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Today's guest is Peter Moskos, a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. He spent two years as a police officer in Baltimore. I asked him to come on and talk about his new book, Back from the Brink, Inside the NYPD and New York City's Extraordinary 1990s Crime Drop. It's one of my favorite books I've read this year (and it was one of my three book recommendations on Ezra Klein's show last week).Peter spoke with hundreds of police officers and NYC officials to understand and describe exactly how the city's leaders in the early 1990s managed to drive down crime so successfully.We discussed:* How bad did things get in the 1970s?* Why did processing an arrest take so long?* What did Bill Bratton and other key leaders do differently?* How did police get rid of the squeegee men?I've included my reading list at the bottom of this piece. Thanks to Harry Fletcher-Wood for his judicious transcript edits.Subscribe for one new interview a week.Peter, how would you describe yourself?I would say I'm a criminologist: my background is sociology, but I am not in the sociology department. I'm not so big on theory, and sociology has a lot of theory. I was a grad student at Harvard in sociology and worked as a police officer [in Baltimore] and that became my dissertation and first book, Cop in the Hood. I've somewhat banked my career on those 20 months in the police department.Not a lot of sociologists spend a couple of years working a police beat.It's generally frowned upon, both for methodological reasons and issues of bias. But there is also an ideological opposition in a lot of academia to policing. It's seen as going to the dark side and something to be condemned, not understood.Sociologists said crime can't go down unless we fix society first. It's caused by poverty, racism, unemployment, and social and economic factors — they're called the root causes. But they don't seem to have a great impact on crime, as important as they are. When I'm in grad school, murders dropped 30-40% in New York City. At the same time, Mayor Giuliani is slashing social spending, and poverty is increasing. The whole academic field is just wrong. I thought it an interesting field to get into.We're going to talk about your new book, which is called Back from the Brink, Inside the NYPD and New York City's Extraordinary 1990s Crime Drop. I had a blast reading it. Tell me about the process of writing it.A lot of this is oral history, basically. But supposedly people don't like buying books that are called oral histories. It is told entirely from the perspective of police officers who were on the job at the time. I would not pretend I talked to everyone, because there were 30,000+ cops around, but I spoke to many cops and to all the major players involved in the 1990s crime drop in New York City.I was born in the ‘90s, and I had no idea about a crazy statistic you cite: 25% of the entire national crime decline was attributable to New York City's crime decline.In one year, yeah. One of the things people say to diminish the role of policing is that the crime drop happened everywhere — and it did end up happening almost everywhere. But I think that is partly because what happened in New York City was a lot of hard work, but it wasn't that complicated. It was very easy to propagate, and people came to New York to find out what was going on. You could see results, literally in a matter of months.It happened first in New York City. Really, it happened first in the subways and that's interesting, because if crime goes down in the subways [which, at the time, fell under the separate New York City Transit Police] and not in the rest of the city, you say, “What is going on in the subways that is unique?” It was the exact same strategies and leadership that later transformed the NYPD [New York Police Department].Set the scene: What was the state of crime and disorder in New York in the ‘70s and into the ‘80s?Long story short, it was bad. Crime in New York was a big problem from the late ‘60s up to the mid ‘90s, and the ‘70s is when the people who became the leaders started their careers. So these were defining moments. The city was almost bankrupt in 1975 and laid off 5,000 cops; 3,000 for a long period of time. That was arguably the nadir. It scarred the police department and the city.Eventually, the city got its finances in order and came to the realization that “we've got a big crime problem too.” That crime problem really came to a head with crack cocaine. Robberies peaked in New York City in 1980. There were above 100,000 robberies in 1981, and those are just reported robberies. A lot of people get robbed and just say, “It's not worth it to report,” or, “I'm going to work,” or, “Cops aren't going to do anything.” The number of robberies and car thefts was amazingly high. The trauma, the impact on the city and on urban space, and people's perception of fear, all comes from that. If you're afraid of crime, it's high up on the hierarchy of needs.To some extent, those lessons have been lost or forgotten. Last year there were 16,600 [robberies], which is a huge increase from a few years ago, but we're still talking an 85% reduction compared to the worst years. It supposedly wasn't possible. What I wanted to get into in Back from the Brink was the actual mechanisms of the crime drop. I did about fifty formal interviews and hundreds of informal interviews building the story. By and large, people were telling the same story.In 1975, the city almost goes bankrupt. It's cutting costs everywhere, and it lays off more than 5,000 cops, about 20% of the force, in one day. There's not a new police academy class until 1979, four years later. Talk to me about where the NYPD was at that time.They were retrenched, and the cops were demoralized because “This is how the city treats us?” The actual process of laying off the cops itself was just brutal: they went to work, and were told once they got to work that they were no longer cops. “Give me your badge, give me your gun."The city also was dealing with crime, disorder, and racial unrest. The police department was worried about corruption, which was a legacy of the Knapp Commission [which investigated NYPD corruption] and [Frank] Serpico [a whistleblowing officer]. It's an old police adage, that if you don't work, you can't get in trouble. That became very much the standard way of doing things. Keep your head low, stay out of trouble, and you'll collect your paycheck and go home.You talk about the blackout in 1977, when much of the city lost power and you have widespread looting and arson. 13,000 off-duty cops get called in during the emergency, and only about 5,000 show up, which is a remarkable sign of the state of morale.The person in my book who's talking about that is Louis Anemone. He showed up because his neighbor and friend and partner was there, and he's got to help him. It was very much an in-the-foxholes experience. I contrast that with the more recent blackout, in which the city went and had a big block party instead. That is reflective of the change that happened in the city.In the mid-80s you get the crack cocaine epidemic. Talk to me about how police respond.From a political perspective, that era coincided with David Dinkins as [New York City's first black] mayor. He was universally disliked, to put it mildly, by white and black police officers alike. He was seen as hands off. He was elected in part to improve racial relations in New York City, to mitigate racial strife, but in Crown Heights and Washington Heights, there were riots, and racial relations got worse. He failed at the level he was supposed to be good at. Crime and quality of life were the major issues in that election.Dinkins's approach to the violence is centered around what they called “community policing.” Will you describe how Dinkins and political leaders in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s thought about policing?This is under Ben Ward, the [NYPD] Commissioner at the time. The mayor appoints the police commissioner — and the buck does stop with the mayor — but the mayor is not actively involved in day-to-day operations. That part does go down to the police department.Community policing was seen as an attempt to improve relations between the police and the community. The real goal was to lessen racial strife and unrest between black (and to a lesser extent Hispanic) communities and the NYPD. Going back to the ‘60s, New York had been rocked by continued unrest in neighborhoods like Central Harlem, East New York, and Bushwick. Community policing was seen as saying that police are partly to blame, and we want to improve relations. Some of it was an attempt to get the community more involved in crime fighting.It's tough. It involves a certain rosy view of the community, but that part of the community isn't causing the problems. It avoids the fact there are people who are actively criming and are willing to hurt people who get in their way. Community policing doesn't really address the active criminal element, that is a small part of any community, including high-crime communities.Arrests increased drastically during this era, more than in the ‘90s with broken windows policing. If the idea is to have fewer arrests, it didn't happen in the ‘80s. Some good came out of it, because it did encourage cops to be a bit more active and cops are incentivized by overtime. Arrests were so incredibly time-consuming, which kind of defeated the purpose of community policing. If you made an arrest in that era, there was a good chance you might spend literally 24 hours processing the arrest.Will you describe what goes into that 24 hours?From my experience policing in Baltimore, I knew arrests were time-consuming and paperwork redundant, but I could process a simple arrest in an hour or two. Even a complicated one that involved juveniles and guns and drugs, we're talking six to eight hours.In the ‘80s, Bob Davin, [in the] Transit Police, would say they'd make an arrest, process at the local precinct, search him in front of a desk officer, print him, and then they would have to get a radio car off patrol to drive you down to central booking at 100 Centre Street [New York City Criminal Court]. Then they would fingerprint him. They didn't have the live scan fingerprints machine, it was all ink. It had to be faxed up to Albany and the FBI to see if it hit on any warrant federally and for positive identification of the person. Sometimes it took 12 hours to have the prints come back and the perp would be remanded until that time. Then you'd have to wait for the prosecutor to get their act together and to review all the paperwork. You couldn't consider bail unless the prints came back either positive or negative and then you would have that initial arraignment and the cop could then go home. There are a lot of moving parts, and they moved at a glacial pace.The system often doesn't work 24/7. A lot of this has changed, but some of it was having to wait until 9 am for people to show up to go to work, because it's not a single system. The courts, the jails, and policing all march to their own drummer, and that created a level of inefficiency.So much of the nitty-gritty of what cops actually do is boring, behind-the-scenes stuff: How do we speed up the paperwork? Can we group prisoners together? Can we do some of this at the police station instead of taking it downtown? Is all of this necessary? Can we cooperate with the various prosecutors? There are five different prosecutors in New York City, one for each borough.There's not a great incentive to streamline this. Cops enjoyed the overtime. That's one of the reasons they would make arrests. So during this time, if a cop makes an arrest for drug dealing, that cop is gone and no cop was there to replace him. If it's a minor arrest, there's a good chance in the long run charges will be dropped anyway. And you're taking cops off the street. In that sense, it's lose-lose. But, you have to think, “What's the alternative?”Bob Davin is a fascinating guy. There's a famous picture from 1981 by Martha Cooper of two cops on a subway train. It's graffitied up and they're in their leather jackets and look like cops from the ‘70s. Martha Cooper graciously gave me permission to use the picture, but she said, "You have to indemnify me because I don't have a release form. I don't know who the cops are." I said, "Martha, I do know who the cop is, because he's in my book and he loves the picture.” Bob Davin is the cop on the right.Davin says that things started to get more efficient. They had hub sites in the late ‘80s or ‘90s, so precincts in the north of Manhattan could bring their prisoners there, and you wouldn't have to take a car out of service to go back to Central Booking and deal with traffic. They started collecting prisoners and bringing them en masse on a small school bus, and that would cut into overtime. Then moving to electronic scan fingerprints drastically saves time waiting for those to come back.These improvements were made, but some of them involve collective bargaining with unions, to limit overtime and arrests that are made for the pure purpose of overtime. You want cops making arrests for the right reason and not simply to make money. But boy, there was a lot of money made in arrests.In 1991, you have the infamous Crown Heights riot in Brooklyn. Racial tensions kick off. It's a nightmare for the mayor, there's this sense that he has lost control. The following year, you have this infamous police protest at City Hall where it becomes clear the relationship between the cops and the mayor has totally evaporated. How does all that play into the mayoral race between Dinkins and Giuliani?It was unintentional, but a lot of the blame for Crown Heights falls on the police department. The part of the story that is better known is that there was a procession for a Hasidic rabbi that was led by a police car. He would go to his wife's grave, and he got a little three-car motorcade. At some point, the police look at this and go "Why are we doing this? We're going to change it." The man who made the deal said ‘I"m retiring in a couple weeks, can we just leave it till then? Because I gave him my word." They're like, "Alright, whatever."This motor car procession is then involved in a car crash, and a young child named Gavin Cato is killed, and another girl is severely injured. The volunteer, Jewish-run ambulance shows up and decides they don't have the equipment: they call for a professional city ambulance. Once that ambulance is on the way, they take the mildly-injured Jewish people to the hospital. The rumor starts that the Jewish ambulance abandoned the black children to die.This isn't the first incident. There's long been strife over property and who the landlord is. But this was the spark that set off riots. A young Jewish man was randomly attacked on the street and was killed.As an aside, he also shouldn't have died, but at the hospital they missed internal bleeding.Meanwhile, the police department has no real leadership at the time. One chief is going to retire, another is on vacation, a third doesn't know what he's doing, and basically everyone is afraid to do anything. So police do nothing. They pull back, and you have three days of very anti-Semitic riots. Crowds chanting "Kill the Jews" and marching on the Lubavitch Hasidic Headquarters. Al Sharpton shows up. The riots are blamed on Dinkins, which is partly fair, but a lot of that's on the NYPD. Finally, the mayor and the police commissioner go to see what's going on and they get attacked. It's the only time in New York City history that there's ever been an emergency call from the police commissioner's car. People are throwing rocks at it.It took three days to realise this, but that's when they say “We have to do something here,” and they gather a group of officers who later become many of Bratton's main chiefs at the time [Bill Bratton was Commissioner of the NYPD from 1994-1996, under Giuliani]: Mike Julian, Louis Anemone, Ray Kelly, and [John] Timoney. They end the unrest in a day. They allow people to march, they get the police department to set rules. It still goes on for a bit, but no one gets hurt after that, and that's it.It was a huge, national story at the time, but a lot of the details were not covered. Reporters were taken from their car and beaten and stripped. The significance was downplayed at the time, especially by the New York Times, I would say.That's followed by the Washington Heights riots, which is a different story. A drug dealer was shot and killed by cops. There were rumors, which were proven to be false, that he was executed and unarmed. Then there were three days of rioting there. It wasn't quite as severe, but 53 cops were hurt, 120 stores were set on fire, and Mayor Dinkins paid for the victim's family to go to the Dominican Republic for the funeral. The police perspective again was, “You're picking the wrong side here.”Then there's the so-called Police Riot at City Hall. Nominally, it was about the CCRB, the Civilian Complaint Review Board, and setting up an accountability mechanism to control cops. But really it was just an anti-Dinkins protest. It was drunken and unruly. The cops stormed the steps of City Hall. I have the account of one of the cops who was on the top of those steps looking at this mob of cops storming to him, and he's getting worried he's going to be killed in a crush. There were racist chants from off-duty cops in the crowd. It did not reflect well on police officers. But it showed this hatred of David Dinkins, who was seen as siding with criminals and being anti-police. The irony is that Dinkins is the one who ends up hiring all the cops that Giuliani gets credit for.In the “Safe Streets, Safe City” program?Yes. That was because a white tourist, Brian Watkins, was killed in a subway station protecting his parents who were getting robbed. That led to the famous headline [in the New York Post] of “Dave, do something! Crime-ravaged city cries out for help.” He, with City Council President Peter Vallone, Sr., drafted and pushed through this massive hiring of police officers, “Safe Streets, Safe City.”The hiring wasn't fast-tracked. It might be because Dinkins's people didn't really want more cops. But it was a Dinkins push that got a massive hiring of cops. When the first huge class of police officers graduated, Bill Bratton was there and not David Dinkins.Some interviewees in your book talk about how there's physically not enough room in the police academies at this time, so they have to run classes 24/7. You cycle cohorts in and out of the same classroom, because there are too many new cops for the facilities.You have thousands of cops going through it at once. Everyone describes it as quite a chaotic scene. But it would have been hard to do what the NYPD did without those cops. Ray Kelly, who was police commissioner under Dinkins at the end [from 1992 to 1994] before he became police commissioner for 12 years under Bloomberg [from 2002 to 2013] probably could have done something with those cops too, but he never had the chance, because the mayoral leadership at the time was much more limiting in what they wanted cops to do.Crime starts declining slowly in the first few years of the ‘90s under Dinkins, and then in ‘93 Giuliani wins a squeaker of a mayoral election against Dinkins.One of the major issues was the then-notorious “squeegee men” of New York City. These were guys who would go to cars stopped at bridges and tunnel entrances and would rub a squeegee over the windshield asking for money. It was unpleasant, intimidating, and unwanted, and it was seen as one of those things that were just inevitable. Like graffiti on the subway in the ‘80s. Nothing we can do about it because these poor people don't have jobs or housing or whatever.The irony is that Bratton and Giuliani were happy to take credit for that, and it was an issue in the mayoral campaign, but it was solved under David Dinkins and Ray Kelly and Mike Julian with the help of George Kelling [who, with James Wilson, came up with broken windows theory]. But they never got credit for it. One wonders if, had they done that just a few months earlier, it would have shifted the entire campaign and we'd have a different course of history in New York City.It's a great example of a couple of things that several people in your book talk about. One is that disorder is often caused by a very small set of individuals. There's only like 70 squeegee men, yet everybody sees them, because they're posted up at the main tunnel and bridge entrances to Manhattan. And getting them off the streets solves the problem entirely.Another emphasis in the book is how perceptions of crime are central. You quote Jack Maple, the father of Compstat, as saying, “A murder on the subway counts as a multiple murder up on the street, because everybody feels like that's their subway.” The particular locations of crimes really affect public perception.Absolutely. Perception is reality for a lot of these things, because most people aren't victimized by crime. But when people perceive that no one is in control they feel less safe. It's not that this perception is false, it just might not be directly related to an actual criminal act.The other thing I try to show is that it's not just saying, “We've got to get rid of squeegee men. How do you do it?” They had tried before, but this is why you need smart cops and good leadership, because it's a problem-solving technique, and the way to get rid of graffiti is different to the way you get rid of squeegee men.This book is in opposition to those who just say, “We can't police our way out of this problem.” No, we can. We can't police our way out of every problem. But if you define the problem as, we don't want people at intersections with squeegees, of course we can police our way out of the problem, using legal constitutional tools. You need the political will. And then the hard work starts, because you have to figure out how to actually do it.Will you describe how they tackle the squeegee men problem?Mike Julian was behind it. They hired George Kelling, who's known for broken windows. They said, “These people are here to make money. So to just go there and make a few arrests isn't going to solve the problem.” First of all, he had to figure out what legal authority [to use], and he used Traffic Reg 44 [which prohibits pedestrians from soliciting vehicle occupants]. He talked to Norm Siegel of the NYCLU [New York Civil Liberties Union] about this, who did not want this crackdown to happen. But Norman said, “Okay, this is the law, I can't fight that one. You're doing it legally. It's all in the books.” And So that took away that opposition.But the relentless part of it is key. First they filmed people. Then, when it came to enforcement, they warned people. Then they cited people, and anybody that was left they arrested. They did not have to arrest many people, because the key is they did this every four hours. It was that that changed behavior, because even a simple arrest isn't going to necessarily deter someone if it's a productive way to make money. But being out there every four hours for a couple of weeks or months was enough to get people to do something else. What that something else is, we still don't know, but we solved the squeegee problem.So in 93, Giuliani is elected by something like 50,000 votes overall. Just as an aside, in Prince of the City, Fred Siegel describes something I had no idea about. There's a Puerto Rican Democratic Councilman who flips and supports Giuliani. Mayor Eric Adams, who at the time was the head of a nonprofit for black men in law enforcement, calls him a race traitor for doing that and for being married to a white woman. There was a remarkable level of racial vitriol in that race that I totally missed.10 years ago when I started this, I asked if I could interview then-Brooklyn borough president Eric Adams, and he said yes, and the interview kept getting rescheduled, and I said, “Eh, I don't need him.” It's a regret of mine. I should have pursued that, but coulda, woulda, shoulda.Giuliani is elected, and he campaigns very explicitly on a reducing crime and disorder platform. And he hires Bill Bratton. Tell me about Bratton coming on board as NYPD commissioner.Bratton grew up in Boston, was a police officer there, became head of the New York City Transit Police when that was a separate police department. Right before he becomes NYPD Commissioner, he's back in Boston, as the Chief of Police there, and there is a movement among certain people to get Bratton the NYC job. They succeed in that, and Bratton is a very confident man. He very much took a broken windows approach and said, “We are going to focus on crime.” He has a right-hand man by the name of Jack Maple who he knows from the Transit Police. Maple is just a lieutenant in transit, and Bratton makes him the de facto number two man in the police department.Jack Maple passed away in 2001 and I didn't know what I was going to do, because it's hard to interview a man who's no longer alive. Chris Mitchell co-wrote Jack Maple's autobiography called Crime Fighter and he graciously gave me all the micro-cassettes of the original interviews he conducted with Maple around 1998. Everyone has a Jack Maple story. He's probably the most important character in Back from the Brink.Jack Maple comes in, no one really knows who he is, no one respects him because he was just a lieutenant in Transit. He goes around and asks a basic question — this is 1994 — he says, “How many people were shot in New York City in 1993?” And nobody knows. That is the state of crime-fighting in New York City before this era. There might have been 7,000 people shot in New York City in 1990 and we just don't know, even to this day.One citation from your book: in 1993, an average of 16 people were shot every day. Which is just remarkable.And remember, shootings have been declining for two or three years before that! But nobody knew, because they weren't keeping track of shootings, because it's not one of the FBI Uniform Crime Report [which tracks crime data nationally] index crimes. But wouldn't you be curious? It took Jack Maple to be curious, so he made people count, and it was findable, but you had to go through every aggravated assault and see if a gun was involved. You had to go through every murder from the previous year and see if it was a shooting. He did this. So we only have shooting data in New York City going back to 1993. It's just a simple process of caring.The super-short version of Back from the Brink is it was a change in mission statement: “We're going to care about crime.” Because they hadn't before. They cared about corruption, racial unrest, brutality, and scandal. They cared about the clearance rate for robbery a bit. You were supposed to make three arrests for every ten robberies. It didn't matter so much that you were stopping a pattern or arresting the right person, as long as you had three arrests for every ten reported crimes, that was fine.This is a story about people who cared. They're from this city — Bratton wasn't, but most of the rest are. They understood the trauma of violence and the fact that people with families were afraid to go outside, and nobody in the power structure seemed to care. So they made the NYPD care about this. Suddenly, the mid-level police executives, the precinct commanders, had to care. and the meetings weren't about keeping overtime down, instead they were about ”What are you doing to stop this shooting?”Tell listeners a little bit more about Jack Maple, because he's a remarkable character, and folks may not know what a kook he was.I think he was a little less kooky than he liked to present. His public persona was wearing a snazzy cat and spats and dressing like a fictional cartoon detective from his own mind, but he's a working-class guy from Queens who becomes a transit cop.When Bratton takes over, he writes a letter up the chain of command saying this is what we should do. Bratton read it and said, “This guy is smart.” Listening to 80 hours of Jack Maple, everyone correctly says he was a smart guy, but he had a very working-class demeanor and took to the elite lifestyle. He loved hanging out and getting fancy drinks at the Plaza Hotel. He was the idea man of the NYPD. Everyone has a Jack Maple imitation. “You're talking to the Jackster,” he'd say. He had smart people working under him who were supportive of this. But it was very much trying to figure out as they went along, because the city doesn't stop nor does it sleep.He was a bulls***er, but he's the one who came up with the basic outline of the strategy of crime reduction in New York City. He famously wrote it on a napkin at Elaine's, and it said, “First, we need to gather accurate and timely intelligence.” And that was, in essence, CompStat. “Then, we need to deploy our cops to where they need to be.” That was a big thing. He found out that cops weren't working: specialized units weren't working weekends and nights when the actual crime was happening. They had their excuses, but basically they wanted a cushy schedule. He changed that. Then, of course, you have to figure out what you're doing, what the effective tactics are. Then, constant follow up and assessment.You can't give up. You can't say “Problem solved.” A lot of people say it wasn't so much if your plan didn't work, you just needed a Plan B. It was the idea that throwing your hands in the air and saying, “What are you going to do?” that became notoriously unacceptable under Chief Anemone's stern demeanor at CompStat. These were not pleasant meetings. Those are the meetings that both propagated policies that work and held officers accountable. There was some humiliation going on, so CompStat was feared.Lots of folks hear CompStat and think about better tracking of crime locations and incidents. But as you flesh out, the meat on the bones of CompStat was this relentless follow-up. You'd have these weekly meetings early in the morning with all the precinct heads. There were relentless asks from the bosses, “What's going on in your district or in your precinct? Can you explain why this is happening? What are you doing to get these numbers down?” And follow-ups the following week or month. It was constant.CompStat is often thought of as high-tech computer stuff. It wasn't. There was nothing that couldn't have been done with old overhead projectors. It's just that no one had done it before. Billy Gorta says it's a glorified accountability system at a time when nobody knew anything about computers. Everyone now has access to crime maps on a computer. It was about actually gathering accurate, timely data.Bratton was very concerned that these numbers had to be right. It was getting everyone in the same room and saying, “This is what our focus is going to be now.” And getting people to care about crime victims, especially when those crime victims might be unsympathetic because of their demeanor, criminal activity, or a long arrest record. “We're going to care about every shooting, we're going to care about every murder.”Part of it was cracking down on illegal guns. There were hundreds of tactics. The federal prosecutors also played a key role. It was getting this cooperation. Once it started working and Giuliani made it a major part of claiming success as mayor, suddenly everyone wanted to be part of this, and you had other city agencies trying to figure it out. So it was a very positive feedback loop, once it was seen as a success.When Bratton came on the job, he said, “I'm going to bring down crime 15%.” No police commissioner had ever said that before. In the history of policing before 1994, no police commissioner ever promised a double-digit reduction in crime or even talked about it. People said “That's crazy.” It was done, and then year after year. That's the type of confidence that they had. They were surprised it worked as well as it did, but they all had the sense that there's a new captain on this ship, and we're trying new things. It was an age of ideas and experiment.And it was a very short time.That's the other thing that surprised me. Giuliani fired Bratton in the middle of ‘96.It's remarkable. Bratton comes in ‘94, and August 1994 is where you see crime drop off a cliff. You have this massive beginning of the reduction that continues.That inflection point is important for historical knowledge. I don't address alternatives that other people have proposed [to explain the fall in crime] — For example, the reduction in lead [in gasoline, paint, and water pipes] or legalized abortion with Roe v. Wade [proposed by Stephen Dubner].Reasonable people can differ. Back from the Brink focuses on the police part of the equation. Today, almost nobody, except for a few academics, says that police had nothing to do with the crime drop. That August inflection is key, because there is nothing in a lagged time analysis going back 20 years that is going to say that is the magic month where things happened. Yet if you look at what happened in CompStat, that's the month they started getting individual officer data, and noticing that most cops made zero arrests, and said, “Let's get them in the game as well.” And that seemed to be the key; that's when crime fell off the table. The meetings started in April, I believe, but August is really when the massive crime drop began.To your point about the confidence that crime could be driven down double digits year over year, there's a great quote you have from Jack Maple, where he says to a fellow cop, “This is going to be like shooting fish in a barrel. As long as we have absolute control, we can absolutely drive this number into the floor.”One detail I enjoyed was that Jack Maple, when he was a transit cop, would camp out under a big refrigerator box with little holes cut out for eyes and sit on the subway platform waiting for crooks.For people who are interested in Jack Maple, it is worth reading his autobiography, Crime Fighter. Mike Daly wrote New York's Finest, which uses the same tapes that I had access to, and he is much more focused on that. He's actually the godfather of Jack Maple's son, who is currently a New York City police officer. But Maple and co were confident, and it turned out they were right.As well as having changes in tactics and approach and accountability across the NYPD, you also have a series of specific location cleanups. You have a specific initiative focused on the Port Authority, which is a cesspool at the time, an initiative in Times Square, the Bryant Park cleanup, and then Giuliani also focuses on organized crime on the Fulton Fish Market, and this open-air market in Harlem.I was struck that there was both this general accountability push in the NYPD through CompStat, and a relentless focus on cleaning up individual places that were hubs of disorder.I'm not certain the crime drop would have happened without reclamation of public spaces and business improvement districts. Bryant Park's a fascinating story because Dan Biederman, who heads the Corporation, said, “People just thought it was like a lost cause, this park can't be saved. The city is in a spiral of decline.” He uses Jane Jacobs' “eyes on the street” theory and then George Kelling and James Q. Wilson's broken windows theory. The park has money — not city money, but from local property owners — and it reopens in 1991 to great acclaim and is still a fabulous place to be. It showed for the first time that public space was worth saving and could be saved. New York City at the time needed that lesson. It's interesting that today, Bryant Park has no permanent police presence and less crime. Back in the ‘80s, Bryant Park had an active police presence and a lot more crime.The first class I ever taught when I started at John Jay College in 2004, I was talking about broken windows. A student in the class named Jeff Marshall, who is in my book, told me about Operation Alternatives at the Port Authority. He had been a Port Authority police officer at the time, and I had not heard of this. People are just unaware of this part of history. It very much has lessons for today, because in policing often there's nothing new under the sun. It's just repackaged, dusted off, and done again. The issue was, how do we make the Port Authority safe for passengers? How do we both help and get rid of people living in the bus terminal? It's a semi-public space, so it makes it difficult. There was a social services element about it, that was Operational Alternatives. A lot of people took advantage of that and got help. But the flip side was, you don't have to take services, but you can't stay here.I interviewed the manager of the bus terminal. He was so proud of what he did. He's a bureaucrat, a high-ranking one, but a port authority manager. He came from the George Washington Bridge, which he loved. And he wonders, what the hell am I going to do with this bus terminal? But the Port Authority cared, because they're a huge organization and that's the only thing with their name on it — They also control JFK Airport and bridges and tunnels and all the airports, but people call the bus terminal Port Authority.They gave him almost unlimited money and power and said, “Fix it please, do what you've got to do,” and he did. It was environmental design, giving police overtime so they'd be part of this, a big part of it was having a social service element so it wasn't just kicking people out with nowhere to go.Some of it was also setting up rules. This also helped Bratton in the subway, because this happened at the same time. The court ruled that you can enforce certain rules in the semi-public spaces. It was not clear until this moment whether it was constitutional or not. To be specific, you have a constitutional right to beg on the street, but you do not have a constitutional right to beg on the subway. That came down to a court decision. Had that not happened, I don't know if in the long run the crime drop would have happened.That court decision comes down to the specific point that it's not a free-speech right on the subway to panhandle, because people can't leave, because you've got them trapped in that space.You can't cross the street to get away from it. But it also recognized that it wasn't pure begging, that there was a gray area between aggressive begging and extortion and robbery.You note that in the early 1990s, one-third of subway commuters said they consciously avoided certain stations because of safety, and two thirds felt coerced to give money by aggressive panhandling.The folks in your book talk a lot about the 80/20 rule applying all over the place. That something like 20% of the people you catch are committing 80% of the crimes.There's a similar dynamic that you talk about on the subways, both in the book and in your commentary over the past couple years about disorder in New York. You say approximately 2,000 people with serious mental illness are at risk for street homelessness, and these people cycle through the cities, streets, subways, jails, and hospitals.What lessons from the ‘90s can be applied today for both helping those people and stopping them being a threat to others?Before the ‘80s and Reagan budget cuts there had been a psychiatric system that could help people. That largely got defunded. [Deinstitutionalization began in New York State earlier, in the 1960s.] We did not solve the problem of mental health or homelessness in the ‘90s, but we solved the problem of behavior. George Kelling [of broken windows theory] emphasized this repeatedly, and people would ignore it. We are not criminalizing homelessness or poverty. We're focusing on behavior that we are trying to change. People who willfully ignore that distinction almost assume that poor people are naturally disorderly or criminal, or that all homeless people are twitching and threatening other people. Even people with mental illness can behave in a public space.Times have changed a bit. I think there are different drugs now that make things arguably a bit worse. I am not a mental health expert, but we do need more involuntary commitment, not just for our sake, but for theirs, people who need help. I pass people daily, often the same person, basically decomposing on a subway stop in the cold. They are offered help by social services, and they say no. They should not be allowed to make that choice because they're literally dying on the street in front of us. Basic humanity demands that we be a little more aggressive in forcing people who are not making rational decisions, because now you have to be an imminent threat to yourself or others. That standard does need to change. But there also need to be mental health beds available for people in this condition.I don't know what the solution is to homelessness or mental health. But I do know the solution to public disorder on the subway and that's, regardless of your mental state or housing status, enforcing legal, constitutional rules, policing behavior. It does not involve locking everybody up. It involves drawing the line between acceptable and unacceptable behavior. It's amazing how much people will comply with those rules.That presents the idea that someone's in charge, it's not a free-for-all. You get that virtuous loop, which New York had achieved in 2014–2016, when crime was at an all-time low in the city. Then the politicians decided public order wasn't worth preserving anymore. These are political choices.I had a similar version of this conversation with a friend who was shocked that there were zero murders on the subway in 2017 and that that number was stable: you had one or two a year for several years in the mid-2010s.It was five or fewer a year from 1997 to 2019, and often one or two. Then you have zero in 2017. There were [ten in 2022]. It coincides perfectly with an order from [Mayor] de Blasio's office and the homeless czar [Director of Homeless Services Steven] Banks [which] told police to stop enforcing subway rules against loitering. The subways became — once again — a de facto homeless shelter. Getting rule-violating homeless people out of the subway in the late ‘80s was such a difficult and major accomplishment at the time, and to be fair it's not as bad as it was.The alternative was that homeless outreach was supposed to offer people services. When they decline, which 95% of people do, you're to leave them be. I would argue again, I don't think that's a more humane stance to take. But it's not just about them, it's about subway riders.There's one story that I think was relevant for you to tell. You were attacked this fall on a subway platform by a guy threatening to kill you. It turns out he's had a number of run-ins with the criminal justice system. Can you tell us where that guy is now?I believe he's in prison now. The only reason I know who it is is because I said, one day I'm going to see his picture in the New York Post because he's going to hurt somebody. Am I 100 percent certain it's Michael Blount who attacked me? No, but I'm willing to call him out by name because I believe it is. He was out of prison for raping a child, and he slashed his ex-girlfriend and pushed her on the subway tracks. And then was on the lam for a while. I look at him and the shape of his face, his height, age, build, complexion, and I go, that's got to be him.I wasn't hurt, but he gave me a sucker punch trying to knock me out and then chased me a bit threatening to kill me, and I believe he wanted to. It's the only time I ever was confronted by a person who I really believe wanted to kill me, and this includes policing in the Eastern District in Baltimore. It was an attempted misdemeanor assault in the long run. But I knew it wasn't about me. It was him. I assume he's going to stay in prison longer for what he did to his ex-girlfriend. But I never thought it would happen to me. I was lucky the punch didn't connect.Peter Moskos's new book is Back from the Brink, Inside the NYPD and New York City's Extraordinary 1990s Crime Drop.My reading listEssays:Johnny Hirschauer's reporting, including “A Failed 'Solution' to 'America's Mental Health Crisis',“ “Return to the Roots,” and “The Last Institutions.” “Broken Windows: The Police and Neighborhood Safety,” by George L. Kelling and James Q. Wilson. ​“It's Time to Talk About America's Disorder Problem,” Charles Lehman.Books:Ghettoside: A True Story of Murder in America, Jill Leovy.​Prince of the City: Giuliani, New York, and the Genius of American Life, Fred Siegel.​ Cop in the Hood: My Year Policing Baltimore's Eastern District, Peter Moskos.​Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic, Sam Quinones.​Bonfire of the Vanities, Tom Wolfe. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.statecraft.pub

