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Today's
Stories
November
10 / 11, 2007
Alain
Gresh
Uncle Sam's New Backyard: How to Turn
a Region into a Graveyard
November
9, 2007
Patrick
Cockburn
In the Kandil Mountains with the
PKK
Mohammed
Hanif
Musharraf and the Drunk Uncle
John
Ross
Blackwater Goes to Mexico
Mike
Whitney
Ron Paul, Big Media's Invisible Candidate
Tom
Barry
In Latin America, the Hillary Clinton Policy is the Bush Policy
Corporate
Crime Reporter
Is the AFL Trying to Derail Single Payer Health Care?
Badruddin
Khan
Pakistan and the Israel Lobby
David
Macaray
The WGA STrike: the Empire Strikes Back
Martha
Rosenberg
The Blood Sport of Vice Presidents
Website
of the Day
Stryker Blockade!
November
8, 2007
Kathleen
& Bill Christison
Meeting the Other in Israel and
Palestine
William
Loren Katz
Waterboarding in American History
Mike
Whitney
The Long Fall: a Market Without Parachutes
Sheldon
Richman
Why Woodstock May Have Saved John McCain's Life
Liaquat
Ali Khan
Solidarity with Pakistan's Lawyers
Marc
Gardner
The Victims of "Jessica's Law": Parolees Without Rights
(or Homes)
Jackie
Corr
The Big Fish from Whitefish: Montana, the Last Retreat of the
Investment Banker?
Brenda
Norrell
Between Bombs and Border Walls
Dave
Lindorff
Ridiculing Impeachment at the New York Times
China
Hand
Rewriting the History of the Sudan Calamity
Sen.
Russ Feingold
FISA and America's Basic Freedoms: Let's Not Repeat the Mistakes
of the Patriot Act
Website
of the Day
The Welfare Poets Meet Hugo Chavez
November
7, 2007
Paul
Craig Roberts
Dollar's Fall Collapses the American
Empire
Russell
Mokhiber
Pelosi and Me: Can't the Democrats End the War By Not Bringing
the Funding Bill to the Floor?
Vijay
Prashad
The Apotheosis of Bobby Jindal
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Educating Pakistan: What Mukasey Can Teach Musharraf
Alan
Farago
To Bee or Not to Bee? The Politics of Colony Collapse
David
Macaray
The Writers' Guild Strike: Is There an Ice-Breaker?
Nikolas
Kozloff
The Case of the Slimy Senator: Chuck Schumer Greenlights Mukasey
Charlotte
Laws
What We Learned from Stephen Colbert's Presidential Campaign
Daniel
White
Zahid's Story
William
Cook
The Politics of Servility: Congress and the Israel Lobby
Website
of the Day
Safe Lawns
November
6, 2007
Mike
Whitney
Welcome to Year 27 of the Reagan
Revolution
Ralph
Nader
Who Determines the Price of Oil?
Andy
Worthington
The Torture of Ali al-Marri
Pam
Martens
Wall Street Metes Out Street Justice to Citigroup
Liaquat
Ali Khan
Pakistan's Dark Future
William
Schroder
The Return of Water Torture
Stephen
Lendman
Punishing Gaza
William
Blum
Cuba and Original Sin
Former
US Intelligence Officers
A Memo on Torture, Intelligence and Mukasey
November
5, 2007
Alexander
Cockburn
How I Spent the Eighth Brumaire
Russell
Mokhiber
Pelosi and Me: The Democrats and Single Payer
David
Macaray
How to Turn Workers Against Each Other (and Make Them All Poorer)
Gary
Leupp
General Musharaff's "State of Emergency"
Dave
Lindorff
Those Minot Nukes
Ludwig
Watzal
Israel's Dilemma in Palestine
Patrick
Cockburn
Tensions Ease in Iraqi Kurdistan
Peter
Stone Brown
John Fogerty Makes Peace with His Past
Michael
Simmons
Yo! What Happened to Peace?
