Mountain Views News          Saturday, January 22, 2011

11

OPINION

 Mountain Views News Saturday, January 22, 2011 


HAIL Hamilton My Turn

Mountain 
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Dean Lee 

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Contributors

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Paul Carpenter

Stuart Tolchin

Kim Clymer-Kelley

Christopher Nyerges

Peter Dills 

Hail Hamilton 

Rich Johnson

Chris Bertrand

Mary Carney

La Quetta Shamblee

Glenn Lambdin

Greg Wellborn

Ralph McKnight

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Pat Ostrye

Editorial Cartoonist

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House Republicans may 
be focused on fulfilling their 
campaign promise to work to 
overturn the health care reform 
law, but a new CBS News/New 
York Times survey finds that a 
plurality of Americans prefer 
they focus instead on creating 
jobs. 

The poll finds forty-three 
percent of Americans believe 
the most important thing for 
the new Congress to focus on 
is job creation - compared to 
just 18 percent who say the 
top priority should be health 
care. Fourteen percent chose 
the federal budget deficit, 
12 percent the wars in Iraq 
and Afghanistan, and seven 
percent illegal immigration. 
Respondents were presented 
with a list of options. 

The poll also found that a 
majority of Americans polled 
- 56 percent - do not believe 
the health care bill’s impact on 
themselves and their families 
has been clearly explained. 
Only 41 percent say it has been 
explained somewhat or very 
well, including just one in ten 
who say it has been explained 
very well. 

Republicans have sought to tie 
their effort to repeal the health 
care law to the issue of jobs, 
labeling the legislation passed 
last year “job-killing” and “job-
destroying.” Democrats have 
used Republican endeavors to 
overturn the law as a second 
opportunity to sell the law 
to the American people after 
falling short in their first 
attempt. 

This report covers an early 
release of a pair of questions 
from the survey. The full poll 
will be released at 6:30 p.m. 
Eastern Time.

CBS News Poll analysis by the 
CBS News Polling Unit: Sarah 
Dutton, Jennifer De Pinto, Fred 
Backus and Anthony Salvanto.

The Failure of the 

War on Drugs

I was disappointed by the failure of Prop. 19 
-- the legalization of marijuana initiative -- in 
last November’s election, but I was disgusted that 
its failure at the box office has been spun by the 
mainstream media and numerous public officials 
as a reaffirmation of the War on Drugs.

The War on Drugs is a sickening and the ocean of hypocrisy, incompetence, 
corruption and human wreckage it has left in its wake is almost 
endless in its magnitude. Originally declared by President Nixon in 1971, 
the War on Drugs became institutionalized two years later with the creation 
of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). 

U.S. involvement in the international narcotics trade began during 
the Vietnam War when the CIA began shipping home heroin from the 
Golden Triangle in the body cavities of dead American soldiers. Our 
involvement has continued unchecked from transporting cocaine from 
Columbia to pay for the Contras in Nicaragua to money laundering in 
Panama to the reintroduction of heroin production in Afghanistan. 

Incredible isn’t it!? The CIA is importing the same illegal drugs the 
DEA and local law enforcement are arresting street drug dealers and users 
for, and it is this involvement that have added an extra 1.25 million 
non-violent drug offenders to our already overcrowded prison system. 
More insidious has been the domestic laundering of CIA profits by some 
of America’s largest, most respected banks, and offshore by CIA-run financial 
operations like BCCI, aided and abetted by U.S.-supported dictators 
like Panama’s Manuel Noriega.

Since January 1, 2011, the War on Drugs has cost the American taxpayer 
approximately $1 trillion -- or more than $700 million a day! This 
is a total waste of tax dollars; and we just began the new year!

The human cost is much worse. Drug prohibition has decimated generations 
and criminalized millions for behavior which is entwined in human 
existence, and for no other purpose than to uphold the defunct and 
corrupt thinking of a minority of misguided, self-righteous, degenerate, 
racist demagogues who wish nothing but the unadulterated destruction 
of blacks and Hispanics.

Based on the unalterable proviso that drug use is essentially an unstoppable 
and ongoing human behavior which has been with us since the 
dawn of time, any serious reading on the subject of past attempts at any 
form of drug prohibition (including alcohol prohibition) would point 
most normal thinking people in the direction of sensible regulation.

By its very nature, drug prohibition cannot fail but creates a vast increase 
in criminal activity and, rather than preventing society from 
descending into anarchy, it actually fosters an anarchic business model 
-- the international illegal drug trade. Any decisions concerning quality, 
quantity, distribution and availability are then left in the hands of unregulated, 
anonymous and ruthless drug dealers, who are interested only 
in the huge profits involved.

Thus, the allure of this reliably and lucrative industry, with its enormous 
income potential that consistently outweighs the risks associated 
with the illegal operations that such a trade entails, will remain with us 
until we are collectively forced to admit the obvious -- our failed drug 
prohibition policy.