In this episode of the Addict II Athlete podcast, Coach Blu Robinson interviews Jessie Blanchard, a dedicated nurse and founder of 229 Safer Living Access recently featured on the, This American Life Podcast, "The Call". Jessie shares her experiences on the front lines of addiction recovery, emphasizing the courage it takes for individuals to reach out for resources. The conversation explores themes of empathy, the importance of self-care, and the power of choice in recovery. Jessie highlights the need for unconditional love and support without judgment and discusses the root causes of addiction, including the impact of housing instability. The episode concludes with a powerful story of how a simple act of kindness can lead to significant change in someone's life. In this conversation, Jessie and Blu Robinson explore the nuances of support in the context of addiction recovery. They discuss the importance of redefining help, emphasizing the need for trust, consistency, and access to resources rather than a savior mentality. The dialogue challenges traditional notions of tough love, advocating for a more compassionate approach. They celebrate the transformations individuals undergo when they find their purpose and highlight the detrimental effects of labeling. The conversation concludes with a focus on self-care and setting boundaries to maintain personal well-being while supporting others. Learn more at-https://safe-spot.me/  Listen to the entire episode of "The Call"- https://www.thisamericanlife.org/809/the-call/act-one-15 or here  https://slate.com/podcasts/what-next/2023/09/how-overdose-prevention-hotlines-work  Chapters 00:00 Introduction to the Podcast and Guest 01:23 Meet Jessie Blanchard: A Frontline Hero 02:32 The Courage to Call for Help 05:12 Understanding Addiction and Empathy 09:16 The Power of Choice in Recovery 10:37 Loving Without Judgment 15:08 The Importance of Self-Care 16:51 Empathy: A Natural Human Trait 18:49 Identifying Root Causes of Addiction 23:11 The Role of Housing in Recovery 28:31 Real Connections and Problem Solving 31:23 Redefining Help and Support 33:12 The Role of Trust and Consistency 36:11 Challenging Tough Love 39:31 Celebrating Transformation and Purpose 41:26 The Power of Language and Labels 43:19 Addressing the Root Causes of Addiction 51:29 Setting Boundaries and Self-Care Please join Addict to Athlete's Patreon support page and help us turn the mess of addiction into the message of sobriety! https://www.patreon.com/addicttoathlete Please visit our website for more information on Team Addict to Athlete and Addiction Recovery Podcasts. https://www.AddictToAthlete.org Join the Team! Circle, our new social support event, along with the team and athlete communication platform, is designed to help us break free from doom scrolling and shadow banning and foster stronger connections among us. Follow the link, download the app, and start this new chapter of Team AIIA! Join Circle https://a2a.circle.so/join?invitation_token=16daaa0d9ecd7421d384dd05a461464ce149cc9e-63d4aa30-1a67-4120-ae12-124791dfb519

