Posted on by Nathan Riley

Don’t Let Cuomo Become Mayor

I will not pick one candidate for NYC Mayor: Andrew Cuomo.

He makes life difficult for everyone else. When he rejects an idea, he frequently leaves people furious. They had spent hours responding to his detailed questions and end up feeling used. They became convinced Governor Cuomo never supported the idea and did not ask questions in good faith. His attitude makes people feel like supplicants unable to satisfy him; he had no real interest in their proposal.  Like MAGA Republicans, he displays contempt for ideas that improve people’s lives and mocks idealists wishing to make life easier and diminish prejudice.

Think carefully about the stories told about Cuomo and you get a sense of the hostility that surrounds his life at the top of the political ladder. He is the son of a Governor, a member of President Bill Clinton’s cabinet (Secretary of Housing and Urban Renewal), former NYS Attorney General and Governor of New York. You will not find him riding the subway, and he leaves the distinct impression that people who do ride it are unimportant.

Given how often subway riders wait in a station while the MTA fixes a problem, it is unlikely he will be a mass transit Mayor.  Andrew Cuomo enjoys pleasing conservative Democrats by appearing to cut government spending. Spending billions on modernizing the subways will strain the City’s budget and make fiscal conservatives unhappy. Cuomo will bring a bad attitude to this thorny problem.

A telling example of the hatred surrounding him is the fury that led to his resignation on August 24, 2021. The push came from his own party. In the 2020 election, Democrats, who controlled the Assembly, gained control of the State Senate. Within 8 months, these Democrats and an investigation by State Attorney General Letitia James forced him to resign. Those who knew him best showed him the door. Besides a State Legislative investigation, the Attorney General found 11 women who complained Andrew Cuomo would not leave them alone. When they were near, Cuomo made sexual overtures. Even with this evidence of repetitious behavior it still took President Biden’s intervention to force the Governor to leave.

Cuomo’s aides were powerless to stop his harassment—further evidence that he does not listen. Politico reported Federal investigators found Cuomo “repeatedly subjected” women in his office to non-consensual sexual contact, ogling and gender-based nicknames. Top Cuomo staff “were aware of the conduct and retaliated against four of the women he harassed,” the DOJ concluded. Like Mayor Adams, Cuomo staff includes loyalists who protect him even when acting illegally.

His current campaign suggests he learned no lessons from his ignominious ouster as Governor. The City public financing system has strict rules to prevent wasting public funds or obscuring the identity of donors who wish to exceed legal limits. In a filing, Cuomo’s campaign failed to comply and was denied his public funds. Then the city’s Campaign Finance Board found the campaign skirted fund limits by coordinating with an independent PAC that accepted large donations. According to charges, Cuomo’s supposedly independent body worked with the campaign. A fine of $622,056 was imposed and Cuomo’s campaign is fighting the charges.    

Cuomo’s departure from public life was ugly and my belief is Andrew Cuomo should never hold public office again.  I will not place my mark next to Cuomo’s name in the Democratic Primary Election in June.

Posted on by Nathan Riley

It’s Time for “Whatever” People to Unite

Freedom Democrats reach a cross section of America among  them are viewers of porn and its performers , are close to the LGBTQ+ community, sex workers and their clients, and drug users. They number in the millions and respect each other’s habits and do not tell other people how they should live their lives.

Political scientists tell us voters join their friends and become a stable voting bloc. A key organizing tool of this new group are weekly parties. The “whatever” people form the core of the Freedom Democrats.

Around 2015, many drug reformers rejected the idea that drugs are a problem. Millions like to get high, and they objected to a negative focus that fed shame. In truth and in fact it is absurd that the pleasures of drug use should be considered criminal. People having a good time are not committing a crime!

Marginalizing people with demeaning laws betrays our heritage; the right to the pursuit of happiness is enshrined in the Declaration of Independence. So fundamental is this right, that the Declaration insists that governments are “instituted” to “secure these rights.” Laws prohibiting drug use directly conflict with the Declaration. For this reason, reformers rejected the idea that their drug use requires government management.

This blog hopes open minded people will unite and vote.

For years, arguments supporting drug legalization accepted the idea that drug use is a problem. Reformers made the case that criminalizing drugs was bad policy; it increased the danger of drugs and the risk of harm to users. In 1981, the futile fight against drug use cost $1.5 billion; currently, it costs $35 billion. Except in those states that made marijuana legal and collect tax money rather than spending it. As early as 1944, NYC Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia issued a study backing marijuana legalization. In the eighty years since then, expert after expert voiced support for similar conclusions. What is new is the growing recognition that even “hard drugs” like heroin are used just as safely as marijuana or alcohol. These scientific conclusions buttress the arguments for the universal right to get high, guaranteed by the Declaration of Independence.

Roughly ten years ago, and growing every year, drug users and reformers reject the notion that these pleasures are unmanageable. A vocal advocate for this change repudiated many of his earlier ideas. Carl Hart, a professor at Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons, when he started his study of drugs, thought drug use was a major cause of the crime and poverty infecting black neighborhoods like the one he grew up in. Over the years, Professor Hart’s research led him to repudiate this hypothesis; he concluded it was nonsense.

