirmed this – problem drinker after drinker after drinker….
The people I have met who have run over children while in a drunken stupor are serving a life sentence in that narrowest of confines – the human head. You won’t catch them laughing about anything much.
Yet there are no warning labels on booze bottles – easily our most dangerous drug – it’s Pharmacologically worse than Heroin.
Maybe labels just don’t look sexy – but hey, all those people are not necessarily laughing WITH you.
Happy Labour Day, time to have a wild celebration – a cup of tea and a biccy and a reflection on Wally Nash, MJ Savage, Big Norm, Dave Lange and maybe, just maybe – some modern-day heroes in the making….cheers mark
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stuey said:..
“..Maybe you could have checkpoints on the street with drug tests to pass..”
um..!..isn’t that what metiria/the greens are campaigning for..?
and kevin ..have you hear this one…?
there comes a time when an (oft-repeated/cited) aphorism can tip into over-used-cliche/simplistic drivel..
that churchill quote is way past that date..
eh..?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
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Im glad you’ve got a sence of humour Kevin, im sorry about your sister and the devastation of Maori but you may find prohibition played /plays the key role in these – if it was an overdose check ‘swiss’ comments above.
the fact is Kev, pot quite possibly aint that bad. if it correlates with ‘dropouts and crims and underclass’ that is the alienation factor of the law at work to some large extent.
(although I may conceed pot may affect memory a little but still managed an arts degree under the influence)
and you phil seem to be putting hte boot into the greens support of ‘cannabis driving’ is unsafe mentality in parliament….
yes that is dodgy..
We know it aint bad at all, A, I do it all the time and still manage to drive safely and efficently if not more so because of the ‘awareness’ factor.
But at least you have to give a little credit to them insisting a positive result should not also be a misuse of drugs act crime. I reckon the police basically wont notice if someones stoned, and it will be business as usual with stoners and cars.
however maybe the Greens should not be tinkling with anomalous driver safety legislation, and getting back to ‘first principles’ and getting cannabis into class D where it belongs (but even the med bill forgets this ligical ‘order in council’ option).
Pity about that 5% threshold, as it has somewhat stymied and divided cannabis reform support in the NZ community. the support is massive, Why aint it happening…
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Weedeater
Just where do you get the idea that support for legalizing dope is “massive”, there is nobody that I know who supports this move.
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how can we deny the scientific/data-based strength of bb’s argument..
and shouldn’t that be..nobody you know says they support ‘legalising dope’..?
in your presence..?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
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yep it depends what circles you move in and whose afraid of whos a narc. . there is also a ‘manufactured consent factor’ depending on who’s winning hte debate at any one time in the media (which tends to load the negative propaganda constantly),
I still have th chch press clipping from about 10 days before the 1999 election where LABour, Act, Greens (of course), Alliance, even NZ1 supported looking into if not decriminalisation itself. (yep even NZ1)
National were looking very lonely and got pummeled by the voter sentiment as the Nandor party took centre stage.
talk to kids (of course they wont talk to you if they know youre a prohibitoinist) but the bunch of 4th formers from hagley high i ran into the other week couldnt give me enough ‘high fives’ when they saw my Norml cap and found out i’m on hte ‘legalise cananbis committee’….
incidently they first started talking to me because they saw me clearing litter from around the Antigua St Bridge (chch) and gave me a round high fives for that first.
there was ten of them and I had to give them a boring ‘r18 health message’ so much for the big success of grice and Scotts ‘great brain robbery’.
similarly there was an auckland high school voter survey where ALCP got something like 18% from one school -found that on google I think.
but also talk to any bogan / underclass / maori youth and plenty of the middle class tokers (amongst the staticitical estimate of half a million kiweeds). many of course say ‘who cares we smoke it anyway’ but sometimes you just have to put the case to people who dont even smoke and they will say ‘yes i agree with you’ (A Maori JP lady I spoke to in Port Chalmers one time).
at one point even annette king and helen clark and trevor mallard were advocates but got cold feet real quick when the education sector closed ranks. (but individually and covertly, many teachers will admit the is a legitimate debate about the legal status). Just dont expect anyone to shout it from the mountain tops, except perhaps the ALCP and all power to them if only the media would give them a go.