In today's show Beth reviews the latest data on the opiate epidemic in Boulder. You'll hear from a pharmacologist who studies substance abuse, a DEA agent who oversees the task force on fentanyl, and our state senator who discusses legislation at the state level, as well as a story on a novel, implantable device to … Continue reading "Opiate Epidemic Update from 2024"

On today's show: 1. Tickets to the 8th Annual Giving Breakfast - https://www.wakeupcarolina.org/product/giving-breakfast-individual-ticket/ 2. WakeUp Carolina's website - https://www.wakeupcarolina.org 3. Sam Quinones' website - samquinones.com 4. Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic - https://amzn.to/4hQry73 5. The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth - https://amzn.to/4hRCgdD 6. Dreamland (YA edition): The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic - https://amzn.to/3ZcQgHy This episode's music is by Tyler Boone (tylerboonemusic.com). The episode was produced by LMC Soundsystem.

All this week we are focusing on fentanyl. We begin with the writer and journalist Sam Quinones, author of “Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic” and “The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth.”

From LA with Love is an episodic journey into the Lynchian landscape of Los Angeles. On this episode, dive into the drama and tragedy of Downtown LA's Skid Row, & the Great Wealth Divide. Mentioned in the episode: The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Methhttps://www.amazon.com/Least-Us-Tales-America-Fentanyl/dp/1635574358Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic

All this week we are focusing on fentanyl. We begin with the writer and journalist Sam Quinones, author of “Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic” and “The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth.”

Very excited to have Sam Quinones on The Lonely Podcast. Sam is a remarkable independent journalist and reporter with over 35 years of experience in the business. Earlier in his career, Sam spent 10 years living in Mexico and working as a freelance journalist, where he published two of his first non-fiction novels. Among many famous journals, Sam wrote for the LA Times, the New York Times, National Geographic, the Atlantic, and many more. Sam is mostly known for his two most recent books, the first, Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic, was published in 2015 and received the National Book Critics Circle award. It was also selected as one of the Best Books of 2015 by Amazon, Daily Beast, Buzzfeed, Seattle Times, Boston Globe, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Entertainment Weekly, and much more. Dreamland provides a grim view into the opiate epidemic in America, explains its roots, and its devastating effects throughout the country. The book had a tremendous impact on the way American society viewed the Opiate crisis and was pivotal in shifting the narrative against big Pharma. His most recent book, The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth, was released in 2021 and was nominated for the National Book Critics Circle award. The Lease of Us provides a deep dive into the history of Fentanyl and Methamphetamine and how these drugs revolutionized the international drug market and drug consumption in America. Sam has a unique ability to provide, on the one hand, a deep explanation of the root causes of the crisis while, on the other hand, sharing extremely touching individual stories that would help one restore faith in humanity. During our conversation, we discussed what led Sam to investigate these issues, namely the opioid crisis and the prevalence of synthetic drugs on America's streets. His journies around the country in pursuit of the truth, the impact of the “Drugafication of America” on our society, the danger in modern-day synthetic drugs, the unwanted outcomes of the legalization of Marijuana, the role of Big Pharma and big business in this crisis, and Sam's Marshall Plan to Save America. This was one of my favorite episodes thus far, and I'm sure you will enjoy this conversation as much as I did................................................................................................................................................... YOU CAN LISTEN TO THE FULL EPISODE ON:YouTube: https://youtu.be/nlaKekW-2-kSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4ktRM7SIzVWcAhE9jqGIq3Apple Podcast:https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-lonely-podcast/id1510273071..................................................................................................................................................TIMESTAMPS:(00:00) - Introduction(04: 53) - What brought Sam to write Dreamland(07:17) - How the Mexican Drug Cartels found a new heroin market in America(14:50) - Why Columbus Ohio became the epicenter of the Opioid Crisis?(16:15) - What is unique about the Opioid Crisis that is different than any other drug crisis?(17:30) - Why Fentanyl and Methamphetamine are different than any other drug in history?(24:45) - How "regular people" fall into drug addiction(28:00) - The disease of addiction and effective treatment(32:50) - Why the homelessness crisis is so extreme in San Francisco?(37:00) - Reasons for homelessness(41:00) - the role of Marijuana?(44:00) - The Drugafication of America(49:00) - How effective drug legalization looks like?(54:00) - The impact of "Dreamland" on the narrative against Big Pharma(60:00) - The Sackler Family and Purdue Pharma(64:00) - The Marshall Plan to Save America..................................................................................................................................................LINKS TO SAM'S WORK:The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth: https://www.amazon.com/Least-Us-Tales-America-Fentanyl/dp/1635574358Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic: https://www.amazon.com/Dreamland-True-Americas-Opiate-Epidemic/dp/1620402521/ref=sr_1_1?crid=271W7AI22JU3I&keywords=dreamland%20sam%20quinones&qid=1645989580&s=books&sprefix=dreamland%2Cstripbooks%2C96&sr=1-1True Tales from Another Mexico: https://www.amazon.com/True-Tales-Another-Mexico-Quinones/dp/0826322964Antonio's Gun and Delfino's Dream: True Tales of Mexican Migration: https://www.amazon.com/Antonios-Gun-Delfinos-Dream-Migration/dp/082634254X/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=Sam's Website: https://samquinones.com/Sam on X: https://twitter.com/samquinones7

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit public.substack.comThe lack of affordable housing, not addiction and mental illness, is the main driver of homelessness, say the researchers behind a recent University of California, San Francisco study. Hailed as the “deepest look” at the subject in decades, the Benioff Center for Homelessness and Housing Initiative conducted a statewide survey of thousands of people. The researchers say their conclusions settle the debate over the root causes of America's homelessness crisis.However, this study is limited by significant methodological issues, critical omissions, and biases. It downplays the influence of addiction and mental illness, exaggerates economic factors behind homelessness, and undercounts the number of people on the street from out of town. While it asks participants about substance abuse, the study never mentions fentanyl, despite the drug's catastrophic impact on California's homeless population. In 2020 and 2021, drug overdoses, driven by meth and fentanyl, were the leading cause of death among unhoused residents in Los Angeles County, according to a 2023 report from LA County Public Health.In fact, there is ample evidence to show fentanyl and methamphetamine, specifically, have been driving the catastrophic rise in overdose deaths nationwide — well over 100,000 in 2022, and climbing.While the Benioff study authors insist that “homeless migration is a myth,” Public has interviewed hundreds of homeless people in California since 2019 and found that drug tourism drives San Francisco's street homelessness. San Francisco's Police Chief confirmed as much recently when he announced that 95% of people his officers arrested for drug use were from out of town. Even the San Francisco Chronicle, which has long insisted that street addicts were mostly local, admitted the Chief's remarks “corroborat[ed] perceptions that many residents already have — that their city has become a magnet for the narcotics trade.”Even in progressive West Coast cities, it is becoming increasingly difficult to justify the failure of “Housing First” policies. San Francisco Mayor London Breed, responding to an injunction to prevent the city from clearing homeless encampments and moving people into shelters, recently accused non-profit organizations of holding the city hostage for decades.“Since 2018, we've helped almost 10,000 people exit homelessness,” Breed said in a recent speech, noting that point-in-time counts of the homeless population never reach as high. “So what does that mean? This city is being taken advantage of and we are tired of it.”Still, many insist the media exaggerates the scope of the methamphetamine problem in the US, employing hyperbolic and hysterical narratives to sensationalize meth addiction in the same way it did crack cocaine. In fact, they claim, meth is “almost identical” to Adderall.Veteran journalist and author Sam Quiñones disagrees. His deep dives, first into the opioid epidemic and then the tsunami of trafficked fentanyl and meth that began to ravage the U.S. over the past decade, are the subject of his most recent books, Dreamland: The True Tales of America's Opiate Epidemic and The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth. Much of the reason people end up homeless in the first place, Sam says, is due to mental illness or drug addiction, often in combination, with one preceding the other.

Sam Quinones is a journalist, storyteller, former LA Times reporter, and author of four acclaimed books of narrative nonfiction, including New York Times bestseller and National Book Critics Circle Award winner "Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic." His new book is "The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth."

Celebrated novelist and essayist Walter Kirn, author of works of fiction like Up in the Air and non-fiction such as Lost in the Meritocracy and veteran of major media outlets ranging from GQ to Esquire to Vanity Fair and beyond, has seen his place in the media landscape evolve in the last few years since he was early to recognize the truth about the hysteria driving the Covid "pandemic". Since then, he's written important essays for Compact (where Adam has a monthly column) and started a podcast with Matt Taibbi called America this Week. Most recently, Kirn has teamed up with the celebrated writer and journalist David Samuels to found a new publication called A County Highway, which is in the style of a 19th Century newspaper and will focus on the totality of America, not just its primary cities. Walter and Adam here discuss that new publication, the middle of America, Cape Cod, San Francisco, Covid, psy-ops, the opioid epidemic, Danny McBride and much more. SOUNDTRACK: Thin Lizzy "Boogie Woogie Stance" Swervedriver "Sci-Flyer"  The Dead C "Sky"  The Velvets "Heroin (Live at the MatrixI)"  Mercyful Fate "The Oath"  LINKS: Walter at Substack Walter at Twitter County Highway Walter and David Samuels introduce County Highway America this Week Walter "Paranoia is our Duty" 

In his latest article for The Atlantic, Sam Quinones writes that America's shift toward treatment instead of jail time for drug abuse “is both well intentioned and out of date, given the massive street supplies of fentanyl and meth. It is failing just about everyone.” He argues that instead of waiting for addicts to voluntarily enter rehab, the legal system should force them to go. Quinones is a journalist who has covered the drug trade for over a decade and published two books on the subject: “The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth” and “Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic.” We'll talk about how to address the nation's ever-more challenging drug crisis that we see playing out on our streets and in our families. Guests: Sam Quinones, journalist and author. His recent piece in The Atlantic is titled "America's Approach to Addiction Has Gone Off the Rails.” His books include "The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth" and "Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic." Vitka Eisen, president and CEO, HealthRIGHT 360, San Francisco's largest drug treatment provider

Sam Quinones is a journalist, storyteller, former LA Times reporter, and author of four acclaimed books of narrative nonfiction, including New York Times bestseller and National Book Critics Circle Award winner Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic and his most recent book The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth. "The most original writer on Mexico and the border" (San Francisco Chronicle), he lives with his family in Tennessee. Intro and Outro music by: Decisions by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Source: http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/index.html?isrc=USUAN1100756 Artist: http://incompetech.com/

With news that the powerful synthetic opioid fentanyl is responsible for a continued rise in overdose deaths in New York City and elsewhere, Sam Quinones, independent journalist and the author of Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic and (now in paperback), The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth (Bloomsbury, 2021), and Courtney McKnight, clinical assistant professor of epidemiology at NYU's School of Global Public Health, talk about the drug and what makes it so life-threatening and resistant to efforts to stem its abuse.

