Running with the torture loving DEA
by Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher
November 7, 2019
Welcome back to the DEA Lounge!
I want to thank our public servants here for taking time out to join us. I know you've got a busy schedule, locking up liberals, so any time you can spare--
What did I say?
Hey, listen, I understand. By locking up liberals, you keep the Drug Warrior conservatives in power and thus maintain your crucial jobs of quashing dissent in America and limiting human consciousness.
No, seriously. I suppose the Drug War was bound to happen eventually on planet earth.
[gasp]
It had to happen at the precise moment in human history when capitalism and modern transportation coincided with a new awareness of the psychoactive power of plants.
[murmur]
PICTURE0020
We could either greet this alignment of forces rationally or not, and guess which choice we made?
[laughter]
Suddenly, Chicken Little politicians were screaming: "Oh, me gosh, we have to outlaw plants!"
Wrong.
AUDIO5
Earth to politicians: you should have outlawed the profit motive when it comes to those psychoactive plants, not the plants themselves.
[applaud]
I guess they had to scapegoat plants, though, since the alternative was to question the all-powerful god of capitalism 1 .
[laughter]
The result? They thereby created such a violent world that we had to invent a whole new movie genre to accommodate all the bullets and bodies: namely, the Drug War movie.
[laughter]
I hate to call such politicians morons, but if the dunce cap fits...
[drum]
[laughter]
"Gee, what happened? We outlawed plants and a bunch of violence ensued. Who would have thunk it?"
[laughter]
Answer: anyone with half a brain.
[drum]
[laughter]
Don't you love those Drug War movies 2 3 4 ? Those movies where the DEA "heroes" laugh at the US Constitution and willfully employ torture and murder to achieve their goal of outlawing Mother Nature? Ah, yes, good old American values: torture and murder.
[gasp]
Check out Running with the Devil, a DEA propaganda film starring Laurence Fishburne and Nicolas Cage.
[gasp]
Along with Leslie Bibb as the torture-loving DEA agent.
[gasp]
You know, if the Drug War is Christian, as many fundamentalists maintain, then I must have missed something in Sunday School.
[laughter]
I missed the part where Jesus told his followers to place suspects in bikini briefs, suspend them by a metal chain, and then threaten to drill holes in their abdomen with a power tool, as Leslie Bibb threatens to do to the so-called "Snitch" in Running with the Devil.
[gasp]
Oops, I forgot to mention: SPOILER ALERT!
[drum]
[laughter]
Speaking of spoilers, you ever notice that the Drug War spoils democracy!
[applaud]
I just looked up the movie, Running with the Devil, on so-called Common Sense Media.
[murmur]
Common Sense? More like Common Nonsense.
[laughter]
They pan the movie for its nudity and four-letter words...
[murmur]
...but they have absolutely NOTHING to say about the movie's glorification of governmental fascism5.
[laughter]
Common Sense Media is like: Watch out, parents. There are some very naughty words, indeed, in this movie! Land's sakes! Aside from that, though, it's just a good-natured romp extolling the wonders of fascism! So enjoy!
[laughter]
My name is Ballard Quass and I'll be here until they outlaw freedom of speech6, which won't be long considering that our government has already had the metaphysical chutzpah to outlaw mere plants!
Notes:
1: What the drug war tells us about American capitalism DWP (up)
2: Glenn Close but no cigar DWP (up)
3: Blast-off for Planet Hypocrisy! DWP (up)
4: Drug War Quotes in TV and Movies DWP (up)
5: Glorifying Beneficial Drug Use DWP (up)
6: Speak now or forever hold your peace about drug prohibition DWP (up)
Ten Tweets
against the hateful war on US
My cousin says we should punish drug dealers. I say we should punish those politicians who created those drug dealers out of whole cloth by passing unprecedented laws against the use of Mother Nature's bounty.
The scheduling system is a huge lie designed to give an aura of "science" to America's colonialist disdain for indigenous medicines, from opium, to coca, to shrooms.
The drug war bans human progress by deciding that hundreds of drugs are trash without even trying to find positive uses for them. Yet scientists continue to research and write as if prohibition does not exist, that's how cowed they are by drug laws.
As great as it is, "Synthetic Panics" by Philip Jenkins was only tolerated by academia because it did not mention drugs in the title and it contains no explicit opinions about drugs. As a result, many drug law reformers still don't know the book exists.
The UN of today is in an odd position regarding drugs: they want to praise indigenous societies while yet outlawing the drugs that helped create them.
The U.S. government created violence out of whole cloth in America's inner cities with drug prohibition -- and now it is using that violence as an excuse to kick the people that they themselves have knocked down.
The press is having a field day with the Matthew Perry story. They love to have a nice occasion to demonize drugs. I wonder how many decades must pass before they realize that people are killed by ignorance and a corrupted drug supply, not by the drugs themselves.
Someday, the First Lady or Man will tell kids to "just say no to prohibition." Kids who refuse will be required to watch hours' worth of films depicting gun violence, banned religions, civil wars, and adults committing suicide for want of medicine that grows at their very feet.
Imagine educational documentaries showing how folks manage to safely incorporate today's hated substances into their life and lifestyle.
Problem 2,643 of the war on drugs:
It puts the government in charge of deciding what counts as a true religion.
Click here to see All Tweets against the hateful War on Us
Next essay:
Previous essay:
No cookies, no ads.
Attention, Teachers and Students: Read an essay a day by the Drug War Philosopher and then discuss... while it's still legal to do so!
The Partnership for a Death Free America is a proud sponsor of The Drug War Philosopher website @ abolishthedea.com. Updated daily.
Copyright 2025, Brian Ballard Quass
Contact: quass@quass.com
(up)