Select House committee to start work on curbing drug use

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Members of a recently formed legislative drug task force are set to meet with the public Friday in Duluth to begin their work examining synthetic drug abuse in Minnesota.House Speaker Paul Thissen (DFL-Mpls) announced last week the formation of the Speaker’s Select Committee on Controlled Substances and Synthetic Drugs that will study drug-related issues and develop recommended policies to combat surging synthetic drug use.The group is scheduled to attend a public hearing on synthetic drug abuse June 7 in Duluth. Thissen said in a news release the committee will hold hearings during the interim with a goal of issuing recommendations by Feb. 25, 2014 on curtailing the sale and use of drugs.Lawmakers serving on the committee are: Rep. Kathy Lohmer (R-Stillwater), Rep. Jim Newberger (R-Becker), Rep. Dan Schoen (DFL-St. Paul Park), Rep. Erik Simonson (DFL-Duluth) and Rep. John Ward (DFL-Baxter). Continue Reading

Will marijuana initiatives lead to real reform?

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Voters in Colorado and Washington approved initiatives to legalize the personal possession and use of marijuana. (One in Oregon failed; it was apparently poorly conceived, and had little activist support.) It needs to be noted that the approval of such initiatives is one thing, and the actual law that ends up happening can be quite another. Ideally, said actual law would include the immediate release of everyone currently incarcerated in those states for non-violent marijuana “offenses.” Fat chance. Continue Reading

FREE SPEECH ZONE | Occupy Minneapolis, Minnesota Law Enforcement and Illegal Drugs

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Here is an update on the story from Occupy Minnesota and how local Minnesota law enforcement were giving young people illegal drugs and then releasing them into Peavey Plaza which is where Occupy Minneapolis has been camped, ever since the “progressive” Minneapolis City Council evicted us from the People’s Plaza, right outside Minneapolis City Hall.Free Speech ZoneThe Free Speech Zone offers a space for contributions from readers, without editing by the TC Daily Planet. This is an open forum for articles that otherwise might not find a place for publication, including news articles, opinion columns, announcements and even a few press releases. The opinions expressed in the Free Speech Zone and Neighborhood Notes, as well as the opinions of bloggers, are their own and not necessarily the opinion of the TC Daily Planet.The focus of this story has been the corporate media and their “response” to this story. As far as I can tell WCCO (located right where the police were picking up sober kids and returning them stoned) have been the only corporate media to even cover this story. They framed it as a good thing, an aid to local law enforcement. Continue Reading