The powerful synthetic opioid fentanyl is responsible for a continued rise in overdose deaths in New York City and across the country. On Today's Show:Sam Quinones, independent journalist and the author of Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic and The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth, and Courtney McKnight, clinical assistant professor of epidemiology at NYU's School of Global Public Health, talk about the drug and what makes it so life-threatening and resistant to efforts to stem its abuse.

Journalist, former L.A. Times reporter, and New York Times best-selling author, Sam Quinones, visits us to discuss his latest book, The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth. A follow-up to 2015's Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic, The Least of Us tells of Read More

Sam Quinones is a journalist, storyteller, former LA Times reporter, and author of four acclaimed books of narrative nonfiction, including New York Times bestseller and National Book Critics Circle Award winner "Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic." His new book is "The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth."

This episode is also available as a blog post: https://youarewithinthenorms.com/2023/01/02/amerisource-bergen-wrongly-charged-and-has-not-contributed-to-the-so-called-opiate-epidemic-it-was-and-has-been-the-dea-part-1/ --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/norman-j-clement/support

America is in the midst of a new drug crisis. Earlier this year, the CDC reported a staggering 107,000 overdose deaths in 2021. That's one every five minutes. It's up almost 15% from 2020 and nearly 70% of those deaths involved fentanyl.    On today's episode, Duane speaks with Sam Quinones who has been sounding the alarm for years. A journalist and storyteller, Sam is a former LA Times reporter and author of four acclaimed books of narrative nonfiction, including New York Times bestseller and National Book Critics Circle Award winner, Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. She's also the author of the National Book Critics Circle Award finalist, The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth, which captures the devastation of this new epidemic of synthetic drugs, but at the same time, offers a lot of hope.   Duane and Sam explore the root of this whole opioid crisis and the need for us, as a society, to embrace recovery without anonymity, no more euphemisms, and no more hiding. We all have to get out of the shame that comes with addiction. We're also living in a culture of addictive stuff where fast food, sugars, and pornography are legal. All this boils down to social change that is best achieved in small ways and small daily efforts – and it all starts with you!   In this episode, you will hear: The supply of synthetic drugs in Mexico How his book focuses on the message of hope in the midst of the opioid era Dr. Lou Ortenzio's story of addiction and recovery Getting rid of the anonymity and euphemisms How we're living in a culture of addictive stuff Becoming a master of your own fate What you can do on an individual level Subscribe and Review Have you subscribed to our podcast? We'd love for you to subscribe if you haven't yet.  We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second and it helps spread the word about the podcast. Supporting Resources: https://samquinones.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/samquinonesjournalist  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/samquinones_author/  Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic https://www.amazon.com/Dreamland-YA-Americas-Opiate-Epidemic/dp/1547601310  The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth https://www.amazon.com/Least-Us-Tales-America-Fentanyl-ebook/dp/B0932RRNVL?ref_=ast_sto_dp  NovusMindfulLife.com Episode Credits If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Emerald City Productions. They helped me grow and produce the podcast you are listening to right now. Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com Let them know we sent you. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today on Salt Lake Dirt I welcome one of my favorite non-fiction writers. Sam Quinones joins me to talk about his latest book The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth (out now in paperback). I became a fan of Sam's work after reading Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. His writing is powerful and informative. Check it out. Great conversation, great books, great guy. Thanks for listening! Kyler --- For more on Sam Quinones: PURCHASE: The Least of Us SamQuinones.com IG: @samquinones_author FB: @samquinonesjournalist

Sam QuinonesBOOK: The Least of Us (2021)https://samquinones.com/Marni GoldmanBOOK: True To Myself: Peace, Love, Marni (2019)https://peacelovemarni.com/William ChristieBOOK: The Double Agent (2022)https://williamchristieauthor.com/--------------------------Sam Quinones is a journalist, storyteller, former Los Angeles Times reporter, and author of three acclaimed books of narrative nonfiction, including New York Times bestseller and National Book Critics Circle Award winner Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. His latest book, The Least of Us delivers an unexpected and awe-inspiring response to the call that shocked the nation in Sam Quinones's award-winning Dreamland. https://samquinones.com/Marni Goldman is a Spiritual Life Coach and author of True To Myself: Peace, Love, Marni. Goldman, the daughter of a drug-addicted mother, has survived a life of depression, ADHD, childhood PTSD, anxiety, and a leukemia diagnosis. Goldman works with people all over the world to help them transcend and heal emotional traumas. https://peacelovemarni.com/William Christie is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and a former Marine Corps infantry officer who commanded a number of units and served around the world. He has written eleven novels including The Double Agent, published either under his own name or that of F.J. Chase. https://williamchristieauthor.com/--------------------------Frankie Boyer is an award winning talk show host that empowers listeners to live healthy vibrant lives http://www.frankieboyer.com

This episode we're talking about Investigative Journalism! We talk about what makes something journalism, when we don't read articles, enjoying vs. appreciated media, and more! You can download the podcast directly, find it on Libsyn, or get it through Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, or your favourite podcast delivery system. In this episode Anna Ferri | Meghan Whyte | Matthew Murray | Jam Edwards Things We Read (or tried to…) Busted: A Tale of Corruption and Betrayal in the City of Brotherly Love by Barbara Laker and Wendy Ruderman Unholy: Why White Evangelicals Worship at the Altar of Donald Trump by Sarah Posner, narrated by Cassandra Campbell The Finance Curse: How Global Finance Is Making Us All Poorer by Nicholas Shaxson "The overall results of this sea change from progressive economics toward identity politics has been an enduring one, and it was crystallized by Hillary Clinton in an election rally speech in 2016. "If we broke up the big banks tomorrow," she shouted, "Would that end racism?" "No!” Her audience replied. "Would that end Sexism?" No!" Although she did say she would tackle the banks if they misbehaved, hers was a pro-big bank message, couched as something progressive.” The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean Tell Me No Lies: Investigative Journalism and its Triumphs by John Pilger Murrow on McCarthy (YouTube) Dreamland (YA Edition): The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic by Sam Quinones The Gospel of Wellness: Gyms, Gurus, Goop, and the False Promise of Self-Care by Rina Raphael Kill the Messenger: How the CIA's Crack-Cocaine Controversy Destroyed Journalist Gary Webb by Charles Bowden and Nick Schou The Disappearing Act by Florence de Changy Other Media We Mentioned The Turnaway Study: Ten Years, a Thousand Women, and the Consequences of Having—or Being Denied—an Abortion by Diana Greene Foster Betrayal: The Crisis in the Catholic Church by The Boston Globe Don't Call It a Cult: The Shocking Story of Keith Raniere and the Women of NXIVM by Sarah Berman Unmask Alice: LSD, Satanic Panic, and the Imposter Behind the World's Most Notorious Diaries by Rick Emerson Go Ask Alice by Beatrice Sparks (Wikipedia) Lower Ed: The Troubling Rise of For-Profit Colleges in the New Economy by Tressie McMillan Cottom Treasure Islands: Tax Havens and the Men who Stole the World by Nicholas Shaxson Also published as Treasure Islands: Uncovering the Damage of Offshore Banking and Tax Havens Poisoned Wells: The Dirty Politics of African Oil by Nicholas Shaxson Don't Call It a Cult: The Shocking Story of Keith Raniere and the Women of NXIVM by Sarah Berman The Library Book by Susan Orlean The Feather Thief: Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century by Kirk W. Johnson The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth by Sam Quinones Hidden Figures: Young Readers' Edition by Margot Lee Shetterly Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty by Patrick Radden Keefe Links, Articles, and Things The Librarian Alignment chart Jorts the Cat Episode 080 - True Crime The Unlikely Rise of the French Tacos Ed Yong His COVID stories in The Atlantic Episode 145 - Anthropology Non-Fiction Notes from America The Wolf Pack of White Nationalism Hillary Clinton Suggested Breaking Up the Big Banks Won't End Racism and Sexism. Is She Right? How Democrats Killed Their Populist Soul “kind of a bummer to have been born at the very end of the Fuck Around century just to live the rest of my life in the Find Out century” (Twitter, 2021-02-21) The Invisible Substrate of Information Science MLM: Men Loving Men: Men who have sex with men (Wikipedia) Multi-level marketing (Wikipedia) Marxism–Leninism–Maoism (Wikipedia) Line Goes Up – The Problem With NFTs “Tech Company: At long last, we have created the Torment Nexus from classic sci-fi novel Don't Create The Torment Nexus” (Twitter, 2021-11-08) 10 Investigative Journalism Books by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, & People of Colour) Authors Every month Book Club for Masochists: A Readers' Advisory Podcasts chooses a genre at random and we read and discuss books from that genre. We also put together book lists for each episode/genre that feature works by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, & People of Colour) authors. All of the lists can be found here. The Naked Don't Fear the Water: An Underground Journey with Afghan Refugees by Matthieu Aikins The Skin We're In: A Year of Black Resistance and Power by Desmond Cole Stolen from Our Embrace: The Abduction of First Nations Children and the Restoration of Aboriginal Communities by Suzanne J. Fournier and Ernie Crey We Refuse to Forget: A True Story of Black Creeks, American Identity, and Power by Caleb Gayle Black Wave: Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the Forty-Year Rivalry That Unraveled Culture, Religion, and Collective Memory in the Middle East by Kim Ghattas The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story by Nikole Hannah-Jones and The New York Times Magazine Without You, There Is No Us: My Time with the Sons of North Korea's Elite by Suki Kim The Book Collectors: A Band of Syrian Rebels and the Stories That Carried Them Through a War by Delphine Minoui His Name Is George Floyd: One Man's Life and the Struggle for Racial Justice by Robert Samuels Seven Fallen Feathers: Racism, Death, and Hard Truths in a Northern City by Tanya Talaga The Light of Truth: Writings of an Anti-Lynching Crusader by Ida B. Wells Give us feedback! Fill out the form to ask for a recommendation or suggest a genre or title for us to read! Check out our Tumblr, follow us on Twitter or Instagram, join our Facebook Group, or send us an email! Join us again on Tuesday, November 15th we'll be talking about Podcasts! Then on Tuesday, December 6th we'll be discussing the genre of Military Fiction!

Sam Quinones is no stranger to many in Ross County.  The "Dreamland" author spent time here while researching "The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic," (buy it here) which was released in 2016. The book stood as a clarion call to arms for communities across the country to deal with the impact of the crushing havoc opiates were wreaking in communities such as our town.  He also returned to host discussions of the book in 2017 and will return in September 2022 as part of ADAMH's Recovery Celebration. Join us for our chat with him as we talk about the book (and his second effort), its influence in the country, and how the threat we're facing today may be worse than the one we thought we had under control. We also get into a discussion about how local podcasts are the way our communities can come together and help find solutions to our biggest opportunities. Feels Like Home Podcast is powered by Horizon,  Greater Things are Coming! Bringing fiber to the home service in Chillicothe, Circleville and more new cities coming soon! Call Horizon today to get the fastest, most reliable, and the only 100% fiber-optic Internet service in the area. As always, thanks for listening to Feels Like Home. Send us feedback at feelslikehomepod@gmail.com. Hit that subscribe or follow button on your favorite podcast site and give us a review! Let your friends and fellow podcast listeners about us. Special thanks to Buzzsprout, our podcast hosting service.Follow and interact with us on Facebook and Twitter. Feels Like Home theme song is provided by our great friend, Cory Breth.  Check out his music and merchandise here: https://www.corybrethofficial.comPowered by Horizon The fastest, most reliable, and the only 100% fiber optic Internet service in the area. 

Sam Quinones - Journalist, storyteller, former LA Times reporter, and author of three acclaimed books of narrative nonfiction. His most recent book is “The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth” which followed his 2015 release, “Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic.” He joins joins Tavis for a conversation on the Opioid crisis in light of yesterday's news in which a federal judge ordered Walmart, CVS, Walgreens to Pay $650 Million Over Opioid Sales.

    Episode 129 Notes and Links to Sam Quinones' Work        On Episode 129 of The Chills at Will Podcast, Pete welcomes Sam Quinones, and the two discuss, among other topics, growing up in a house that exalted reading, Sam's freelance writing training, his time living and writing in México, his love of storytelling in its myriad forms, and his insights gleaned from his reporting for his amazing recent books on the opiate and meth and fentanyl epidemics.      Sam Quinones is a journalist, storyteller, former LA Times reporter, and author of three acclaimed books of narrative nonfiction, including The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth, released in 2021, and his 2015 release, Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic.  Sam Quinones' Website   Buy Sam's Books   Sam on C-SPAN BookTV's In Depth   REVIEWS: The Least of Us in Christianity Today & Plough Quarterly   Sam on CBS Saturday Morning

Episode 128 Notes and Links to Vania Patino's Work        On Episode 128 of The Chills at Will Podcast, Pete welcomes Vania Patino, and the two discuss, among other topics, her early love of reading in Spanish and English, Twilight, a formative experience for Vania as a high school reporter, her busy and educational college years, the power of Chicano Studies and Ethnic Studies classes, and ideas of objectivity and balance in journalism.        Vania Patino is a news reporter for KERO-TV in Bakersfield, CA, a former reporter for KFDA in Amarillo, Texas, and a former standout student in Pete's English 10 honors class. For Latino Reporter: “After El Paso shooting, Texans seem divided over looser gun laws”   Video from Cal State Fullerton's Al Dia Newsmagazine   Video and Article by Vania: "In Tex-Mex country, ‘el sabor' helps Boricua culture thrive" At about 1:40, Vania gives background on her relationship with language, learning English as a second language, and her early love of reading, including her love of a particular teen series   At about 5:00, Pete and Vania discuss the phenomenon that was the Twilight series    At about 7:00, Vania describes how Spanish specifically calls to her, interests her, etc., as well as how she re-embraced the beauty of speaking Spanish    At about 10:00, Vania wows with an amazing story from her third day on the job in Amarillo that highlights    At about 12:50, Vania highlights important lessons learned in college ethnic studies and Chicano history courses   At about 14:40, Vania discusses interesting conversations around identity that came up during her enjoyable college years   At about 16:25, Vania responds to Pete's questions   At about 18:20-27:30, Vania recounts an incredibly impactful experience in covering a 2015 Donald Trump speech in San Pedro    At about 27:35, Vania talks about her time in Amarillo, Texas, including covering a different political arena than she was used to   At about 29:50, Vania talks about formative experiences from her busy college days, and shouts out mentor Inez Gonzalez   At about 32:00, Vania recounts a funny anecdote about interning with NBC News with Lester Holt    At about 37:00, Vania gives the story of the horrific tragedy in Thousand Oaks, sadly the first of many mass shootings that she has covered    At about 42:30, Vania tells a story that is emblematic of being innovative and dogged in pursuing a local angle to a national story    At about 46:15, Vania explains the writing and background work for a news “package”   At about 50:55, Vania responds to Pete wondering about how she balances formal and informal presentations of the news   At about 53:30, Vania discusses ideas of objectivity in reporting, particularly post-Trump as POTUS   At about 57:30, Vania answers Pete's question about which tv shows/movies “get it right” with regard to a realistic view of the newsroom   At about 59:40, Vania responds to Pete's question about the responsibilities that come with doing translation in news   At about 1:04:30, Vania discusses future projects   At about 1:08:40, Vania gives contact information/social media info        You can now subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts, and leave me a five-star review. You can also ask for the podcast by name using Alexa, and find the pod on Stitcher, Spotify, and on Amazon Music. Follow me on IG, where I'm @chillsatwillpodcast, or on Twitter, where I'm @chillsatwillpo1. You can watch other episodes on YouTube-watch and subscribe to The Chills at Will Podcast Channel. Please subscribe to both my YouTube Channel and my podcast while you're checking out this episode.      This is a passion project of mine, a DIY operation, and I'd love for your help in promoting what I'm convinced is a unique and spirited look at an often-ignored art form. The intro song for The Chills at Will Podcast is “Wind Down” (Instrumental Version), and the other song played on this episode was “Hoops” (Instrumental)” by Matt Weidauer, and both songs are used through ArchesAudio.com.     Please tune in for Episode 129 with Sam Quinones, a journalist, storyteller, former LA Times reporter, and author of three acclaimed books of narrative nonfiction, including The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth, released in 2021, and his 2015 release, Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic.  The episode will air on June 28.

