Letter from the Editor: New columns
This week’s Advocate marks the second column in a new series we’re calling Basemental. The column will focus on the local DIY music scene, artists who play and record in alternative spaces, like basements and barns, old churches and galleries. It’s written by Will Meyer, a local DIY musician who plays in a bunch of bands including Bucket and New Mom.
Basemental will appear during the first and third week of each month, alternating in print with stalwart music scribe Gary Carra’s “Nightcrawler.” You can still read “Nightcrawler” every week online at valleyadvocate.com where Carra posts a fresh article every Wednesday. And for even more “Nightcrawler,” catch Carra talking shop with Lazer 99.3 FM’s morning DJ Leslie on Wednesdays — 6:20 and 9:20 a.m.
On a related note, for the past three months the Advocate has had an environmental column, Down to Earth, by Naila Moriera, a science writer, journalist, poet, and naturalist living in Western Mass. She teaches writing at the Smith College Jacobson Center and she is the Writer-in-Residence at Northampton’s Forbes Public Library, 2015-17. Catch Down to Earth the second week of the month.
I am incredibly proud to present these new writers to local readers while expanding our areas of coverage. Enjoy!
— Kristin Palpini
Editor
Legalize all drugs and collect the taxes
The War on Drugs has been costing us $51 billion per year since Nixon coined the term in 1971. Obviously, it has not worked. If we legalized all drugs and taxed them the revenue is expected to be $49 billion per year.
That adds to $100 billion available for education and treatment. Other nations have found that education and treatment works and is all that works. We suffer about 47,500 deaths per year from drug overdoses. This is because there is no quality control and heroin is often cut with Fentanyl or other toxic additives. Deaths also occur because after a short stay in rehab users go back to the usual quantity. They have lost some of their tolerance and the same amount is now an overdose. Also people just make mistakes.
Portugal legalized all drugs July 17, 2001, and has the second lowest overdose rate in Europe. Usage is way down because pushers, traffickers and related crime are all gone. There is no effort to get new addicts because there is no profit to be made. Existing addicts get the correct amount of standard purity from a nurse.
Without the threat of incarceration, many addicts seek treatment and get it. Long term treatment is all that works because addiction is a long term brain disease. We have no money for treatment now but we would if we ended this useless War on Drugs. Show high school kids some pictures of addicts after 20 years of usage and there won’t be very many who want to look like that. A little education can go a long way. Let’s get smart. We don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Just look at what other nations have done to solve drug problems. The first step is to eliminate the profit. Legalization would save a lot of lives in Mexico, too.
— Malita Brown,
Wilbraham
‘Pseudo-educated’ women for Hillary!
Hillary Clinton is a corrupt and hypocritical woman, part of the establishment and in the pockets of the banks just like the rest of our politicians. Sadly, pseudo-educated women like editor Palpini cannot see through Clinton’s lies and that of the one-party system currently destroying this country (“Between the Lines: Hillary Clinton is the real revolution,” Jan. 21-27, 2016). If Clinton stands for women’s rights, why does she take money from the Saudis? Oh yeah, I know, it must be a lie from the mean, bad conservative men that are keeping women down. Hillary for prison 2016!
— Gino Dos Santos,
Amherst
