-------------------------------------------------------------------
Candidates Are Using The Internet To Plug Into . . . A Wired Electorate
('San Jose Mercury News' Says With More Than Four In 10 Californians
Already Plugged Into The Internet, Cyber-Technology Is Reshaping
The Electoral Process)
Date: Thu, 30 Apr 1998 21:16:12 -0400
To: mapnews@mapinc.org
From: Mike Gogulski
Subject: MN: US CA: Candidates are using the Internet to plug into ... A
WIRED ELECTORATE
Sender: owner-mapnews@mapinc.org
Newshawk: Marcus-Mermelstein Family
Source: San Jose Mercury News (CA)
Contact: letters@sjmercury.com
Website: http://www.sjmercury.com/
Pubdate: Tue, 28 Apr 1998
Author: Philip J. Trounstine, Mercury News Political Editor
CANDIDATES ARE USING THE INTERNET TO PLUG INTO ... A WIRED ELECTORATE
Digital citizens' use of technology is having the Net effect of changing
politics, bit by bit
Californians who are plugged into the Internet -- already more than four in
10 registered voters -- are enjoying an unprecedented explosion of
information sources this year as cyber-technology helps to reshape the
electoral process.
With the extraordinary proliferation of sites on the World Wide Web,
Net-savvy voters now can study candidates' stands and ballot propositions,
volunteer time and support, follow campaign reporting and analysis, watch
television commercials and hear speeches.
At the same time, some campaigns are beginning to use the Web to
communicate with voters directly by e-mail and offering political surfers
the opportunity to register to vote or obtain an absentee ballot.
No one is predicting that the exponential increase in the political use of
the Net will have a pivotal impact on outcomes in the 1998 elections. But
the changes the Internet is effecting -- on voters and campaigns alike --
are widely seen as long-lasting and profound.
``It's an empowering tool,'' said Kim Alexander, director of the California
Voter Foundation (www.calvoter.org), one of the first and most
comprehensive election sites on the Web.
``It's giving voters a choice. They can say `No' to the TV ads and the
direct mail. They can go on the Internet and get information from a
variety of sources,'' she said. ``I think that's revolutionary.''
According to Jack Kavanaugh, publisher of Rough and Tumble
(www.rtumble.com), one of the most informative free online political sites,
candidates who fail to click with Net-smart voters run the risk of
appearing out of touch.
``If you have a dorky Web site and you're running for major political
office, you have an image problem,'' he said. ``If you have an engaging Web
site, that will indicate you are someone who should really be looked at.''
To be sure, all Web sites are not created equal.
Some -- like attorney general candidate Bill Lockyer's site
(www.lockyerforag.com) -- are nothing more than e-mail links.
Others -- like U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer's (www.boxer98.org), with order
blanks for ``Boxerware'' clothing and other items, contribution templates,
up-to-date-news and more -- are Java-enriched full-tilt-boogie destinations.
``Everybody knows they have to be there, but nobody knows the full impact
they can have with this new technology,'' said Leslie Goodman, of Strategic
Communications Services, publisher of political access
(www.politicalaccess.com), one of the most useful political link sites.
In addition to the California Voter Foundation, Rough and Tumble and
political access, Secretary of State Bill Jones' official site
(www.ss.ca.gov) offers a treasure trove of free political information,
including an online ballot pamphlet, voting and registration statistics,
campaign finance data and even live election results.
So dedicated to using the Internet is Jones that he assigned a team of Web
masters to teach nearly two dozen staff members in his office how to design
Web pages.
Tremendous tool
And for true political devotees -- willing to pay significant fees --
McClatchy Newspapers' Capitol Alert (www.capitolalert.com) and the National
Journal's Hotline (www.cloakroom.com/pubs/hotline) are extensive.
Online voters are finding the Internet a tremendous tool.
``It's phenomenal,'' said Lori Christian of Manhattan Beach, who joined
Democrat Jane Harman's campaign (www.janeharmanforgovernor.com) after
hooking up by e-mail. ``From an information standpoint, you can get all the
detail you need, you can find out positions on issues and you can
correspond without taking up too much time.''
Christian, 38, Mac user and mother of two with one on the way, is one of
those whom Jon Katz described in Wired Magazine
(www.hotwired.com/special/citizen) as ``digital citizens (who) embrace
rationalism, revere civil liberties and free-market economics and gravitate
toward a moderated form of libertarianism.''
According to a recent survey of California by the Field Poll, 42 percent of
the state's 14.3 million registered voters use e-mail. Moreover, Field Poll
director Mark DiCamillo estimates about three-fourths of e-mail users are
registered to vote.
These digital citizens -- 77 percent of them white -- are a distinct group.
While 47 percent of California voters are registered Democrats and 37
percent are Republicans, Field's e-mail voters are equally divided at 41
percent each.
More liberals online
Ideologically, however, they are less conservative than their non-Net-savvy
counterparts.
Nearly half the offline voters say they're conservative, 40 percent say
they're middle-of-the-road and only 12 percent call themselves liberal,
according to the Field Poll.
Among online voters, 28 percent say they're conservative, 48 percent say
they're middle-of-the-road and 24 percent say they are liberal.
Online voters are younger, more affluent, more educated and weighted with
males. According to DiCamillo, they're also more likely to read newspapers
and less likely to get their news from television than their non-Net
counterparts.
They're less partisan, less ideological and more independent than their
offline counterparts.
Interestingly, the latest Field Poll found that among all likely voters,
Attorney General Dan Lungren was leading the pack with 24 percent of the
vote, followed by Harman at 17 percent, airline tycoon Al Checchi at 15
percent and Lt. Gov. Gray Davis at 11 percent.
But among online voters, Lungren dropped to 20 percent, Harman rose to 19
percent while Checchi and Davis were tied at 10 percent. ``They're not like
the rest of the public,'' said DiCamillo of the upscale voters who are
digital citizens.
Connecting with these digital citizens is virtually uncharted territory in
political campaigns. One approach being pioneered this political season is
``e-slate,'' a classic slate mailer that will be sent by e-mail to hundreds
of thousands of online voters who, by giving their e-mail addresses to a
variety of political sites, are seen as open to receiving political e-mail.
Robert Barnes of San Francisco's Informed Voter has signed up several
Democratic candidates, including Harman, Cruz Bustamante, Lockyer, Kathleen
Connell, Phil Angelides and Delaine Eastin.
May reach 1 million
``We don't consider it spam,'' Barnes said. ``We're not selling products or
asking for money.'' The mailers will include absentee ballots, polling
place locations and information about the candidates who have paid to be a
part of the slate mailer, he said. The database, under construction now,
may reach 1 million voters ``who have publicly put out their e-mail
addresses.''
Lt. Gov. Gray Davis' campaign manager, Garry South, argues that while the
Web is a tool to augment campaign communications, ``I think you can
overstate the case. I just don't think in the final analysis elections are
going to be won or lost based upon who has the best Web site or who gets
the most hits on their Web site.''
While Harman, Davis (www.gray-davis.com), Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren
(www.lungrenforgovernor.org) and Checchi (www.alchecchi.com) all display
favorably selected news stories about themselves on their sites, only
Checchi includes negative stories about his opponents.
On the other hand, Checchi's site includes a vast array of policy papers on
issues, while Harman's offers Real Video versions of her campaign
commercials but far less by way of substantive positions.
Thus far, only Boxer's site provides visitors a means for making online
contributions using a credit card, a feat that requires expensive, secure
e-trade technology.
Even local candidates have jumped onto the Net. In San Jose's mayoral
contest, all three major candidates -- Ron Gonzales, Pat Dando and Kathy
Chavez Napoli -- have Web pages (www.rongonzales98.com,
www.dandoformayor.com and www.napoliformayor.com). Dando offers campaign
statements in English, Spanish and Vietnamese. Napoli's, however, is under
construction.
