Tag: moral panics

Trump’s Choice For Top Justice Department Role Says Marijuana Is A ‘Gateway Drug’ That Makes Consumers ‘Boring And Smelly’

President-elect Donald Trump has made his selection for another top Justice Department official: Harmeet Dhillon, who has peddled the gateway drug theory about marijuana and says cannabis makes people who consume it “silly, boring and smelly.”

Trump said on Monday that he intends to nominate Dhillon as assistant attorney general for civil rights. The lawyer has served in leadership roles with the Republican National Committee and California Republican Party, and she’s a frequent Fox News contributor.

For those following the marijuana policy positions of Trump’s cabinet picks, Dhillon’s comments on the issue reveal a staunch opposition to the use of cannabis, which she claimed is a “gateway drug and ambition-killer” following President Joe Biden’s mass marijuana pardons.

This choice for a key DOJ position also comes amid the final steps of the Biden administration’s efforts to reschedule marijuana—a task that the incoming Trump administration will inherit and which his Justice Department will play a pivotal role in facilitating.

Dhillon doesn’t seem expressly opposed to the idea of preventing people from going to jail over simple cannabis possession, however, and she’s pointed out that federal prosecutors rarely go after people over that low-level offense. At one point, she criticized Vice President Kamala Harris over her prosecutorial record on cannabis.

But she’s made her distaste for cannabis consumption clear on a number of occasions.

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Florida Sen. Rick Scott says he’ll vote against recreational pot after brother’s death

Republican Sen. Rick Scott of Florida says he’ll be voting in November against a ballot amendment to legalize recreational marijuana in his state, a deeply personal decision based on his brother’s long history of addiction.

The senator and former Florida governor said he watched his brother Roger Scott begin smoking marijuana as a teenager and then struggle with substance use for the rest of life.

“People end up with addictive personalities, and so he did,” Scott said in an interview. “It messes up your life, and so that’s why I’ve never supported legalization of drugs.”

When Roger Scott died in April at 67, the cause wasn’t substance abuse, but rather “a life of drugs and alcohol” catching up with him, the senator said. He had lived in an apartment in Dallas, Texas, where he served jail time in 1990 on a misdemeanor conviction of possessing dangerous drugs, court records show.

Rick Scott became wealthy as a lawyer and health care industry executive before entering politics. Now running for reelection, he lamented that his brother had a “tough life” and says it all began with marijuana.

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We Were Wrong To Panic About Secondhand Smoke

In 2003, UCLA epidemiologist James Enstrom and I published a study of environmental tobacco smoke (ETS)—also called “secondhand smoke” or “passive smoking”—in the British Medical Journal (BMJ). Using data from the American Cancer Society’s prospective study of 1 million adults, we concluded that ETS exposure was not associated with increased mortality.

Since that conclusion flew in the face of the conventional wisdom that had long driven state and local bans on smoking in public places, our study understandably sparked a controversy in the public health community. But the intensity of the attack on us in the pages of a medical journal—by critics who were certain that our study had to be wrong but typically failed to provide specific evidence of fatal errors—vividly illustrates what can happen when policy preferences that have taken on the status of doctrine override rational scientific debate.

A recent study by American Cancer Society (ACS) researchers underscores that point by showing that, contrary to what our critics asserted, the cancer risk posed by ETS is likely negligible. The authors present that striking result without remarking on it, which may reflect their reluctance to revisit a debate that anti-smoking activists and public health officials wrongly view as long settled.

Exposure to ETS is known to cause eye and throat irritation and to exacerbate preexisting respiratory conditions. In addition, it is simply disagreeable to many people (including me). But assessing the claim that ETS is potentially deadly requires dispassionate examination of the available scientific evidence.

That is not what Enstrom and I encountered when we published our BMJ paper. Critics were outraged by the article and demanded its retraction. But they were never able to satisfactorily explain why such an extreme step was justified.

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Legalizing Marijuana Does Not Jeopardize Mental Health, Studies Show, Contrary To Opponents’ Alarmist Claims 

Opponents of marijuana legalization often allege that jurisdictions that have legalized adult-use marijuana sales experience subsequent rises in incidences of cannabis-induced psychosis and other adverse mental health consequences. But nearly a decade worth of scientific data from Canada and the United States refutes this contention.

For instance, a study published last year in an imprint of the Journal of the American Medical Association evaluated the relationship between U.S. legalization laws and psychosis rates in more than 63 million privately insured individuals. Researchers described it as the “largest [study] to quantify the association of medical and recreational cannabis policies with rates of psychosis-related health care claims across US states.”

Investigators concluded: “State medical and recreational cannabis policies were not associated with a statistically significant increase in rates of psychosis-related health outcomes.”

They’re not alone in this determination. A just-published consensus study compiled by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine concluded, “There is insufficient evidence of an association between cannabis policy and changes in mental and behavioral health.”

