And speaking of killing, I don't know what they were thinking at DetNews when they decided to redo all the head shots by pulling them in tighter. Cripes, I've got to do a new one. Whatever they did to my current shot makes it look like I haven't washed my face in thirty years. Oh well, I'm working on a new hairstyle anyway. I keep chopping more off every week.
It's a odd thing. When I was very young I wanted to travel on safari to the heart of deepest, darkest Africa kind of a la Bogie and Hepburn in the African Queen, but I lost interest in the continent when they renamed the Belgian Congo. Zaire didn't sound so appealling a destination and they put all the wild animals into nature preserves as they developed the jungles.
Perhaps I was too hasty in my judgement. Kees Kennis, which I think is African for son of a baboon or something, has renewed my interest in African travel. I think the guy may be certifiably crazy, which is why I'm adding him to the Drunks and Poets. He'll fit right in there. But, if you forgive the occassional wild beast schlong shots, he posts some great photos.
In FY 2005, DEA stripped domestic and foreign drug traffickers of nearly $1.9 billion in drug proceeds and revenue denied, which included $1.4 billion in asset seizures and $477 million in drug seizures. This, Mr. Chairman, exceeds DEA’s FY 2005 $1 billion goal for asset and drug seizures by 90 percent.
Then there's this interesting melding of the drug war and general intelligence on Americans.
Intelligence and National Security ($11.9 million and 57 positions – including one Special Agent and 42 Intelligence Analysts). In February of this year, Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales signed a joint memorandum designating an element of DEA’s Intelligence Division to be a member of the Intelligence Community (IC). IC membership will allow DEA to expand and strengthen its existing relationships with our nation’s intelligence agencies. With 86 offices in 62 countries – the largest law enforcement presence abroad – DEA is poised to make valuable and lasting contributions in the intelligence arena.
In other words, they wish to further conflate drug dealing and terrorists and browbeat foreign governments into undertaking prohibition polices. And so much for their commitment to harm reduction.
Demand Reduction Program: DEA proposes to eliminate all positions dedicated to this program for a reduction of 40 positions (including 31 Special Agents) and $9.2 million. This proposal would allow DEA to focus on its core mission of drug law enforcement. When possible, however, Special Agents would participate in demand reduction activities on a collateral duty basis.
The savings on harm reduction are slated to be added to their harm enhancement program -- the harassment of pain management physicians.
Diversion and Control Fee Account (DCFA) : As I stated earlier, the President’s request includes $212 million under the DCFA, a $10.4 million increase over FY 2006. Of the total requested amount, DEA proposes funding of $3.4 million for DCFA program improvements. This funding would allow DEA to boost intelligence support (33 Intelligence Analysts) needed for diversion investigations. This request is a continuation of the FY 2006 Diversion Intelligence Initiative, whose goal is to place one Intelligence Analyst in every Field Division Diversion group.
Meaning they like milking the cash cow of forfeiture by targeting physicians. How do you think they managed to make that almost two billion in seized property? And they've upped their target for the next fiscal year. Remembering they can seize property without proving the crime first, you can be certain a hefty percentage came from doctors and not from the million low-level drug offenders taking up room in our prisons.
It doesn't bode well for the future of chronic pain sufferers or for a civil society.
Regardless of the occasional critic's shot, Tandy retains her passion for running the government's largest anti-drug bureaucracy — the kind of job that can be stressful and emotionally exhausting.
"This job is a calling, not just for me but for all of the 11,000 people in this agency. I have the best job on Earth," she said.
Think about that for a minute, there's 11,000 people drawing hefty salaries and they have barely made a dent in the supply or use of drugs. And what would be their incentive to "win?" They would have to find new work. Besides they justify their existence with legalized highway robbery. Here's how dear Karen got her job.
In the Justice Department, Tandy was a pioneer in the enforcement of asset forfeiture law — a government tactic used to deprive drug merchants of material gain by seizing planes, boats, ranches and more exotic possessions such as strip clubs and golf courses bought with drug cash.
"When I came through the door, I made money the No. 1 priority," she said.
Note she says money, not elimination of drug use, not protection of the children, not public safety, it's all about the money. At least she admits I guess. It's a powerful incentive and they don't even have to prove a crime to seize it.
The amount of money the DEA seized each year has more than quadrupled, to $1.9 billion last year, making the DEA the rare federal agency that nearly pays for itself, she joked.
That's no joke. We pay about 2 billion in just salaries and expenses for the agency. That I assume includes office space and whatnot but not necessarily the expenses of the sting operations themselves. And it's so misleading to proffer the seizures as "paying" for the agency. These are not liquid assets. It's mostly property that's unlikely to return its listed value into the coffers and the (inflated) value of the drugs they keep off the street shouldn't be added at all since they destroy them, not sell them themselves. Their salaries are still coming out of the taxpayer's pocket.
Word has it Ms. Tandy might be offered a job in the private sector. She dismisses the idea, saying she's perfectly happy in her present job. And who wouldn't love a job that pays so well and doesn't require that you actually succeed at your mission.
You often hear people say they support the troops. For the left, who speak out against the war, it's not easy to show that tangibly to the men and women who are stuck at the front lines and even among those who believe in the war, one wonders, if they don't have someone they care about serving in the military, how have they let the soldiers know?
There is something you can do, right now, to brighten up a unknown soldier's Independence Day spent in Iraq. This lovely lady in Georgia is organizing a card drive. You can buy cards, make cards, or just send a note. Send unsealed cards to:
Mrs. Kat Orr Thanks For Freedom! Campaign 740 Thompson Lane Loganville, GA 30052
If you can't get cards together, you can email to THANKS_4_FREEDOM@yahoo.com. Emails will printed and sent to Iraq with the cards. The deadline is June 16, 2006. Please keep it platonic. Nothing of a suggestive nature will be accepted.
Our troops don't have a choice. They're facing death daily while we enjoy our customary lives at home. Please take a moment and show our soldiers you haven't forgotten them.
I picked this up from Henning's blog. I believe this was shot in Bruce's kitchen. There's a shot of Bruce, famed pedal steel picker and former Scud Mountain Boy, at the very end of the video. Bruce and Kevin and I were all bartenders at the Baystate Hotel, which was the center of what was left of the music scene in Noho in those years.
Bruce is probably the most nervous person I've ever met in my life. A perpetual motion machine, but brilliant, both intellectually and musically. I loved him and everyone else in the video, like my own family. And I always did love that song. I must have heard it performed live, almost a thousand times...
