In the thrall of the monster drug barons

In the thrall of the monster drug barons
Blue Collar Bohemian
21 February 2007

Isn't it good to see that the best politicians money can buy are so consistent in their attitudes to public health and moral fibre. On one hand they enjoy a felch-fest with the drug dealers and poker machine pushers of the Australian Hotel Association (SMH 13/02/07), while on the other they sool the sniffer dogs onto the punters going to the Big Day Out, and just about everything else, in case they might have a reefer or eccy pill in their pocket.

Fresh from fee-for-servicing their other pimps and sugar daddies at the Property Council the brave defenders of the realm from The Pernicious Weed From Hell brigade are shameless in their hypocritical no-nothingism on drug prohibition – "There are no recreational drug users, just criminals" barked one fuckwit cop from the best police farce money can buy about the Big Day Out.

In Dopeland, his excellent book on the marijuana culture in Australia, John Birmingham reports smoking pot with all sorts of people – lawyers, a deputy mayor, teachers, librarians, and a senior bureaucrat who "claimed to have pulled cones with a former Liberal premier". The state wasn't specified, but one can speculate. In NSW, certain politicians well known for their pompously reactionary public attitude to law and order have been big choofers – I know, I smoked with them when they and I were in Young Labor many years ago (it seems like a parallel universe now). Birmingham also said he had to reduce his book by 25 per cent because of defamation laws. Now that, under the reformed laws, truth is all that has to be demonstrated he should republish Dopeland with the deleted information restored.

Meanwhile, on what is spuriously claimed to be the other side of the political fence, the federal Liberal MP Sophie Mirabella has been linked to an undeclared secret "supporters fund" that received $15,000 from British American Tobacco. Former NSW liberal premier Nick Greiner was chairman of the board of WD&HO Wills and then British American Tobacco Australia from 1996 to 2004. Last year the Liberal Party received $209,249 from the tobacco pushers Phillip Morris and BAT (Australian Electoral Commission figure). When you listen to the shit that dribbles from the mouths of every member of Howard's government about the "drug menace" it is useful to remember who owns their punk bitch arses and which drugs kill most people, how many drunks clutter hospital casualty wards due to their own stupidity and how many people are in deep financial straits due to easy access to that monumental idiocy, the poker machine.

It is also obvious that so much of the government propaganda regarding those fine sacred herbs Cannabis indica and Cannabis sativa is just bullshit. For example over the last fifty years, despite the exponential increase in marijuana enjoyment since the late sixties, the incident of schizophrenia has not changed. Nor has anyone died from using pot. Compare this to the recently released figures showing that alcohol kills an indigenous person by suicide or hemorrhagic stroke every 38 hours, and that indigenous women die at 25 of hemorrhagic stroke at a huge rate. In the invader population death from this affliction at that age is virtually unknown.

So, the next time you're sitting in the pub trying to listen to a live band (if you can find one) over the cretinous sound of the pokies and the pigs going through the bar with the sniffer dogs ruins your night out, remember there is a place for these poor exploited animals – the Korean Barbeque.

Oh, and for you readers with a camera phone, here's a tip. If you see some uniformed deadshit behaving in a racist, brutal, vicious, authoritarian and stupid manner towards someone … snap away! … and send the pictures to anywhere they will get lots of unwanted publicity. The cops have cameras everywhere watching everything, especially on railway stations, and this would balance things somewhat. After all, if they aren't doing anything wrong they have nothing to worry about. Where have we heard that before?



powered by FreeFind		In the thrall of the monster drug barons Blue Collar Bohemian 21 February 2007 Isn't it good to see that the best politicians money can buy are so consistent in their attitudes to public health and moral fibre. On one hand they enjoy a felch-fest with the drug dealers and poker machine pushers of the Australian Hotel Association (SMH 13/02/07), while on the other they sool the sniffer dogs onto the punters going to the Big Day Out, and just about everything else, in case they might have a reefer or eccy pill in their pocket. Fresh from fee-for-servicing their other pimps and sugar daddies at the Property Council the brave defenders of the realm from The Pernicious Weed From Hell brigade are shameless in their hypocritical no-nothingism on drug prohibition – "There are no recreational drug users, just criminals" barked one fuckwit cop from the best police farce money can buy about the Big Day Out. In Dopeland, his excellent book on the marijuana culture in Australia, John Birmingham reports smoking pot with all sorts of people – lawyers, a deputy mayor, teachers, librarians, and a senior bureaucrat who "claimed to have pulled cones with a former Liberal premier". The state wasn't specified, but one can speculate. In NSW, certain politicians well known for their pompously reactionary public attitude to law and order have been big choofers – I know, I smoked with them when they and I were in Young Labor many years ago (it seems like a parallel universe now). Birmingham also said he had to reduce his book by 25 per cent because of defamation laws. Now that, under the reformed laws, truth is all that has to be demonstrated he should republish Dopeland with the deleted information restored. Meanwhile, on what is spuriously claimed to be the other side of the political fence, the federal Liberal MP Sophie Mirabella has been linked to an undeclared secret "supporters fund" that received $15,000 from British American Tobacco. Former NSW liberal premier Nick Greiner was chairman of the board of WD&HO Wills and then British American Tobacco Australia from 1996 to 2004. Last year the Liberal Party received $209,249 from the tobacco pushers Phillip Morris and BAT (Australian Electoral Commission figure). When you listen to the shit that dribbles from the mouths of every member of Howard's government about the "drug menace" it is useful to remember who owns their punk bitch arses and which drugs kill most people, how many drunks clutter hospital casualty wards due to their own stupidity and how many people are in deep financial straits due to easy access to that monumental idiocy, the poker machine. It is also obvious that so much of the government propaganda regarding those fine sacred herbs Cannabis indica and Cannabis sativa is just bullshit. For example over the last fifty years, despite the exponential increase in marijuana enjoyment since the late sixties, the incident of schizophrenia has not changed. Nor has anyone died from using pot. Compare this to the recently released figures showing that alcohol kills an indigenous person by suicide or hemorrhagic stroke every 38 hours, and that indigenous women die at 25 of hemorrhagic stroke at a huge rate. In the invader population death from this affliction at that age is virtually unknown. So, the next time you're sitting in the pub trying to listen to a live band (if you can find one) over the cretinous sound of the pokies and the pigs going through the bar with the sniffer dogs ruins your night out, remember there is a place for these poor exploited animals – the Korean Barbeque. Oh, and for you readers with a camera phone, here's a tip. If you see some uniformed deadshit behaving in a racist, brutal, vicious, authoritarian and stupid manner towards someone … snap away! … and send the pictures to anywhere they will get lots of unwanted publicity. The cops have cameras everywhere watching everything, especially on railway stations, and this would balance things somewhat. After all, if they aren't doing anything wrong they have nothing to worry about. Where have we heard that before?