For Net surfers in search of impartial information, Rough and Tumble --
which its creator, veteran TV journalist Jack Kavanaugh, bills as ``a daily
drive-by on California politics'' -- offers links to important news stories
and commentary, most California newspapers, national publications, public
interest groups and various official sites.
Likewise, politicalaccess provides a vast array of links to media,
political organizations, election sites, government agencies and
subscription services. ``This site is designed for the press corps covering
California elections and consultants attempting to `Wag the Dog, '' Goodman
advises on her home page. But the site is a gold mine.
For those with the resources -- political professionals, newspapers,
lobbyists and legislators -- the Sacramento Bee's Capitol Alert, which
charges $300 a year, provides unmatched services such as legislative bill
tracking, attorney general's opinions, expert commentary and digests on
virtually every state and federal contest in California.
The Los Angeles Times and KMEX-TV have created ``Power of the Vote''
(www.latimes.com/HOME/NEWS/POLITICS/KMEXVOTE) as a non-partisan guide to
political participation, including useful information on how to register to
vote and report irregularities. Uniquely, the site offers information in
Spanish and English.
To date, candidates who have unleashed negative attacks on one another on
television have yet to go negative on the Web. Some political specialists,
however, expect that sooner or later the limits of propriety will be tested
on the Internet.
``One of the key calculations candidates should be making is how to talk to
people who are listening,'' said Goodman. ``But if people think the
Internet's best use is to slime voters with negative attack messages,
they're missing the point. People don't like to sign on and find smut mail.''
Alexander of the California Voter Foundation has high hopes.
``We're estimating that there will be a million Californians surfing the
Web for election information this year,'' she said. ``They're more likely
to retain information and to share information. It gives us a chance to
return to a new style of grass-roots campaigning.''
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Busted - America's War On Marijuana (Transcript
Of Public Broadcasting Service's Television Special
About The War On Some Drug Users)
Fri, 29 May 1998 11:16:38 -0700
From: savages@hemp.org
Date: Fri, 29 May 1998 03:30:40 -0700 (PDT)
To: octa99@crrh.org
Subject: PBS on pot
Take a look
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/dope
Rastamon
FRONTLINE
Show #1615
Air date: April 28, 1998
Busted: America's War on Marijuana
Written and Produced by Elena
Mannes
INDIANA ARCHITECT: My concept
of the penalties, the whole time I was
involved with growing marijuana, was,
you know, "Gosh, I could get caught and
spend a year in prison." I mean, we were
particularly naive about what the final
result could be. [Busted - Federal
sentence: 20 years]
CRAIG RALSTIN, Indiana State
Police: There are people that are growing
it for money, but they're criminals just
like any other criminal.
WILL FOSTER: I lived a pretty decent
life. I worked every day. I paid my taxes.
You know, I didn't go out and hurt
nobody. I didn't rob nobody. I didn't
know that cultivation carried 2 to life, no.
[Busted - State sentence: 93 years]
ANDREA STRONG: They said, "Well
he can't have bond. He's facing a life
sentence." And my mom says, "Well
who did he kill?" You know, "Did he
rape somebody? Did he molest some
child? What did he do?" He was accused
of being the middleman in a marijuana
conspiracy. He connected the buyer and
the grower. [Busted - Life sentence,
Leavenworth]
STEVE WHITE: I think it's a dangerous
drug. I don't think it does any good,
period.
1st DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
Chimney on this house here. You can see
a little bit of heat coming out of it, a little
animal standing there in the back yard.
NARRATOR: In the night sky over
Indianapolis, the hunt is on: drug
enforcement agents scanning a
neighborhood for evidence of marijuana.
2nd DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
Hello!
1st DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
That don't look quite right. Yeah, a patio,
patio door, window. Window's been
covered over. Looks a little odd.
NARRATOR: The infrared camera
could reveal a marijuana-growing
operation inside any one of these houses.
Infrared detects heat, which can indicate
a "grow room" using a lot of lights.
2nd DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
The foundation certainly is warm.
1st DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
That's what I was going to say. That
foundation's hotter than fire.
2nd DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
Yeah.
1st DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
That's the only thing I see real unusual.
NARRATOR: This kind of marijuana
search is happening all over America.
The war on marijuana has become a
battle fought not only overseas, but on
home turf.
3rd DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
We've got a search warrant. The targets
are two white males-
STEVE WHITE: This is a law-and-order
part of the country. Law enforcement's
held in probably higher esteem here than
any place I've ever been.
NARRATOR: For many years, Steve
White ran Indiana's war on marijuana as
an agent with the Federal Drug
Enforcement Administration. The DEA is
spending over $13 million a year to fund
state cannabis eradication programs.
STEVE WHITE: We were one of the
first 20 states to do it, and there hadn't
been an organized effort, I don't think,
against marijuana in the U.S. since the
late 1930s.
NARRATOR: White recently retired
from active duty with the DEA and now
teaches undercover police techniques. He
went along with us on a typical arrest to
show us the world of marijuana law
enforcement.
1st DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
Search warrant! Please open the door.
2nd DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
I'll get this side door here.
1st DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
Police! Search warrant!
2nd DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
You have the right to remain silent.
Anything you say can be used against
you in a court of law. You have the right
to an attorney. If you cannot afford an
attorney, one will be [unintelligible] for
you. You understand you're under
arrest?
SUSPECT: Yes, sir.
NARRATOR: For this arrest in
Bloomington, Indiana, an informant had
tipped agents off to an indoor marijuana
grow room. It was allegedly run by a
business school student and his
roommate in the back of their house.
STEVE WHITE: This is their growing
room, and the first thing that you can see
on these plants is that they've been
topped, or the flowering tops, in other
words, have been pruned off the colis of
the plant. This is fairly typical. They've
got three lights here, the smaller plants
over there, larger ones coming up here.
I think a lot of people that grow actually
grow so that they don't have to go out
and buy dope. But the down side and
reverse side of that is, some time along
the line, they say, "Gee, I've spent this
much on equipment and this much on
fertilizer. Why don't I grow a little more
and sell it and pay for that?" And then
that's when they come into my clutches.
[to suspect] Would you hazard a guess
as to what a pound of that stuff would be
worth on the market?
SUSPECT: I wouldn't know.
STEVE WHITE: If I said $2,000 to
$5,000, could that be in the range?
SUSPECT: That would be about right, I
guess- guessing.
NARRATOR: This suspect was one of
about 3,000 people arrested for
marijuana offenses in Indiana last year.
The state's cannabis eradication program
now makes more marijuana arrests than
any state in the nation. During the
summer and early fall, when the corn is
high, the drug enforcement team heads
out to make its own harvest.
DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT: I
think we may have some [unintelligible]
marijuana plants back in the center of
this cornfield.
NARRATOR: Any one of these corn
rows may hide thousands of dollars
worth of marijuana.
CRAIG RALSTIN, Indiana State
Police: I've been spotting marijuana as a
pilot with the state police for about 19
years. I think it's one of the most
important jobs that we could be doing
because I know what the effect of the
marijuana is on our young people in our
society.
NARRATOR: An estimated 10 to 30
million Americans use marijuana, and as
much half of all the marijuana used in
America is now home grown.
CRAIG RALSTIN: We'll use
fixed-wings and helicopters and trained
spotters, and we'll find where people are
either preparing their grows or suspicious
areas that look like somebody's cut an
area out of a field. And once we find the
plant from the air, we'll direct our ground
guys, and they'll go back in and either cut
it or pull the plants out.
That's a pretty nice plant.
ARMY OFFICER: Yeah.
CRAIG RALSTIN: You can see the
growers started this one indoors some
place in a cup, and brought them and
transplanted them back out here. That's
kind of the thing that we run into. We're
always trying to keep up with the
growers and try to get them before they
get them out.
DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT: Are
these your fields here?
MAN: Right. Yes.
DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
Okay, we got some marijuana out of this
one and this one, both.
ARMY OFFICER: He contacted me.
DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT:
Okay. Okay, good enough.
ARMY OFFICER: He's the one that
told me.