Today, we welcomed Sam Quinones to discuss his book, "The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth." The book follows his 2015 release,  Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. Both books are critically acclaimed. In January 2022, The Least of Us was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle (NBCC) award for Best Nonfiction Book of 2021. Book:  The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth (2021) Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate (2015)   Link to Greg's blog : ZZs Blog   #SamQuinones #TheLeastofUs # Dreamland #Podcast #Meth #Fentanyl #Homeless #Drugaddiction #GregGodels #ZZblog #ZZsblog #PatCummings #ComingFromLeftField

This episode of BCEN and Friends lets you meet our friend Sam Quinones. Sam Quinones is a Los Angeles-based freelance journalist, a reporter for 35 years, and author of four acclaimed books of narrative nonfiction. He is a veteran reporter on immigration, gangs, drug trafficking, and the border. He is formerly a reporter with the L.A. Times, where he worked for 10 years. Before that, he made a living as a freelance writer residing in Mexico for a decade. In 2015, Sam Quinones authored Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic (Bloomsbury, 2015), which ignited awareness of the epidemic that has cost the United States hundreds of thousands of lives and become deadliest drug scourge in the nation's history. Dreamland won a National Book Critics Circle award for Best Nonfiction Book of 2015 and has been selected as one of the top books of 2015 by Amazon, Daily Beast, Buzzfeed, Boston Globe, Entertainment Weekly, the Wall Street Journal, and many other organizations. His latest book, released in November 2021, is The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth. In The Least of Us, Quinones chronicles the emergence of a drug-trafficking world producing massive supplies of dope cheaper and deadlier than ever, marketing to the population of addicts created by the nation's opioid epidemic, as the backdrop to tales of Americans' quiet attempts to recover community through simple acts of helping the vulnerable. Michael Dexter and Mark Eggers talk with Sam about two of his books, Dreamland: The Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic and The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth. Come spend some time with us as we listen to Sam tell about these books and some of the stories within the pages. Sam also shares some of his history of being a writer and his love for crime reporting. This episode is called: Hope: during America's Opiate Epidemic Sam Quinones can be found: Email: samquinones7@yahoo.com Twitter: @samquinones7 Facebook: samquinonesjournalist Instagram: @samquinones_author

Title: The Least of Us and the Pandemic of Drugs in AmericaDescription: Today Steve is joined by author Sam Quinones to discuss his books on the drug pandemic in the United States. Sam takes us through the evolution of the use and abuse of prescription and illegal drugs over the past 30 years.Learn More About our Guest:Sam Quinones, author of The Least of Us and Dreamlandhttps://samquinones.com/You can learn more about Beyond the Big Screen and subscribe at all these great places:www.atozhistorypage.comwww.beyondthebigscreen.comClick here to support Beyond the Big Screen!https://www.subscribestar.com/beyondthebigscreenhttps://www.patreon.com/beyondthebigscreenClick to Subscribe:https://www.spreaker.com/show/4926576/episodes/feedemail: steve@atozhistorypage.comwww.beyondthebigscreen.comhttps://www.patreon.com/historyofthepapacyParthenon Podcast Network Home:parthenonpodcast.comOn Social Media: https://www.facebook.com/groups/atozhistorypagehttps://www.facebook.com/HistoryOfThePapacyPodcasthttps://twitter.com/atozhistoryMusic Provided by:"Crossing the Chasm" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 Licensehttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/Image Credits:Begin Transcript:Thank you again for listening to Beyond the Big Screen podcast. We are a member of the Parthenon Podcast network. Of course, a big thanks goes out to Sam Quinones Author of the books Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic and The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth. Links to learn more about Sam Quinones and his books can be found at samquinones.com or in the Show Notes. You can now support beyond the big screen on Patreon. By joining on Patreon and Subscribe star, you help keep Beyond the Big Screen going and get many great benefits. Go to patreon.com/beyondthebig screen to learn more. By supporting Beyond the Big Screen on Patreon, you are going a long way to continuing to make this podcast sustainable and available in the future!A special thanks goes out to our supporters on Patreon and Subscribestar. Thank you to our Executive Producer Alex!Another way to support Beyond the big screen is to leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. These reviews really help me know what you think of the show and help other people learn about Beyond the Big screen. More about the Parthenon Podcast Network can be found at Parthenonpodcast.com. You can learn more about Beyond the Big Screen, great movies and stories so great they should be movies on various social media platforms by searching for A to z history. Links to all this and more can be found at beyond the big screen dot com. I thank you for joining me again, Beyond the big Screen.Least of Us[00:00:00] Thank you so much for joining us again on beyond the big screen, I am really excited to be joined by Sam Ken Yonas. Sam is an independent journalist and is author of a number of really great books, including the books that we will focus on today. His latest book, the least of us, true tales of America and hope and the time of fentanyl and the.Sam is also the author of dreamland. The true story of America's opiate epidemic. Uh, Sam, can you maybe just tell us a little bit about yourself and how you became interested in investigating these, uh, drug epidemics in the U S sure. Um, Steven, great to be with you. I, I, um, uh, I really had no interest. I have to tell you.I had no interest in, in addiction or pain management or any of that stuff. I had lived in Mexico for 10 years as a journalist. I've been a reporter 35 years. I've been a crime reporter a lot of those years. [00:01:00] And that's kind of how I see myself in, in general. And, um, I, uh, I lived in Mexico for 10 years, came back to LA, which is my, kind of roughly my home region and, um, got a job at the LA times when they put me on a story.Um, that really, they put me on a team of reporters talking about writing about the, the, the drug war that had just kicked off in Mexico. When I lived in Mexico's 94, 2004, I mean, there was nothing like what's happened since it was a, it was an easy country to move around. Uh, there was very little danger.It seemed to me, I, I was a freelancer, very Vagabonding all over the place. It was not a, um, a dangerous thing. And then all of a sudden it became, uh, deadly. Uh, and, um, and so my job was to write about drugs as they trafficked, uh, after they crossed the border were how they got to the rest of the country.And as part of that, I got onto the story [00:02:00] in dreamland of the town of Holly SCO in the state of. Mexico, small state on the Pacific coast of Mexico in which people had divine. Uh, a system of, of delivering a heroin very much like pizza delivery. So you call a number and the operator takes sure your order and they send a driver to you to deliver your heroin.And not only that, though, the real importance to the, this, this group, um, w in my opinion, was that. Um, they were extensively expansionary, so they began to move all over the country. They were everywhere. They were in Phoenix and Reno. They were then they moved across the Mississippi and they were in Columbus and Charlotte and various places.But 20, 25 states eventually, I think I counted them in anyway, as I was doing that, I began to realize there was a much, much bigger story. Behind me that I was unaware of because I had been in Mexico when it really evolved. And that was the revolution in pain management [00:03:00] with regard to the very, very aggressive use of opioid painkillers, narcotic painkillers, Vicodin, Percocet, Oxycontin, very well known.Um, and so I, that was how you explained why these guys had this. Heroine market. I didn't, I could not explain why they had grown. I thought, you know, who would ever go back to using heroin? I mean, I thought the seventies were the time when we forgot about heroin. Um, we learned it was a bad drug and, and moved on.And, and so it was that revolution in pain management that I realized was much bigger than anything I was dealing with with, with these guys from, from Mexico. And so I began to see the two stories as connected. And that's when I began to really figure all that out. I really had a lot of background in Mexico.By that point, I had written two books about Mexico and Lou knew a lot about small town, Mexican life and immigration and all that. I didn't know a thing about addiction. Didn't really know what an Oxycontin [00:04:00] was when it's, when I started all this, but it kind of, it was backing into the story with the heroin.Coming to this realization that I was really focusing on the smaller story, the much bigger story affecting the entire country was the opioid pain revolution. It's so interesting. You mentioned that, um, the change in Mexico in that time you were living there, I'm originally from upstate New York and we go to Canada, just going to Canada is like nothing.It's like going to the next town over and we moved to Texas and I asked somebody, okay. You know, pop over to Juarez or Laredo, Laredo, and they were like, that's probably not the best idea. And you're saying that changed to very recently. I would say that that changed in in 2000 began to change in 2005 and six.Um, that's when you begin to see the first cartel. A lot of this has to do with Chapo Guzman, Chapo Guzman was the head of the Sinaloa cartel. He was in prison for a lot of years. He [00:05:00] escaped in a variety of kind of very corrupt ways in which, you know, anyway, it's a long story that, but he gets out and when he gets out, he begins to kind of throw his weight around the country a little bit and disrupt a lot of the.Ways of controls that had been in place for drug trafficking, uh, at the different border air. So he begins to attack, Porres begins to attack Tijuana. Um, and, and he also, um, begins to attack, um, the Texas. Side. So he's got all these things going on and that's why, um, these, these cartel wars began to pop off beginning and about those years.And that's why, um, uh, Laredo, but particularly, um, uh, Reynosa Macallan, those areas that were extraordinarily. Uh, Tijuana Juarez a few years later, you begin to see a murder rates through the roof. Uh, 3000 murders a year in acquires becomes the most dangerous place in the, [00:06:00] in the, on the planet, as what I understood, um, all of that because of these very, um, these, these attempts to control and, and battling back, um, by Chapo Guzman and.

In today's episode, We take a look at the horrific state of the opiate epidemic and how New York is only making it LIGHT YEARS worse. Last month, they decided to open clinics that allowed the public to use illegal drugs under “supervision” and even going as far as to help them actually shoot up. Like, assist them in injecting heroin into their veins. Yes, you read that correctly. This one is personal and gets down and dirty pretty quick. Lots of first-hand education on how we got here and give into the possibility that we are fully beyond repair. Like, subscribe, and tell all your friends about the show. We are growing every show and we can't thank you enough for being a loyal listener. New episodes every week.

This week on Dopey! We are joined by legendary journalist, storyteller, former LA Times reporter, and author - Sam Quinones. Sam comes on to tell us all about the current climate of struggle around the fentanyl epidemic and it's impact on America. Sam initially made a huge impact on the addiction/recovery community with his award winning book; Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. His most recent book is called 'The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth'  PLUS Dopey super friend, unlicensed advice columnist and Strung Out author, Erin Khar joins us and we hang out and read emails! PLUS much more on a very special new episode of the old Dopey show!      

Todays MM will be different as we are trying a longer type format and a deeper dive into an important book, Dreamland:  The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic.Key Points from the Episode:You will be uncomfortableIt will be tough to listen tooYou can't believe this is happening in the United StatesOther resources:Want to leave a review? Click here, and if we earned a five-star review from you **high five and knuckle bumps**, we appreciate it greatly, thank you so much!Because we care what you think about what we think and our website, please email David@teammojoacademy.com, or if you want to leave us a quick FREE, painless voicemail, we would appreciate that as well.Be sure to check out our very affordable Academy Review membership program at http:www.teammojoacademy.com/support

On this week's episode, we sit down with Sam Quinones to discuss the contents of his books Dreamland and Least of Us, the neuroscience of addiction, and the reasons why he feels hopeful about our future as a nation navigating an opioid epidemic. Sam is a journalist and author of four books of narrative nonfiction. Sam's landmark book Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic won a National Book Critics Circle award for Best Nonfiction and ignited awareness of the opioid epidemic happening in the United States. Sam's latest book, The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth explores the emergence of unprecedented drug-trafficking in the US, contrasted with stories of Americans recovering community through simple acts of service and care. JOIN US FOR A CONVERSATION WITH SAM FEBRUARY 23, 2022 AT 6:30 PM: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/a-conversation-with-best-selling-author-sam-quinones-tickets-211930438647 READ THE LEAST OF US: TRUE TALES OF AMERICA AND HOPE IN THE TIME OF FENTANYL AND METH: https://samquinones.com/books/the-least-of-us/ The views and opinions expressed on Awareness 2 Action are those of the guests and host and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Prevention Department or Northwestern Community Services.  

A reading of The Bad Mother: On Making it Easier for Addicts to Do Drugs, by Nancy Rommelmann, published on Paloma Media on Jan. 18, 2022Patreon open threadThe Bad Mother, a novel, by Nancy RommelmannSan Fransicko: Why Progressives Ruin Cities, by Michael ShellenbergerThe Least of Us, True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth, by Sam QuinonesDreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic, by Sam Quinones 

The unfettered prescribing of pain medications meets the massive influx of black tar heroin in this true, riveting tale of capitalism run amok.  Author and journalist Sam Quinones explains how this unintentional collision led to the catastrophic opiate crisis in this country in his book "Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic"

Your host, Angela Kennecke,  first met Journalist and Author, Sam Quinones, when he spoke at an Opioid Summit in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, after writing his best-selling book, Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. Now his latest book, The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth, looks at how much the drug market has changed and how deadly and addictive it has become. Quinones examines why the unbelievable number of fentanyl overdoses aren't enough to stop people from playing Russian roulette with drug use.  His work exposes how extensive the synthetic drug epidemic has become and offers solutions and hope, one small effort at a time. Support the show (https://www.emilyshope.foundation/donate-2)

--On the Show: --Sam Quinones, author of the New York Times bestseller "Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic, and most recently, "The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth," joins David to discuss opiate and meth addiction, treatment, the drug war, and more. Get the book: https://amzn.to/30AbRhG --A shocking partisan vaccination gap has opened, with 96% of Democrats vaccinated, but only 54% of Republicans --Newsmax host Chris Salcedo delivers one of the most ignorant rants about climate change we've ever seen --Notable discussions from the David Pakman Show subreddit, including about the term "Karen," the White House's COVID Omicron warning, and more --Former President Donald Trump endorses Republican Congresswoman Lauren Boebert for re-election --Nancy Pelosi rejects the possibility of a stock-trading ban for members of Congress --As Omicron takes over, COVID vaccine booster mandates begin, and the UK sets COVID case records --Voicemail caller comments on the Air Force discharging 27 servicemembers for refusing the COVID vaccine --On the Bonus Show: Build Back Better isn't happening this year, New Zealand's new cigarette ban, car break-ins explode in San Francisco bay area, much more...