Drug use is often scapegoated as a cause of poverty, which is more closely tied to society’s neglect. Students in these neighborhoods often receive minimal encouragement at school, their families struggle and don’t earn a living wage, and government services are inferior to nonexistent. Explanations for downtrodden conditions cannot be reasonably traced to the bad habits of the residents. It’s an unworkable explanation. Middle class people use more drugs than the poor, they can afford it, and their lives don’t fall apart.

Those blaming the poor’s problems on drug use seldom mention that a half-a-million people are arrested every year, “to say nothing of the shameful racial discrimination in marijuana arrests,” wrote Professor Hart. In 2013, black people were four times more likely than white people to be arrested for marijuana possession. At the federal level, three-fourths of the individuals arrested for marijuana possession were Hispanic. Undoubtedly, the growing legalization of marijuana has improved this situation, but its main lesson is still in its infancy: society can absorb legalization without trauma.

Moreover, Hart’s years of research on drug use in a university setting dispelled the notion that crack, meth, or psychedelics were more addictive than marijuana. Other legal substances like alcohol, caffeine, or food most adults have no real problem handling but which cause some people real difficulty. The connection between overeating and obesity is a far greater health problem than drug use. But there is no call to wage war against food and make it illegal.

By propagating the myth that drugs made people dangerous, society gave new life to older racist prejudices enflaming fears that marginal groups like Blacks, Chinese, or the Irish threatened society. Myths about the danger of drug use spawn alarming headlines, increase media audiences, and justify increased funds for police, drug testing, and treatment programs. The true beneficiaries of drug prohibition. By casting it as an evil, politicians were relieved of the obligation to offer a helping hand other than making the only acceptable outcome: stop using the drug now.

Professor Hart’s fury and sense of moral failing was directed at himself and other drug users who showed little solidarity with the persons ensnared by hostile laws. In his radical book Drug Use for Grown-Ups, the professor clearly admitsthat he lived a happy life using drugs. It increased “affability, euphoria, and energy—all conducive to a party atmosphere.” If he was free to enjoy his life with these drugs, the Professor insisted that morality demanded solidarity with others captured by the criminal law. Adults who use drugs sporadically for pleasure, Hart insists, must come out of the closet for the same reasons that lesbians and gays made their habits known. Once people realized that their friends and neighbors were gay, it became difficult if not impossible to believe that it was a problem. Hart makes a convincing case that users will also change people’s attitudes.

He describes delightful moments with his wife, often with enhanced intimacy and sexual pleasure. Drugs accompanied him in many special moments in their marriage. Hart’s pleasure is not pot, he likes heroin.

The conclusions from his research reinforced his politics. He eloquently dismantles the 1980’s crack scare. It was a successor to previous racist lies that this or that evil drug made blacks insanely dangerous criminals. Today we laugh at the absurd tales in the movie Reefer Madness, but these mean-spirited tales led to a degree of police intervention that has no justification in a free society. At the height of the crack scare, Governor Mario Cuomo called for life sentences even for small amounts of crack worth $50 while Congressman Charles Rangel “advocated for the deployment of military personnel and equipment to rid cities of the drug.” These mythic drug scares are a reoccurring part of American life. They have no scientific basis and are dangerously totalitarian.

In the ensuing panic, Congress passed “legislation setting penalties that were literally one hundred times harsher for crack-trafficking than for powder cocaine–trafficking violations. From a pharmacological perspective, Professor Hart notes, crack is no more harmful than powder cocaine. “They are the same drug.”

The obvious and racist difference between powdered coke that is snorted and crack that is smoked is the color of the user’s skin. Decades later Congress stopped ignoring these criticisms, but even then they could not bring themselves to make the penalties for crack and cocaine equal. Congressional reform reduced the sentencing disparity, but still in the throes of the dangerous drug nonsense, the “reform” reduced the disparity to 18:1. Thank you, but no thanks.

Policy-based arguments seeking reform but which accept the idea that drugs are exceptionally dangerous easily leads to compromises that make the 18:1 seem like an acceptable improvement.

It is far better to insist that drug use is legal and allow adults to control their use. Drinks during alcohol prohibition were often laced with dangerous ingredients. Once drinking became legal, whiskey became safer. Making drug use legal would make drugs safer and improve education on the safe use of drugs. Drugs would have standardized ingredients and users would receive sound advice backed by medical research. Such a plan recognizes that adult drug users like Professor Hart will manage their use successfully and doctors, friends and family will help those whose use cause problems.

Drug users are often a picky lot. Those who like opium understand that methamphetamines have an entirely different effect. The users and their community can sort out these problems without having their privacy invaded by strangers and the law. Driving is legal but often dangerous, and in all probability some users will find ways to make drugs dangerous. But most users will choose safe habits. That is why Professor Hart entitles his book Drug Use for Grown-Ups. Freedom requires that we allow adults their right to pursue happiness and society will work with users to enhance pleasure rather than promote danger.

Freedom Democrats will not only fight for adults’ rights to use drugs, but they will stop racist police practices. The opposition to drug laws is another chapter in stopping the U.S.’s history of terrorism against blacks.

Professor Hart insists drug users unite and demand the simple truth that in the United States getting high and happy is a basic human right. The Declaration of Independence guarantees the fundamental right to pursue happiness.