There is therefore an irrefutable connection between drug prohibition 
and the crime, corruption, disease and death it causes. Anybody who’s 
not mentally challenged should be capable of understanding that it is 
not simply the demand for drugs that creates mayhem, it is our refusal 
-- despite all evidence to the contrary -- to allow legitimate businesses to 
meet the demand.

Because drug cartels -- the largest being the CIA -- will always have 
an endless supply of ready cash for wages, bribery and equipment, no 
amount of tax dollars, police powers, weaponry, wishful thinking or 
pseudo-science will make our streets safe again. Only an end to prohibition 
can do that! Remember the positive effects of ending national 
alcohol prohibition in 1933. How much longer are we willingly to foolishly 
risk our survival by continuing to ignore the obvious, historically 
confirmed solution?

If you support the mass suicide cult of prohibition, and erroneously 
believe that you can win a war without logic and practical solutions, then 
prepare yourself for even more death, tortured corpses, corruption, terrorism, 
sickness, imprisonment, economic tribulation, unemployment 
and the complete loss of the rule of law. The only thing prohibition successfully 
does is prohibit the regulation while turning our schools and 
streets into black markets for drugs. Regulation would mean the opposite.

STUART Tolchin..........On LIFE

I THANK GOD FOR 

MAKING ME AN ATHEIST

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When and how did the universe begin? Why are 
we here? Why is there something rather than nothing? 
Maybe even the question of Who Am I Really? 
and finally, Is there something I’m supposed to be 
doing, and can I help the world?

Yes, I know most people don’t seem to have time 
to ask these questions after they reach a certain age. 
Still there were a couple of thousand people quietly 
lined up for hours tonight as we waited to see 
(or more accurately experience) Stephen Hawking 
. Professor Hawking, as you probably know, is considered 
by many to be THE SMARTEST MAN IN 
THE WORLD. He holds the Isaac Newton Chair at 
the University of Cambridge and is responsible for 
theories related to the Big Bang, Black Holes, and 
the expanding universe. All of this despite the fact 
that he suffers from ALS and cannot move hardly a 
muscle. He sits scrunched in his wheel chair with a 
frozen stoic expression on his face. He is tiny and he 
doesn’t move. His words come through this fancy 
synthesizer or simulator or whatever that he activates 
by twitching a cheek muscle. Somehow his presence 
for me reminds me of the conflicted atheist’s statement 
about God as expressed at the conclusion of 
the Golden Globe Awards Show. There is something 
transcendent going on here. I like being free to think 
about it but it all seems like something more than the 
operation of randomness and I thank God for making 
me an atheist and allowing me to explore the feeling 
without telling me what to think. 

 Professor Hawking is considered by most to be 
the greatest living scientist and is thought to be the 
most influential scientist since Albert Einstein. The 
major competitor for this title of most important scientist 
since Einstein is Altadena’s own Richard Feynman. 
The Hawking presentation actually contained 
little science. Instead it was a prepared brief history 
of his life together with jokes, witticisms and a sense 
of fun that emphasized that a big part of life was the 
ability to enjoy and make the most of whatever came 
around. In contrast to this was the TEDx Cal Tech 
presentation of the legacy of Richard Feynman. Yes, 
I was there too in the hope of finding some answers 
to the eternal questions. I enjoyed the eight hour 
presentation which involved about 40 speakers talking 
about different aspects of Feynman’s influence, 
but my overall experience was that something was 
missing. The many brilliant men and women were 
working to make technology faster and smaller but 
still something of the vision of Richard Feynman 
(an avid conga drum player and practical joker) was 
missing.. The closest that magical vision came to 
the stage was during the music segments, when Ondar, 
a throat singer from Tuva performed. Professor 
Feynman had dreamt of going to Tuva to learn about 
throat singing, an ability wherein the singer sings in 
several voices and notes simultaneously. I hate to say 
it, but this exhibition made me think a little about 
God and a little about the eternal questions. The 
singer, dressed in the traditional garb of his almost 
forgotten country, smiled sincerely throughout his 
presence on and off the stage. I walked up to him 
and had some one take a picture of the two of us and I 
felt authentic warmth from him as we hugged. Since 
my technical ineptitude prevented me from obtaining 
a picture of Professor Hawking even though he 
passed in his wheel-chair just a few inches from me, I 
am including a picture of the ancient warrior Ondar 
as representative of the hope for the survival of our 
poor endangered specie.