For 25% off your first Aurate purchase, go to https://auratenewyork.com/mikhaila and use promo code “Mikhaila”! In this episode, Sally Satel and Peter Pischke join Mikhaila to talk about dependence-forming medications, the opioid epidemic, and the prescription-drug system that's partly to blame. Sally Satel is a psychiatrist and addiction medicine writer. She is a lecturer at Yale School of Medicine and the author of ‘PC MD: How Political Correctness Is Corrupting Medicine.' More recently, she co-authored ‘Brainwashed: The Seductive Appeal of Mindless Neuroscience.' Her articles have been published in The New York Times, the New Republic, and The Wall Street Journal. Peter Pischke is a journalist and health and disability reporter. He hosts The Happy Warrior podcast and has been on many top podcasts and TV shows. As a journalist who's struggled with chronic pain, he aims to educate people and raise awareness about issues as important as the opioid crisis—which is discussed at length in this episode. ———————————— Find Peter Pischke on Twitter @HappyWarriorP https://twitter.com/happywarriorp or hear him host The Happy Warrior Podcast at https://anchor.fm/happywarrior There's more Sally Satel on her website https://SallySatelMD.com and Twitter @slsatel https://twitter.com/slsatel Useful resources for people with chronic pain: https://nationalpain.org https://nationalpaincouncil.org https://painnewsnetwork.org ———————————— Follow Me On ———————————— Audio - https://linktr.ee/mikhailapeterson Twitter - https://twitter.com/MikhailaAleksis Instagram - https://instagram.com/mikhailapeterson Facebook - https://facebook.com/mikhailapeterson... Lion Diet - https://linktr.ee/liondiet Telegram - https://t.me/mikhailapeterson ———————————— Show Notes ———————————— [0:00] Intro [02:37] Introducing guests Peter Pischke and Sally Satel [05:59] What is the opioid crisis? How did it get started? [09:07] “Just between 2020 and 2021, we've hit our highest number in a year yet for deaths, which was about 90,000 related to opioid addiction” - Peter Pischke [11:02] Peter shares his personal story of addiction and recovery from opioid use [14:25] Mikhaila shares her experience with painkillers for childhood arthritis and the difficult choice between using a habit-forming drug or feeling miserable day in and day out [15:21] "It's like woah, I'm in a lot of pain, I full-on have an autoimmune disorder and there's a reason I need these pain killers, and in the moment it's the difference between being in chronic pain or sleeping but being on a pain medication that is dependency forming" - Mikhaila Peterson [15:54] Sally's experience working at a methadone clinic in Washington DC [20:36] “Some of our patients say they can't handle this on their own and get on a replacement medication for the opioids. And this is not the right medical analogy, but metaphorically it might be like taking insulin: it's just a medication you take every day. Some people do get off completely, but those are the more rare cases"- Sally Satel [21:02] “It takes a long time to repair your life, and people use drugs for a reason” - Sally Satel [22:40] The mixture of drugs in many cases of overdose. The difficulty in prescribing necessary meds post-2016 legislation restricting doctors' ability to prescribe certain drugs [34:39] The extreme pressure on doctors to see more and more patients. Its effect on prescribed patient care [39:35] Dependence-forming medications [44:05] American culture and the constant war between addicts and legitimate patients in legislature and treatment [51:53] “It could well be that many people on high-dose opioids today didn't need to be on that high of a dose [...] That's all true, but once you're on a high dose that's working, and you want to stay on it, to me it's unconscionable that doctors would take you off of it” - Sally Satel [52:16] A message from Peter for those struggling with chronic pain [54:43] A message for people who may be using or considering using [55:21] Wrapping up #MikhailaPeterson #Addiction #OpioidCrisis #MedicalSystem #ChronicPain

Today the guys are joined by author/journalist Sam Quinones. Sam is the author of the award winning book Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. His latest release, The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fetanyl and Meth, is the basis for our conversation. Sam helps shed light on the link between rampant homelessness and drug use in the US, the changing chemical structure of drugs like meth, and how we can help those who are in desperate need of it.  This episode is sponsored by Gun Barrel Coffee.

In 2015, renowned writer Sam Quinones woke up many Americans to the dangers of the opioid epidemic with his award-winning book Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. In his new book, The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth, Quinones follows up Dreamland with an exploration of the terrifying next stages of the opioid epidemic, and the stories of individuals and communities that have fought back. Quinones was among the first journalists to capture the true danger presented by synthetic drugs. In fentanyl, traffickers landed a painkiller a hundred times more powerful than morphine, and laced it into cocaine, meth, and counterfeit pills, causing tens of thousands of deaths—at the same time as Mexican traffickers made methamphetamine cheaper and more potent than ever. Combined, these new synthetic drugs wrecked communities across the country, particularly rural areas, led to a surge of mental illness concerns, and fed a growing homelessness problem throughout the United States. Quinones explores these issues and more. At a time of great despair because of multiple drug epidemics, Quinones also finds sources of hope, in communities fighting back against rampant synthetic drug issues and helping individuals repair their lives. Quinones concludes that the nation has forsaken “what has made America great” and that “when drug traffickers act like corporations and corporations like drug traffickers, our best defense, perhaps our only defense, lies in bolstering community.” Please join us for an important conversation on one of the country's most challenging problems, and what we all can do to rise to the challenge. SPEAKERS Sam Quinones Journalist; Author, The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth April Dembosky Health Correspondent, KQED—Moderator In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we are currently hosting all of our live programming via YouTube live stream. This program was recorded via video conference on November 4th, 2021 by the Commonwealth Club of California. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 2015, renowned writer Sam Quinones woke up many Americans to the dangers of the opioid epidemic with his award-winning book Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. In his new book, The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth, Quinones follows up Dreamland with an exploration of the terrifying next stages of the opioid epidemic, and the stories of individuals and communities that have fought back. Quinones was among the first journalists to capture the true danger presented by synthetic drugs. In fentanyl, traffickers landed a painkiller a hundred times more powerful than morphine, and laced it into cocaine, meth, and counterfeit pills, causing tens of thousands of deaths—at the same time as Mexican traffickers made methamphetamine cheaper and more potent than ever. Combined, these new synthetic drugs wrecked communities across the country, particularly rural areas, led to a surge of mental illness concerns, and fed a growing homelessness problem throughout the United States. Quinones explores these issues and more. At a time of great despair because of multiple drug epidemics, Quinones also finds sources of hope, in communities fighting back against rampant synthetic drug issues and helping individuals repair their lives. Quinones concludes that the nation has forsaken “what has made America great” and that “when drug traffickers act like corporations and corporations like drug traffickers, our best defense, perhaps our only defense, lies in bolstering community.” Please join us for an important conversation on one of the country's most challenging problems, and what we all can do to rise to the challenge. SPEAKERS Sam Quinones Journalist; Author, The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth April Dembosky Health Correspondent, KQED—Moderator In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we are currently hosting all of our live programming via YouTube live stream. This program was recorded via video conference on November 4th, 2021 by the Commonwealth Club of California. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

https://www.npr.org/2021/11/08/1051475843/dopesick-hulu-true-story-opioid-addiction Lack of Character: Personality and Moral Behavior, https://lukeford.net/blog/?p=139670 Lovemaps: Sexual/Erotic Health and Pathology, Paraphilia, and Gender Transposition In Childhood, Adolescence and Maturity by John Money, https://lukeford.net/blog/?p=130433 https://www.takimag.com/article/from-dreamland-to-nightmareland/ Steve Sailer writes: With the CDC estimating last month that drug overdose deaths rose over 30 percent in the first twelve months of the pandemic to nearly 100,000, Sam Quinones' outstanding new sequel to his award-winning 2015 book Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic is definitely timely. Quinones' The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth brings us up to date on the disastrous drug developments of the past half-dozen years. Dreamland explained how the Sackler family promoting OxyContin to doctors as a “non-addictive” synthetic opioid painkiller in the late 1990s set off what I call the White Death that quietly killed so many working-class whites in the first decade of this century. Then, as the medical profession became less irresponsible about writing pain-pill prescriptions, Mexican drug smugglers stepped in to supply cut-off pill addicts with heroin. While Dreamland was superbly reported, its prose style was occasionally slightly off. In contrast, The Least of Us is elegantly written. And Quinones has perfected his method of merging big-picture cause-and-effect analyses of the economics and neuroscience of drugs with illustrative human-interest stories of Americans swept up in this national catastrophe. Join this channel to get access to perks: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSFVD7Xfhn7sJY8LAIQmH8Q/join https://odysee.com/@LukeFordLive, https://lbry.tv/@LukeFord, https://rumble.com/lukeford https://dlive.tv/lukefordlivestreams Listener Call In #: 1-310-997-4596 Superchat: https://entropystream.live/app/lukefordlive Bitchute: https://www.bitchute.com/channel/lukeford/ Soundcloud MP3s: https://soundcloud.com/luke-ford-666431593 Code of Conduct: https://lukeford.net/blog/?p=125692 https://www.patreon.com/lukeford http://lukeford.net Email me: lukeisback@gmail.com or DM me on Twitter.com/lukeford Support the show | https://www.streamlabs.com/lukeford, https://patreon.com/lukeford, https://PayPal.Me/lukeisback Facebook: http://facebook.com/lukecford Feel free to clip my videos. It's nice when you link back to the original.

We are joined again today by one of our very first guests on the show.  Sam Quinones is an award-winning journalist and the New York Times bestselling author of Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. Two years ago, Sam and I discussed how opioid addiction had transformed the health and healthcare landscape of our nation. Today, Sam is back to share with us his latest book, out now, The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth. His fascinating, in-depth reporting reveals the rapidly evolving drug epidemic that, while overshadowed by a global pandemic, has in many ways intensified.  He also shares stories of hope that demonstrate we still have a path forward on this uniquely challenging public health crisis.  And if you enjoy today's episode, I encourage you to go back and listen to our original discussion in Episode #12. 

Author Sam Quinones joins Jess and Zerlina to talk about his new book "The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth," on sale October 12!"The Least of Us" is the follow up to Quinones' award-winning New York Times bestseller, "Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic."

0:00 - Dan & Amy review the Virginia gubernatorial closing arguments 14:40 - Law & Order: Cook County Circuit Court   28:31 - Dan & Amy head to Glasgow and check out COP 26 42:13 - Audio: Mom pleads with goons protesting Sinema outside her daughter's wedding 46:11 - Senior Legal Fellow for the Heritage Foundation, Hans von Spakovsky, discusses election integrity and his new book Our Broken Elections: How the Left Changed the Way You Vote. Purchase Our Broken Electionshere 01:00:34 - Dan & Amy offer examples of false exegesis of Romans 13 for justification 01:22:40 - President at Wirepoints Inc, Ted Dabrowski: We should remain concerned about the elderly instead of running around vaccinating children. Check out Ted's latest - wirepoints.org 01:34:53 - Jorge Cham –cartoonist behind the popular online comic Piled Higher and Deeper & Daniel Whiteson – professor of physics and astronomy at the University of California, Irvine, answer Frequently Asked Questions about the Universe. Purchase Frequently Asked Questions about the Universe here 01:43:45 - Dan & Amy explain how you can become more marriageable 01:50:24 - Journalist and author of Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic, Sam Quinones, shares his new book The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth. Purchase Dreamlandhere. Purchase The Least of Ushere See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The opioid crisis in the United States is a textbook example of free market economics. The powerful lie, manipulate, and skirt regulations to make buckets of money, while innocent people suffer. Journalist Sam Quinones joins Goldy and Paul to unpack the economics behind the opioid crisis, and the new threat of synthetic opioids like fentanyl. Sam Quinones is a journalist best known for his reporting in Mexico and on Mexicans in the United States. He is the author of the award-winning Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. His new book, The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth, is out today. Twitter: @samquinones7 The Least of Us: https://bookshop.org/books/the-least-of-us-true-tales-of-america-and-hope-in-the-time-of-fentanyl-and-meth/9781635574357 What did the Sacklers know? https://newrepublic.com/article/162148/sacklers-know-patrick-radden-keefe-purdue-opioid-crisis-review  The 'Secret History' Of The Sackler Family & The Opioid Crisis: https://www.npr.org/2021/04/14/987195464/the-secret-history-of-the-sackler-family-the-opioid-crisis  State-Level Economic Costs of Opioid Use Disorder and Fatal Opioid Overdose: https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7015a1.htm  Massive Costs of the US Opioid Epidemic in Lives and Dollars: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2780313  Website: http://pitchforkeconomics.com/ Twitter: @PitchforkEcon Instagram: @pitchforkeconomics Nick's twitter: @NickHanauer

McGruff the Crime Dog guests hosts in Episode 39 of the Book XCh... well OK, maybe not (and yes, we just dated ourselves - but those who know, know!). This time out, your humble hosts/book-hungry twins take a bite out of the vast buffet of books that explore crime, both real and imagined. We delve into classic mysteries, true crime reportage, historical novels with unexplained murders at their center, pulp detective fiction, harrowing accounts of real-life urban crime, and some of the most heinous and traumatic events in American history (think JFK, Watergate and 9/11). Together, Jude and John dare to delve into the criminal mind and discuss just what it is that makes reading about the dark side of humanity so unnervingly, but undeniably, compelling. (And don't miss a very special and FUN interview coming up in a few weeks, for Episode 40!!) Thanks for listening everyone. MUSIC BY YOUNG WOLF, VOIDZ PANDA BOOKS DISCUSSED/MENTIONED/RECOMMENDED IN THIS EPISODE What Jude is currently reading/plans to read next: 'The Songlines,' Bruce Chatwin - 'Billy Summers,' Stephen King - What John is currently reading/plans to read next: 'Foundation,' Isaac Asimov - 'The Valancourt Book of World Horror Stories, Vol. 1,' Ed. by James D. Jenkins & Ryan Cagle Books/Writers discussed in this episode: THE FACTORY SERIES by Derek Raymond (He Died with His Eyes Open, The Devil's Home on Leave, How the Dead Live, I Was Dora Suarez, Dead Man Upright) - 'The Name of the Rose,' - Umberto Eco - 'An Instance of the Fingerpost,' Iain Pears - The crime fiction of Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers and P. D. James - 'In Cold Blood,' Truman Capote - 'Murders in the Rue Morgue (story),' Edgar Allen Poe - 'The Gangs of New York,' Herbert Asbury - 'The Lighthouse,' P. D. James - 'Classic Crimes,' William Roughead - '2666,' Robert Bolaño - 'All the President's Men,' - Bob Woodward & Carl Bernstein - 'Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald and the Assassination of JFK,' Gerald Posner - 'Oswald's Tale,' Norman Mailer - 'The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11,' Lawrence Wright - 'Killers of the Flower Moon,' David Grann - 'Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic,' - Sam Quinones - 'Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets,' David Simon - Planned next episode of the Book XChange podcast: Episode 40 will be a BXC SPECIAL - an interview with our very own Jude Joseph Lovell, about his brand new time-twisting, mind-bending, noirish mystery thriller 'Time O'Clock.' (Available for order now on Amazon) We will discuss the book, the influences that went into writing it, and the delights of twisty, dream-like, rule-breaking fiction.

This episode is a little longer than usual because we had a lot to say! The THEMES in this book. Whewww. Next week, we're reading chapters 26 through the end of 40 of Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi. -- Other books mentioned in this episode: Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic by Sam Quinones Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo Outlawed by Anna North --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

TNCRadio.LIVE https://www.amazon.com/Such-Unfortunates-Andrew-Mann-ebook/dp/B07S9LJRTZ Learn why the current system has failed and caused the current #Opiate epidemic. We will interview Andrew Mann about #addiction, #bullying, #depression & #anxiety. His book “Such Unfortunates” offers hope to people struggling with addiction.

