UPDATE: Big apologies to the folks at Bostinno, where this post first appeared.
Bill grew up in a hardworking middle class family in Massachusetts. His parents provided for his every need and enrolled him in private school where he was a successful athlete and on the honor roll.
At a friend’s house during his freshman year in high school, he and his friends stole Percocet, a powerful pain medication from his friend’s parent’s medicine cabinet.
Within in three months, he was addicted and taking painkillers on a daily basis. He started buying the powerful painkiller Oxycotin on the street and stealing money from his parents. He stopped playing sports and barely graduated high school. Within a year of graduating from high school, he was sniffing heroin and entered his first rehab. Over the next several years his addiction worsened; he eventually began injecting heroin and contracted Hepatitis C as a result. He has spent the last few years bouncing from jail to rehabilitation facilities.
Sadly, this story is a composite of thousands of true stories around our Commonwealth.
For years, Massachusetts has struggled with the growing problem of substance abuse. Illicit drugs such as heroin and painkillers have brought devastation to our families, communities and individual lives. It is time that we put an end to the spread of substance abuse and it starts by how we treat it.
In Massachusetts, we currently treat substance abuse as a criminal issue. This will stop in my administration. We need to start to treat substance abuse as a public health issue. When we focus on addiction and substance abuse as a disease, we can start to lay the foundation to stop it from spreading, just like halting the spread of a virus.
Our state leads the nation in healthcare services and research, and yet we have the 6th highest rate in the United States of drug users under the age of 18. Data suggests that as many as 10% of our children in Massachusetts are using illicit drugs.
This past week, I proposed creating an Office of Recovery. We need an office that is solely designated to coordinating with local detox and rehabilitation facilities so every person can easily find immediate treatment.
As Governor, I will highlight the issue of substance abuse and addiction in our Commonwealth. I will work to lessen the stigma of this illness and open our minds to it as a health problem. Only then will widespread education and other measures be effective and only then will many of our fellow citizens who suffer from addiction and drug abuse seek and obtain the treatment they need.
We as a Commonwealth need to be proactive, not reactive. It is a moral and economic imperative that Massachusetts leads the way on an Office of Recovery. As Governor, I will lead our efforts to removing the stigma of substance abuse and together we will stop this epidemic and keep Bill and tens of thousands of our children out of jail, rehab or the morgue.
Sure, focusing on substance abuse as a public health issue rather than a criminal justice issue is very important. An Office of Recovery sounds like a fine idea and I’m all for anything that helps maximize access to recovery services.
That said, this all begs the bigger question(s). What do you intend to do as Governor, if anything, to reform or repeal the current laws on possession and sale of illegal drugs? Do you support marijuana legalization? What about legalizing simple possession of other drugs? Generally, do you support mandatory minimum sentences for drug possession?
Avellone seems to have opened the door to much of what you are asking.
So Ronny and Nancy “War on Drugs” fiasco mandatory minimums seem to be on the table. I’m sure we’ll be getting some additional details and debate on the topic. So kudos to Avellone for making this a topic in the primary.
But, I am concerned that Avellone has recently come put publicly against full marijuana legalization:
If he can’t see the obvious benefits of ending prohibition for marijuana, I’m skeptical about Avellone’s commitment to truly stopping treating substance abuse as a criminal issue altogether.
I’m not at all on board with legalization and remain highly skeptical even regarding medical use, though I’m open to more reasonable enforcement and greater emphasis on the treatment side. I have yet to find a good reason to affirmatively say that another narcotic is OK to be on the market when quite frankly if it were entirely up to me we’d ban cigarette smoking outright as well.
Even in these times of prohibition, it is not classified as a narcotic, it’s classified as a schedule one controlled substance.
And as for its medical uses, I would trust centuries of its use in medicine over your skepticism: http://medicalmarijuana.procon.org/view.timeline.php?timelineID=000026
I probably should not have used such a technical term, but even as a controlled substance my point basically stands. I’m open to limited medical usage, but would feel a lot better if it were more controlled than even filling a prescription. IMO it should be used only in the presence of a doctor.
I believe in the harm principle and personally have not tried marijuana but feel that it’s about as harmful as alcohol or tobacco which we already sell and tax. In fact most studies show it is less harmful. The sky hasn’t fallen in Washington or Colorado I don’t see why it would in MA. It
Would be pretty nice to know that my white friends would be paying taxes that help the government rather than the cartels and it would be nice if my non white friends didn’t have to go to jail if they were caught.