WOMAN: You know, it really makes me
mad that people can come into your field
and do that, you know, and they don't
have to do any work.
MAN: And they make more money, you
know, than I will-
WOMAN: They pull out your corn
plants.
MAN: -for the whole crop, you know?
But the cows ate it all last time, except
one plant.
MIKE GAYER, Indiana State Police:
Unfortunately, every day that we fly, we
find cultivated marijuana. There is not a
day that goes by that we go out in this
aircraft that we do not find cultivated
marijuana plants. There's that much in
the state of Indiana.
RALPH WEISHEIT: "The marijuana
basket of America" would probably be a
good description of the central part of the
U.S. Marijuana is grown in every state of
the U.S., so it is a national phenomenon,
but it seems particularly prevalent in the
Midwest.
NARRATOR: Ralph Weisheit, a
professor of criminal justice at Illinois
State University, has done extensive
research on the domestic marijuana
industry.
RALPH WEISHEIT: We have to make
guesses about how much marijuana is
growing because it is an illegal crop, but it
is easily the biggest cash crop. Some
people have said it goes into the billions.
The value is far higher, probably double
the value of corn. You also have in the
Midwest a fair amount of marijuana
that's already growing wild that was
planted during the Second World War.
NARRATOR: The federal government
actually gave farmers the seeds because
hemp from the marijuana plant was
needed to make rope after supplies from
Asia were cut off.
MIKE GAYER, Indiana State Police:
It was good in the '40s. It's bad in the
'90s.
DRUG ENFORCEMENT AGENT: The
government paid them to grow it, and
now the government is paying us to take
it away.
RALPH WEISHEIT: Certainly, of all
the illegal drugs, there's been no drug
about which the government has had
more mixed feelings. Marijuana has had a
somewhat different role than other drugs.
It has had a mystical sort of atmosphere
about it for some and it's been the
embodiment of evil for others.
1st WOMAN: It doesn't do anything
good for you.
1st MAN: It's very bad for you.
2nd MAN: It's a mild relaxant.
3rd MAN: This is a nice drug. It doesn't
have a hangover. You don't become
aggressive and belligerent.
4th MAN: It is dangerous.
2nd WOMAN: Changes your mind.
5th MAN: It affects short-term memory.
3rd WOMAN: Paranoia.
6th MAN: Killing brain cells.
4th WOMAN: There's a reason why it's
illegal.
7th MAN: I'm not sure I understand how
you make a plant illegal.
RALPH WEISHEIT: I find that some
law enforcement officials believe it is a
drug, and a drug is a drug, and so harsh
penalties should go with that, if we have
harsh penalties for other drugs. I have
found others who see marijuana as
completely different from cocaine or
heroin, and really believe that we've gone
far too far along in our handling of the
drug through the criminal process.
NARRATOR: More Americans use
marijuana than all other illegal drugs
combined and are spending an estimated
$7 billion a year to buy it on the black
market. It's believed that more than two
million Americans grow marijuana
themselves, either for personal use or to
sell it.
NARRATOR: ["Sea of Green" video]
Hello, and welcome to the Sea of Green.
Follow the simple instructions and soon
you will begin your harvest.
NARRATOR: Lessons on how to set up
a grow room are readily available on
videotape and in magazines. "High
Times," founded in 1974, now has a
circulation of a quarter million readers.
Even the Internet has marijuana Web
sites with discussion about softening the
laws and the experience of other
countries with decriminalization.
The mass media treats marijuana with a
mixture of alarm and laughter.
1st ACTOR: ["Home Improvement"] It's
not oregano.
2nd ACTOR: Tarragon?
1st ACTOR: This is marijuana.
2nd ACTOR: Jill cooks with marijuana?
NARRATOR: Popular culture sends a
mixed message, and for many marijuana
growers, the temptation to defy the law
seems to outweigh the risk of arrest.
Doug Keenan, who lives in a quiet
middle-class neighborhood of
Indianapolis, was even willing to go
public and show us his grow room, dug
deep underground so the infrared
cameras won't detect it.
DOUG KEENAN: The humming that
you hear is the ballast, which is driving
the light here. Most all of this equipment
can be bought at any hardware store.
Once you've decided that you're going to
be consuming it pretty regularly, then you
come up with, "Well, I'm going to need a
steady supply." Simple reason is you've
got something that's priced more than
gold. If you're going to smoke a lot of it,
you can't afford to buy it out on the
black market.
NARRATOR: Over the last two
decades, the potency of marijuana on the
market has increased and the price has
skyrocketed. In the early 1980s, an
ounce of commercial grade sold for about
$40. Today an ounce costs up to $400-
in fact, a price higher than gold, which
now sells for around $300 dollars an
ounce.
DOUG KEENAN: I will be growing as
long as I am free to do so- "free" being
that nobody's put a ball and chain around
my ankle. You have to realize that your
liberty is at risk every minute of every
day.
NARRATOR: So why go public and
take the chance of arrest?
DOUG KEENAN: It's a delicate
trade-off, but in my mind- you know, a
lot of people have asked me why be an
activist at all. The alternative is, if I don't,
you're going to have a police state in
another 30 years. And this is basically a
right of consumption. I have the right to
grow and consume anything that God
gives me the seed and the ground to grow
it in.
NARRATOR: So far, Keenan's grow
room has escaped detection by Indiana's
drug enforcement team. But often,
growers who think they're operating free
and clear for years are actually the targets
of long investigations that do end in
arrest.
INDIANA ARCHITECT: I got a
20-year prison sentence and I was just
totally devastated. I think we were all
particularly naive about what the final
result could be.
NARRATOR: This Indiana architect and
his brother, an attorney, used this farm to
grow large amounts of marijuana, which
they sold commercially. They were
arrested by Steve White after a five-year
investigation.
STEVE WHITE: The farmer that owned
this property had run into some financial
difficulties. And he was a client of the
attorney, and when the attorney's brother
called him and wanted to expand the
operation, this came to mind.
NARRATOR: The architect doesn't
want his identity revealed.
INDIANA ARCHITECT: The farmer
didn't hesitate at all. He had very few
alternatives to be able to make the money
that was going to be needed to save his
farm. And this was in the early '80s,
when all the farms in America were really
in a big financial crisis. We grew there for
a couple of years, and the first year we
grew 50 pounds, and at that time it was
worth about $100,000.
STEVE WHITE: They were the
all-American boys. They loved their
children. They loved their parents. So,
you know, how do I characterize them?
Smart. Nice. They broke the law. And
they knew better. The people of Indiana
will not tolerate this type of behavior.
Why should we say it's okay for a guy to
make a million dollars raising marijuana?
Marijuana's the threshold drug. It's the
drug that most children, kids start out
with.
NARRATOR: In a community like
Warsaw, Indiana, marijuana is not only
growing in the cornfields, it's being traded
in the halls of the high school.
1st GIRL: You can see when people's
doing it at school, the smell of it at
school.
INTERVIEWER: You can smell it at
school?
1st GIRL: Oh, yeah. Some people do it
in the bathroom.
1st BOY: The bathroom's bad.
1st GIRL: We just got caught, like, two
weeks ago. There was, like, five girls that
got caught doing it.
2nd GIRL: That was, like, the second
week of school.
3rd GIRL: You can't hide it. I mean,
you see somebody walking up and down
the street, all you have to do is ask them
and they can give it to you. They'll sell it
right there to you, on the spot.
INTERVIEWER: All of you know
somebody you could go probably call
right now?
STUDENTS: Yeah. Yeah.
2nd BOY: The guys- well, if you don't
do it, they call you wimps and all kinds
of things, and just try to put you down
and get you to do it and finally snap.
PAUL CROUSORE, Principal,
Warsaw High School: We had
indicators that we're having problem with
drugs in the building. We had a drug
sweep back a few years ago, where we
actually had the police come in and dogs
and we searched, and we arrested 17
students.
NARRATOR: The Warsaw high school
has begun testing its athletes for drugs. A
student who tests positive for marijuana
is suspended from competition for a year.