Today, we speak with Jeremiah Lindemann, a product engineer with Esri working in the geospatial industry based in Colorado. He spends much of his time supporting health and human services and public safety agencies. His career has helped him be an advocate after a personal loss of his brother to opioids, mapping various opioid topics and helping people tell their stories of loss. More recently, similar mapping around loss and vaccinations has been applied to COVID-19 with the assistance of GISCorps, a non-profit volunteer organization. Topics of discussion on today's episode include: COVID-19 mapping online and the three maps that Jer has been working on recently: Lost Loved Ones, Vaccination Experiences, and Recovery Stories Jer's past work with mapping the opioid crisis How mapping impacts the grieving process and encourages empathy The use of maps to bridge the gap between the isolated individual to the community at large, bringing awareness to what is occurring within neighborhoods. Resources mentioned on today's episode: Coronavirus Stories: Lost Loved Ones, Vaccination Experiences, and Recovery Stories COVID19 Vaccine and Memorial Maps on Twitter The National Safety Council (Opioid Maps) - Honor Loved Ones Lost to Opioids In America: The Installation Story by Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic by Sam Quinones Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company that Addicted America by Beth Macy --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/unconventionaldyad/support

“We really have to have a horrible relationship with ourselves if we're going to poison ourselves every single day.”-Dr. Bryan BorlandDr. Rob Graessle grew up in Columbus, OH in a blue collar neighborhood called Hilltop where few people went to college. Like many blue collar neighborhoods around America, Hilltop and adjacent Franklinton have been ravished by the opioid epidemic. Rob was a first generation college student and one of the few who made it out of his neighborhood and went on to college where he eventually went to medical school, trained in emergency medicine, and returned to his hometown.Rob worked at Grant Medical Center, Columbus' busiest Level-1 trauma center, for the last 10 years. Just over a year ago, he began working on a project to give back to his childhood neighborhood and help with the opioid epidemic. Out of a vision he had, Basecamp Recovery Center was born. On August 3rd, 2020, Rob along with Dr. Bryan Borland, opened their doors, began seeing patients, and helping those struggling with substance use disorder.Join The Mosaic Life Circle to be the first to hear about new episode releases, exclusive Instagram content, and brand new merchandise deals!Suffering from Addiction? Please Utilize These Resources:Contact or Visit Basecamp Recovery Center815 W. Broad Street, #200Columbus, OH 43222(614) 717-0822Find an addiction treatment center:https://www.samhsa.govFind an addiction physician:https://www.asam.orgConnect with Basecamp Recovery Center@BasecampMed on Facebook@BasecampMed on Instagram@BasecampMed on TwitterBasecampMed.comTimestamps00:05:29 Welcome Rob & Bryan00:06:48 The Opioid Crisis00:11:32 Rob's Story00:15:15 Bryan's Story00:21:12 Drug Use in the Medical Field00:24:59 Basecamp Recovery Center00:28:30 Spirituality in Recovery00:33:49 The Consequences of Marijuana Legalization00:37:28 Genetic Predisposition to Substance Use Disorder00:41:20 The Resources Basecamp Provides00:44:15 Why People Use00:47:11 Approaching the Addiction Problem00:56:02 Why We Shouldn't Place Blame00:59:36 Getting the Help an Addict Needs01:03:39 Life-Changing Books01:06:50 Reaching BasecampRob's Life-Changing BookThe Book of ProverbsBryan's Life-Changing Book“Shifting the Monkey: The Art of Protecting Good People From Liars, Criers, and Other Slackers” by Todd WhitakerBooks Mentioned“Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic” by Sam Quinones“Addictive Thinking: Understanding Self-Deception” by Abraham J Twerski M.D.“Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams” by Matthew Walker“Ego is the Enemy” by Ryan Holiday“Meditations” by Marcus AureliusAdditional ResourcesGrant Medical CenterYale School of Medicine: New strategies for combating the opioid epidemicAlcoholics AnonymousNarcotics AnonymousFederation of State Physician Health Programs12-Step Recovery ProgramWorkaholics AnonymousSubstance Abuse & Mental Health Organization (SAMHSA)The American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM)Words of Wisdom“Seeing much, suffering much, and studying much, are the three pillars of learning.” -Benjamin DisraeliSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Our latest podcast features an interview with New York Times best-selling author Beth Macy, author of “Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and The Drug Company That Addicted America.” Macy is also creator of the Audible Original audio documentary, “Dopesick: Finding Tess." In our conversation, we discuss the overwhelming response to “Dopesick” and some of the spinoff projects inspired by the book. Macy also shares what she’s personally gained from the experience and what it was like to grow up with a parent who struggled with addiction. Resources mentioned in this episode:Beth Macy’s website: https://intrepidpapergirl.com/ Beth Macy on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/authorBethMacy/ Beth Macy on Twitter: https://twitter.com/papergirlmacy Recommended Books: In Pain: A Bioethicist's Personal Struggle with Opioids by Travis Rieder Long Bright River (A Novel) by Liz Moore Pain Killer: An Empire of Deceit and the Origin of America's Opioid Epidemic by Barry Meier Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic by Sam Quinones American Overdose: The Opioid Tragedy in Three Acts by Chris McGreal Fentanyl, Inc.: How Rogue Chemists Are Creating the Deadliest Wave of the Opioid Epidemic by Ben Westhoff Sponsor Information: Teen Connections https://www.plannedparenthood.org/planned-parenthood-south-atlantic/education-programs/teen-connections Contact: Malinda Britt, PPSAT Community Health Educator Malinda.Britt@ppsat.org / (540) 315-2130

The Opiate Epidemic continues to ravage families and communities alike. Today on the show, Drs. and , authors of The Opioid Epidemic: What Everyone Needs to Know join us to talk about what you need to know.

Why is it that you can find a doctor to prescribe opiates in every single medical practice in America, but it takes so much time and effort to find a doctor to prescribe a natural hormone? Don't mind the rant today. I'm a bit bitter. If you're looking for more information about Matrix Hormones visit MatrixHormones.com Be sure to mention my name to save the $150. Pick up a free TRT Guide below: Avoiding Acne HPTA Restart Protocol Which labs do I need? TRT Expectation Timelines FREE All Things Testosterone Stickers Pick up a Zombie Dad shirt here.

The opioid epidemic impacts families across the country regardless of race, religious beliefs and socio-economic background. But what does this mean for your family? How did it get started? Are parents adding to the problem? How can we keep our teens safe? Mighty Parenting podcast host Sandy Fowler chats with Sam Quinones, author of Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic, to understand how the opioid epidemic is impacting our teens and what parents need to do.  Our Guest: Sam Quinones Detailed Show Notes and Support at MightyParenting.com Our Sponsor: Ecree - On-demand virtual writing tutor for students Support this podcast at MightyParenting.com/support

"Book Report — 'The Coddling of the American Mind'"   Josh and Betsy are back with another book report, so take a look (or a listen) — this book has generated incredible controversy across American culture. Are young Americans “emotionally and intellectually coddled” today? And if so, what should we think and do about it? This and more in the latest from Intersect.   Show Notes: The Atlantic Magazine Article Books: "The Coddling of the American Mind" Yale Students Protest Video: Yale Students Berating Professor - Highlights Josh was reading: "Dreamland... America's Opiate Epidemic"  Questions? Email us at intersect@nepres.com

Sam Quinones is a journalist, storyteller, and author of the enthralling book Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. Dreamland won a National Book Critics Circle award for the Best Nonfiction Book of 2015, and was selected as one of the Best Books of 2015 by Amazon.com, Slate.com, the Daily Beast, Buzzfeed, Seattle Times, Boston Globe, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Entertainment Weekly, and Audible. Sam lived in Mexico for 10 years as a freelance writer before returning to the U.S. to cover immigration, drug trafficking, neighborhood stories, and gangs for the LA Times. Wait till you hear how this crime reporter became an expert on opioids. Visit A Second Opinion's website here: https://asecondopinionpodcast.com/ Engage with us on social media at: Facebook Twitter Instagram  

There are two guests on this week's special 250th episode of The Chauncey DeVega Show. Chris Arnade is a photographer and contributing writer for the New York Times, Atlantic, Guardian, Washington Post, Financial Times, and Wall Street Journal. His new book is Dignity: Seeking Respect in Back Row America. Arnade reflects on leaving his job as a stock trader on Wall Street and embarking on a quest across America during the rise of Trump in an effort to see just how broken American society is and was. Arnade also shares how his walks across New York City and taking pictures of everyday people -- the working class, the poor, people without homes, hustlers, immigrants, migrants, and others -- impacted his understanding of life and human dignity and became the basis of his new book Dignity: Seeking Respect in Back Row America. Arnade also reflects on the power of listening and how in many ways the poor and homeless are more honorable and good than the rich and the powerful. Investigative journalist and author Sam Quinones is the second guest on this week's show. He is a journalist, storyteller, and former LA Times reporter. Quinones' most recent book is Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. Dreamland won the National Book Critics Circle Award in 2015. Quinones explains how Big Pharma and their opiates took over huge swaths of Trumplandia and other parts of the United States through "pain management" -- and then enterprising Mexican drug kingpins were able to leverage that opportunity to import huge amounts of heroin into the country. Quinones also explains what he learned from meeting one of the most important figures in the U.S.-Mexico heroin trade and if Donald Trump's wall will do anything to stem the tide of drugs (and addiction) in America. Chauncey DeVega reflects on America in a time of moral inversion when white supremacists and other right-wing street hooligans and paramilitaries can march openly in American cities such as Portland and it is the anti-fascists who are somehow labeled as "terrorists". Chauncey is deeply worried that tens of millions of Americans no longer know right from wrong in the Age of Trump. And Chauncey also shares some little-known history about the true origins of the Statue of Liberty and how African-Americans struggling against Jim and Jane Crow understood the statue to be an affront and insult. At the end of this week's special 250th episode of the podcast Chauncey shares an exciting story about the newly discovered bones of a 5-foot-tall prehistoric penguin. SELECTED LINKS OF INTEREST FOR THIS EPISODE OF THE CHAUNCEY DEVEGA SHOW    How Stephen Miller authors Trump's immigration policy Ken Cuccinelli's ancestors were dirt-poor Italian immigrants — no different than those Trump wants to bar He sounded the alarm on "Hateland": Daryl Johnson warned us about right-wing terror in 2009 Whose "America" is it? Neil Diamond's big, inclusive vision vs. Donald Trump's narrow hatred Statue of Liberty created to celebrate freed slaves, not immigrants, new museum recounts National Park Service -- Abolition and the Statue of Liberty The Statue of Liberty Was Originally a Muslim Woman Newly Discovered 'Monster' Penguin Was As Tall As an Adult Human WHERE CAN YOU FIND ME? On Twitter: https://twitter.com/chaunceydevega On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/chauncey.devega My email: chaunceydevega@gmail.com Leave a voicemail for The Chauncey DeVega Show: (262) 864-0154 HOW CAN YOU SUPPORT THE CHAUNCEY DEVEGA SHOW? Via Paypal at ChaunceyDeVega.com Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thechaunceydevegashow  Please subscribe to and follow my new podcast The Truth Report https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-truth-report-with-chauncey-devega/id1465522298 http://thetruthreportwithchaunceydevega.libsyn.com/ Music at the end of this week's episode of The Chauncey DeVega Show is by JC Brooks & the Uptown Sound. You can listen to some of their great music on Spotify.   

In this episode, we interview Ginny Atwood Lovitt; an important person in the recovery world! She is a key player in the advocacy arena, naloxone access (the opiate overdose reversal drug), and just an awesome and fun recovery ally. It was so informative, she left us wondering what else in this world of recovery we have yet to uncover! Ginny is the founder of The Chris Atwood Foundation: an organization that has the mission "to save lives from opioid overdose, support recovery from substance use disorder, and defeat the stigma of this treatable brain disease." Check them out at https://www.chrisatwoodfoundation.org! Simply put, Ginny is a force to be reckoned with when it comes to opioid addiction! We really enjoyed having her on the show! Lastly and most importantly, we dedicate this episode in Chris Atwood's honor. May you rest in peace, brother. 

Prescriptions for opioid painkillers have increased by 60 per cent in the UK during the last decade, and the number of codeine-related deaths in England and Wales has more than doubled. The government is now planning to put prominent warnings about the dangers of addiction on the packaging of opioid medicines, to protect people from 'the darker side of painkillers' - as Secretary of State for Health Matt Hancock put it. This is an effort to avoid the situation in the United States where 130 people die every day from opioid-related drug overdoses, which has prompted President Donald Trump to declare a national health emergency.But are we really on the precipice of our own epidemic? David Aaronovitch asks how the situation got so out of control in the USA and whether the UK should do more to regulate painkillers containing opioids. CONTRIBUTORS Sam Quinones, journalist and author of 'Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic'. Dr Raeford Brown, former chair of the FDA's Anesthetic and Analgesic Drug Products Advisory Committee Dr Luke Mordecai, consultant anaesthetist at University College Hospital, with research focus on opiate use and complex pain Professor Leslie Colvin, chair of pain medicine, University of DundeeDr Emily Finch, consultant addiction psychiatrist at the South London and Maudsley NHS TrustProducers: Serena Tarling & Richard Fenton-Smith Researcher: Kirsteen KnightDetails of organisations offering information and support with addiction are available at bbc.co.uk/actionline, or you can call for free at any time to hear recorded information on 08000 155 947.

This episode will cover the evolution of this opioid epidemic in America. Mr. Sam Quinones, author of Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic will be discussing the heroin trade in America, it’s connection to prescription opioids, the medical community’s move towards pain management, pharmaceutical marketing, and general attitudes around poverty and social isolation. We will discuss the web of contributing factors that have created our current state as well as ideas on how to move forward.

#169: David Drew Pinsky, commonly known as Dr. Drew, is an American celebrity doctor who is a board-certified internist, addiction medicine specialist, and media personality. He serves as producer and starred in the VH1 show Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew, and its spinoffs Sex Rehab with Dr. Drew, and Celebrity Rehab Presents Sober House. On this episode we discuss addiction, social media addiction, sex addiction, celebrity rehab and the opiate epidemic.   To connect with Dr. Drew Pinsky click HERE To connect with Lauryn Evarts click HERE To connect with Michael Bosstick click HERE Read More on The Skinny Confidential HERE For Detailed Show Notes visit TSCPODCAST.COM To Call the Him & Her Hotline call: 1-833-SKINNYS (754-6697) This episode is brought to you by FOUR SIGMATIC We have been drinking this company's mushroom-infused elixirs and coffees for over a year now. When we need a break from coffee but still need that extra morning jolt and focus the Mushroom Coffee with Lion's Mane and Chaga is the way to go. Lauryn also drinks the Mushroom Matcha which is a green tea designed as a coffee alternative for those of you who want to cut back on caffeine without losing focus and cognitive boosts. This stuff doesn't actually taste like mushrooms, it's delicious. All of these blends have a ton of nutrients and amino acids to give you balanced energy without the jitters. To try FOUR SIGMATIC products go to foursigmatic.com/skinny and use promo code SKINNY for 15% off all products.  This episode is brought to you by RITUAL Forget everything you thought you knew about vitamins. Ritual is the brand that’s reinventing the experience with 9 essential nutrients women lack the most. If you’re ready to invest in your health, do what I did and go to www.ritual.com/skinny  Your future self will thank you for taking Ritual: Consider it your ‘Lifelong-Health-401k’. Why put anything but clean ingredients (backed by real science) in your body?