The professor has shrewd observations to encourage drug users unity. For example, he warns that there is a negative side to “the current popular psychedelic movement.” He cautions that it is “dominated by people who justify their use of these drugs by couching it in medical or spiritual jargon.” Their careful arguments avoid “the stigma associated with using these substances, so long as the reason for use is not to get high.” But the professor prefers the libertarian attitudes like those of a psychedelic icon like Jerry Garcia. Garcia—it should be added, but the professor doesn’t mention—was a heroin user, even if the Grateful Dead’s devoted followers preferred LSD they knew that drug laws violated their rights.

Professor Hart calls for all drug users to come out of the closet. Getting high is an inalienable right protected by the Declaration of Independence. This freedom should become a cornerstone of the argument for drug legalization.

Launching Freedom Democrats requires the help of smart persons who will join an old man like me. I’m 82 and nearly blind and must find activists who want to help.

Organizing Freedom Democratic requires no special skills. The starting point are weekly parties that invite sex workers, porn watchers, drug users, and LGBTQ+, the “whatever” persons who share a common attitude. They want a new birth of freedom in the United States. The weekly parties will give people who share common views the opportunity to work together and become a political force.

Posted on by Nathan Riley

Drug Use Has Comparable Risks To Drinking A High-Ball

Freedom is tied to the discovery of new ideas, what we often call “truth.”

Freedom in the United States is a constant struggle. The most famous and obvious is slavery. Slavery was practiced all over the world, long before it was used to make sugar or grow tobacco. Slaves are a constant backdrop in the Bible. Between 20 to 40% of the Roman population was slaves. Supporters of slavery insisted that once freed blacks would do no work and rape white women. Slavery, we were told, was a pillar of civilization.

As freedom became accepted, slavery conflicted with changing moral standards. Making drugs legal is no greater a change in moral standards than when the United States abandoned slavery or allowed women to vote.

Appeals to freedom, frequently meant changing minds; what was considered “right” became “bad.” Conventional morality opposed a new freedom and then became accustomed to it, even insisting on it.

Freedom permits us to challenge existing ideas; slavery stopped being a “good” and became an appalling evil to many Americans. Freedom allowed reformers to challenge existing ideas and insist on a better reality. Today it is harder to accept that drug use is criminal behavior that good people should stop, an evil that harms us. It is simply untrue that poverty is caused by drug use, multiple reasons are tied to poverty: more people than there are jobs, education that doesn’t instruct many young people, and few programs that help people learn after they are 18 and start to recognize the importance of schooling.

Arguing that drugs are an evil is being challenged. If gambling, overeating and alcohol are addictive it becomes difficult to claim heroin has some special evil factor making it more addictive than other activities. Moreover, drinking, eating, and gambling are legal and most people do not become addicted to these pastimes. People get high at reasonable times in reasonable ways. They do it for the same reason people eat and drink to be merry and have fun. Users feel convivial, have better sex and more fun high.

It’s a pleasure that adults should have the right to enjoy. More and more scientists agree controlled use is possible. Much of the argument gets enmeshed in medical jargon about receptor cells and the way the brain works. However difficult the arguments, these scientific disputes are earth-shattering in their conclusions.

With the same caution that we practice with alcohol, being cautious about how much we consume and when we drink, scientists are telling us that the illegal drugs may foster fun and are just as safe as drinking, which has been legal for nearly 100 years. Many scientists, like Carl Hart in his indispensable book Drug-use for Grown-ups, are saying the public has the facts wrong. Heroin, methamphetamine, marijuana, cocaine, psychedelics, etc. can be used safely, and it’s possible to clearly explain this safe use to the public. In short, there is no scientific basic for making the drugs illegal. The law has got its facts wrong and is impinging on our right to pursue happiness. Freedom Democrats can help persuade the nation to support this reasonable policy. Drug legalization offers freedom to drug users and their suppliers. It is a good thing. It makes sense to weigh the opinion of the scientists; after all, their claim is a breakthrough.

A big mistake is assuming that an illegal drug has the power to control your life. Those of us who live happily with drug users know that people can get high on Friday and be energized for work on Monday. We see this with our naked eyes but public hostility leads us to remain silent. We protect users from the law by keeping them in the closet. This strategy has a bad effect, it prevents the public from seeing the truth. Drug users know that the risk of a highball and a snort are comparable. If drug users left the closet, the public would know that drug users should have the freedom to choose their highs.

A major implication of the scientists’ conclusions is that we overemphasize the dangers of drug use. Focusing on danger moves our thoughts into anxiety, making it easier to accept the false conclusion that this is a high risk activity. A major reason that people use drugs is happiness, a right protected by the Declaration of Independence. Not just protected but one of the three core values in our democracy, “the right to Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Making drugs legal is a simple act of respect, recognizing that the millions of Americans who get high know when they are having fun, and wish to have that feeling again and again. Drinkers know the pleasure of that first drink after work. A decent respect for opinion should make it clear that if drug users say it’s fun they know what they are talking about. The argument for drug legalization is just that simple. Don’t believe it when they tell you drugs destroy your lives. It only happens occasionally and is usually not permanent but just a stage in life. It makes more sense to say, “You should be careful, and learn how to use the drugs safely.”

In turn, it is our obligation to recognize that allowing drug users to pursue their habits is an act of respect. Users should be able to buy drugs conforming to strict government standards. A pill taken to get high should be as safe as a pill prescribed by a doctor. Obviously, there would be restrictions. You wouldn’t want pills that look like candy, you don’t want your children to eat a whole box full. The pills should be child-safe. When it says 60mg of whatever drug, it damn well had better be 60mg. At the same time, the legal drug industry should have the right to recognize that their products are used for pleasure. They should have permission to advertise that people enjoy their products, just as alcohol is advertised with people enjoying themselves.

