Will Legal Marijuana Look Like This?

Print magazine solicited a number of professional design firms to put together potential packaging for legal marijuana. It resulted in a very interesting collection.

The statistics website FiveThirtyEight estimates that if public support continues to grow at its current pace, legalization could happen within 15 years.

With this in mind, Print contacted four firms: Lust, a graphic design practice in Amsterdam established by Thomas Castro, Jeroen Barendse, and Dimitri Nieuwenhuizen; the New York office of Base, which worked with its branches in Europe; the Oslo firm Strømme Throndsen, winner of the 2009 Award for Design Excellence for its flour packaging; and The Heads of State, a two-man operation run by Jason Kernevich and Dustin Summers in Philadelphia.

The brief was simple: What would a legal pack of marijuana cigarettes look like?

Check out the Print site for more pics of the designs.

Q & A on change.org

The Criminal Justice blog at change.org has a short Q & A with myself and Jack Cole.

Volunteers Needed

Our new Speakers Bureau Director, Shaleen Title, recently sent this email to all LEAP members:

"Law Enforcement Against Prohibition is seeking professional, articulate volunteers to support LEAP by booking speaking engagements in your area.

LEAP is growing quickly as more and more distinguished members of law enforcement join us to speak out about the harms caused by our current drug policies. As you know, LEAP's strategy is to send our respected and credible speakers out to explain this issue to captive audiences. We want to utilize each speaker to their maximum potential and reach as many new people as possible, so we are seeking volunteers to help us put our speakers in front of audiences across the United States and abroad.

Because of the training involved, we ask volunteers to commit to 1-2 hours per week. You'll be reaching out to civic clubs, universities, churches, and other groups in your area to book our speakers. We will train you to call on these groups as a member of LEAP and explain why they should be interested in hosting a LEAP speaker. As a token of appreciation for your time and effort, we offer a small compensation for each gig you are able to arrange.

This is a great opportunity to gain experience in advocacy, outreach, and event planning while helping to promote LEAP's message. If you are interested in volunteering, please email me with your name, city, country and relevant experience."

Stalin's 5 year plans

The older among you may remember the Soviet Union 5 year plans. What used to happen was the Governing body, would declare targets for agriculture, manufacturing, mineral and coal production etc. to be reached during the next 5 years. Invariably the Commisars from the different regions would boast about reaching and surpassing those targets in the regions under their jurisdictions. However the reality was far short, millions continued to starve, production usually fell and where it rose the products manufuctured were invariably seriously flawed and often useless. The boasting continued, till almost the fall of the Soviet era.
Almost every statement out of the DEA and other prohibition groups, reminds me of that era in the Soviet Union. Invariable also empty boasts were unstainable and contributed to the implosion of the whole system. I suspect we are close to the same situation with the war on drugs.
Tony

Colby Cosh on international drug policy

Colby Cosh has a column in the National Post today about drug policy. He examines the U.S. government reaction (or lack of it) to decriminalization in Mexico, and the recent court ruling in Argentina:

"Say, are we still having that debate over whether the United States constitutes an empire? I remember the idea seeming controversial a few years back. In 2009, the whole idea of disagreeing with it seems quaint. But maybe things will look different in a few more years. Empires do not rise and fall monotonically; they expand and contract, relax and relent. In an extraordinary turn of events, Caesar has temporarily turned a blind eye to the policing of morals in the provinces, allowing startling drug reforms in two major "partner" states."

Read the full column here.

Topics for discussion

My hope is that this blog will be more substantial than repeatedly stating, "Prohibition bad. Legalization good." I would like this blog to become a wide ranging discussion about a number of different topics. Here are some of my ideas for blog posts:

-What are some options for how stimulants could be regulated?
-Should there be changes to how alcohol is regulated?
-Creative fundraising ideas for LEAP.
-The role of a police officer.
-How can we recruit more LEAP speakers?
-What is dexamphetamine?
-How can we increase LEAP's membership by a factor of ten?
-What will happen to medicinal marijuana programs after marijuana is legalized?

What topics would you like to see discussed?