..this is just one of those gut things for me. The way I see it it’s bad enough we already have one legal substance to smoke, and pollute my breathing space if I’m in that kind of environment. I just simply DO NOT WANT to add to that and this time no studies or stats or reports are going to change that. Jail is stupid; I’m fine with the penalties being civil, which I guess would also be a source of revenue, but outright legalization whether intended or not says it’s OK and gives people especially kids unwarranted access. Yes, I know the laws would all say adults only, but how has that worked out for cigarettes. What I have yet to see is an affirmative reason to legalize it. Even medically, it’s the active ingredient that may have some benefits, but that doesn’t mean people have to light up.
How is WA or CO not keeping it out of the hands of kids? Both laws
are 21 or older and the UD and licensing system is stricter than the standards for A, T, or F (in terms of selling for the latter) and ban it in public places with an equivalent of an open container law violation. Can’t sell or smile
anywhere near a school. Liberals should base their public policy off of data-not gut checks.
Is smile a typo? I have almost no faith that kids won’t have an easier time getting it than they do where it is illegal. As long as I’m not claiming false facts I am entitled to my opinion and i’m sticking to it on this one.
Of course you’re entitled to your opinion. Here’s mine.
This nation was founded on principles that celebrate individual freedom. The phrase “pursuit of happiness” is not meaningless decoration.
I think the burden of proof is on anyone, including you, who would restrict the freedom of adults to pursue their happiness as they choose. When the facts support reasonable restrictions — such as selling addictive substances to minors — then those reasonable restrictions make good policy. Personal opinion and preferences — unsupported by facts — do not meet that standard.
I’m reminded of James Carville’s remark about gay marriage — “I was steadfastly opposed to gay marriage, until I realized I did NOT have to do it myself”.
If you don’t want to use marijuana, by all means don’t use marijuana. Pursue your own happiness however you like — please celebrate a society where each of us can do the same.
…for all the same reasons I don’t want people around me using cigarettes, plus you add the intoxication factors that make things like driving high comparable to driving drunk AND the risks to personal health that will drive those costs up. Plus, was it illegal all along just ’cause? I’m assuming there was a halfway decent reason. When I saw the lines in CO on the first day of legality go out the door and around the block the thought of all those either closet or wannabe potheads admittedly made me nervous. I can be reasonable about enforcement, but there is NO reason to basically give permission for people to use it. Granted if it had been legal all along maybe I wouldn’t be chomping at the bit to ban it, but to legalize it now sounds backwards. I do not claim to be liberal, and certainly not libertarian on this, though I would note that it especially seems counterintuitive for the same people who don’t want to let people gamble away their own money with no threat to anyone’s physical health are OK with people risking the health of themselves and others around them by smoking another substance.
We’re hearing all about your gut feelings, and you assumptions, and your guesses, but many of the things you’re asserting as facts are arguable at best. For instance, you are making a mistake in assuming that there was a good reason for outlawing pot. Search “Harry Anslinger,” and you’ll see why. Here’s the Encyclopedia Britannica:
Here’s some more:
It’s hard to have a rational conversation when so much of your commenting is based on feelings without facts.
christopher, I dunno where you grew up but you ask virtually any kid whether it’s easier to get pot or alcohol and he’ll tell you pot. Here’s a study if that floats your boat. This despite the billions we spend on enforcing the marijuana ban.
I know you have a “gut feeling” but sometimes gut feelings are wrong.
Honestly curious if this changes your opinion in any way.
I would have had no idea where to get pot growing up and I’m not sure my closest circles would have either. Alcohol, OTOH as a legal substance could have been in any one of our homes.
There’s hard data in that link that shows that this is true. Pot is easier to get. It’s pretty straightforward: a liquor store won’t sell to a 17-year-old but a pot dealer will.
most parents have booze in the house, and not hidden nor locked. The same is most certainly not true for pot.
I’m not arguing with the data — I’m arguing with your logic.
You can say you don’t want them around you until the cows come home, Chris – put that together with an empty beer can and you can get a nickel at the redemption center.
The prohibition against marijuana is about 1000 times worse than the harm it does – the money spent enforcing the ban and the lives ruined in jail are just not worth it.
Erosion of civil rights, confiscation of private property leading to militarization of police forces, and overwhelming harshing of millions of people’s mellow.