Other than Ondar, I had not experienced much 
contact with the eternal questions in the presentations. 
There was much talk of technological progress 
moving on to the smaller and the faster but without 
much purpose other than the quest for awards and 
prizes. I had a hollow feeling and shared that thought 
with the man sitting at the table with me. Synchronistically, 
he turned out to a guy named Steve Robertson 
who happens to be behind something called 
Project Peace on Earth, an attempt to heal the world. 
(The God in which I do not believe never rests) He, 
Steve, intends to utilize music emanating from sacred 
places as a kind of vehicle. He told me about the 
intended concert which is to come from Bethlehem 
on November 11, 2011. All sorts of respected and 
famous people are involved in this project. Perhaps 
you are interested in this project; I’m going to check 
it out on the Web.

In conclusion it’s nice to know that other people, 
lots of other people, still search for answers to the 
eternal questions. The search is a hard one and may 
take us to strange places, perhaps even to Bethlehem; 
(it won’t be the first time) but it is a search that for me 
is worth everything. With all the sham I have seen in 
this world it is inspiring to know that there are still a 
few could-be shaman around.


1961

RICH Johnson

Wow! 1961 was fifty years ago. Einstein was 
right! Time is relative. When you are ten years old 
one year is roughly 10% of your life. When you are 
20 it is 5% and so on and so forth. This may explain 
why time goes by faster and faster the older 
we get. Each year becomes a smaller percentage of 
our entire lifetime. Is this deep? Enough is enough. 
Let’s take a look at 1961.

 1961 could certainly be called the year of freedom. 
That year students of all races took up the cause of ending racism by 
becoming “Freedom Riders.” Busloads rode south to help force integration. 
Sadly, lives were sacrificed as Americans made the tough choices to 
help right wrongs and expose injustices. 

 Speaking of race, the first American (and second person ever) to 
travel in space, Alan Shepard, suddenly found himself, well, in space. Suddenly 
may not be the right word. On May 5, 1961 he spent hours sitting 
atop a Mercury rocket waiting for the launch that would shoot him up and 
bring him down in 15 minutes. While he was waiting and waiting, nature 
called, and he did a very childish thing. I’m not coarse enough to come 
right out with what he did other than to suggest that if Depends (adult diapers) 
had been available at the time he wouldn’t have made as big a mess. 
He did get another chance at space travel going to the moon his second 
time out. Nothing childish that I know of happened on that flight…if you 
know what I mean.

 Also in 1961, several thousand Harvard students were tear gassed by 
police as they demonstrated over a very serious issue. It seems the Harvard 
administration decided future diplomas would be printed in English and 
not Latin. This apparently infuriated a big part of the student population. 
How about pig latin? Will that work? Nothing like a cause to sink your 
teeth into!

 Skateboarding in California (called sidewalk surfing) took off in 
1961, as did the return of the yo-yo, selling 15 million. If you wanted to 
move up from skateboarding, a 1961 corvette set you back $3,934. A little 
short? A Porsche only ran you $3,780. The New York Yankees won the 
World Series. “West Side Story” won best picture. Sophia Loren was the 
best actress in “Two Women.” Maximilian Schell won best actor in “Judgment 
at Nuremberg.” Miss Michigan, Nancy Fleming, became 1961’s Miss 
America. 

 Oh, here is an interesting set of statistics. Research in 1961 revealed 
it took 62 years for electric wiring and 80 years for the telephone to reach 
34 million homes. Furthermore it took 49 years for cars and 47 years for 
the electric washing machine to reach 34 million homes. How many years 
do you think it took for the television to reach 34 million homes? 10 years 
baby!

 Speaking of television, the top 5 shows of 1961 were: 1. “Gunsmoke”, 
2. “Wagon Train”, 3. “Have Gun Will Travel”, 4. “Andy Griffith”, 5. “The Real 
McCoys.” In case you’re interested “Rawhide” was number 6 (Rawhide introduced 
us to Clint Eastwood whose characters name was Rowdy Yates.)

 In the really important news of 1961 Marvel Comics introduced us to 
“The Fantastic Four” comic book characters.

 Finally, speaking of fantastic, I sat through a dress rehearsal of one 
terrific play. The Sierra Madre Playhouse’s Fairytale Theatre production 
of “Cinderella.” The music is grand with local Jane Fuller playing the lead. 
What needs to be seen to be believed are the ugly stepsisters, played by 
good friends of mine, Richard Halstead and Guy Crawford. All the children 
in the audience play mice and are encouraged to help Cinderella 
throughout the play. Also, Prince Charming comes out into the audience 
and dances with any girl in the audience who wants to dance with him. 
Thank goodness the ugly stepsisters don’t come out. As wonderful as 
watching this play is, it is also a joy to see the look on the children’s faces as 
they become involved throughout the entire play. 

 The play just premiered Saturday the 22nd. It will be playing the next 
four Saturdays at 11:00 am at the Sierra Madre Playhouse, 87 W. Sierra 
Madre Blvd. Tickets are $18.00 for adults and $12.00 for children 12 and 
under. For reservations call (626) 355-4318.

 Congrats to June Chandler for a sensational play. Come and bring 
kids if you can. But come.


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