Sorry Mystic, just had to fix a couple of typos. I get pretty serious with these comments. Please hit "Edit" and "Save" and jump back in front of me.

Noam Chomsky said it well, when Communism fell in Eastern Europe U.S. elites needed a new bogey man as a pretex to dispense with the Constitution and make ilegitimate military actions elsewhere. When old man Bush wanted to invade Panama in 1990 after Mannuel Noriega got too independant, for example, the Berlin Wall had fallen and "glasnost" and "perestroika" were disolving the Eastern Bloc so he couldn't say, "Communism!" anymore so he said Noriega was a "narcodictator" trafficking drugs into the United States. Bush had started his "zero tolerance" campaign against drugs, their trafficking and use, the next to previous summer (some 15 months earlier).

Also part of that campaign - that fomented hysteria about drugs, drug use and drug users - was the rushed passage of new, draconian drug laws of questionable constitutionality and a disdainful dispensing with constitutional provisions in enforcement methods. Drugs were so terrible, it was reasoned, and drug users and dealers so despicable that surely we had to be hysterical and dispense with any constitutional measures that were designed to protect the innocent from wrongful conviction or harrassment by the authorities - just as "communism" and "communists" were before and "terrorism" and "terrorists" would be later on. Surely, it was implied - and sometimes stated - the founders of the United States and framers of the Constitution could not have been providing for this monstrous unforseen circumstance when they crafted the Bill of Rights (or for communism before or terrorism later) and thus could never have intended for us, of subsequent generations, to apply the constitution to this monstrosity and to these monsters (it would appear, from their rhetoric and action, that the Constitution could only function, and was only intended to function, under some sort of ideal circumstances and conditions, which, of course, never happen as this isn't anything near to an ideal world - in actuality, of course, such times of crisis and likely hysteria are when the Constitution is needed most and are the very times and circumstances for which it was written).

Also, in the '80s, the Reagan era, the War on Drugs was used for political witch hunts. Just as Joe McCarthy and HUAC, in the '50s, used anti communist hysteria to purge radicals of the '30s, right wingers of the '80s, as the Village Voice noted at the time, used the hysteria about drugs to purge the radicals of the '60s. People who were discovered to have smoked pot in '60s or '70s - before the super straight (but alcohol soaked) '80s - were fired, denied positions and banished from public life and effectively "black listed". Most notable among these was David Ginsburg, Reagan's Supreme Court nominee who did not gain confirmation when it hit the fan that he had smoked pot in college.

This strategy served them well because if, at that time, you could exclude everybody who'd ever smoked pot from public life you would effectively exclude all the radicals of the '60s. It was also at about this time that the wide spread drug testing earnestly began - for the purpose of excluding those who'd made a defiant life style choice more than to prevent impairment on the job (as was more or less frankly stated at the time, saying it was done to make for general intolerance ["zero tolerance"] of illegal - and, of course, otherwise illicit - behavior).

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Well put, Dr. Richard!

These systematized practices are always just a means for the powerful to kick around, control and, ultimately, to exploit the powerless. There's even the thesis that drug laws were made in the first place to criminalize the cultural customs of racial minorities who they didn't like or didn't want stepping out of their place and always wanted to have an excuse to throw in jail, e.g., marijuana for African-Americans and Mexicans and opium for Chinese immigrants in California.

If your relative with the drug testing business has access to all these drugs, would it not be possible to spike the sample of someone he wanted to trash? Or someone he was paid off to trash? How can you possibly defend yourself against that kind of abuse?

Quote leighmf:Alcohol is the gateway drug anyway.

leighmf ~ Hiccup! Yep! I'll sure drink to that!

Even Hitler and Stalin never imagined treating their people with such abuse. And one hopes that, in Germany at least, the average citizen would have complained about such nastiness. But the fact that so many Americans quietly submitted to this horror shows how far this country has fallen, and that the lyrics about the "land of the free" are as hollow as the slogan in a beer commercial.

Lewis, thank you for sharing such an illuminating and unique perspective! The immediate relative you speak of sounds like a psychopath all right; and what a bloody hypocrite!

The whole idea of drug testing is enough to make me friggin' crazy. I've only endured this degrading ritual once in my life. It was almost twenty years ago, during my brief stint as a nursing student. Given that situation and environment, and all that I'd already invested in my training up to that point, it was unavoidable. I'd prepared for it well in advance, via the necessary (ahem) change of habit and lifestyle, so I passed the test without incident. But I vowed to myself that never again would I subject myself to such a disgusting and unwarranted intrusion.