Why do they hate the idea of Americans having fun?
…or they’re awesome at hiding it which I doubt given its distinctive odor. I encounter cigarette smoking on a regular basis even with the restrictions; I do not want that to become my experience with marijuana. I believe I have already said that jail makes no sense.
…I’ve always interpreted, and I believe historical context backs me up, “pursuit of happiness” as being able to fulfill your potential and advance as far as your talents and effort will allow without false barriers being placed by a legally enforced class system, not the phony sense of happiness one gets from getting high. If pursuit of happiness is your concern let’s redouble our efforts to expand opportunity and fight the growing income inequality, for which availablity of more drugs will only hinder.
America is a republic. That means that, in the absence of explicit action to the contrary, each of us completely free to do whatever we like. We delegate powers to the government — the government is empowered to do ONLY what we ask it to. The purpose of our laws and constitution is to spell out the LIMITS of government — everything other freedom is ours to use or abuse as we wish.
My happiness is my own, not yours. My route to happiness is equivalently mine, not yours. I don’t believe the phrase “pursuit of happiness” needs deep interpretation, I think it means exactly what it says.
Feel free to impose whatever set of constraints you like on your own behavior and life. I will push back as hard as I am able to stop you from imposing those personal desires on the rest of us.
I agree with the comment downthread that I fear this exchange is hijacking this thread. Mr. Avellone is to be commended for taking a courageous and much-needed position on the way we treat substance abuse. The use of marijuana is a TINY sideshow in comparison to the issue he raises.
We ought NOT to use “substance abuse” as an excuse to impose our personal whim on those around us. I applaud Mr. Avellone for finally speaking reason about this much-abused (pun intended) topic.
I pushed back on pursuit of happiness since you brought it up. Remember, the Declaration isn’t a legal document anyway. Yes, the government is empowered to do what we ask, but I find no constitutional right to light up or prohibition on the government to ban the use or sale of a substance. Even if we got into federal vs. state, a strict constructionist might say there is no federal power, but state governments generally do have plenary police power provided that they do not deny or disparage rights protected by either federal or state constitutions.
You still haven’t answered my basic question which is that the WA and CO prohibit public smoking of ANY kind and also prohibit sales to minors. So let’s please discuss what the law actually does rather than what you think it will or won’t do. The guy smoking a butt at the bus stop will NOT be allowed to smoke a joint since it’s treated the same as an open container violation.
And to be fair to Christopher he is okay with decriminalizing it, just
not okay with making money off of it which is even harder to understand. Granted Tom’s eloquent defense of personal freedoms goes out the window when the state lottery is concerned…
The guy smoking a butt at the bus stop isn’t legally allowed to do that either. Yet we see it all the time.
I think this is part of Christopher’s concern… regardless of the law set in stone, he’s concerned about his actual future interactions with actual people when, for the most part, cops aren’t around and it’s easy enough to hide the roach if a cop rolls by.
While I don’t completely agree with Christopher’s conclusions or his logic to get there, I do share this particular concern, and think it’s a valid one.
Why do you have the concern that someone would be smoking pot at a bus stop? Because then they’d be Riding the Bus Under the Influence? Because you’re afraid of Second-Hand Smoke? Because they’d be making themselves feel good in a way you don’t approve of?
What?
Maybe I’m more sensitive than most, but that is the factor regarding cigarettes as well that makes me so opposed. I’d be more libertarian about this is I thought it really only affected the person doing the smoking. That is followed by concerns about intoxication, but it’s possible to enjoy alcohol in moderation without effect, but I’m not sure about pot in that regard.
In open air (such as walking around a college campus), the concentration of perfume and/or the volatiles that carry body order is as high as cigarette or marijuana smoke.
I don’t like to smell BO, and I find some perfumes and colognes obnoxious. By your argument, I should promote laws to make perfume and body odor illegal.
“Concerns about intoxication”? Really? Are you proposing a new crime like “walking under the influence”? Public intoxication is already illegal. Surely that’s enough to manage whatever “problem” may exist, and with any intoxicant.
….but neither that nor BO is inhalable in that sense. The odor is offensive, yes, but I’m going beyond mere smell to the second-hand smoke aspects.
How are perfume or body odor – or any other odor – not inhalable in exactly the same way as smoke? I really don’t understand what you’re trying to say.