Website
of the Day
Petition: In Defense of the Morton West HS Antiwar Students
November
3 / 4, 2007
Tariq
Ali
Pakistan Sinks Deeper into Night
David
Price
Army's Price Salesman of Counterinsurgency
Manual Seeks to Defend Stolen Scholarship
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Splitsville
Alan
Farago
The Housing Crash, Suburban Sprawl and the Crisis of the American
Middle Class
Paul
Krassner
He's Back! Don Imus Meets Michael Richards
Rannie
Amiri
Why the U.S. is Safeguarding Iraq's War Criminals
P.
Sainath
Indexing Humanity, Indian Style
Ayesha
Ijaza Khan
Pakistan in a Daze
Robert
Fantina
Is the Bush Administration Talking Itself Into a War With Iran?
Seth
Sandronsky
The Politics of Health Care in California
Ron
Jacobs
The Bebop of Baraka
Ramzy
Baroud
A Case for Arab Dignity
Heather
Gray
When Capitalists Get a Free Ride
November
2, 2007
Dr.
Mary Pipher
Acting on Conscience: Psychologists
and Abusive Interrogations
Saul
Landau
How Pete Stark Became a Pariah
Andy
Worthington
Guantánamo as House Arrest
Sharon
Smith
A Tale of Two Stadiums
Gary
Leupp
Fascist Beatifications: the History and Politics of Sainthood
Gregory
Harms
The Chorus of Slander on Palestine
Christopher
Brauchli
Racism in High Places
Peter
Morici
The Falling Dollar and the Stubborn Trade Deficit
Dave
Lindorff
The Easy Way to Stop the Looming US Attack on Iran
David
Penner
Zombie Nation
Website
of the Day
Fall in Yosemite
November
1, 2007
Paul
Craig Roberts
The Wages of Hegemony
Patrick
Cockburn
The Most Dangerous Dam in the World
Dave
Lindorff
The Air Force Report on the Minot-Barksdale Nuclear Missile Flight
Jonathan
Feldman
The Strange Political Economy of Death in the South
Mike
Ferner
They Met the Resistance in Iraq
William
S. Lind
A Question for Would-Be Presidents
Diana
Johnstone
"Fascislamism" Versus "Shoah Business"
Jacob
Hornberger
The War on Telephone Privacy
A..K.
Gupta
The Apocalypse will be Televised
Lyuba
Zarsky /
Kevin Gallagher
The Enclave Economy of Mexico's Silicon Valley
Felice
Pace
Does the SPLC Equate Anti-Zionism with Anti-Semitism?
Website
of the Day
This One's for You, Ed Abbey
October
31, 2007
Bill
Quigley
New Orleans' Broken Criminal Justice
System
Rev.
William E. Alberts
A Trail of American Blood: From the White House to CBS News
Ray
McGovern
Attacking Iran for Israel
Eric
Walberg
Poisonous Espionage: Litvinenko and the New Cold War
V.
G. Smith
The Second Death of Guy Môquet
Luis
J. Rodriguez
"Social Cleansing" from Guatemala to LA
Sheldon
Richman
Bush has Time to Run the World
Walter
Brasch
A Real Halloween Scare
Website
of the Day
Boogie Rocks!
October 30, 2007
David
Price
Pilfered Scholarship Devastates Gen.
Petraeus's Counterinsurgency Manual
M.
Shahid Alam
The Pakistan Question
Andy
Worthington
The Epiphany of Matthew Waxman: a Government Insider Turns Against
Gitmo
Patrick
Cockburn
The Bicycle Bomber of Baquba
Anthony
Papa
The Twisted Logic of Drug Laws
Floyd
Rudmin
What "All Options are on the Table" Really Means
Sherwood
Ross
Giuliani and Torture
Website
of the Day
The Worst Lobby? You Decide
October
29, 2007
Lisa
Hajjar
Inside Israel's Military Courts
Joe
DeRaymond
The Politics of Lethal Injections
Patrick
Cockburn
The High Stakes in Iraqi Kurdistan
Isabella
Kenfield /
Roger Burbach
Corporate Murder in Brazil
Fred
Gardner
The Frivolous Investigation of Dr. Sterner
Farzana
Versey
Caricaturing Islam
Stephen
Fleischman
The Greening of the Oligarchy
Marcelle
Cendrars
The Congressional Rip Cord
Eamonn
McCann
Dan Keating, the Last of the Republican Irreconcilables
Martha
Rosenberg
For Halloween, Ann Coulter Dresses as .... Ann Coulter!