And new data from Canada, published this month in the journal Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology determined that cannabis-related emergency department visits declined among schizophrenia patients following Canada’s adoption of adult-use marijuana legalization.

“Our findings suggest that regulatory measures accompanying legalization could enhance the quality and safety of cannabis products, potentially leading to fewer adverse health outcomes in vulnerable patient populations,” the study’s authors wrote. “Furthermore, our study indicates that legalization and cannabis regulation, in certain contexts, may help reduce acute care utilization in vulnerable patient groups.”

Their findings are particularly relevant because it is well established that those suffering from schizophrenia, psychosis and similar conditions tend to consume cannabis, tobacco and other controlled substances at rates higher than those in the general population. Data also suggests that, in some cases, cannabis use may exacerbate symptoms of psychosis or even trigger a psychotic episode in those predisposed to it. Therefore, regulatory strategies that better educate, target and protect this vulnerable population is critically important.

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DeSantis Stirs Pot Again With More Anti-Marijuana Ads Funded By Taxpayers, Including One Linking Cannabis To Domestic Violence

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) is facing new allegations of weaponizing state agencies with taxpayer-funded ads to support his campaign to defeat a marijuana legalization initiative that voters will decide on at the ballot next month.

In an ad from the Department of Transportation (DOT), three sheriffs make various claims about the harms of cannabis—including one who suggests that marijuana use is associated with a greater risk of domestic violence, contrary to research on the topic.

“When we make home visits for domestic violence calls, they’re often associated with marijuana use,” Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said.

Duval County Sheriff T.K. Waters said in the PSA, first reported by Seeking Rents, that there are “too many kids going to the ER because of weed gummies and joints laced with fentanyl.”

In one of the only statements from the sheriffs that seems directly relevant to DOT, Brevard County Sheriff Wayne Ivey said “we see more traffic collisions and fatalities because of driving high.”

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JD Vance Says ‘Bags Of Marijuana’ And Candy Laced With THC And Fentanyl Are Coming Across The Border, Blaming Biden-Harris Immigration Policy

Former President Donald Trump’s 2024 running mate, Sen. JD Vance (R-OH), is accusing Vice President Kamala Harris of failing to stop marijuana and fentanyl disguised as Nerds candy and other popular brands that appeal to children from coming across the border.

At a Faith & Freedom Coalition event in Atlanta last month, the senator talked about being invited to the evidence room of a sheriffs department where he says he saw “every drug you can possibly imagine,” including “bags and bags of marijuana,” pressed fentanyl pills and meth.

“I say, ‘Guys, what is going on here? You’ve got all these drugs here that looks to me just like a box of candy—a box of Nerds candy,” Vance said. “And they say, ‘Well, sir, that’s actually THC and fentanyl.’ But I say, ‘Wait a second, the cartels have disguised deadly fentanyl to look like child’s candy so that they can make it easier to get into our country?’”

“Yet we know that one of those packets of fentanyl is going to end up in one of our neighborhood streets,” he said. “One of those packets of fentanyl is going to end up in a child’s playground. One of those packets of what looks like Nerds candy, but is actually a deadly substance, is going to end up in our schools, and a kid’s going to open up a packet of candy, take a piece of candy out and lose their life because of it.”

“Now that is a sick and deranged human being that would do anything like that. But it’s a sick and deranged human being who would give that person power over the United States of America, and that’s exactly what Kamala Harris has done,” he said. “She has given these drug cartels free reign over our country, and now they’re smuggling in deadly drugs that look like child candy.”

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Big Tech’s Latest “Fix” for AI Panic Is To Push a Digital ID Agenda

A research paper, authored by Microsoft, OpenAI, and a host of influential universities, proposes developing “personhood credentials” (PHCs).

It’s notable for the fact that the same companies that are developing and selling potentially “deceptive” AI models are now coming up with a fairly drastic “solution,” a form of digital ID.

The goal would be to prevent deception by identifying people creating content on the internet as “real” – as opposed to that generated by AI. And, the paper freely admits that privacy is not included.

Instead, there’s talk of “cryptographic authentication” that is also described as “pseudonymous” as PHCs are not supposed to publicly identify a person – unless, that is, the demand comes from law enforcement.

“Although PHCs prevent linking the credential across services, users should understand that their other online activities can still be tracked and potentially de-anonymized through existing methods,” said the paper’s authors.

Here we arrive at what could be the gist of the story – come up with workable digital ID available to the government, while on the surface preserving anonymity. And wrap it all in a package supposedly righting the very wrongs Microsoft and co. are creating through their lucrative “AI” products.

The paper treats online anonymity as the key “weapon” used by bad actors engaging in deceptive behavior. Microsoft product manager Shrey Jain suggested during an interview that while this was in the past acceptable for the sake of privacy and access to information – times have changed.

The reason is AI – or rather, AI panic, thriving these days well before the world ever gets to experience and deal with, true AI (AGI). But it’s good enough for the likes of Microsoft, OpenAI, and over 30 others (including Harvard, Oxford, MIT…) to suggest PHCs.