DAVE FULKERSON, Athletic
Director, Warsaw High School: The
kids have to realize there are rules that
they must go by. And that's- you know,
our society is made up of rules. The one
thing that the general public fails to
realize, that it's in violation of the law.
It's against the state law. You can be
arrested. You can be sent to jail.
2nd BOY: If they get caught, they go on
probation. Even when they're on
probation- I had a friend and- they break
probation.
1st GIRL: Sometimes when people get
caught, they finally realize that they're
doing something wrong and they quit.
But then, on the other hand, there's some
people that are just, like, "Oh, that's
okay. I'll just go out and- once I get free
I'll go out and do it again."
NARRATOR: Many drug counselors
consider marijuana to be a gateway drug
that could lead to the use of harder drugs.
BRET RICHARDSON: [to class]
Name one of the gateway drugs. Joe?
1st PUPIL: Marijuana.
BRET RICHARDSON: Marijuana.
Give me another one. Caitlin?
2nd PUPIL: Beer, wine.
NARRATOR: Lee Ann Richardson and
her husband, Bret, of the Warsaw,
Indiana Police Department, work for the
D.A.R.E. program - Drug Abuse
Resistance Education. D.A.R.E. uses
local police officers to teach drug
education in the schools.
3rd PUPIL: Hi, Caitlin. Would you like
to have some marijuana with me?
2nd PUPIL: No.
3rd PUPIL: How come?
2nd PUPIL: It'll make me sick. Oh, I've
got to go work on that homework.
3rd PUPIL: Fine.
BRET RICHARDSON: Cut. Well done!
But what if they say, "Why not?" What if
they start to tease you? Think about
three reasons why you don't want to use
drugs.
1st BOY: I really didn't know much
about marijuana. I didn't know what
harmful effects it can do on your life and
stuff like that. I mean, it's really nice to
know now. And I made the decision not
to do marijuana or any drug.
2nd BOY: It just- like, it can hurt you,
and it kills you and stuff if you do too
much of it.
GIRL: Well before I- before Officer
Richardson came in this year, I was, like,
"What's so wrong about it? It just
grows." But now I know what the
harmful effects are and I know that I will
never, ever do it.
NARRATOR: The actual effects of
marijuana on people who use it have
been the subject of scientific study, but
the results have not served to settle the
debate about its dangers.
Dr. CHARLES SCHUSTER: Marijuana
has very profound affects, particularly
when it's smoked, and the most
important thing about it is that it's
immediate.
NARRATOR: Dr. Charles Schuster, a
psychopharmacologist at the Wayne
State University School of Medicine, also
headed the National Institute of Drug
Abuse during the drug crackdown in the
1980s. He's been researching marijuana
for more than 30 years.
Dr. CHARLES SCHUSTER: It's a
powerful drug and it has powerful effects
on mood, powerful effects on your ability
to perform skilled activities, powerful
effects on cognition and powerful effects
on your heart- huge increases in heart
rate, for example, when you smoke it.
It's a powerful drug and we can't dismiss
that.
There are many differences between
heroin, cocaine, and marijuana, on the
other hand. Number one, marijuana,
unlike heroin and cocaine, has never
been associated with acute overdosage
death. To the best of my knowledge, no
one has died because they've smoked too
much marijuana. Clearly, people die from
overdoses of cocaine and of heroin.
Number two, I think that although
marijuana can produce dependence and
addiction, the likelihood of that occurring
in people is much less than with drugs
such as cocaine and heroin.
When we think about social policies and
a lot of other things, we have to realize
that the public health dangers associated
with illicit drugs depends upon the illicit
drug we're talking about. With marijuana,
I think that we're talking about a lesser
evil than we are when we're talking about
cocaine and heroin, but that doesn't mean
that it isn't an evil. [www.pbs.org: More
on marijuana in the body]
Dr. DAVID MUSTO: Marijuana's an
excellent example of how we have shifted
our views on a substance. You have
these enormous shifts and, really,
research takes place against these larger
attitudes, and it's also interpreted in these
larger attitudes.
NARRATOR: Dr. David Musto, of Yale
University, has devoted years of study to
the history of America's drug policies and
attitudes toward marijuana in particular.
Dr. DAVID MUSTO: Marijuana started
to come into the United States in the
1920s, along with Mexican immigrants.
Then, in the 1930s, when the Great
Depression hit, these people became a
feared surplus in our country, and they
were thought to take marijuana, go into
town on the weekend and create
mayhem. Now, that's very close to the
general attitude toward marijuana in the
1930s. It was thought to be a cause of
crime and a cause of senseless violence.
The head of the narcotics bureau from
1930 to 1962, Harry J. Anslinger,
decided he had to fight marijuana really
in the media. He tried to describe
marijuana in so repulsive and terrible
terms that people wouldn't even be
tempted to try it. In the 1960s, the use of
marijuana was symbolic of the
counterculture, of the anti-Vietnam war
battles. It became something that, if you
used, you used it almost ritually, as
joining a large group of people who had
similar points of view and similar
attitudes, let's say, to authority and to the
government and so on.
NARRATOR: In the early 1970s, the
Shafer Commission was ordered by
Congress to consider marijuana and the
drug abuse laws.
Dr. DAVID MUSTO: They came out
with the conclusion that marijuana should
be decriminalized. That is, small amounts
for personal use might be fined, like you
might get a ticket. And this was very
upsetting to President Nixon. President
Nixon, I think, of all of our Presidents
was the one most viscerally opposed to
drugs.
Then in the Carter Administration, I think
it was in 1978, all the heads of the
agencies came before Congress and
asked for the decriminalization of
marijuana of up to one ounce. And it was
quite interesting. There was quite a
backlash to this. You had the parents'
movement formed.
PARENT: -that if I became involved and
other parents became involved now
maybe this problem would not touch-
that the evil fingers of drugs would not
lay their hands on the shoulders of my
little boy.
Dr. DAVID MUSTO: And they created
quite a reaction and defeated some
people who were running for Congress
and had favored decriminalization. So
you move right from the Carter
administration into the Reagan
administration, which was very anti-drug
and anti-marijuana.
Pres. RONALD REAGAN: The
American people want their government
to get tough and to go on the offensive,
and that's exactly what we intend, with
more ferocity than ever before.
Dr. DAVID MUSTO: The Republicans
and Democrats, seeing this as a
tremendous, dangerous issue, vied with
one another as to all the ways that they
were going to help control drugs.
NARRATOR: One of those drugs was
cocaine, which was causing widespread
concern. Coke sales were rapidly
spreading from the cities to the suburbs,
and the 1986 death of basketball star Len
Bias, blamed on crack cocaine, put even
more pressure on lawmakers.
In 1986 President Reagan signed the Anti
Drug Abuse Act, which ordered
mandatory minimum sentences with no
parole for all illegal drugs. The federal
penalties were set according to the
amount of the drug involved, equating
marijuana plants with gram weights of
other drugs. For example, 100 plants is
considered comparable to 5 grams of
crack cocaine. The mandatory minimum
sentence for 100 plants of marijuana is 5
years; for 1000 plants, 10 years.
INDIANA ARCHITECT: I was one of
the lucky ones. Because my crime had
taken place in the early '80s meant that I
was going to be sentenced under the old
law, what's now called the old law. And
the new law, which came into effect in
1987, has got mandatory minimum
sentencing.
NARRATOR: The Indiana architect was
released after serving 5 years of his
20-year sentence. Now anyone convicted
on the same federal charges would not be
allowed parole. The mandatory minimum
sentencing ordered by the new law also
prevents judges from giving a lesser
penalty.
ERIC SCHLOSSER: The 1986 Anti
Drug Abuse Act was the most significant
drug legislation of this generation, which
shifted enormous power within our legal
system away from judges to prosecutors.
NARRATOR: Eric Schlosser wrote
about the history and impact of
marijuana law enforcement for a recent
series in "The Atlantic Monthly"
magazine. He also consulted for this
program.