A debate surrounding the legal sale of drugs that get you high and happy should help protect the users and minimize harms. Legalizing drugs means putting to bed the nightmares that surround the myth of addiction. If gambling and overeating can be an addiction, then it is improbable that there is something especially malevolent in a psychedelic or heroin. Sometimes addiction happens; usually it does not.

Freedom would stop the police from interfering with users’ habits. A decent respect for drug users should recognize their heartfelt plea for civility. We will not harm your children, but we will save the young from the harms of harsh criminal penalties. Instead of threats, we insist on respect and recognition, telling the public, “We will listen to you if you will listen to us.”

{If you think ideas like these can become important by showing how many people think this way, then please contact me. I am 82 and nearly blind and looking for an enterprising person to launch Freedom Democrats.}

Posted on by Nathan Riley

Let’s Start a Movement For Freedom

All too often, people vote the way their friends and colleagues vote. When unions were strong and union halls were social gathering places, people voted Democratic and for unions.

Unions, of course, have declined, and the union halls play a smaller role in reaching voters. The kinds of people that join unions has changed over the years. Now, union members are usually white-collar workers—schoolteachers, professional athletes, and government office workers. Unions of autoworkers, steelworkers, construction workers, railroad workers, and other working class unions like apartment building employees are important, but they don’t dominate organized labor the way they did after World War II. Frequently, these unions work with their employers to stop foreign competition.

Freedom Democrats will organize a different group: sex workers and their customers, drug users, the LGBTQ+ community, porn watchers and the performers. By throwing weekly parties, Freedom Democrats hope to create a large group that supports personal privacy and seeks alternatives to the forever wars. The weekly parties will allow people of different backgrounds, regardless of education, to create groups of voters who can influence politics in their community and hopefully in Washington D.C. It is hoped that the weekly parties take the place of union halls as social gatherings for voters.

Freedom is critical to this group because all too often politicians impose criminal penalties, often harsh, that interfere with these people’s lives. The Declaration of Independence guarantees us equality and the right to pursue happiness as we choose. Turning these ideals into reality appeals to many Americans. In all probability, the people coming to the Freedom Democratic parties will include many who aren’t sex workers, lesbians, transgendered, or gay and prefer real sex to porn. They simply don’t care how other people live their lives, but they don’t want government interference. Adults in a free country can make up their own minds about how they get high or how they get off.

In a free country, doctors can treat patients without strangers, especially politicians and the law telling them how to do their job. The free choice that women should have with regard to abortion should also apply to people’s other personal habits. Doctors should be free to work with patients on a treatment plan that conforms to medical standards without the law or moralists telling doctors how to do their job. Most especially, doctors should be able to prescribe drugs that make users’ lives comfortable without judges or the DEA interfering.

Freedom Democrats are trying to turn the Declaration of Independence’s promise into daily reality. This idea is attractive to all kinds of people, including those who don’t take drugs or purchase sex. For this reason, it is hoped that Freedom Democrats will appeal to many Americans and give the group influence. If Freedom Democrats can nominate candidates, provide votes that help elect officials, it will have a chance to change attitudes and the law in this country.

I am 82, nearly blind, and eager to find enterprising people who want to start such a movement. I can only offer an idea. It is up to others to turn that idea into a reality.

Posted on by Nathan Riley

Allow Grown-Ups To Use Drugs

It doesn’t matter if you’re a cosmopolitan sipping a martini after a day at the office or a gourmet tasting only half a serving of dessert, you must exercise self-control. Adults can’t stuff their face without getting fat, and an adult can’t spend an evening chugging beer without getting drunk. Self-control is a critical component of good health.

So it should come as no surprise that heroin users must practice self-control.

The best research confronts the obvious truth that people all over the world get high and that those foolish moralists who would ban drugs and alcohol use cause harm and threaten the liberty of our citizens.

Carl Hart, a Columbia professor who spent years doing biased research to prove that marijuana and other drugs were harmful until he reached a conclusion that a fair reading of the evidence demonstrates that using the illegal drugs with the same self-control that we promote for drinking and eating poses no danger to health and may in fact be a sensible part of a healthy life.

My father died at 91. He had his last martini on a Thursday and died on Saturday. Drinking was one of his great pleasures, and like many of his generation that lived through alcohol prohibition, he was convinced that marijuana and even heroin used judiciously were pleasures that any adult should be free to choose. What he knew from experience, scientists have supported with research.

Professor Hart is just one of a growing chorus of reformers who believe adults should be free to choose their pleasures. It is a well-known fact that moderate consumption of alcohol reduces the risk of heart attack and stroke. Professor Hart extends this same principle to heroin. He uses it. But quite reasonably insists that the user should be prudent and exercise self-control. In his book Drug Use for Grown-ups, based on his research and his personal habits, he demonstrates that using heroin with self-control is fun and can be part of a happy life.

The research is extensive and available to those doubters who want scientific affirmation for what other people discover while growing up. If you aren’t self-aware and don’t control your use, all of these substances can cause substantial harm. But in fact the greatest harm is caused by the government and law enforcement programs to stop illegal drug use.