Website
of the Day
Campaign 2008
October
27 / 28, 2007
Alexander
Cockburn
So Much for Islamo-Fascism Awareness
Jeffrey
St. Clair
The Dam That Isn't There
James
Bovard
Breaking Down an Innocent Man: The FBI's Right to Threaten Torture
Ralph
Nader
Beyond the Rule of Law
M.
Reza Pirbhai
The Wahhabis are Coming, the Wahhabis are Coming!
Robert
Sandels
Pay the Invaders! Cuba, Claims and Confiscations
Jacob
G. Hornberger
Ruling By Decree
Missy
Beattie
The Arsonists in the West Wing
John
Ross
U.S. Eyes on Oaxaca
Robert
Fantina
Condi Rice, the Imperial Cheerleader
Ron
Jacobs
Labor at the Crossroads
Ali
Moayedian
In Search of Logic About Iran
David
Michael Green
What If We Had a President Who Didn't Give a Damn About Terrorism?
Poets
Basement
Block, Davies and Ford
Website
of the Day
Bring 'Em Home: a Music Video
October
26, 2007
Brian
Cloughley
Revenging Bloodshed
Saul
Landau
Portrait of Rudy
Ahmad
Al-Akras
Getting Justice in the HLF Case
Franklin
Lamb
Does "Loving" Lebanon Mean Never Having to Say You're
Sorry?
Mike
Whitney
Murdoch's Cuckoo's Nest
Dave
Lindorff
Home of the Brave? Reducing US Casualties By Killing More Civilians
Alan
Farago
A Castro Behind Every Bush
Yifat
Susskind
Conscripting Feminism into the War on Terror
Website
of the Day
Dead Life in a Political Prison
October 25, 2007
Jeffrey
St. Clair /
Joshua Frank
Iraq's Environmental Crisis
Manuel
Garcia, Jr.
Homes of the Crash Test Dummies
Paul
Craig Roberts
The Fraudulent War on Terror
Col.
Dan Smith
The Politics of Paranoia: Jane Harman's War on the First Amendment
Alan
Farago
The Way to Paradise?
Chris
Kutalik
The Lesson of the Chrysler Rebels
Brian
McKinlay
John Howard and the Curse of Bush
Cindy
Sheehan
Pete, Nancy, George and WW III
Website
of the Day
Support the America's Program!
October
24, 2007
Natalie
Washington-Weik
White Fantasies About Race-Based
Intelligence
Andy
Worthington
The Guantánamo Suicides
Michael
Birmingham
What Happened in Nahr Al Bared?
Corporate
Crime Reporter
The Nuclear Democrats
Tariq
Ali
Bush's Cuba Detour
Farzana
Versey
Imagining Serfdom in a Scarf
Dave
Zirin
White Noise
James
Murren
What "Support Our Troops" Means
Todd
Chretien
Looking Reality in the Face
Martha
Rosenberg
What Came First, the Chicken or
the Cage?
Website
of the Day
Hillary Clinton on Nuclear Power
October
23, 2007
Ralph
Nader
Bush's Catastrophic Rhetoric
Lawrence
R. Velvel
Goldsmith Stands Convicted--By His Own Mouth: How a Harvard Law
Professor Justified Rendition at the Bush Justice Dept.