..is a toxic substance that can get into your lungs. Perfumes and BO just smell. It’s the difference between staring at the sun which can cause damage and looking at any number of other things that you simply just see.
Marijuana smoke is not “toxic.” Breathing it does not cause immediate harm, especially as second-hand smoke. It is not poisonous.
Also, I’m interested in why you think perfume and BO “just smell” and do not consist of particles that can get into your lungs. Here’s a fun read for you:
Just smells, though, right?
You’ve all given me a lot to think about, at least some of which honestly still seems counterintuitive. There are still the articles I found on a quick Google search regarding the harms and effects of marijuana which I assume didn’t just make stuff up. Would I get used to it?-probably. Will the sky fall?-probably not. For now, however, my own vote is still no, for reasons I’m apparently having a hard time explaining even to myself. The idea of legalizing another controlled substance still provokes the question in my mind, “Must we?” Just my opinion, but maybe others are more persuadable.
We’ve put your arguments through the ringer, but you already support de-criminalization which at the federal level would make such a huge difference. That makes you far more consistent than the President who concedes it’s not harmful, admits he enjoyed it, and still insists on using heavy handed federal prosecutions. The drug war is one of our most harmful public policies and I welcome any ally who wants to end it even if we disagree on the next step.
I get it that legalization is a harder hurdle for some-my own parents who actually experimented with it during the 60s still view that as a bridge too far. But that’s why the example of WA and CO will help. Same with SSM. Mom was freaked out after the 04′ ruling and by 05 was a solid supporter and angry whenever she heard opponents. It goes from “that’s new and strange” to “I don’t care it doesn’t affect me” pretty fast. I get where your coming from, in college I asked my one smoker roommate to keep the pot smoke inside his room with an open window and that worked out fine. Didn’t want it in the common areas and he obliged. The government can surely figure out a similar arrangement.
I didn’t realize all public smoking was still banned, but I still think it opens unnecessary cans of worms.
The argument I make against the lottery has a different foundation from Christopher’s objection to marijuana:
1. I object to the state being in the lottery business. I would similarly object to the state growing and selling marijuana.
2. Data shows that gambling losses fall disproportionally on the least affluent and most economically desperate portions of our population. Nobody has offered comparable data about marijuana
3. In a republic, a sound justification for asking government to limit certain behavior is when that behavior — when practiced by a significant number of people — causes demonstrable harm to all. Sex in private between mutually consenting adults causes no harm to society. Opening a strip-club and brothel in a suburban neighborhood destroys property values and interferes with the “peaceful enjoyment” of its neighbors. The former is allowed, the latter is restricted. I make a similar distinction between marijuana and gambling — I argue that the former harms nobody, while the latter harms everybody.
Marijuana does have some harmful effects, especially on the smoker. Gambling has no harmful effects on many people who play casually and others not closely connected to someone with a problem.
There is little beyond anecdotal evidence of harm from second-hand marijuana smoke. Virtually EVERYTHING we do has *some* harmful effects.
Saying that gambling “has no harmful effects on many people who play casually” begs the question. It is the harmful effects on people who DO NOT play “casually” that are well-documented. Moderate marijuana use has no harmful effects on people who aren’t harmed by it. Moderate alcohol consumption has no harmful effects on people who are not alcoholics.
You greatly exaggerate the risks of second-hand smoke, especially second-hand smoke from marijuana. The more recent studies (like this (paywalled) of second-hand cigarette smoke find no statistically significant relationship between lung cancer and exposure to passive smoke. Women who lived with a smoker for 30 years or more had a “borderline statistical significance” (which is the same as “no” statistical significance — something either is or is not “statistically significant).
According to this piece in Forbes, quoting Dr. Jyoti Patel of the Northwestern University School of Medicine:
I’m not arguing against reasonable restrictions on public smoking. I think you are arguing FOR unreasonable restrictions on marijuana use.
…we were now questioning the effects of even secondhand cigarette smoke. I thought that was the whole reason for being so restrictive, and I sure as heck want to be nowhere near it, even briefly, even where smoke has been recently if not simultaneously if I can help it. I can’t imagine being within a few feet downwind of a pot smoker being pleasant either, and I still have not heard a compelling reason to say it’s OK to consume another substance.