Perhaps the most important proof and one of the key points that another researcher, Dr. Peter Grinspoon, makes in his book Seeing Through the Smoke is that overeating can be an addiction. That is, what should be a pleasure, when used judiciously, can be life threatening if the eater insists on experiencing the pleasure of food to excess.

Without a doubt, obesity causes more premature deaths than fentanyl, alcohol, and car accidents. A study in the distinguished New England Journal of Medicine, concluded, “We are also simply eating more calories per person: Portion sizes have gone up, and eating outside of the home often means heavier, unhealthier foods, and sugary drinks to wash them down.” According to the researchers, a high body weight contributed to 4 million deaths globally — or 7 percent of the deaths from any cause — in 2015.

Eating unhealthy foods causes more deaths than fentanyl or car accidents. This is a worldwide problem. It is worst in the United States. Put bluntly, Coca-Cola and soft drinks kill more people than any of the illegal drugs. This is of course not a plea to make sugary foods illegal. In terms of policy, it is a plea to give public health officials more authority over the habits of U.S. residents.

Anybody my age, 82, has watched as public health techniques dramatically reduce cigarette smoking. When I was growing up, every house had ashtrays on most tabletops. A fun evening with guests would probably lead to the smoking of almost a pack of 20 cigarettes. Nobody went outside to smoke; it happened in the living room with everybody present. Public health messages, over decades, made smoking uncomfortable, a bad habit. Cigarettes are still with us, but their use is dramatically lower than it was in 1950. The discomfort with smoking is widespread. Among young people, who quite commonly decline not only tobacco but marijuana to protect their lungs. Without arresting anybody, public health policy changed our national habits.

In one of his most arresting passages, Carl Hart argues that the illegal drugs don’t follow this public health impulse because of racism.

Controlling illegal drug use costs billions that pay the salaries of police, judges, prison guards, and even drug treatment programs. The police prison industrial complex is uniformly racist, and encourages public fear, and its arrests threaten personal freedoms. It continues the U.S. history of applying terrorism against black and brown communities. Almost uniformly, white people who use the illegal drugs are given more compassion. They have a problem. Those with a different skin color are dubbed criminals, burdened with a record, and even imprisonment for their supposed moral failings. Sheepishly, Professor Hart admits that at the start of his drug research he believed drug use caused poverty and antisocial behavior in his communities. He has freed himself from these racist delusions.

The simple truth is some of the people who use drugs harm themselves; others, quite possibly a large number of others, get pleasure and relaxation from their drug use. It contributes to their sense of well-being. The drug war and its billions of dollars threaten all users. Public health measures would dramatically reduce the number of people earning good wages to fight the drug war, but will be more effective. Without burdening the taxpayers, public health measures would solve most of the problems associated with drug use, just as it has reduced but not ended the health problems associated with smoking. And cause no threat to our freedoms.

Perhaps the biggest benefit of this approach would be the increase in freedom in the United States. Police intrusions into the lives of our citizens are prompted all too often by suspicions that an otherwise law-abiding citizen may be involved with illegal drug use. At its most extreme, hundreds of Americans have been shot and killed by police officers enforcing the drug laws. Freedom Democrats would end this threat to our liberties.

Posted on by Nathan Riley

Drug Use Is No More Addictive Than Overeating

Since World War II, caring people have rejected stigma, recognizing its cruelty.

Freedom Democrats enthusiastically join in the fight against stigma. The latest group to hold its head high and say, “We are doing nothing wrong,” is drug users. It has become increasingly difficult to accept the stigma that using hard and psychedelic drugs is always harmful and should be illegal. More and more drug users reject the hostile conclusion that getting high must be destructive behavior. Some people have problems with drugs, just as some people have problems with overeating, but the growing body of evidence makes it clear that many people use drugs and have fulfilling lives. It is mean to look down on drug users.

In the United States black people were stigmatized before and after slavery. Black workers were stigmatized as lazy and stupid. Whites were often surprised by blacks’ intelligence and shrewdness. Written before the Civil War, Frederick Douglass’s autobiography was greeted with skepticism. No black, the stigmatizers said, could write that well; a white person must have been the actual author.

When it comes to stigma, the unfair treatment of blacks has lasted an extraordinarily long time, but other stigmatized groups have shed their negative labels since World War II. Historically homosexuals were mocked, occasionally locked up, until the nation went crazy. Immediately after World War II, gays became a national threat. They were considered security risks. Homosexuals could stay in the closet, but if their loves became public, they lost their jobs. It became illegal for Uncle Sam to provide employment to LG persons.

During this gruesome period, supporters of homosexuals helped lesbians and gays stay in the closet. These heterosexuals, like my parents, thought it was helpful to call lesbians and gays “sick.” Sick people deserved compassion and treatment. Psychiatrists thought that gays could become heterosexual with treatment. In other words, lesbian and gay people could become “healthy” by just being like straights. Men chasing women was considered “normal.” “Sick” had turned into a stigma.

During this same period, women fought stigmas that labeled them overly emotional flibbertigibbets who created confusion until men straightened out the problems. Men were the smart, rational backbone of government and society. Women took care of the home. This prejudice was stupid. Virtually every open-minded person understood that some women were smarter than some men and that women often had better solutions to problems. Feminism blossomed and so did the view that women are equal to men.