Vijay
Prashad
The Nuke Deal is Dead
Bonnie
Bricker /
Adil E. Shamoo
The True Cost of War for Oil
Dave
Lindorff
Christopher Dodd's Make or Break Moment
Mike
Whitney
The Big Squeeze
Farzana
Versey
Race with the Devil
Stanley
Heller /
Ben George
Something New from the Antiwar Movement
Marcelle
Cendrars
You Too Can Confront the Holy Executive
Regan
Boychuk
Burma and Haiti: Comparing the Media Response
Website
of the Day
King Corn
October
22, 2007
Ishmael
Reed
Should Blacks Go Green?
Marjorie
Cohn
Mukasey and the Constitution: Another Loyal Bushie
Rannie
Amiri
Is There a Method to Bush's Middle East Madness?
Diane
Farsetta
Time to Pay for Payola: the FCC and Pundit-for-Hire Armstrong
Williams
Todd
Alan Price
Renewing No Child Left Behind: A Hurricane Katrina Aimed at Public
Education
Robert
Jensen
The Quagmire of Masculinity
Stephen
Lendman
The UAW Leadership Sells Out Its Workers
Jemima
Khan
The Kleptocrat in an Hermes Headscarf
Sunsara
Taylor
David Horowitz Can't Handle the Truth
Binoy
Kampmark
No Ideas, Please: the Australian Elections
Website
of the Day
Support the Center for International Policy
October
20 / 21, 2007
Alexander
Cockburn
The Man Who Builds Hillaryworld
Tariq
Ali
A Massacre Foretold
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Greetings from Echo Park
Andy
Worthington
The Shame of Diego Garcia
Mike
Whitney
Housing Flameout
Daniel
Wolff
Play It As It Lays
David
Rosen
Deviants on Parade: Folsom St. Fair and America's 4th Sexual
Revolution
Saul
Landau
David and Goliath in Iraq
Ron
Jacobs
COINTELPRO and the Panthers
Robert
Fantina
The Strange Love of Mitt Romney and Bob Jones
David
Heleniak
Erring on the Side of Hidden Harm
Joe
Allen
Hoffa Brown-Nosing at UPS
Prairie
Miller
Lions for Lambs
Poets'
Basement
Gibbons, Holt and Buknatski
Website
of the Weekend
Crash!
October
19, 2007
John
Ross
Che's Mexican Legacy
Sheldon
Rampton
Shared Values Revisited: a Case Study in the Limits of Propaganda
Rahul
Mahajan
A Tale of Two Atrocities: Blackwater and Haditha
Devra
Davis
Deadly Secrets: Chemical Pollution and Cancer
Christopher
Brauchli
Blasphemous Science
Wadner
Pierre
Haiti After the Deluge
Bill
Quigley
Jailed for Justice
Website
of the Day
Textbook Sticker Shock
October
18, 2007
Saree
Makdisi
Academic Freedom is at Risk
Meg
Dwyer
What I Learned from 9/11: Who Wouldn't Want Us Dead?
Alevtina
Rea
Sketches of Russian Life
Norman
Solomon
The United States of Violence
Kristoffer
Larsson
Something is Rotten in Sweden
Harvey
Wasserman
Nukes are Back and So are We
Website
of the Day
Eve Ensler: "A Filibuster Would Stop This War"
October
17, 2007
Steve
Niva
Counter-Insurgency, American-Style
Andy
Worthington
The Case of Mohamed Jawad
Alan
Farago
The Credit Shock
Russell
Mokhiber
The New Billionaire-Criminal Class
Sharon
Smith
Democrats, AWOL When It Mattered
Mike
Whitney
Time for the Banks to Face the Hangman
Robert
Fantina
Iraq, Iran and the US: Business as Usual
Chris
Irwin
Where Have All the Rednecks Gone?