1. Where is the data to suggest this is bad-specifically
lottery losses? I would argue state production of marijuana is not the apt analogy. State taxation is. I want the state to make money off of pot-not the cartels. Similarly, I want the state to make money off the lottery rather than have the underground lottery the Anguilos used to run.
2. You still haven’t shown how the lottery causes problem
gamblers or effects them, using statistics. I know lottery players who go to the casinos ( and would without a lottery) and those that do not. But I agree with you that anecdotal evidence shouldn’t determine policy and I am willing to listen to your arguments on this point if the lottery specifically is shown to make matters worse.
3. This is the reason I oppose casinos in MA. The libertarian in me has no problems with Vegas which has been a gambling destination for over 60 years and wouldn’t exist as a city without the industry existing or people going there. They can handle the externalities. We can’t, and I agree that it will cause crime, damage property values, and not produce the benefits it’s proponents claim. You’d be hard pressed to argue the lottery causes these externalities on the same scale-but I’m open to persuadability.
I would argue that Christopher should exam the reality in WA and CO so far and see if it’s really as bad as he envisions. Similarly, perhaps Tom and I should see how lottery v non lottery states operate and what the costs and benefits are in each case.
Lots of ineffective and suboptimal treatments have been used for centuries. Big whoop. I have no doubt that there are legitimate medical uses for the substances within marijuana, but it is highly questionable that the best way to deliver those to patients in a reliable form is actually in the form of marijuana itself.
In any case, I totally agree it should be legalized. Then people can use it just like any other herbal remedy and leave doctors out of it.
Prohibition didn’t work for alcohol; all it did was enrich a violent criminal class (and certain to-be-prominent political families) and poison and criminalize a lot of ordinary people. Pretty much exactly what the War on Drugs has accomplished. Outlawing tobacco would have similar success.
(not in the literal sense of course since I’m not that old, but we both know what you mean:))
Which is why in this case “if it were entirely up to me” includes subcaveats like “if I thought it would actually work”. Both are public health concerns on multiple levels and I just see zero upside to outright legalization of another controlled substance.
What a silly thing to say.
Of course, there are potential downsides too. Legalization of marijuana *might* lead to increased use, to more (still illegal) DUI, to more access by minors, and to the legalization of all drugs altogether (which many are scared about even though I would support that as well).
That said, you’d have to be totally blind and/or shamefully ignorant to see “zero upside” potential in the legalization of marijuana. Obviously (?), legalization of marijuana would save millions of dollars in wasted law enforcement resources which could and should be used to (say) provide needed health care to substance abusers. Legalization would provide more liberty and personal freedom to millions of adult Americans. Legalization (like the end of Prohibition) would cripple the black market, lower the price of marijuana and generally lead to less associated crimes (theft/assault/turf wars). Legalization would raise millions in much-needed tax revenue and allow the FDA (and/or similar state entities) to regulate the quality and safety of drugs.
It’s simply inconceivable to that anyone could see “zero upside” to the legalization of marijuana. I urge you to educate yourself and participate in the debate from a position of non-ignorance.
Putting aside how weird it is that christopher’s so invested in keeping kids away from the devil weed, to echo my above post, legalization and age barriers just work better than bans. It’s a lot easier to get your licensed liquor store to card than your friendly neighborhood pot dealer.
…that walking around college campuses, one encounters a lot more cigarette smoking, a legal substance for adults but certainly a habit students began underage, than marijuana?
Honestly, christopher, your responses here are veering in to Dan from Waltham territory. Since you have a history of not being so seemingly ignorant and argumentative, I’ll take one more run at responding to your latest “question.”
Why is it? Several reasons, among them:
1) Smoking marijuana in public is illegal. Smoking cigarettes isn’t. Most college kids act legally in public. You might as well ask why don’t we regularly see college kids walking around drinking alcohol.
2) The average smoker smokes 15-20 cigarettes a day (more than one for every waking hour). The average marijuana smoker smokes far,far less. Even those who regularly smoke pot every day (not the majority of marijuana smokers) rarely smoke more than the equivalent of a handful of cigarettes worth of marijuana daily. A pack of cigarettes contains 14 grams of tobacco. That’s a half ounce of marijuana! That would last weeks and weeks for most pot smokers.
3) Nicotine is physically addictive (leading far more regular use and the “need” to smoke in public). Marijuana is not. While illegal marijuana is demonstrably easier for teenagers to get than cigarettes, trying marijuana as a teenager is less likely to lead to a college-age habit than trying cigarettes.
