CIVIL LIBERTIES AND JUSTICE

In an election year in which no major-party candidate seems interested in
liberty and limited government as a major priority,it is all the more
crucial to maintain and explain the importance of civil liberties,justice
and respect by the government for the rights of citizens.Whether or not we
have an impact on any of the candidates, the Register will continue to
explain the importance of civil liberties to the building of a civil
society, focusing on a few issues in 2000 that continue to demand
attention, while being open to expansion of the agenda.

Three Strikes, Prison Reform: California's "Three Strikes" law remains the
most punitive such law in America and continues to put people in jail for
long periods with little or no justification. The injustice and expense to
taxpayers will continue to mount.

An initiative campaign to change the law so it applies only to violent
crimes is under way. We will report on it and on other reform efforts.

With the "strikes" law and other recent laws, California now imprisons a
higher proportion of its population than any other jurisdiction on Earth.
With the rapid expansion of the prison system and the growing political
power of the prison guards' union, frequent abuses of prisoners have
occurred, including inattention to medical problems.

We will continue to call for reform and put forward alternatives to
incarceration as superior ways to carry out the ongoing struggle against
crime and violence.

Medical Marijuana: Although California voters passed Prop. 215, allowing
patients with recommendations from a doctor to possess, cultivate and use
marijuana, implementation remains spotty.

Some police departments still ignore the new law, treating patients as they
would treat recreational users. Gov. Davis' quiet opposition prevented the
passage of legislation in Sacramento that, while less than perfect, would
have created reasonably intelligible rules that would have protected most
patients and given law enforcement officers some guidance.

Former gubernatorial candidate Steve Kubby, whose trial on marijuana
charges is scheduled for February in Placer County, and other patients have
tried to get Orange County officials to set protocols and guidelines. San
Francisco has set up a ID-card system.

We'll follow the trials and compare and contrast various implementation plans.

We'll pay attention to initiatives in other states to medicalize marijuana
for ill people.

And we'll follow efforts at the federal level to "reschedule" marijuana so
it can be prescribed legally (as cocaine and morphine can) if a licensed
doctor deems it efficacious.

The Drug War: Other aspects of the war on drugs will demand attention.

A major military commitment to the ongoing civil war in Colombia, justified
in part by the supposed necessity of carrying the war on drugs to supplying
countries, is likely this year. Congressional efforts to reform "asset
forfeiture" laws, which allow authorities to seize property even if no
criminal charges have been filed, are possible.

More examples of police corruption related to the war on drugs are
virtually inevitable. Rumors abound that more elected officials, in the
wake of New Mexico Republican Gov. Gary Johnson's bold questions about the
war on drugs, are ready to go public.

Criminal Justice: The release of Dwayne McKinney after 19 years in custody
for a murder he didn't commit and the ongoing release of prisoners wrongly
imprisoned due to malfeasance and corruption in the LAPD's Rampart Division
highlight an obvious fact: Our criminal justice system is less than
perfect. We'll try to sort out which abuses are due to human error and
which are the result of systemic problems and recommend solutions, pointing
out that the proper goal of the system is justice, not successful
prosecutions or convictions. Among the issues worthy of attention: the
preponderance of former prosecutors among judges and the contributions the
drug war makes to systemic
corruption.