This has been a major factor in my decision to remain self-employed. It's bad enough that employers control as big a chunk of our lives as one typically spends on the job. But drug testing gives employers control of how people spend their time off the job, which is simply outrageous. It's like they own you; even your body. And these tests specifically target marijuana smokers.

Policies and laws of this sort are the hallmark of a fascist police state, where every aspect of your life is under the microscope. I will go to any lengths to avoid this. Frankly, I'd rather be dead than have to live on other people's terms 24-7, because it is tantamount to modern-day slavery. Shouldn't we all have certain areas of our lives that are for us alone, beyond reach of Big Brother or employers, or other authority figures? Isn't this a major factor in what makes life worth living? Who owns our bodies anyway?! Something well worth contemplating. - Aliceinwonderland

My question in regards to mandatory drug testing is this; If we are to test employees, does this include random drug testing for Prosecuting attorneys, District attorneys, all cops, legislators, congressmen, senators, bankers, CEOs, etc? Is this random drug testing for all or just random drug testing for the little guy?

Thom makes an excellent point about sleep problems. I've had sleep apnea my whole life but only learned about it recently. When I drove for a living I used to routinely fall asleep at the wheel after about 45 mins of continuous driving. I thought it was normal. Only after people who heard me sleep insisted I get it checked out did I learn the truth. With a simple CPAP machine my life was changed. Now I can't force myself even to take a nap during the day. It's a new lease on life; and, a miracle that I never killed myself or anyone else. Like Thom said, when you sense you have a problem you tend to self regulate and find ways to cope to protect yourself and others. At least I did. I would take breaks and short naps along the side of the road when necessary.

Ironically, a lot of truckers use various drugs to cope with the same problem. The drugs counteract their sleeping problem. I wonder what would happen to highway safety if you took those drugs away and their sleep apnea went undiagnosed? Actually, no, I don't have to wonder. Thom hit the ball out of the park with this one, we do need to end drug testing. It is counterproductive as well as a Constitutional violation of unwarranted searches and seizures. It has the potential of causing much more harm than good in many ways; and, has no place in a free society.

I am blood relative (immediate family) to the owner of a prominent drug testing lab here in the US. If it weren't enough that this person rakes in millions annually on state, federal and private contracts in corrections, transportation and private industry through testing of individuals for commonly abused drugs (among other things,) the business is organized such that the operating company which does the testing holds no assets and therefore cannot suffer any significant damages for botched tests which harm innocents. A separate holding company owns all the assets other than a pay period's worth of cash so the cash reserves and physical assets are beyond the reach of most courts. And if that weren't sufficiently insulting, this person once intimated that being in such a position, virtually any manner of compound is readily accessible to him in its pure form for the taking whenever the urge to partake should arise, no prescription required and, apparently, with little if any regulatory oversight. This is the same person whom, when we were considerably younger, was found to be in possession of syringes, needles and illicitly produced or obtained illegal drugs. Right up there with the likes of Darrell Issa i.e an unrepentent sociopath gleefully exhibiting the rigidly authoritarian corporate personna of so many of our "pillars" of industry and society. Pompous, arrogant, self-righteous and condescending pretty much sum up my impression.

The usual higher minimum wage, stronger unions, restricting international exchange, etc, have their place. Yet in the past when we had those policies and more, we still had widespread poverty. Shouldn’t we be trying something else?

How about if we try what works? Any place that has used any aspect of geonomimcs has benefitted: de-tax wages, de-fund corporate welfare, enforce environmental standards, recover the socially-generated value of sites and resources, and pay people a dividend from the resultant surplus public revenue, a la the dividend of Alaska or Singapore, for example.

Of those, the most potent and maybe the hardest to implement is the public recovery of publicly-generated land values. It works because it spurs owners to use prime locations most efficiently, which creates jobs and attracts investments. It’s fair because we didn’t create land, we all need land, and paying land dues is a way of compensating our neighbors, those whom we exclude (as long as the government pays a dividend or provides universally desired social services). Land dues run up against land speculation but they are what make geonomics tick, and have a home at progress.org.

Finally I get to learn what "RT" stands for; thank you, Palin! And I've just been reminded - yet again - why I kicked the TV habit. Soon as I have the time, I'll check out that link. - AIW