By the 1960’s, a growing population across the globe realized that labeling groups as “inferior” was wrong. Stigmatization demeaned same sex love, women, blacks, Spanish speaking, and in the northern United States southern whites were stigmatized. It took George Wallace running for President to demonstrate that some whites in the North were just as racist as some whites in the South.

The battle against stigma was widespread in the United States after the upheavals of the 1960’s. As the times changed even the military, long considered a deeply conservative institution, adopted anti-stigmatization policies. Gay and lesbian soldiers opened doors that allowed the transgendered to work in the military. Women, blacks, and Spanish speaking people became senior officers whose rank required them to command white men. Stigma didn’t disappear, but it became dubious and presumptively illegal in the eyes of the law.

This social change is attacked by the Donald Trump administration. Diversity is damned, and employees are dismissed for supporting it. It will be a hot-button issue as long as Trump is president.

Nonetheless, the battle against stigma is being fought on a new front. The latest group fighting stigma is drug users. Slowly but surely, it is being recognized that drug users are not sick nor demented.

In fact, much if not most of drug users’ pain is caused by stigmatizing drug use. Change has been painfully slow. In the 1960’s, using marijuana was considered dangerous. It led to laziness, opened the door to stronger drugs like heroin, and demonstrated a contempt for law. This argument failed. Marijuana use became widespread, and its users did not become drug addicts. Stigmatizing people is dangerous, wrong, and causes harm.

World War II and the German Holocaust had exposed the dangers of racial categories. Their acceptance could justify horrific acts. As the lesson of World War II became clear, segregation in the army and the classroom became illegal. The battle to give blacks the right to vote and end Jim Crow practices created interracial friendships. Smoking pot was not only fun, it was a form of solidarity with the victims of racism.

Pot use skyrocketed and by high school teenagers had been to parties where some people got stoned. It became impossible to claim pot was dangerous. The menace of drug use had been disproved. Zero tolerance, or the goal of making America drug free, became absurd extremism.

In city after city, all over the world, it became recognized that some people did drugs, always had and always will. Policy makers were forced to answer the question, what is the harm? If it was the spread of disease from needle-sharing, then it became obvious that drug users should have a steady supply of sterile needles. Though by no means universal, harm reduction became a public health objective. Cities like San Francisco boasted of their accomplishments in reducing drug related harm. Other cities kept their policies lowkey and faced attacks if their harm reduction programs became public knowledge.

Harm reduction is a major step forward, but like supporting homosexuals because they are “sick” it doesn’t dispute the belief that drug use is dangerous and inferior behavior.

A growing chorus of thinkers now argue that drug users are not sick and those who have problems deserve help. It is generally understood that gambling can become addictive and lead to financial disaster. In fact, most gamblers watch their pocketbook and stay within a budget. Gambling is fun, and that is why people like it. Drug users are just as sensible.

The argument that heroin is dangerous because it is addictive has become suspect. Gambling can be addictive for some but not for others, the same is true for heroin. Bankers, plumbers, and college professors use heroin without harming their careers. A Columbia University professor came out of the closet about his drug use. Carl Hart makes this argument in his book Drug Use for Grown-Ups. Consider this observation: lock-ups in cities all over the United States don’t help heroin users going through withdrawal. For some, it is horrible agony, but for many it’s just a challenge and they “tough it out.” Don’t think you know about heroin’s effects because you read newspaper stories or saw antidrug movies. The effects are individual, and they vary with the individual, just like gambling and drinking. Some people get great pleasure from eating and preparing food; other people overeat. You can’t generalize about drug use anymore than you can generalize about eating.

Addiction is a troublesome concept. Using heroin, methamphetamine, is a problem for some but not everyone. That is the lesson that Freedom Democrats are learning and disseminating.

In a free country, no judge should be allowed to tell a person you must go into treatment. It should be up to the person to decide if they want help. Nobody should be allowed to shout “Don’t do this! You will go to jail!” That is not freedom; it is stigmatizing and ignores the right of persons to make their own decisions about how they live their lives.

Posted on by Nathan Riley

Was The Election Musk’s Swan Song?

The Republicans are still strong in Florida, but electing the Democrat for the Wisconsin Supreme Court is an unequivocal victory.

While it is true that Democrats picked up votes in Florida, the Republicans still won in a landslide. That they had less votes than last year proves nothing. Last year, Donald Trump was at the top of the ticket. This year, it was local elected officials who still crushed the Democrats, even if they are not a big attraction like “The Donald.”

One sign that Trump’s diminished popularity cost him votes occurred in Florida. One county that had always been Republican turned blue and voted for the Democrats. The county’s biggest employers are military bases. Politico reports that this county is known as the Cradle of Naval Aviation, in other words federal workers live there and vote. According to Politico, “There are more federal workers in Florida’s 1st District than in any of state’s 27 other congressional districts.” There are four military bases in or near the county of Escambia. Federal workers and their families have every reason to fear the wrath of Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency. They stopped being Republicans and gave the Democrats a 2,000-vote margin. The Republicans still won, but throughout the South there are military installations. Musk may be pushing them into the Democratic column.

In Wisconsin, the Republicans turnout was as large as expected, but the Democratic votes surged, and Susan Crawford, the candidate who will keep the Wisconsin court liberal, easily won the election.

Musk, in his wisdom, gave millions to Brad Schimel, the Republican candidate. In a remarkable display of bad taste, Musk mocked Americans by giving two voters separate checks for 1 million dollars each.

