LAS MARIPOSAS ESTAN LIBRE

I think I saved an Orange Monarch's life today. I was walking down Pleasant Street and it sort of bounced off the wall and fell at my feet. He was breathing and the wings looked pretty undamaged but he looked a little wobbly. He was in a really bad place and sure to be stepped on by some unconsious tourist. I stuck my finger under his little spotted head and he jumped on.

I carried him a block and a half to the nearest shrubbery. We talked. He climbed up my arm but sat on my sleeve the whole way. I'd never seen one that close. I found the last rose blooming, ironically in front the DA's office, and he flew off my arm into the greenery. I like to believe he's on his way to Mexico right now.

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GAMES PEOPLE PLAY

So the buzz off the top of the inbox today is this new game, Ghettopoly, a Monopoly style board game. Here's their pitch:

Buying stolen properties, pimpin hoes, building crack houses and projects, paying protection fees and getting car jacked are some of the elements of the game. Not dope enough?...If you don't have the money that you own to the loan shark you might just land yourself in da Emergency Room.

The game pieces include a pimp, a prostitute, a crack cocaine rock, and an Uzi. Kind of an ugly game I think. I can understand why the people who have to live in those ghettos are insulted. It reminded me of gentler days though and Dealer McDope, a Furry Freak Brothers inspired game, that was based on honest dealing, not stealing. I had fun playing that one in those days - I can't imagine competing in this one. Just not my idea of fun. It illustrates exactly what I want to cure in the drug culture.

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SCHOOL YARD BULLY

The Aga John blew through Beantown yesterday to proclaim his latest inane strategy to spend your tax dollars. He deems the solution to be drug testing in all the public schools. He would like to line your children up like Holocaust victims going to the gas chamber and make them pee in cups, regardless of probable cause. Unfortunately, I can't find the link to the study that proved there was absolutely no difference in drug consumption in schools where this policy has already been tried at the moment, but I do have one that describes the failure Mr. Walters other pet waste of money, the failed anti-drug media campaign. There are studies that prove these commericials not only fail in deterring drug use among teenagers, they have actually caused it to increase. Let me remind you that your legislators in DC just allowed another billion dollars to be budgeted for just that campaign. That is your money that is going into corporate media pockets instead of directly into your kid's schools, where it is most needed.

The neo-cons are cutting the heart out of the public school system. What do they care - their kids go to private schools. Around here the local public system is forced to charge students to ride the bus while the arts, music and physical education programs are eliminated. A billion dollars could give a lot of struggling inner city schools a big boost and free extra-cirricular activities would keep more kids off the street than ridiculously inaccurate ads. I've said this before, but it's worth repeating. If you lie to a teenager once, they will never believe you again.

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SO SWEAR

Speaking of lying, consider the benefits of priviledge that our current misleader enjoyed. Some of you might remember when the issue of personal drug use came up in late 1999. At that time, our now fully appointed President Bush the II, refused to give a straight answer about his own drug use in 1972 and 1973. These are coincindentally the same years he was allegedly acheiving greatness as a pilot in the National Guard. Trouble is he didn't show up at exactly the times they were having the piss tests. No one remembers seeing him. Not to mention he was bumped into the fly-boy's club ahead of 500 other less connected sons on the waiting list.

From the link, I think it's called Burning Bush: Bush and his father have denied that he received any preferential treatment. But last year, Ben Barnes, who was speaker of the Texas House in 1968, said in a sworn deposition in a civil lawsuit that he called Guard officials seeking a Guard slot for Bush after a friend of Bush's father asked him to do so.

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DISAPPEARING INK

The last word on this subject goes to Preston Peet tonight. He nailed this issue in a piece originally written for, but since disappeared from, disinfo.com, in November 2000, GW Bush- The Spineless Party Animal From Hell. Preston is a tireless warrior in this battle and has a knack for the facts. From his mouth to your ears:

....Bush passed severe mandatory minimum sentences for drug possession and sales in Texas, in addition to federal mandatory sentences already in place. Teen drug use, according to the 1998 Texas School Survey of Substance Use Among Student, Grades 7-12, Texas Commission on Drugs and Alcohol Abuse, while dropping around the country for the most part, has risen 30 percent in Texas under Bush, despite the insanely repressive drug policies. ...

On what our fearless misleader had to say on the issue of his own drug use:

"The game of trying to force me to prove a negative and chase down ugly, unsubstantiated rumors has got to end, so I’m going to end it," Bush told reporters. CNN News quotes him saying he wouldn’t answer the questions about his possible youthful drug use, as it may send a signal that "whatever I may have done is ok."

Preston replied, "What? That is exactly the point. If Bush can be a presidential candidate without one day of mandatory treatment or imprisonment, or even a day in court to answer for his bad habits, why should he have signed into law such extremely harsh anti-drug laws in the Longhorn State, Texas?"

Says it all for me.

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