ERIC SCHLOSSER: And since that law
was passed the federal prison population
has tripled. And whereas drug offenders
used to be a small proportion of federal
inmates, today about 70 percent of the
people in federal prison are drug
offenders. There are more people now in
federal prison for marijuana offenses
than for violent offenses.
ANDREA STRONG: He had a two-year
enhancement, though, I believe, for
manager organizer, but that's it.
NARRATOR: Andrea Strong's brother,
Mark Young, was sentenced under the
new law and was given life for brokering
the sale of 700 pounds of marijuana.
ANDREA STRONG: They said, "Well,
he can't have bond. He's facing a life
sentence." And my mom says, "Well,
who did he kill?" You know, "Did he
rape somebody? Did he molest some
child? What did he do?"
NARRATOR: Young had no previous
record of violence or drug trafficking.
ANDREA STRONG: It changed my
entire life. I lost my cleaning business
because we had made the news and we-
our story, Mark's story, with my name
and stuff, was in the newspaper, the local
paper, and some of the women whose
homes that I cleaned in, they didn't want
me in their home anymore. You know, I
didn't have anything to do with drugs in
any kind of way. My brother did.
NARRATOR: About 17 percent of all
federal inmates are convicted marijuana
offenders. That's one federal prisoner in
six. Because mandatory minimum
sentences do not allow parole, federal
prisoners convicted on non-violent
marijuana charges sometimes serve more
time than convicted murderers sentenced
under state law.
Scott Walt is serving 24 years for
conspiracy to possess with intent to
distribute around 2,000 pounds of
marijuana. David Ciglar: 10 years in
federal prison for cultivation of 167
marijuana seedlings.
And take the case of John Casali and
Todd Wick, two young men convicted of
growing some 1,600 marijuana plants in
northern California. Their sentence, the
10-year mandatory minimum, was
handed down by Judge Thelton
Henderson of the federal district court in
San Francisco.
Judge THELTON HENDERSON: I
told these young men that I wished I
could do something other than what I
did, and I felt awful about it, but that I
felt bound by the law. I think they were
rehabilitatable within less than 10 years.
I'm opposed to mandatory minimums, in
general, because I think they're unduly
harsh. I think that they don't allow the
judge the discretion to deal with the
individual problem. There is a formula
that says you've been involved with a
certain amount of drugs, for example,
ergo you get the mandatory minimum.
ANDREA STRONG: In the federal
sentencing, if you have so many plants
that are involved in your conspiracy - and
in this case it was over a thousand plants
- then, like my brother, you receive a life
sentence, and that means life without the
possibility of ever being paroled. And
they'll bury you in Leavenworth's back
yard, if you can't bring him home to bury
him. And that's what we were told.
NARRATOR: Andrea Strong's brother,
Mark Young, appealed his life sentence
on grounds that the prosecution had
miscounted the number of plants. He's
now serving a 12-year sentence. Andrea
Strong has become a leader in the
national organization Families Against
Mandatory Minimums.
ANDREA STRONG: Our goal is to
repeal mandatory minimum sentences
that are given to first-time non-violent
drug offenders. We believe they should
be punished, but we believe their
punishment should fit their crime.
NARRATOR: If Mark Young had been
sentenced under Indiana state law, he
would have received a lesser sentence,
but state marijuana penalties vary widely,
and in other parts of the country, the
state punishment can be even more
severe than the federal. In 15 states, you
can get life for a non-violent marijuana
offense.
NARRATOR: In Oklahoma, Will Foster
was sentenced to 93 years for marijuana
cultivation and possession in the presence
of a child. When Foster was arrested at
his Tulsa home in 1995, police said an
informant told them Foster had
methamphetamines.
WILL FOSTER: It was about 2:00
o'clock on the afternoon of December
28th, and the police come to our house.
They didn't knock, they just
battering-rammed our door down.
MEGAN BURKE: In less than a
30-second span of time, you know, from
the minute they hit the door. My life will
never be the same.
NARRATOR: Foster's partner, Megan
Burke, was in the house with their three
children.
MEGAN BURKE: It happened so
quickly. The next thing I know, the door
exploded inward. It knocked me
backwards onto my 5-year-old daughter.
NARRATOR: They found no
methamphetamines, but they did find
Foster's marijuana grow room down in
the basement.
MEGAN BURKE: I was afraid of it,
afraid of the ramifications if we got
caught. I knew they would be steep. I
had no idea it would be a life sentence, a
death penalty, in essence. In the
beginning, I was very angry. I just
wanted to kill him because I thought, you
know, "You did this." And I had to step
back from myself because I can't give
him all of the blame. I knew what he was
doing, and I could have had a big
screaming fit and he would have stopped.
He would have been mad, but he would
have stopped. And I didn't do that. So I
guess, in that respect, I share it equally.
NARRATOR: Foster says all the plants
were for his personal use, to help with
arthritis, but the number of plants raised
suspicions.
BRIAN CRAIN, Assistant D.A., Tulsa,
Oklahoma: Other than the fact that we
found over a kilo of marijuana, there
were gram scales, which indicate
packaging and distribution. There were
baggies. There were other paraphernalia
that indicated distribution. We felt
comfortable in bringing that to trial. The
idea that you can grow marijuana, that
you can distribute marijuana, that you
can possess marijuana in the presence of
a minor- that is not something that we
will accept in Tulsa County.
[www.pbs.org: Study state-by-state
laws]
NARRATOR: Will Foster is serving his
time in a Texas prison because there's no
room in Oklahoma's overcrowded cells.
Foster is appealing on grounds that the
search warrant was invalid, and since he
was charged under state rather than
federal law, he does have the chance of
parole. The state had offered Foster a
plea bargain, but he refused.
WILL FOSTER: The reason that I went
to jury trial was that this was the only
way I could guarantee that my wife
would not go to prison. She was their
only witness. They made her testify
against me.
MEGAN BURKE: I didn't want to have
to do that. I really didn't. But it was that
or I was going to go to prison, and I
didn't know who would get these kids.
And he said "You have to. You don't
have a choice." So I testified for the
state, and I testified for the defense, and
it was the longest four days I've ever
had. And I knew that he'd get something.
I mean, it's Oklahoma. But I didn't
expect 93 years.
NARRATOR: The wives of marijuana
growers are often put under pressure to
testify against their husbands or risk
prison terms themselves. Jodie Israel
refused to take the stand against her
husband and is now serving a 12-year
federal mandatory minimum sentence.
JODIE ISRAEL: You know,
somewhere it's got to stop. If I was to
testify against someone and bring down
10 people- you know, it's got to stop
somewhere.
NARRATOR: Her husband, a first-time
offender, was convicted of growing
marijuana. He is a Rastafarian and
claimed he used marijuana for religious
reasons. Because she presumably knew
what he was doing, Jodie Israel was
charged with conspiracy.
JODIE ISRAEL: The problem with
conspiracy is it's the only time they allow
hearsay into the courtroom. So if they
can't get you for anything else, they can
get you for conspiracy. Your husband
could go away on a business trip for the
weekend and come back home, and he
could have been out, you know, buying
drugs, and you're going be charged.
When I came in, my children were 1, 2,
and my 3-year-old had just turned 4, and
my daughter was 9. And they're all in
different homes, and my littlest son
doesn't even know who I am. It's hard
because, as a parent, you want to protect
your child from hurt. And it's like I have
caused this hurt.
NARRATOR: She has seen her children
only once in each of the four years she's
already served.
JODIE ISRAEL: I made a mistake in
that I chose the wrong man. But 11 years
of my life away from my children isn't
right.
NARRATOR: Kristen Angelo, a
teenager who lives near Seattle,
Washington, is learning what happens to
a family when a parent is caught growing
marijuana.
KRISTEN ANGELO: I knew that my
Dad grew pot. I didn't know how big it
was or, you know, anything like that, but
it didn't bother me. I just never really
thought twice of it. I never thought the
consequences could be this harsh on my
family, otherwise I probably would have
said, you know, "Hey, Dad, maybe you
shouldn't be doing this."