Schimel and Musk lost big to the Democrats.

It is hardly a coincidence that within days of the election stories appeared that Musk will leave Washington. It is impossible to know if this is a wish or Trump has actually made up his mind, but one thing is sure, Congressional Republicans want Musk to leave. Stay tuned.

The other good news from this election is a magic bullet. Democrats honed in on “democracy” more than they did fascism, civil liberties, or other words damning the President. “Democracy” is who we are. Even voters with a grade-school education know and want the United States to be a democracy. The Wisconsin Democrats have given us a fighting word, and a cause that unites all members of the party and all voters in the United States. I suspect we will be hearing more about democracy and Trump’s hostility to it in the future.

Posted on by Nathan Riley

Will Knocking Republicans Increase the Democratic Vote?

Freedom Democrats offer alternatives to many Democratic planks. Legalizing sex work, drugs, and respecting the transgendered and LGBTQ+ community are promises that these planks will be priorities for Freedom Democrats.

Freedom is a core value in the United States, and Freedom Democrats are identifying areas where liberty is limited. Sometimes this is a result of erroneous ideas. If gambling and heroin are addictive, and for that matter so is food, then we should no longer blame heroin or methamphetamine for addiction. Possession of these substances is not a crime. The crime is making people use similar substances without the scientific protections offered by the Food & Drug Administration. In truth, addiction is a common way for people to confront painful problems. Sometimes, people need a doctor to work through these problems. What people don’t need are strangers telling them, “If you only stopped taking heroin, then everything would be good in your life.” Just as women are entitled to privacy when they consult a doctor about pregnancy, so should millions of other Americans be assured of privacy when they have difficult problems that are upsetting their lives and the lives of the people they love. Freedom Democrats want a new America where people can work with doctors without the DEA or judges interfering.  

Other examples of this kind of promise are higher minimum wage, Medicare for All, and support for unions. These positions would be top priorities if Freedom Democrats get elected. They answer the question: If I vote for you, what will you do for me? Democrats used to animate their campaigns with these promises.

All too often, Democrats accept the notion that criticizing Republicans will persuade voters to support them. Elon Musk may be harsh, even cruel, but trying to win elections by saying, “We are good guys. We are not Elon Musk,” will only take you so far.

Three elections on Tuesday, April 1, are testing the proposition that Democrats will become popular by criticizing Republicans. Two House seats in Florida and a Justice of the State Supreme Court in Wisconsin will be elected on April Fool’s Day.

It is also a test of the Democrats’ faith that voters should support them because they believe in good government. The Republicans take a different tact. What did the President promise he would do: Make America Great Again. Trump was running to lower taxes, reduce government spending, raise wages, and get deals from foreign countries that would help the United States prosper. It will come as a surprise to some Democrats that millions of voters believed that he wanted to make the United States stronger and better.

A huge number of Democrats thought the Republican proposals were malarkey. They chose to say baloney and mocked the Republicans. In their anger, they forgot to tell the voters what they would do to help them in their lives.

Franklin Roosevelt was just as emphatic as Donald Trump. He promised Americans they would get “A New Deal.” Vague, you bet, so is Make America Great Again. But Roosevelt’s genius transformed the misery of the Great Depression into a promise of a better future. Once he took office, Roosevelt, among other things, created jobs, provided income to farmers, and started the Tennessee Valley Authority that brought jobs and electricity to a big chunk of the South.

This is a plea to the Democrats to push for a better America and stop believing that complaining about Trump’s fascism is a good way persuade voters. Bernie Sanders clearly understands this, but his ideas come out as a list without a slogan. The many smart people who back Democrats can and should do better.

April 1st will be a test. Will Democrats increase their vote? Or are we still looking for the man who can mobilize this country in a positive direction?

Posted on by Nathan Riley

Is Trump Winning Elections?

On Wednesday (March 26), Donald Trump, as part of his blizzard of new ideas and executive orders, announced that all foreign cars will have a 25% tariff. Presumably the three American manufacturers should be happy.

Curious, I looked for the American automobile manufacturers’ reactions. After saying they support President Trump, American Automakers, the trade association for American automobile manufacturers, was unenthusiastic. First, they wanted a durable solution, and the dramatic announcement of a major market change didn’t sound durable.

There is no sign that foreign competition is the American manufacturers’ major concern. The companies wanted answers to questions that governments normally provide before, not after, a drastic policy change is announced. General Motors, Ford, and Stellantis (formerly Fiat Chrysler) wanted to “avoid raising prices.” Making it probable that their problem was not foreign competition but that their cars were too expensive for American buyers. If the tariffs raised prices and consumers could not pay them, the number of cars made by these automakers would decline. This worry was accelerated by another Trump tariff on imported aluminum and steel. Making metals more expensive means car prices will increase. Normally, a government carefully weighs these issues before starting a new policy. If Trump had done that it was clear he never told U.S. automobile makers. In fact, the suspicion is that Trump, forever the showman, picked the 25% tariff because he liked the number and wanted to make a public impression. No good can come out of policy changes that are not backed by serious study.

Stock traders also worried. The price of Ford and General Motors stocks fell. The day before the tariffs Ford stock traded for $10.30; by Friday afternoon, two days after Trump’s announcement of the tariff, it was trading at $9.65. General Motors went from $52.59 at the close of Tuesday to $46.39 on Friday afternoon. Stellantis went from $12.40 down to $11.30.

