Psychedelic Drugs Show Promise as Anti-Depressants
Friday, 20 August 2010
Don't Drink The Water
Illustration by Emmanuel Romeuf
Andy Roberts’s feature on LSD in the water supply (‘Reservoir Drugs’) described the CIA’s obsession with this type of threat in the 1950s and the scare stories about hippies dumping drugs in reservoirs and similar media reports. I’d like to go back a bit and fill in the gap on the CIA’s own interests. The huge quantities of LSD needed might have meant that spiking water supplies was absurdly impractical… but a little thing like that didn’t stop the world’s favourite spy agency.
In the early 1950s, the CIA approached the Sandoz laboratories in Switzerland, the company that had patented LSD, and requested 10 kilos of the stuff. They were politely informed that the total production only amounted to 10g, enough for some 40,000 doses, but far less than the Agency wanted. The CIA bought what it could from Sandoz, and used some of it in the notorious MK-ULTRA programme. Among other things, the programme explored the effect of LSD on unwitting subjects by spiking drinks at parties. But the idea of using gigantic quantities had not been abandoned.
Dr Jim Ketchum was involved in the US Army’s programme for testing the military effectiveness of a whole range of psychedelic chemicals. He entered his office as Department Chief one Monday morning in 1969 and found a black steel barrel, a bit like an oil drum, in the corner. [1] The military does not always explain everything, and Dr Ketchum assumed there was a good reason for this unusual addition to the furniture. However, after a couple of days he became curious. He waited until everyone else in the building had gone home one evening and opened the lid.
The barrel was filled with sealed glass canisters “like cookie jars”. He took one out to inspect it; the label indicated that the jar contained three pounds of pure EA 1729. This wouldn’t mean much to most people, but to anyone working in this field the code was instantly familiar. Substances were given EA designations from the Army’s Edgewood Arsenal; EA 1729 is the military designation for LSD. The other glass canisters were the same, perhaps 14 of them in all. This was enough acid for several hundred million doses with, Ketchum estimated, a street value of over a billion dollars.
Some wild ideas about what to do next flitted through his mind, but in the event he simply sealed the barrel up again. By the Friday morning it had vanished as mysteriously as it arrived...
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David Hambling @'Fortean Times'
Inebriation
...about a man who specializes in "a very specific type of insobriety - unconscious insobriety."
Drug addict benefit withdrawal considered
People dependent on drugs and alcohol who refuse treatment could have their welfare benefits withdrawn under plans being considered by the Home Office.
The idea is in a consultation paper on the government's drug strategy for England, Wales and Scotland.
The proposals also suggest that addicts on benefits should not be required to seek work while receiving treatment.
Some experts have suggested that withdrawing benefits could lead addicts into crime and prostitution.
The Labour government intended to carry out pilot schemes this year to get drug users into work.
Under the plans, addicts who failed to attend a treatment awareness programme would lose welfare benefits.
However, in May the Social Security Advisory Committee - an independent statutory body - said withdrawing benefits from drug users would lead them into crime and prostitution.
The coalition government scrapped the pilot programme - but the Home Office has now revived the idea.
It asks for views on whether there should be some form of "financial benefit sanction" for claimants who do not take action to address their drug or alcohol dependency.
The Home Office has also confirmed plans to give ministers the power to ban new substance for a year until they have been properly assessed in a bid to combat so-called "legal highs".
Minister for Crime Prevention James Brokenshire said: "The drugs market is changing and we need to adapt current laws to allow us to act more quickly.
"The temporary ban allows us to act straight away to stop new substances gaining a foothold in the market and help us tackle unscrupulous drug dealers trying to get round the law by peddling dangerous chemicals to young people.
25 Tracks: A dubstep chronology By Eighteen
As part of Drowned In Sound's 'Subliminal Transmissions' week, 25 Tracks is an attempt to put together a mix that encompasses as many of dubstep’s myriad shifts as possible over the course of an hour. It’s never going to be comprehensive, and there are doubtless gaping holes where individual artists and sounds ought to be, but the aim is to provide a mostly chronological map of its development – all the way from the dark garage of El-B and Horsepower Productions to the many hybrid forms battling for attention today.
download link
Thursday, 19 August 2010
Wikileaks encryption use offers 'legal challenge'
wikileaks"All we have to do is release the password to that material and it is instantly available," | BBC http://bbc.in/9pJjAx
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