goNZo Freakpower Brains Trust: 4:20 News Index

Friday, February 12, 2010

4:20 News Index

I'm still wading through Part One of the Law Commission's review of the Misuse of Drugs Act. To distill some reference points for public submissions in reply to it, here's a summary from the MSM and blogs so far, as well as an index of 4:20 News blog posts from 2008 to now.

Last night's TVNZ and TV3 stories on the report, including Simon Power's instant dismissal of it. There's a large cast of characters, including the Law Commission's Warren Young, NORML's Phil Saxby, Green Cross' Billy McKee, the NZ Drug Foundation's Ross Bell and MethCon salesman Mike Sabin.

NBR broke the story here, with an NZPA release. The NZ Herald's story is here, tagged as Drug Abuse as always. Stuff reports it here, and on forced treatment of dope fiends here.

This morning's Morning Report began their program discussing the matter with Billy McKee, Phil Saxby, Mike Sabin, Simon Power. Later on, Sean Plunket speaks to police union man Greg O'Connor. O'Connor keeps toeing the drugs = organised crime trope. Nine to Noon's Kathryn Ryan speaks to LawCom's Warren Young, Addiction Treatment's Chris Kalin and United Future's Peter Dunne.

Russell Brown is furious at the outright dismissal of the LawCom's report by Simon Power. Nandor Tanczos is not impressed with the tame conclusions that the Commission reached anyway. Dim Post points out the illogic of the status quo:

There are more serious problems facing the nation but the drug laws – medicinal heroin but not medicinal cannabis; pot growers get prison, brewery owners get knighthoods – are easily the least logical, most absurd and do the most to undermine the moral authority of the state and the justice system.