…and did not take much time with “the Google” to uncover any number of articles regarding addiction/dependence as well as physical and psycological effects.
My point on smoking was yes, they smoke in public because it is legal to do so, and to push back on the point of don’t worry there are age restrictions since I strongly suspect almost all of them started before they were legal. Regarding alcohol they might not drink in the public areas of campus, but they do go to bars, sometimes with fake IDs and sometimes obtained by those who are legal since with the age being 21 you will have some students who are legal and some not.
there is more cigarette smoking than marijuna smoking on college campuses. The simple answer is that, because it now is illegal, you’re not going to encounter it “walking around” the campus. Behind closed doors is another story.
…is I like it that way. Again, I can be reasonable about enforcement, but I don’t want to encounter it walking around campus, though I’d be interested if you can back up your first line. Even if the smoking is done privately you’d think there’d be evidence of being high or smell.
I have no statistics though some probably exist. It’s just based on personal experience. I myself never really smoked either, but at different times in my life have been surrounded by people who smoked both. They smoked the cigarettes openly, because they could, but generally kept the marijuana out of public sight (smell?).
My understanding from NPR is that marajuana is much better and more effective on PSTD military patients than the standard FDA approved set of pharma-manufactured drugs. If nothing else, I think this is worth an experiment, to try to save a few veterans who may otherwise become suicidal.
was, in my opinion, even-handed about marijuana’s uses: Marijuana: The High and the Low.
Two recent reviews avoid such biases and critically examine data from more than a hundred randomized placebo-controlled clinical trials involving some 6,100 patients with a variety of medical conditions.10 Marijuana appears useful in treating anorexia, nausea and vomiting, glaucoma, irritable bowel disease, muscle spasticity, multiple sclerosis, symptoms of amyotropic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig’s disease), epilepsy, and Tourette’s syndrome. (Recent clinical trials confirm many of the claims of Emperor Shen Nung and Dr. O’Shaughnessy.) Despite findings from experiments in my laboratory and others, its anticancer effects in patients are more uncertain and neither THC nor CBD is a proven antineoplastic agent, i.e., effective in treating abnormal growth of tissue.
Judy Foreman, an accomplished medical journalist, devotes a chapter to marijuana in her recent book A Nation in Pain: Healing Our Biggest Health Problem.11 She judiciously reviews the data on the risks and benefits of marijuana as a therapy for medical conditions marked by pain, highlighting where it appears ameliorative, where it falls short, and where there is lack of clarity about its value. Foreman writes:
To put it bluntly, marijuana works. Not dazzlingly, but about as well as opioids. That is, it can reduce chronic pain by more than 30 percent. And with fewer serious side effects. To be sure, some researchers think it’s too soon to declare marijuana and synthetic cannabinoids a first-line treatment for pain, arguing that other drugs should be tried first. But that may be too cautious a view.
Ultimately, marijuana may be used in conjunction with opioids like morphine to allow for lower doses and fewer of the side effects of the opioid family of analgesics. While chronic pain seems amenable to amelioration by marijuana, its impact on reducing acute pain, such as after surgery, is minimal.
Mr. Avellone,
A great part of this cycle and dependency comes from employers asking job-seekers if they’ve been previously arrested. This stigmatizes those who’ve made earlier mistakes, or one mistake, due to substance abuse. Would you support a law that would prevent employers from asking this question, as has been passed in other states?
As I understand it, the law in Massachusetts is that an employer can not ask if an applicant has been arrested, but can only ask about a conviction. I recall being told that for some professions the arrest question can be asked. David? Other lawyers? What is the law here in MA?
I haven’t seen a more frank discussion about the decade long opiate / prescription drug abuse in Massachusetts by ANY candidate for Governor.
Also, let’s not devolve this issue down to whether pot should be legalized or not (I think it should), it leads the debate into the wrong direction and in blog terms, let’s not hijack the post.. We are talking about powerful opiates (heroin and most prescription pain meds are opiates) and they are night and day compared to pot (although the feds do classify them as the same–that needs to end).
Aside from shifting to Drug Courts and more and better treatment, a Governor needs to be working with (and if that doesn’t work–fighting) the medical community to stop the craziness of giving opiates for minor knee operations and dental surgery. We need to stop the supply of these LEGAL drugs.
BTW, Avellone was never on my short list. Still not on my short list. But he has my attention.