Website
of the Day
Sex Ed at Oral Roberts University
October
16, 2007
Peter
Linebaugh
Doris Lessing and the Dynamite
Prize
Paul
Findley
Follow the Leader: The Open Secret About the Israel Lobby
Robert
Bryce
Inconvenient Corrections: Al Gore's Wacky Facts
Uri
Avnery
The Mother of All Pretexts
Paul
Craig Roberts
The Iraqi Genocide
Ray
McGovern
What Did Nancy Pelosi Know About NSA Spying and When Did She
Know It?
Norman
Solomon
The Pro-War Undertow of the Blackwater Scandal
Martha
Rosenberg
The Curse of Cymbalta
William
S. Lind
Out of the Frying Pan
Joel
S. Hirschborn
Time to Boycott Voting
Website
of the Day
Pipeline Through Paradise: Big Oil's Arctic Play
|
Weekend
Edition
November 10 / 11, 2007
The Naulls Case
Psychological
Torture in the Name of Family Values
By FRED GARDNER
Which psychological torture would you
rather not have to endure (bearing in mind that you don't know
how or when it will end):
1. Being made to wear panties
and chained to a heap of fellow prisoners while rude foreigners
insult you. Or,
2. What Ronald Bradley Naulls
endured after his house and his Corona, California cannabis dispensary
were raided by the DEA July 17?
Naulls's torment was amplified
because his wife Anisha was put through it, too, and their children
were the very instrument by which it was applied. On the day
of the raids Aaliyah, Amaiyah, and Aryanna Naulls -ages 5, 3,
and 1, respectively- were taken from their home and placed in
foster care at a location undisclosed to their parents. In the
name of "family values" these healthy, well-cared-for
little girls - impressionable, frightened little girls- were
taken from their mother and father because the raiders had found
edible marijuana stored in a refrigerator in the Naullses's garage.
The rip-off of the Naulls kids was described to your correspondent
on July 26 by an outraged attorney named James Anthony -a former
assistant city attorney in Oakland who had helped Naulls fight
a move by Corona politicians to close his dispensary. According
to Anthony, Naulls had gotten a retail-business license and opened
"Healing Nations" in April 2006, just before the city
imposed a moratorium on cannabis dispensaries. He joined the
Chamber of Commerce, donated to charities, got on well with his
neighbors in a nondescript Corona strip mall. Anthony thinks
the city's attempt to close Healing Nations signaled the DEA
that a raid would be welcome by the local power structure.
Anthony regrets having advised Naulls to pay taxes to the state
Board of Equalization. When Healing Nations was raided a DEA
agent told the media that it had grossed $1.2 million in nine
months; the tax statement was the apparent source of the info.
All the Naullses's assets were seized, including accounts from
a computer consulting company and a property management firm
that Ronnie had started in years past. Financial ruin and prison
was the worst-case scenario Anthony had foreseen for Naulls -not
losing the kids.
Naulls is 27. Anthony described him as "a Republican, a
church-goer, a computer nerd, a small business person. He looks
like Will Smith. Anisha's a beauty queen. The kids are cute as
buttons. There was no trauma in their lives until the cops showed
up and kicked the door in at six o'clock in the morning. They
rousted everybody out of bed, waved shotguns around, handcuffed
mommy and daddy and put them in separate police cars with helicopters
overhead. Now the kids are in the clutches of Riverside County
Health and Human Services and their mother is being held to answer
on felony child endangerment charges.
"Grandma wants to take the kids," said Anthony. "She's
a real estate broker, Japanese-American. But they won't let her
until they've completed a background check because grandpa has
a 19-year-old DUI... The California Supreme Court has said that
marijuana should be treated like any prescription drug. If CPS
has some other evidence that somebody is abusing the kids, fine,
step in and see that they're protected. But the presence of medicine
is utterly irrelevant. Is the county going to take children out
of every home where there's a prescription drug? Why not put
a padlock on the school at 3 o'clock and keep them all?"
Don't give them any ideas, James.