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JD Vance Claims There’s ‘Fentanyl In Our Marijuana Bags That Our Teenagers Are Using’

Former President Donald Trump’s vice presidential running mate, Sen. JD Vance (R-OH), is claiming that “marijuana bags” are being laced with fentanyl, and he says the Biden administration’s border policies are making it so that youth, including his own kids, can’t experiment with cannabis or other drugs without risking fatal overdoses.

During a campaign event with the Milwaukee Police Association in Wisconsin on Friday, Vance said he spoke to a police officer who told him that “we’ve got fentanyl in our marijuana bags that our teenagers are using,” echoing a claim about laced cannabis that’s been routinely contested by advocates and certain state regulators.

“Look, I’m the parent of three young kids… A seven-year-old, a four-year-old and a two-year-old,” he said. “We don’t have to worry about this yet, but I’m certain—because kids are kids—that one day, one of my kids is going to take something or do something that I don’t want them to take. But I don’t want that mistake to ruin their life.”

“I want them to learn from it. I want their parents to be able to punish them. I don’t want our kids to make mistakes on American streets and have it take their lives away from them,” he said, suggesting that he recognizes when his children grow up they may experiment with certain substances such as marijuana, but he’s more concerned with potentially lethal contamination.

Advocates would argue that’s a key reason to enact a regulatory framework for marijuana or other drugs that includes testing requirements and other safeguards to mitigate the risk of dangerous contaminants, but the GOP candidate did not draw that connection and continues to maintain an opposition to cannabis legalization.

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Election 2024: Arizona and Michigan Train Clerks To Report AI Deepfakes To Law Enforcement

The AI (and specifically, deepfakes) panic is playing a prominent role in this US election campaign, with the states of Arizona and Michigan introducing a scheme to train election clerks in identifying content branded as such.

Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes and Michigan and Minnesota counterparts Jocelyn Benson and Steve Simon, all three Democrats, are among those pushing an initiative called the Artificial Intelligence Task Force, launched by the NewDEAL Forum.

NewDEAL Forum is a Washington-based NGO whose board is populated by Democrat-associated figures, and which states it set out to “defend democracy” by developing tools and methods to help election officials and voters not only identify but also flag “malicious AI-generated activity” like deepfakes and “misinformation.”

Arizona and Michigan are considered to be swing states and there this effort is happening in the form of tabletop exercises that teach participants how to inform law enforcement and first responders about flagged content.

That’s not the only recently launched “project:” there’s liberal voting rights and media Democracy Docket platform, which is quoting Jocelyn Benson as saying that Michigan now has a law making “knowingly distributing materially-deceptive deep fakes” a felony.

But this applies only if this activity is seen as intending to harm a candidate’s reputation or chance at success, the Michigan secretary of state explained. However, it wasn’t immediately clear how transparent and precise the rules around determining the intent behind a deep fake are.

If applied arbitrarily, such legislation could catch a lot of things in its net – like satire and parody.

And it’s not an insignificant distinction when talking about AI, and deepfakes for that matter, since both have been around for a while, the latter notably in the entertainment industry.

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Florida Police Groups Oppose Marijuana Legalization Ballot Initiative, Claiming Reform Would Cause ‘Violent Assaults And Death’ Like Alcohol

Two major Florida law enforcement associations are calling on voters to reject a marijuana legalization initiative on the ballot this November, with one claiming it would pose a public safety risk because cannabis use is associated with “violent assaults and deaths” just like alcohol.

The Florida Police Chiefs Association (FPCA) and the Florida Sheriffs Association (FSA) both came out against the marijuana measure, Amendment 3, on Tuesday. They argued that the reform would cause increases in youth use, impaired driving, illicit operations and tax costs for residents, citing dubious evidence.

The chief of FPCA, representing over 1,300 law enforcement officials, said in a press release that passing the cannabis proposal “will hurt public safety and ultimately cost Floridians tax dollars and lives. Among these impacts will be the growth of illegal markets and criminal cartels, impaired driving and traffic fatalities, homelessness and hospitalization as a result of marijuana use.”

“The use of marijuana, just like with alcohol, is also a major risk factor for victimization, violent assaults, and deaths,” Tampa International Airport Police Department Chief Charles Vazquez, the organization’s leader, said.

“Studies have shown alcohol and marijuana in similar percentages of homicide victims (37.5 percent and 31 percent respectively), with the prevalence of marijuana highest in younger victims (15-20 years, 46.8 percent),” he said. “In addition, Black homicide victims had a considerably higher prevalence of marijuana (38 percent) than white victims (23.4 percent).”

The statement did not include citations, but a growing body of research has drawn clear distinctions challenging the idea that rates of violence associated with cannabis use are comparable to alcohol. For example, an analysis of violence between intimate partners that was published recently found that legalizing marijuana for adult use “results in a substantial decrease in rates of intimate partner violence.”

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