NARRATOR: John Angelo, who
worked as a design engineer at Boeing
Aircraft, had a grow room behind the
house where he lived with his family.
JOHN ANGELO: This was an
underground hydroponic growing facility.
I had six trays on each side, 30 feet long.
Each side was capable of holding 380
plants.
NARRATOR: Angelo says he suffers
from manic depression. He is an activist,
working to legalize medical use of
marijuana.
JOHN ANGELO: I've been smoking pot
since I was 12 years old. I've been
growing it for the last 12 years. I found a
long time ago that I'm able to function
with marijuana. My oldest daughter knew
what I was doing. She never questioned
it.
KRISTEN ANGELO: You know, he
didn't smoke it around me or force me to
smoke it or anything like that. Everyone
experiments with it. And for a while, I
did use it in school and I got very bad
grades. It's a lot harder to concentrate.
You can't study very well.
NARRATOR: John Angelo and his wife,
Rachel, say the three younger children
never knew about the marijuana
operation.
RACHEL ANGELO: I'm completely
against children using marijuana. They
don't need to be putting stuff in their
bodies when they're growing, including
caffeine, drugs, alcohol-
JOHN ANGELO: Nicotine, right.
RACHEL ANGELO: -of any kind.
Their little minds need to be developing.
JOHN ANGELO: I had no idea that
they were going to take my children
away from me, that they were going to
take my property away from me, and
that they were going to put me in jail for
5 years. I had no idea.
KRISTEN ANGELO: I was out with
friends. And I came home from school
and we were pulling down the road and
my friends said, you know, "There's cop
car at your house." And I was, like, "Oh,
you're just kidding." You know, "Don't
play around with me like that." And
they're, like, "No, Kristen, we're
serious." You know, "There's a cop car
down there."
RACHEL ANGELO: They came belting
through those doors with their guns in
hand and pointing them around the room
and, you know, talking and-
JOHN ANGELO: Yelling.
RACHEL ANGELO: Well, yelling, and
yelling for John- "John, come out! John,
come out!"
KRISTEN ANGELO: My dad was in
handcuffs and Rachel was in the car, and
I was just- I was shocked. I mean, I was
just- I can't even explain how I felt. It
was just, you know, total adrenaline
rush. I didn't know what to do. I didn't
know what to say. I was really scared for
both of them.
MARK KLEIMAN: Keeping
middle-class kids from drugs has always
ranked very high among the goals of
American drug policy. And a lot of
14-year-olds have now started to use
marijuana.
NARRATOR: Mark Kleiman, a
professor of policy studies at the
University of California in Los Angeles,
has studied the patterns of marijuana use.
MARK KLEIMAN: For a while, the
number of users was falling and,
particularly, the number of young users
was falling. That unfortunately stopped in
1991, and since then, the number of
young users has been increasing. And
what's really frightening is initiations
happening at younger and younger ages.
Gen. BARRY McCAFFREY: [at press
conference] Marijuana is the principal
drug of abuse among youngsters, with
increased numbers of hospital admissions
or treatment admissions where marijuana
is cited as the principle drug threat.
NARRATOR: The alarm has sounded
for the White House Office on Drug
Policy, headed by General Barry
McCaffrey.
Gen. BARRY McCAFFREY: [at press
conference] The drug threat is changing,
and student populations are picking up on
it, and it's tending to drift into younger
years. The first use of marijuana figure -
how old were you when you first used
marijuana - has steadily dropped. And I
anticipate the next time we get a number
to give you, it will have dropped further.
NARRATOR: You won't get an
argument from many American students.
In Warsaw, Indiana, schools the talk is
about mixed messages, with families and
children torn between what the law says
and what widespread use, even in their
own homes, is telling them.
GIRL: I know I lost one of my best
friends over marijuana. Her mom found
out, and her mom was mad, but her
mom also does it, so, I mean, her mom
isn't setting a good role model, or her
dad.
LEE ANN RICHARDSON: I had a girl
tell me that her parents were smoking
marijuana. And I asked her what she did
in that situation, and she said she left and
goes to her room. And I said, "That's
very good." You know, she's making the
right choice, the right decision to get
away from the environment, basically.
BRET RICHARDSON: Just last week, I
had one of my students come to me to
tell me about one of his relatives, and he
wants something done about it, so the
information has been turned over to our
drug task force. I tell them all the
ramifications of that choice that they are
making, and if they want the police
involved in it, it's going to disrupt the
family life. And then it's up to the student
to decide if that's the direction they want
it to go. We don't encourage the kids to
spy. That's not my role. I'm there as
instructor, not as an enforcement officer.
LEE ANN RICHARDSON: And you
see he becomes- I could see he became
partially defensive on it. I think that's a
sore subject with us, especially with the
D.A.R.E. program, because it has
nothing in the curriculum about, you
know, turning people in or doing anything
that way. [www.pbs.org: How effective
is D.A.R.E.?]
STEVE WHITE: One year, we did three
indoor grows here based on the children
of the growers through the D.A.R.E.
program. They not only told us about it,
they drew diagrams, how to get to
Daddy's indoor grow. So that's tough on
a family. The more I think about it, the
more I wonder.
NARRATOR: During his career
arresting marijuana suspects, former
DEA agent Steve White found himself
asking more questions.
STEVE WHITE: I had done a lot of
undercover work. It was mainly
amphetamines, LSD, heroin and cocaine.
I thought all dope dealers were scum to
various levels, that they would sell out
their mother, and I've seen it time after
time. When I got into the marijuana
program, one thing that amazed me was
how cooperative a lot of the people were,
how proud of what they're doing, how
normal, in every other respect, they
were. And there's some of them that I
quite frankly like. This is confusing, but I
still put them in jail.
SUSPECT: I'm not hurting nobody, or at
least I don't feel I am. I'm hurting my
lungs maybe. You know, buy a joint
somewhere and you're a felon, or they
want you to be a felon. I mean, you
know, that's the name of the game for
them.
STEVE WHITE: I came to see them as a
different breed of cat. They're still
criminals, but they don't have some of
the characteristics of all the others that I
dealt with in the 20 years previously.
DENNIS FITZGERALD: There are
some agents that don't see crimes
associated with marijuana use. They
don't see the armed robberies that follow
crack use or that follow heroin addiction.
They don't see any of the crimes that
you associate generally with drug abuse.
NARRATOR: Dennis Fitzgerald was a
federal drug enforcement agent for 20
years. Now retired from the DEA,
Fitzgerald is director of the National
Institute for Drug Enforcement Training.
DENNIS FITZGERALD: Marijuana
abusers don't, generally, when they can't
get marijuana, go out and rob a liquor
store to get money to buy their
marijuana. It just doesn't follow. So an
awful lot of law enforcement officers just
don't have the personal conviction when
it comes to marijuana enforcement that
they do with the enforcement of heroin
laws or crack cocaine laws or cocaine
laws. A lot of agents feel as though the
marijuana laws misdirect an awful lot of
investigative energies, and people are
going to jail for significant periods of time
over very small quantities of marijuana.
NARRATOR: Agents like Fitzgerald and
Steve White have watched the war on
marijuana escalate. It is now costing
federal, state and local agencies at least
$10 billion a year, more than one fourth
the total budget for the war on drugs.
The enforcement effort has brought other
consequences.
DENNIS FITZGERALD: The forfeiture
of the assets directly enriches the police
agency that brings the case against the
grow operators. Now, the monies that
they receive from asset forfeiture,
primarily, it can be used to pay
informants.
NARRATOR: Dennis Fitzgerald has
written a book about how government
agencies use informants to make drug
arrests. Informants can be paid up to 25
percent of the value of assets seized in
arrests, up to $250,000.
DENNIS FITZGERALD: What bothers
me about the informant situation is the
unbelievable amounts of money that the
informants are making, that they can
make. There are pamphlets that are put
out on what to look for in marijuana
indoor grow operations: large
air-conditioning bills, large power bills,
the delivery of firewood, generators.