After the raids, Ronnie Naulls's mother had put up her house
to secure his release. The process took six days and he didn't
emerge from a federal detention center in Los Angeles until July
23. In addition to consoling his wife and agonizing over his
daughters (with whom they would have brief supervised visits
in a Riverside County office building on Wednesday mornings),
Naulls had to focus on his looming federal prosecution and Anisha's
felony child endangerment case --how to find lawyers, how to
raise funds to pay them, what approaches to take. He also had
to make ends meet, i.e. get a job.
Anisha recounts: "They took my SUV. I'd had it for a year
before Ronnie started [the dispensary]. We were told that the
DEA had given it back to the bank. I called the bank and asked
to get my car back. The bank said 'Sure,' but then they called
the DEA and the DEA said 'If you give them the car back, we'll
take it right back from them again.' So the bank got scared and
wouldn't give it back. So it's like 'Wow, can you leave us alone,
we're trying to move on!'"
Ronnie and Anisha Naulls went to Riverside County Superior Court
July 27 seeking custody of their children. They were represented
by Geoff Gerber, a local family law specialist. According to
James Anthony, who debriefed Gerber, "The judge got it that
both parents are out of custody now and seem to be okay parents,
so why not give the kids back to them? He looked to the social
worker for guidance. 'Oh, right the parents are pot smokers!'"
The judge authorized CPS to return the children when the parents
showed declining THC levels. This condition may not be legal,
says Anthony, who wished he had the resources to argue to an
appellate court that the parents's THC levels were irrelevant.
Anthony described an episode that had ratcheted up the Naullses's
terror level. While Ronnie was still in jail, DEA agents had
come to their house unannounced to return the computers confiscated
during the raid. Anisha told them to leave everything on the
porch. The agents tried to assure her that their intentions were
benign but she would let them in the house. The next day, Anthony
said, "a social worker called to say that the DEA had informed
them that Anisha was being resistant and uncooperative. The social
worker said 'You have to cooperate with any government official
who comes by your house, otherwise it looks like you have something
to hide and you're not a fit home for these children.' The county
is being used by the DEA to increase their leverage. 'We have
your children so you have to throw your doors open to the DEA
without a warrant.' Anisha's position was correct."
Ronnie had been ordered to undergo drug testing by two separate
tentacles of The System: federal pretrial services and county
social services. "Ronnie had to do drug testing for pretrial
services up in Orange County and we had to do drug testing for
social services in Corona," Anisha expalined. "We had
to call a number every day and if it said our color, we had to
go in. It's overwhelming." Ronnie Naulls naively figured
that going to a job interview took priority over going to a drug
test. He had been asked back for a follow-up after an initial
interview with a local company in the computer field --"a
good-paying job and they really liked him," according to
Anisha. "Ronnie thought they were going to hire him."
Instead, he was picked up and returned to federal detention on
August 23 for having missed two pee tests (the second miss being
on a day he went to court in an attempt to get the girls back)
and failing to keep his ankle bracelet charged. Middle-class
people who have had little contact with The Syste, often think
they can explain to an understanding supervisor, that common
sense will prevail, that exceptions will be granted; poor people
tend to be conversant with The System and to know better.
Naulls had made another foolish move after the July 27 hearing
when he went to greet well-wishers who were holding a rally in
front of the Healing Nations dispensary. He was observed by government
agents. "The DEA got on the phone with Ronnie's mom,"
according to Anisha, "and told her, 'You're about to lose
your house and your son doesn't care, he's out there protesting.'
Ronnie's mom called and she's crying. They put Ronnie through
hell. Even the judge noticed, he said 'These things they brought
you back on are very minor ... it's kind of silly but I have
to go along with it.'"
Ronnie Naulls's folks came from Kansas. They are not related
to the great UCLA basketball player Willie Naulls (a question
he gets asked all the time). Ronnie discovered the analgesic
effects of marijuana after fracturing his neck and shoulder in
an auto accident; large doses of Ibuprofen and Naproxen had caused
bleeding in his stomach. He decided to open a dispensary when
his father was diagnosed with prostate cancer. "It seemed
absurd that you would pay for a card and there's nowhere to get
your medicine in the county," Naulls said. He did research
on the internet and hired attorney Robert Raich to help him create
a non-profit. The pent-up demand turned out to be enormous. At
the time of the raid, Healing Nations had almost 3,000 members
and Naulls was attempting to repeat his success in an underserved
area north of San Diego.