In other words, the 25% tariff imposed on foreign cars did not bring good news. I’m not concerned about the automobile manufacturers’ stock prices, but I am curious whether these businesses really want Trump to be President. It is likely that the rich and powerful are nervously watching the President and wish he wasn’t there.

There is evidence that most people are turned off by the Donald. An election in Pennsylvania for its state senate flipped the district. A Republican local elected official, Josh Parsons, lost to a local Democratic mayor, James Malone. What was red turned blue in a district that overwhelmingly supported Trump.

Even the Trump administration is worried; they told Elise Stefanik from upstate New York she should stay in Congress. She will give up her chance to be the ambassador to the United Nations. Far from New York City, in upstate, the Republicans are the majority, but the administration was worried, and it decided to play it safe and keep her in the Republican majority.

Plainly, Trump is losing support, but the Republican in Pennsylvania lost by the narrowest of margins. The next test of Trump’s popularity occurs on April 1st. In Florida, there are two special elections for Congress caused by the resignation of Republican members of Congress. Matt Gaetz’s successor is being chosen, and Mike Waltz, who resigned to become one of Trump’s national security advisors, will have his successor chosen. In Wisconsin, millions of dollars are being spent in a statewide election, choosing a state supreme court judge. Brad Schimel, a conservative, is running against Susan Crawford, a liberal. The winner will decide if the state’s highest court has a liberal or conservative bent.

Clearly, one reason Trump is losing popularity is the aggressive behavior of Elon Musk. The Democrats are insisting their judge will stand up to Musk while Schimmel will do the rich man’s bidding.

We are just days away from an early read on Trump’s staying power. If the automobile manufacturers and Pennsylvania voters are changing their minds about Trump, this helps explains the decline in his polling numbers. On Tuesday April Fool’s Day we will find out if Trump’s bull-in-a-chinashop style will hurt him in the elections.

Posted on by Nathan Riley

Will Ukrainian War End Like The Civil War?

I certainly don’t know when the Ukrainian war will end. The ignominious end of the 30-day ceasefire proposal reminds us that the Iron Curtain still separates the West and Russia. It is not going away.

But we do know how one war ended. In the United States, Jefferson Davis, the President of the Confederacy, never surrendered. The fighting stopped when General Ulysses Grant and General Robert E. Lee agreed on terms of surrender.

In September 1864, General Sherman captured Atlanta. Republican spirits soared, and Lincoln became the first President since Andrew Jackson elected to a second term.

After Atlanta, Jefferson Davis left Richmond, Virginia and rallied the South with promises of victory, claiming “I see no chance for Sherman to escape from a defeat or a disgraceful retreat,” (McPherson, James M.. Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era (Oxford History of the United States Book 6) (p. 807). Oxford University Press). The world, of course, saw the occupation of Atlanta as proof that the Union was close to victory. But the war wouldn’t end for nearly eight months.

Confederate politicians insisted that victory was possible. General Sherman agreed the war wasn’t close to ending: “We cannot change the hearts of those people of the South, but we can make war so terrible . . . [and] make them so sick of war that generations would pass away before they would again appeal to it” (p. 809).

After his famous march through Georgia, Sherman attacked South Carolina, the state that ignited the war. Until late 1864, the war had left the Palmetto State untouched. With a vengeance, the North attacked. The state’s long, Atlantic-Ocean coastline made it the last place for the South to receive supplies. The Navy stopped that. The fort protecting South Carolina’s port was captured, and traders were driven off. Town after town was burned. Livestock captured and fed Sherman’s army. Homes were looted for supplies. The state could no longer supply the thousands in General Lee’s divisions.

From there, Sherman’s army marched through North Carolina towards Virginia, preparing to join General Grant in attacking Lee and his army. The long journey was an engineering marvel. Roads under water during the wet winter were restored, bridges built, and the South’s hopes that these natural obstacles would stop Sherman were dashed.

So the war continued.

In Lincoln’s December 1864 annual message to Congress, he rejoiced in the victories but cautioned that the South would only end the war with a demonstration of its hopelessness. However obvious the South’s defeat appeared, it continued to fight.

“In this climate of opinion another movement for peace negotiations flared up and then fizzled out,” Professor James McPherson commented in his extraordinary history.  Lincoln met the Southern delegation and told them bluntly that peace would happen when the Confederacy recognized the restoration of the National authority throughout all the States, no receding on the Slavery question, and the disbanding of all forces hostile to the government (p. 822). The Southern peace feelers failed.

Lee’s army crumbled. Every night a hundred or more soldiers deserted. Soldiers were in bare feet. Men and horses were weak from hunger. When Southerners attacked, the North won. It captured the soldiers and drove Lee’s men back.

Finally, on April 9th, Lee recognized that surrender was the only option. He met with General Grant. His troops were fed, surrendered their arms, and were guaranteed that they would not be tried for treason. They began the long march home. The war was over. Jefferson Davis was not involved in this event, nor was Abraham Lincoln.

It’s entirely possible, even probable, that negotiations will not end the war in Ukraine. Unlike the South, Ukraine is guaranteed funds and supplies. But the country is war torn. Russia is far larger, and despite sporadic attacks, the nation hasn’t suffered the destruction inflicted on Ukraine. The Ukrainians will decide when they want the fighting to stop, and there is no sign that this will happen in the foreseeable future.