There's a whole laundry list of things that
people are told to look for. Ordinary
citizens are encouraged. There's just this
whole network of people that are out
there, just average citizens that have been
drawn in to become informants,
neighborhood crime watches that have
gone a step too far.
POLICE OFFICER: Police search
warrant!
NARRATOR: On this case, an
informant had told state police that this
house in Indianapolis harbored a
marijuana grow. No one was home
except the suspect's son.
POLICE OFFICER: Is your Dad home?
Well, we've got a search warrant to
search the house. Where does your dad
work?
NARRATOR: When the suspect came
home, it turned out he was being used as
an informant himself on another state
police marijuana case, so the charges on
this arrest were deferred.
SUSPECT: It's all about, I guess, they
want you to look for somebody that's
bigger than you- stepping stone.
JOHN ANGELO: They were able to get
a search warrant for an overhead infrared
search. So they come over with a
helicopter one night and saw the heat
signature of the trailer under the ground,
and that was their basis for a search
warrant, then, at that time to come in and
arrest us.
NARRATOR: An informant's tip had
also led to the arrest of John and Rachel
Angelo.
RACHEL ANGELO: I feel that the
government actually makes people feel
good about using the marijuana laws or
drug laws as a basis for- or as a bouncing
board for people to take advantage of
each other and to be vindictive with one
another. You know, "Hurt your neighbor.
It's the right thing to do."
JOHN ANGELO: Although I feel it's an
improper law and I should have worked
to change that law, and I would like to
see laws changed, I agree. Yes, I did
break a law. But I was no threat to the
community. I was no threat to the
environment or to my kids or to anybody
else. Justice would have been served a lot
better by taking my talents or my abilities
to work to let me continue with my job
and paying taxes and stuff, but
community service and home
incarceration, keeping my family
together.
NARRATOR: Rachel Angelo was facing
a five-year prison term. John could get
10 years in addition to a million-dollar
fine.
Judge THELTON HENDERSON: I
think when the sentencing guidelines first
came in, we thought they would phase
out after some period of time. They're
still around, and I see no indication of
them phasing out in the near future. But
I'm not aware of anything judges can do.
We can't lobby. We're pretty much
handicapped. We can speak out, such as
I'm speaking out now, and state our
displeasure and hope that the time will
come when Congress will revisit this.
Sen. ORRIN HATCH, (R), Utah: The
reason why we went to mandatory
minimums is because of these
soft-on-crime judges that we have in our
society, judges who just will not get
tough on crime.
NARRATOR: As chairman of the
Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator
Orrin Hatch of Utah has been a leader in
the fight to strengthen anti-crime laws.
He strongly supports mandatory
minimum sentencing.
Sen. ORRIN HATCH: Keep in mind
these growers and these pushers, they're
killing our kids. They're the reason we
have such a drug culture in this society
that's just wrecking our country in a lot
of respects. In all honesty, I think that
when you have people who are pushing
drugs on our kids or pushing at all, we
ought to get as nails on them, and I don't
think- in many respects, we ought to lock
them up and throw away the keys.
NARRATOR: Over the last decade,
mandatory minimum sentencing has been
reconsidered by congress. The debates
have not led to any change in the law.
Rep. STEVEN SCHIFF, (R), New
Mexico: [at hearing] I think the debate,
if any, should be over how long
individuals should be in prison compared
to others. The debate should never
become whether individuals should spend
time in prison.
MARK KLEIMAN: We ought to think
about sentencing in terms of its actual
impacts on behavior, and we ought to
frame our sentences in ways that make
sense both morally and practically
NARRATOR: Mark Kleiman recently
joined a group of prominent scientists,
drug experts and public officials in
proposing a new middle-of-the road
approach to national drug policy.
[www.pbs.org: Read the proposal.]
MARK KLEIMAN: We don't want to
debate legalization versus prohibition. We
don't want to debate hawks versus
doves. We want to say, "Look, this is
really a complicated question. We need
to look in detail at individual policies and
figure out which ones will actually serve
the public interest."
One of the principles is that we ought to
base our sentencing on a balancing of
costs and benefits, and not merely use
long sentences as a way of expressing
disapproval. I think we ought to start
basing mandatory sentences on the
conduct of the people engaged. Are they
using violence? Are they using
corruption? Are they using kids? If we do
that, I think we'll have a more sensible
set of sentences.
STEVE WHITE: I cannot see somebody
in there doing eight years for marijuana
and a rapist being set free. Anybody that
abuses another human being I have a
certain loathing for. There's a disparity
there. But that's not with law
enforcement. We don't make the laws
and we don't sentence the offenders. All
we do is catch people.
NARRATOR: John Angelo and his wife,
Rachel, agreed to a plea bargain. Rachel
testified for the prosecution and was
given three months in a halfway house
with work release. After she returned
home, John would enter federal prison
for a five-year term.
RACHEL ANGELO: Just exactly what
we expected to happen. They went with
the plea agreement because it was the
easiest thing to do, I think.
JOHN ANGELO: And I'm willing to
accept what I plead to. I saved Rachel
and her father both a lot of pain and
suffering, and I'll live by that then. That's
it. Let's go home.
NARRATOR: Like John Angelo, Doug
Keenan says he needs to grow and use
marijuana for medical reasons. He's a
cancer patient. But Keenan is the kind of
marijuana grower who confuses the
issue. He freely admits he also uses
marijuana for pleasure.
DOUG KEENAN: Most of the people
that are in this want to see the plant let
free. Actually, we'd like to just see the
dialogue get started, but we're having
enough trouble, you know, getting the
government to the table on that.
Everybody on all sides agrees that it's not
working, what we're doing. Great. What
are we going to do next?
Dr. DAVID MUSTO: Actually, the
American people are, in a way, deciding
now about marijuana in a way they never
had the opportunity before. We may be
unraveling the national consensus on
drugs and bringing back to the states the
decision as to what to do with drugs
because the votes in Arizona and in
California suggest that there could be
parts of the country in which there's a
different point of view.
NARRATOR: Both California and
Arizona have passed initiatives that
permit medical use of marijuana. In
California, behind the doors of cannabis
clubs like this one in San Francisco,
marijuana openly changes hands. The
clubs are open to anyone presenting a
doctor's letter stating medical need. The
existence of the cannabis clubs has been
challenged in court.
Dr. DAVID MUSTO: The medical
marijuana debate is extremely interesting.
There's no question that people who
want to legalize marijuana are using the
medical marijuana issue as a wedge. On
the other hand, there are many
statements from people who have used
marijuana in situations in which they've
been greatly helped by marijuana, and
that's their testimony.
MARK KLEIMAN: And the answer
therefore has to be, it seems to me, let's
do the research. I've been boring people
for five years now by just saying,
whenever this question comes up, "Let's
do the research. "Let's find out. Let's try
it on some patients and see if they get
better." We shouldn't debate medical
marijuana as a shadow play about the
deeper question of legalization of
marijuana for recreational use.
Sen. ORRIN HATCH: The minute
California passed that particular statute,
we had marijuana fields start to grow up
again, on the basis that they're using it for
medicinal purposes. And in the process,
of course, we've got a lot of
indiscriminate use of marijuana now in
California that is even greater than it was
before. If you allow people to grow
marijuana and to indiscriminately grow
and use it, then you're adding to the lack
of discipline and the problems that we
have in our society and, really, to,
ultimately, the harder use of harder
drugs.
STEVE WHITE: I do not believe that
decriminalizing or legalizing marijuana is
going to help in any way. I think it's a
dangerous drug. I don't think it does any
good. Period.
DENNIS FITZGERALD: I'm not for
blanket legalization of marijuana. I think
certain offenses should be decriminalized.
MAN AT ANTI-DRUG RALLY:
Marijuana is the cure-all wrong message.