"I thought that in America if you don't infringe on anyone's
life, liberty or property, the government would stay out of your
business," Naulls said when we spoke on Friday, Aug. 10.
He was dreading the prospect of federal prosecution but hopeful
about getting the girls back soon from the county --maybe that
very afternoon. During their once-a-week supervised visits the
children seemed "bewildered," Naulls said. They didn't
know why they had been taken from their home and he and Anisha
were not allowed to explain it to them. How could you, honestly?
"The plant that mommy and daddy smoke that makes them feel
better, some people think it's very, very bad ... "
RN: Our five-year-old thinks
she's she's being punished. She promises to be good. She doesn't
understand why she can't come home.
CP: What do you tell her?
RN: The social worker won't allow us to tell her anything. All
I can tell her is that Jesus teaches us to be patient and to
pray and daddy promises that you will come home. But I can't
say you're going to be home soon or anything with regard to the
time frame.
CP: That must be torture.
RN: It's absolute torture.
CP: Do you know anything about whose house they're in?
RN: No. All we know is that they're with a foster parent. We
don't know where they are or who they're with. Nothing.
CP: Is it just your three girls living there or is there a bigger
group?
RN: From what I gather they have other kids there. Aaliyah says
that the kids are being mean to her. They don't allow her to
use the night light -she had a night light at home. My one-year-old
has a diaper rash, which she never had before. Amaiyah had a
scratch on her arm.
CP: What's the criterion for the decision to let them come home?
James Anthony said they were going to drug test you and if your
THC level was going down, that would be a factor.
RN: My levels have been going down. But the social worker said
that the criminal investigation could curtail them from coming
home.
CP: Any sense that the social worker is sympathetic?
RN: No. They're treating it like another drug case. I can tell
by his demeanor, we're just "drug people." I gave him
a copy of my doctor's recommendation, but... Our lawyer is trying
to be tactful and not offend the social workers. We're afraid
if we make any demands they'll say 'you're not cooperating' and
they'll keep them longer.
On Aug. 13 Naulls told CP that
the girls were still in foster care.
RN: We still haven't gotten
our kids back. The social worker came by on Friday afternoon
to inspect the house and make sure it was safe for the girls,
so we got our hopes up. He went through the house, said he would
make his decision today. He told us to call him at 3. We were
still trying to reach him after 4. The fact that we couldn't
get ahold of him told me the news wasn't going to be positive.
Then he finally called back and said that their decision was
not to give us the kids back because of the pending criminal
investigation. He told Anisha, "You have an open case and
Ronnie has an open case and what if you go to jail?" She
said, "It's not up to you to decide whether we go to jail."
So we go for another hearing to ask a judge to overrule Child
Protective Services.
CP: How often does that happen?
RN: We're told it's 50-50. They look at the situation and also
if we've been following Child Protective Services' requests,
like I am not using medicine and my THC levels are declining
and my wife doesn't have any THC in her system at all. We've
been testing every other day.
On Aug. 16 the Naullses went
to court and prevailed --they got their kids back after 30 days
of separation, fear, and uncertainty-- but there is no happy
ending. Ronnie is facing federal charges for selling a controlled
substance and may have to rely on a public defender. Federal
law doesn't acknowledge that cannabis is a medicinal herb or
that California voted to legalize it. In the land of Common Sense
there would be a "this-family-has-suffered-enough"
defense; but we live in the land of Mandatory Minimums.
In the land of Common Sense the Naullses would have been given
a warning of some kind instead of having their kids ripped off.