So dont delude your self big bro. A lot of people hate the police becasues of what they steal under the misuse of drugs act.
when surveyed the reform support tends to hover between 30% and 60% depending on which way the wind is blowin (the 60% support survey was from from the Dominion newspaper 8 or 10 years ago).
people respond to advocacy on this like nothing else, but unfortunately the Greens are not prepared (or principled enough) to front foot it and nail the debate. that may cost them cananbis support.
regards
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I should also say it depends verry much on how the question is put -notice i said ‘cannabis law reform’ not legalisation which has connotations many dont like and who would be comfortable about an unfettered market? Nor am i comfortable with the ‘all drugs’ thing either. Cannabis home grow will do nicely for starters – its the non-crime of prevalence in NZ.
Regulation or decriminalisation or removing ‘criminality from cannabis’ are all more palatable than legalisation, but then there’s people who consider
decriminasation to mean instant fines which went down like a lead balloon last election.
Instant fines also caused the youth parliament to have an anomalous split on their 2000 cannabis debate, because some supporters of reform saw instant fines as ‘no solution’ leaving only a small faction trying to convey reform sentiment by voting for it: end result, it looked like the majority opposed cannabis law reform (set up to fail?????)
but really it comes down to an evidence base, not peoples prejudices.
interestingly Helen clark has said she supports Partial Prohibition which translates as ‘adults personal use and cultivation without penalty’ or GREEN Party Policy (unless Russel really has got it written out)
same solution as advocated by prof Pennington et al (victoria, aust, 1996) and he’s the one who called it a necessary ‘social adjustment’ according to the EVIDENCE BASE, but he described it also as LEGALISATION for adults personal use and cultivation (5plants).
Also funnily enough it is the ALCP’s policy minimum programme (including penningtons ‘expungement’ rec as well), and when the SElect committee had hearings up and down the country in 2001 ,they kept asking submitters ‘what the legal age should be?’.
but NZ has gone backwards since then thanks in no small part to an inconsistant and weak Green stance, im sorry to say.
with greens (the late Rod donald at least) its always seems to be this self defeating thing that ‘we need strong enough presence in Parliament to get onto cannabis viz coalition negotioations’.
Chicken and egg. YOu need strong enough health law and order advocacy (relating to de-criminalisation) to get the presence, and i aint heard that once from the greens which is ironic when so much of Parliament’s hot air surrounds ‘law and order’ and the anomalous ‘get tough’ bullsh#t.
-its like GK Chesterton said about Christianity. ‘its not that its been tried and failed, its that its never been tried…’
DONT FORGET WHERE THE ’99 VOTE CAME FROM. And we all pay for the ongoing loss of this key issue.
crikey so much for the holiday weekend. the frog owes me a holiday.
(and weedeater has been getting jumpy a bit on the ‘police raids’ thread too). I am going out to finish my tidy up of Cashmere high school stream bank and gardens now (removed 5supermarkets bags full of litter from the shrubbery on saturday)
catch yas
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But you seem to be happy to quote the people whose lives have been ruined by drugs as examples of why they should be legal?
There’s only one underlass in this country mate, and we all know who they are.
Phil, how about trying this Winston quote on for size?
“A fanatic is one who can’t change his mind and won’t change the subject.”
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Peters or Churchill? Was he talking about Edison, Ford, Lenin or Marx? Or himself without realising it?
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ah..!..kevin..!
are you describing ‘the hollow-men’..?..there..?
or the already rich cawing/mewling for ‘more!..more!’/tax cuts..?
(and just ignoring our fast approaching economic and environmental ‘perfect storms’..?…)
and kevin..that’s the obvious danger in relying on aphorisms as any foundation for your personal ‘philosphy’..eh..?
they can usually be ‘picked up’..and viewed/’proved’ from a different angle..eh..?
thus leaving any foundations in crumbling dust..eh..?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
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Churchill, Kevyn.
Well phil to carry analogies further, the environmental perfect storm will be preceeded (and therefore hidden) by the economic perfect storm symptom. Over the last 30 to 40 years, instead of fighting each other we could have been re-inforcing the sea-walls and building a strong society. But ahhh for things that might have been…..now we have to hope there are eonugh transfusions to go around next time Beijing sniffs.
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‘aye..!..stormy seas ahead captain..!”
(and janis is just doing ‘i need a man’ on whoar fm one..
mm!!
phil(whoar.co.nz)
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that’s..http://www.listenlive.net.nz/listen/Whoar/index.php
phil(whoar.co.nz)
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well Russel your ‘if you want biodiversity campaign for social justice’ idea went into the War on Drugs, russell and our own domestic farce in this regard…
dont you consider the criminalisation of half a million kiwis for a non-crime at great expense to the public and for no good outcome ‘socially unjust’ or has the cat got your social conscience? (and therefore environmental conscience as well – you made the link after all)
Pseudo green?
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