Dr. DAVID MUSTO: Should the
government intrude on your private right
to do something? Or does the
government have an obligation to take
steps to protect you in ways that you
couldn't protect yourself? This goes back
to the Federalist papers, I mean, or to the
Constitution. How should we run our
lives? And marijuana has become the
symbol of how we should think about
something that's medicine or not a
medicine, a private right or a public right.
And people bring to it their deepest
feelings and their image of how they
would like the world to be run.
STEVE WHITE: It's an emotional issue.
It's right there with gays in the military
and abortion. Everybody's got an opinion
on it. When I started in law enforcement,
the general opinion, particularly in the
white middle class community, was
"Marijuana? Send them to jail," because
they're probably black or Chicano, to
begin with, and it wasn't something that
affected us. Now it touches everybody in
America. And I don't think anybody
doesn't have a family member in an
extended family that hasn't been touched
by it.
ANNOUNCER: Discover more of our
report at FRONTLINE's Web site. Take
the marijuana quiz, explore the
interactive guide to federal and state laws
on marijuana, read an essay by the
grower who's gone public, and take a
close look at two case histories, plus a
timeline on marijuana in the U.S., the
best of the pro and con arguments and
much more at FRONTLINE on line at
www.pbs.org.
Next time on FRONTLINE-
1st LAWYER: We've been considered to
be tilting at windmills.
ANNOUNCER: -a modern-day David
and Goliath story.
2nd LAWYER: I wanted to get the truth
out.
1st LAWYER: We bet the ranch on it.
ANNOUNCER: How a couple of
small-town lawyers used secret tobacco
industry documents-
2nd LAWYER: The evidence was so
powerful.
ANNOUNCER: -to build the biggest
case in American legal history.
1st LAWYER: When Liggett actually
settled, it was earth-shaking. It started the
walls crumbling.
ANNOUNCER: Get the real story when
FRONTLINE goes "Inside the Tobacco
Deal."
For videocasette information about
tonight's program, please call this toll-free
number: 1-800-328-PBS1.
Now it's time for your letters and the
huge response to our program on the
origins of Christianity: lots of praise, but
also some criticism. Here's a sample.
KENNETH FIELDS: [Palmyra, NJ]
Dear FRONTLINE: From a purely
secular standpoint, an interesting show.
From a true Christian perspective, the
show was without merit and it is obvious
that this show was produced to discredit
Christianity as a faith. I'm sorry, but I
hoped for something better.
JEFFREY CARVER: [Arlington, MA] I
can understand the desire of the
producers to shy away from the question
of Christ's divinity. It's a hot topic, after
all. But really, if you're afraid to address
that question, then much of the rest rings
rather hollow. You can leave belief or
unbelief up to the viewer, but you can't
just pretend it's not there.
JOHN MURRAY: [Redwood City, CA]
As a committed Catholic, I was very
impressed by your program, even
conceding its secular liberal bias. The
program did something which,
unfortunately, occurs all to infrequently
in our parishes on Sunday morning. It
actually got us thinking about our faith,
how it became formed and what it really
means.
ANNOUNCER: Let us know what you
think about tonight's program by fax
[(617) 254-0243], by e-mail
[FRONTLINE@PBS.ORG] or by the
U.S. mail [DEAR FRONTLINE, 125
Western Ave., Boston, MA 02134].
WRITTEN AND PRODUCED BY
Elena Mannes
EDITOR
Ted Winterburn
CO-PRODUCER
Libby Kreutz
CINEMATOGRAPHY
Greg Andracke
SOUND
Duncan Forbes
NARRATOR
Will Lyman
PRODUCTION OFFICE COORDINATOR
Shivani Khullar
RESEARCHER
Micah S.Fink
POST PRODUCTION SUPERVISOR
Linda Patterson Sharpley
CONSULTANT
Eric Schlosser
ASSISTANT EDITOR
Josh Marston
ADDITIONAL CINEMATOGRAPHY
Mark Allan
Gino Bruno
Don Friedell
Tom Hurwitz
Eddie Marritz
Rick Thompson
Mark Trottenberg
ADDITIONAL SOUND
Jeff Duncan
Al Feuerbach
John McCormick
Bernard Russo
Frank Tonhazy
Russell Beeker
ONLINE EDITOR
Steve Audette
SOUND MIX
Jim Sullivan
ARCHIVAL MATERIAL
ABCNews VideoSource
A/P Wide World Photos
Archive Films/Archive Photos
FAMM
High Times Productions
Historic Films
Human Rights 95
Johnson County Indiana Daily Journal
Library of Congress -
Prints & Photographs Division
National Archives & Records
Adminstration
The New York Times
SPECIAL THANKS
Cannabis Cultivators Club
DARE America
DEA
The Drug Policy Foundation
Harrison Elementary School, Warsaw,
Indiana
Indiana State Police Eradication Unit
NORML - National Organization Reform
of Marijuana Laws
Warsaw High School, Warsaw, Indiana
POST PRODUCTION DIRECTOR
Tim Mangini
AVID EDITORS
Steve Audette
Shady Hartshorne
PRODUCTION ASSISTANT
Julie A. Parker
SERIES MUSIC
Mason Daring
Martin Brody
SERIES GRAPHICS
LoConte Goldman Design
CLOSED CAPTIONING
The Caption Center
COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER
Richard Byrne
PUBLICIST
Chris Kelly
OUTREACH COORDINATOR
Emily Gallagher
PROMOTION ASSISTANT
Frances Arnaud
SECRETARY
Denise Barsky
SENIOR STAFF ASSOCIATE
Lee Ann Donner
UNIT MANAGERS
Robert O'Connell
Valerie Opara
BUSINESS MANAGER
Karen Carroll
WEBSITE RESEARCH ASSISTANT
Tracy Loskoski
WEBSITE PRODUCTION
COORDINATOR
Stephanie Ault
WEBSITE PRODUCER/DESIGNER
Sam Bailey
ASSOCIATE PRODUCER
Mary C. Brockmyre
STORY EDITOR
Karen O'Connor
STAFF PRODUCER
June Cross
COORDINATING PRODUCER
Robin Parmelee
SENIOR PRODUCER
SPECIAL PROJECTS
Sharon Tiller
SERIES EDITOR
Marrie Campbell
SERIES MANAGER
Jim Bracciale
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER
Michael Sullivan
SENIOR EXECUTIVE PRODUCER (pause)
David Fanning
A FRONTLINE coproduction with
Elena Mannes Productions, Inc.
(c) 1998
WGBH EDUCATIONAL FOUNDATION
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
New Content (c) 1998 PBS Online and WGBH/FRONTLINE
***
Date: 25 Jun 1999 11:31:05 +0000
From: "Scott Clevenger" (Scott_Clevenger@wgbh.org)
Subject: Reprint of "Busted" Transcript
To: "Portland NORML Webmaster" (pdxnorml@pdxnorml.org)
At 11:31 AM 6/25/99 +0000, you wrote:
We recently noticed that you have placed the transcript for "Busted," A
"Frontline" program, on your web site at: http://www.pdxnorml.org/980428.html
While we appreciate your interest in our "Busted" program. However, we must
request that you remove the transcript from that page. Please feel free to
link directly to the transcript at:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/dope/etc/script.html
The reasons why you cannot reprint the transcript are copyright issues and
contractual agreements we have with various guilds including the Writers
Guild. Please comply with our request ASAP. Any further contact from our
end will be through our lawyers. Thank you in advance for your
understanding and cooperation.
Scott Clevenger
Frontline On-line website Assistant
WGBH, Boston
[to which webmaster Phil Smith replied:]
Fuck you. I know what the Fair Use Act says. You can't tell me what to
print and what not to print.
So sue me,
Phil Smith
webmaster
pdxnorml.org
PS - As a courtesy, I will add your link from the Portland NORML page you
mention to the "Frontline" URL you provide. However, in the future,
I would suggest that you'd get better results if you started out asking
nicely, and consider that the people you are harassing might just be familiar
with the law.
to 1998 Daily News index for April 23-29