The Naulls girls seem to be overcoming their ordeal. Some forms
of torture leave no visible marks but cause nightmares down the
line. We can only hope that their foster home was one of the
good ones and that, having had each other throughout the five-week
separation from their parents, they pulled through in tact. This
is Anisha's take on things after the girls had been home about
five weeks:
"They told the girls that
they were at the babysitters. And that we were working. So, that's
what they think. And they're just kind of like: 'Why did it take
so long?' And we say, 'Well, we were trying to get things together
for work.'
"They're adjusting to being back home. It's a process. They
have a little bit of separation anxiety right now. My oldest
will wake me up, 'I had a nightmare the police took you.' When
Aaliyah started back to school -she had to miss a week of school-
one of her classmates came up to her and was like 'My mommy said
that your mommy's in jail.' So Aaliyah comes home and says,'Mommy,
my friend says that you were in jail. Is that what you were doing
when I was at the babysitters?' And I'm like 'Wow, no. Mommy
wouldn't go to jail. Why would mommy go to jail? Your friend
doesn't know what she's talking about.' We've had a few conversations
like that.
"My three-year-old will say, out of the blue, if I'm leaving,
'Please don't leave me on the freeway.' And I'm like 'Wow, mommy's
not going to leave you on the freeway.' So ... But they're okay,
they're getting back to normal."
Anisha had just learned that
Riverside County is charging her with three counts of felony
child endangerment -one for each of the girls, including Aryanna
who could barely walk back in July, let alone get into the refrigerator
in the garage. "These people are not nice," says Anisha.
The
False Premise of Endangerment
The premise on which government snatched the Naulls girls is
as fraudulent as the premise on which the government invaded
Iraq. In the extremely unlikely event that the girls went into
the garage and the parents didn't hear the alarm and the girls
opened the refrigerator and found the marijuana edibles and unwrapped
them and proceeded to gorge themselves, they would experience
a cannabis overdose, which involves a very unpleasant torpor
that can last for eight hours (some of which is typically spent
asleep). There is no subsequent adverse effect. The most likely
longterm reaction to an overdose of edible cannabis is an aversion
to cannabis in any form. Just as there were no weapons of mass
destruction in Iraq, there is no poison in cannabis. The government
promulgates whatever lies and policies are needed to advance
corporate interests. War in Iraq: good for the oil companies.
War on pot: good for the drug companies. War by any lies necessary.
The vote by more than 5 million Californians for Prop 215 was
above all a testament to its safety, not its efficacy. Most people
who smoked pot in social settings in the '60s and '70s and '80s
were unaware of its medical effects, let alone that it had been
widely used in tinctures produced by Eli Lilly, etc.. But they
did know that they and their friends never experienced reefer
madness or any other health problems. Even most people who never
smoked pot have known people who did and observed that its impact
is negligible compared to alcohol and tobacco. The Prop 215 vote
was a message from the people to the government that marijuana
is relatively benign.
The government's response has been, "Our mind is made up,
don't, confuse us with the facts." It is not just the feds
who treat cannabis as if it causes grave harm; Riverside County's
Department of Social Services is operating on the same false
assumption. After Prop 215 passed, Tod Mikuriya, MD, warned that
implementation would hinge on state, county, and city agencies
revising their protocols. Tod implored Ethan Nadelmann of the
Lindesmith Center (now the Drug Policy Alliance) to conduct or
underwrite what he called an "audit" that would involve
contacting, advising, and pressuring every agency that had to
adjust to marijuana becoming legal for medical use. Nadelmann
said no, his group would be devoting its resources to funding
medical marijuana initiatives in other states.
You don't have to study Clausewitz or Sun Tzu on the art of war
to know that sometimes a victory has to be consolidated before
you try to gain more ground. The danger with advancing too soon
is that your forces get overextended and you're unable to defend
what you've won.
Contributions to the Naulls Defense
Fund can be made on a tax-deductible basis through Green-Aid.
Fred Gardner edits O'Shaughnessy's, the journal
of cannabis in clinical practice. He can be reached at fred@plebesite.com
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