End the Drug War - elect me Sheriff

I hate the Drug War. With a passion. And I hate the Drug Warriors who fight it even more, because they are nothing but vote grubbing politicians with absolutely no morals or scruples. I call them Drug War Criminals.

I've been fighting against Drug War Criminals for at least 25 years and would like to think I've taken at least a chink out of their armor, but the fact is they continue to spread their mayhem throughout our country and the world.

Even as I write this the DEA is trying to put kratom on Schedule I [update - they backed off, probably to gain strength to strike again]. After seven and one-half years of President Obama - the cocaine president . I shake my head in disgust, and in shame that I have not been more effective.

So I run for Sheriff (Linn County, Iowa). Why?

Because America needs a well recognized anti-Drug War Sheriff. Someone who can call a press conference on the steps of the Capital and have the press actually show up. Someone who will be called to testify in front of Congress on the devastating effects of the Drug War in his own neighborhood, his own county, his own country, and in the entire world.

I have laid the groundwork for my campaign by running hundreds of anti-Drug War TV commercials in Washington DC last month (September), every day Congress is in session, at my own expense. I did this for the express purpose of putting Congress on alert - I am coming after the Drug War Criminals.

And the press has noticed. That was my only goal.

So here I am. Only three weeks before an election I can win, but an election that needs lots of local advertising to get my name out.

Not that I am unknown.

My first career was in law enforcement, which terminated because of a 71 year old mayor who didn't think I should have a neatly trimmed beard.

So I started a natural foods company and grew it to $40 million with 300 employees.

I was the first runner-up for National Small Businessperson of the year in 1992 and shook George H. W. Bush's hand in the White House.

In 1983 my company was #78 on the Inc. 500 list of "America's Fastest Growing Companies." 

We were selected by Working Mother magazine as one of the “100 Best Companies in America for Working Mothers,” three years in a row beginning in 1993.

But business is not politics.

Business is about satisfying all your customers.

Politics is about getting 50% plus 1 of the votes.

Votes are all about name recognition. Pity they aren't about qualifications, but they aren't.

Local name recognition requires local advertising. Facebook. Pandora, Broadcast radio. Cable TV. Broadcast TV. Print media.

All these are expensive. Pandora, as just one example, with excellent penetration of the younger market in my county, has a $5,000 minimum ad buy.

I am willing to put a lot of money into this campaign. But I am not as rich as The Hill might have you believe. My business was a cooperative - I didn't own it, I didn't sell it. I just got paid to be the CEO, saved my money, and retired at 48 years old.

Yes, I have enough money to retire and live comfortably, which I have been doing since 2000. But I absolutely cannot ignore the real world. The real suffering caused by Drug War Criminals, at home and abroad. 

Just last week a 13 year old girl was shot and killed on my block. Accidentally, perhaps, by a 14 year old boy. Yes - I can trace that tragedy back to the Drug War. Not drugs, mind you, but the Drug War. The Drug War literally puts guns into the hands of people who do not need them and should not have them.

Just like Alcohol Prohibition did from 1920 through 1933.

The Drug War literally paid for 50% of the Taliban's budget in 2001 and continues to provide them with 40% of their money today .

The Drug War literally propped up North Korea and gave them the opportunity to develop nuclear bombs and ballistic missiles which they plan to aim at the United States.

The Drug War literally paid for the Colombian civil war that lasted 50 years and might last a bit longer, now that the peace agreement has been rejected.

The Drug War literally created the Mexican cartels that have been responsible for over 150,000 deaths.

Must I go on?

I will. Ferguson , Dallas , Milwaukee , Baltimore , Charlotte , Tulsa , do you really think these are unrelated to the 55 year Drug War? They are not.

Must I mention wasted money?

I will. Well over a trillion dollars wasted already, up to $100 billion more wasted every year. But that's not counting a war against the Taliban that has already cost us yet another trillion, or the lost productivity of the incarcerated, the welfare costs of the families they left behind, the value of the lives lost in the streets from Drug War created battles and the lives lost in our own communities from adulterated street drugs.

it's not a heroin epidemic. It's a Drug War epidemic.

I am exhausted - writing about it tears my heart out.

Your money will be spent judiciously. It will not be thrown away on consultants and agencies and hangers on. To date I have done everything myself, except shoot the TV commercials. It is not the creative work which is expensive, it is the paid media.

Please help me end the Drug War once and for all.

Not just legalize medical marijuana (how pitiful that anyone would withhold medicine from another human being).

Not just legalize marijuana (how pitiful that we continue to arrest 700,000 people a year for a plant that is legal in Colorado and four other states).

Not just shorter sentences (how pitiful that anyone should ever spend a day in jail for willingly taking a substance into their own body).

Not just lightening the burden on our black brothers and sisters so they share it equally with whites (how pitiful that we have continued our Jim Crow tradition this far into the 21st century).

No compromises - a complete and total end to the Drug War.

A complete repudiation of Drug War Criminals.

A complete return to a world of sanity.

I promise you I will work every day as Sheriff to end the Drug War nightmare. 

I cannot live in a country that is waging a civil war against itself, based on conflicting personal preferences for recreational substances that do absolutely no harm whatsoever to anyone but their users.

Please support my campaign. For yourselves, and for all the people of the world who are the victims of this utter nonsense.

Gratefully, respectfully, humbly, I ask you to join with me in this cause.