Last year, 72,000 Americans died from drug overdoses. A lot of those deaths -- about three-fourths -- were caused by opioid medication prescribed by doctors or substances like heroin obtained on the street. A disproportionate number of the dead are from West Virginia. For several years, the state has led the nation in per-capita opioid-related deaths. In this episode, hosts Trey Kay and Chery Glaser talk about the origins of the Appalachian drug epidemic. They're joined by Los Angeles crime reporter Sam Quinones, the author of Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic, and by Ian Kessinger, a former addict who now runs a recovery clinic in Elkins, West Virginia.

Sam Quiñones researched and wrote the book Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic. In this episode, Annie has the privilege of speaking with Sam, who shares his rich experiences writing the book - from researching Mexican cartel trafficking, to meeting dealers in prisons who were open and raw with their stories, to getting to know the family members impacted by a Loved One's addiction. Sam paints a vivid picture of how the closing of community pools such as Dreamland (the books namesake) in Portsmouth, Ohio contributed to the gathering storm of what has become our country's worst drug epidemic in history. Hearing Sam feels like listening to an old friend describe years of family and community stories that hit right to the heart of all of us. Dreamland is a book everyone should read, and this is an episode everyone should hear!! A membership at Allies in Recovery brings you into contact with experts in the fields of recovery and treatment for drug and alcohol issues. Our learning platform introduces you to CRAFT and guides you through the best techniques for unblocking the situation. Together we will move your loved one towards recovery. Learn more here: https://alliesinrecovery.net/#benefits

Every day, more than 115 people in the United States die after overdosing on opioids.  The misuse of, and addiction to, opioids — including prescription pain relievers, heroin, and synthetic opioids such as fentanyl — is a serious national crisis that affects public health as well as social and economic welfare.  But, how did it become such a big problem?  For some insight into that, we turn to award-winning journalist Sam Quinones, who’s the author of the book, “Dreamland:  The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic”.  You can learn more about him at http://www.samquinones.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

“The prestige of the government had undoubtedly been lowered considerably by prohibition”, Albert Einstein observed when he visited the United States in the early 1920s. “Nothing is more destructive of respect for the government and the law of the land than laws which cannot be enforced.” In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss Smoke Signals by Martin A. Lee. In this book we take a walk through the history of marijuana, from it being a legal, useful plant and the third largest crop in the U.S to it being illegal and harshly but selectively punished. We see how racism and the variety of political backgrounds have shaped the PR of this ancient plant. “It was a move that served as a pretext for harassing Mexicans. Just as opium legalization in San Francisco 40 years earlier was directed at another despised minority, the Chinese. In each case the target of the prohibition was not the drug so much as those most associated with its use. Typically in the United States drug statutes have been aimed or selectively enforced against a feared or disparaged group within society.” We cover a wide range of topics, including: The history of marijuana, benefits and uses Arguments for and against legalization Political figures and their contribution to The War on Drugs Effects of consumption, psychedelics and edibles Tangents on wellness retreats, duels and fact checking fake news And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Smoke Signals by Martin A. Lee! You can also listen on Google Play Music, SoundCloud, YouTube, or in any other podcasting app by searching “Made You Think.” If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Homo Deus by Yuval Harari for more on the domestication of plants and animals. Or for a totally different type of episode check out Godel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter as a counter to this linear, fact based book. Be sure to join our mailing list to find out about what books are coming up, giveaways we're running, special events, and more. Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show Marijuana [00:32] Neolithic period [01:21] Recreational drug use [02:42] Colorado [02:49] World War I [03:57] World War II [03:58] Virginia [05:27] New York [05:28] Maryland [05:31] Washington, DC [05:32] Austin, Texas [05:38] Shaman [06:18] Biochemistry [06:23] THC [06:26] Psychedelics [06:50] Spirit Journeys [06:53] Hindu texts [07:03] Soma [07:06] Moses [07:52] God [07:53] Ten Commandments [07:54] Ayahuasca [07:59] LSD [08:10] High on Mount Sinai? – Hebrew University’s professor’s theory – Reuters [08:18] The Burning Bush (Ex 3:1–6): A study of natural phenomena as manifestation of divine presence in the Old Testament and in African context [08:18] Hebrew University [08:27] Israel [08:28] Sinai Peninsula [08:31] Amazon Jungle [08:35] Higher Consciousness [09:43] Joe Rogan Experience #1133 – Dennis McKenna [10:25] Silicide [10:26] Mushrooms [10:27] Pharmacological research [10:44] Hemp [12:54] CBD [13:56] Omega 3 [15:18] Declaration of Independence [15:28] Cotton [16:22] Tobacco [16:23] Dietary fat [18:33] Duels [18:40] WeWork [19:01] Estrogen [23:26] Cooking oils [24:46] Soy Oil [24:52] Corn Oil [24:52] Canola Oil [24:57] Arizona [25:32] Miraval Retreat [25:38] Mindfulness [25:38] Healing crystals [26:34] Mysticism [26:39] Civil war [28:26] Hashish candy [28:28] Sears Roebuck Catalog [28:30] Sativa [28:53] Indica [28:54] Edibles [30:11] Salvia [31:30] Paris [32:15] Prohibition [32:54] Mexican Revolution [33:35] California [35:03] Texas [35:11] Ivy League [39:23] FDA [41:18] Patents [41:27] Marinol [41:42] Whey protein [41:57] Keto Diet [42:11] Epilepsy [42:29] Skin diseases [42:32] Autoimmune disorders [42:34] Obesity [42:37] Glaucoma [42:56] Parkinson's [43:24] Federal Marijuana Farm [43:52] California Cannabis Law [44:10] Syria [44:48] Marijuana Tax Act [44:57] Federal Bureau of Narcotics [46:17] FBI [46:27] Great Depression [46:28] Opiate Epidemic [47:06] Alcoholism [47:08] Maryland [47:14] GreenDoc [47:31] San Francisco [48:38] Eaze App [48:44] Postmates [48:47] Ubereats [48:48] Skype [49:10] GrubHub [50:17] LaGuardia committee [50:57] New York Mayor [50:59] Jews [52:23] African-Americans [52:23] Mexican Government [52:56] Congress [54:34] Homophobia [54:39] Pro-family [54:43] Amphetamines [55:13] NIDA agency [55:30] Jamaica [55:38] Postpartum Depression [57:23] Nausea [57:25] Stress [57:33] Anxiety [57:35] Cortisol [57:41] Breast milk [57:45] Meditation [58:15] Heroin [01:01:42] Oxycodone [01:01:59] Libertarians [01:01:23] Protein [01:02:54] Amino acids [01:02:56] Iron [01:02:58] Magnesium [01:02:59] Vitamins [01:03:01] Self-medication [01:05:50] Chemo [01:05:54] Leukemia [01:06:04] Endocannabinoid system [01:06:54] Cannabinoid Receptors [01:07:06] Types of cancer [01:08:20] Peripheral nervous system [01:08:52] Immune system [01:08:54] Lymph cells [01:09:01] Endocrine glands [01:09:02] Reproductive organs [01:09:03] Alzheimer’s Disease [01:09:07] MDMA [01:12:00] Books mentioned Smoke Signals by Martin Lee Godel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter [04:45] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Finite and Infinite Games by James Carse [05:11] (book episode) The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus [05:17] (book episode) Brave New World by Aldous Huxley [07:08] The Bible [07:52] Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [20:44] (Nat’s notes) (book episode) Sapiens by Yuval Harari [20:46] (Nat’s Notes) (part I, part II) Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas [31:58] People mentioned Martin A.Lee Albert Einstein [00:06] Barack Obama [02:37] Joe Rogan [10:31] Terence McKenna [10:35] Dennis McKenna [10:40] Thomas Jefferson [15:24] George Washington [16:30] Donald Trump [18:51] Al Capone [36:53] Nassim Taleb [44:36] (Antifragile episode, Skin in the Game episode) Franklin D. Roosevelt [44:59] Malcolm X [45:56] Harry J. Anslinger [46:07] Richard Nixon [51:23] H. R Haldeman [52:03] Newt Gingrich [54:48] Ronald Reagan [58:49] Nancy Reagan [58:53] Bill Clinton [01:05:08] Show Topics 00:31 – This seems to be one of the longest marijuana books in existence. 390 pages but incredibly detailed. So much history of this ancient plant. Includes scientific, medical and recreational history as well as legislative and political history. The book focuses on the US history of marijuana and some within Europe too. 02:09 – The book starts as soon as the U.S was colonized around 1776 and includes insights right through to 2009. The push on recreational legalization started happening right after this book came out. We knew that cannabis had been illegal for a long time but didn’t know how it became that way. It’s strange to consider that there used to be a law that farmers had to grow hemp. Lots of things in the book are counter to what your original impression might be. We are not high for this episode, this book is too linear and fact-based for that. 05:47 – The book includes a little bit of background on the history of cannabis and the uses. We know old tribes around the world were using psychedelics and other plant medicines to induce spirit journeys or healing rituals. It seems to be a global constant that people are using mind-altering drugs for spiritual experiences. There are theories around certain bible stories being a recounting of a psychedelic experience. 07:59 – Ayahuasca as an incredible psychedelic, several plants found in the Amazon are known for their mind altering capabilities. Drugs have been used in rituals for a long time. Cannabis seems to be like revered for that reason in many of these cultures. Marijuana is a psychedelic when consumed certain ways. It would be pretty easy to think that by taking this plant you're communicating with God. You can't really get these experiences any other way. 11:03 – Looking at the benefits of marijuana and how it can change your perception of the world. Dennis McKenna explains that your brain filters everything you interact with in life and you're looking at it through a lens. With psychedelics and even marijuana some of those filters start to fall away. In some ways you start to see things more clearly. You see things from a different perspective. It puts you in an altered state of consciousness. The uses and harms of marijuana – marketing problem vs framing problem. 12:54 – The distinction between hemp and marijuana is really interesting. They are the same plant but owning hemp products is legal as it is non-psychoactive. So much of society depended up on hemp up until the 1800’s, clothes, paper, rope, oil. It is nutritionally dense too. The production of hemp was so important it was a matter of national security. It’s amazing how public opinion of a product can change. It was the third largest crop until it was criminalized. 200 years later people are getting thrown in jail for possession. Are there any things that we take for granted that will just be like completely illegal in the future? 19:01 – WeWork banning meat consumption on expenses. Vegetarianism would contribute to the reduction in numbers of animals if meat consumption goes down. We can’t sustain the numbers of animals if it is not for consumption. In Homo Deus it mentions that 50% of all non-domesticated fauna have either gone extinct or are on the road to extinction in the last 200 years. 21:18 – Argument against eating chicken. Smaller animal with less meat, not eating chicken is the easiest way to reduce the amount of suffering created through your diet. Also for dietary reasons due to excessive estrogen. 25:49 – Wellness retreats and limited health science knowledge. Some people are vegan for health reasons, some for virtue signalling reasons. They only make choices that are externally visibly as being health conscious. Behind the scenes, like cooking with lower quality oil, poorer choices are made. 28:15 – Origin of the word marijuana from Mexico. Modern strains don’t have much CBD any more because they have been bred to have increased THC. THC is the psychoactive component and CBD is the healing component. Eating it is a very different experience to smoking it. Four times as strong as it is digested and processed by the liver. Varying trends over the years in consumption. Chewing, ingesting, smoking. Hashish clubs and dinner, as part of puddings. 32:44 – The term marijuana came from Mexican slang. Prohibitionist started using it take advantage of growing racism against Mexicans. Became attributed to being a Mexican thing. California was the first to outlaw it in 1913. 35:21 – “It was a move that served as a pretext for harassing Mexicans. Just as opium legalization in San Francisco 40 years earlier was directed at another despised minority the Chinese. In each case the target of the prohibition was not the drug so much as those most associated with its use. Typically in the United States drug statutes have been aimed or selectively enforced against a feared or disparaged group within society.” Recurring theme of using drug laws as a form of racism. Looking at the arguments to keep marijuana illegal, some say this is a way to like catch people who are doing other crimes. Also that the police choose to not go after the actual drug dealers. There are more low level consumers who are easier to prosecute. Laws seem to be enforced extremely selectively. By being put in jail that increases the likelihood of becoming a more serious criminal. 40:23 – Marijuana has so many medical uses. As a society we are used to single target drugs but cannabis has over 200 different active compounds. The pharma industry is mostly interested in patentable compounds – a plant isn’t patentable. Cannabis has been found to reduce side effects of lots of conditions. Remarkable stories of it stopping the progress of glaucoma, stopping people turning blind. People in states that do not have legal marijuana access for medical purposes have to rely on friends bringing it to them illegally. 44:36 – False narratives portrayed to the public about the effects of cannabis use. Taleb said that if any time somebody uses children or women as the reason for something being bad, they're probably lying. It was said that “marijuana will make Mexicans and blacks lust after your wives”. 44:59 – Acts of cannabis taxation were brought into force and enforced harshly before people even knew the law existed. The punishment does not fit the crime at all. Harry J. Anslinger put together a campaign against marijuana for more funding and to keep his job. Doctors are now getting tired prescribing opiates and seeing people get addicted to them so are turning to dispensing cannabis where usage is legal. In San Francisco there are startups that will deliver marijuana products in under 30 minutes. 50:47 – So many research initiatives are being done and they overwhelmingly say it's not harmful however Anslinger ignores them. Side effects are debunked and the LaGuardia committee refutes every claim. 51:41 – Moving on in history to Nixon. “Nixon linked cannabis to loudmouth to racial protesters. ‘They're all on drugs’. He brusquely told an aide. Susceptible to bouts of paranoia the commander-in-chief blamed the Jews for spearheading efforts to legalize cannabis. ‘You know, it's a funny thing every one of those bastards that are out there for legalizing marijuana is Jewish, what the Christ is the matter with the Jews Bob?’ Nixon asked his closest advisor HR Haldeman. In private conversations with his inner circle tricky dick also Savaged African-Americans. Nixon emphasized that ‘you have to face the fact that the whole problem is really the blacks. The key is to devise a system that recognizing this while not appear in to’ Haldeman wrote in his diary.” 52:30 – You can't like just make a law that it's illegal to be black or Jewish but you can pass a law that targets them. Crackdowns on production did nothing except increase the price of marijuana and make more Mexicans want to farm it. Distinctions between alcohol and marijuana. “Nixon, a heavy drinker, drew a rather fuzzy distinction between marijuana and alcohol. ‘A person doesn't drink to get drunk a person drinks to have fun while a person smokes pot to get high’, the president told a friend” “Addicted to sleeping pills and amphetamines and often South on liquor Nixon staggered through the White House in a daze talking to portraits of past presidents that hung on the walls" 54:08 – Everybody who's heavily against legalization is a hypocrite in one way or another they're either alcoholics or they're taking painkillers. It seems like a fairly common theme. Studies on effects of marijuana consumption in Jamaican mothers. “The ganja moms and their kids did not appear to be harmed by marijuana exposure in the womb. There were no physical abnormalities, no cognitive deficits and no neonatal complications nor were there any discernible differences between the three day old babies of mothers who used marijuana and the three-day-old non-exposed babies. They were surprised to discover that after one month the babies of mothers who had used ganja throughout their pregnancy were actually healthier more alert and less fussy than one month old infants whose mothers did not take cannabis. Test results for one month old infants whose mothers also ingested ganja while breastfeeding were even more striking heavily exposed babies were more socially responsive and more autonomically stable than babies is not exposed to cannabis through their mothers milk. Alertness was higher motor and autonomic function or autonomous systems were robust. They were less irritable less likely to demonstrate in balance of tone needed less examiner facilitation than the neonates of non using mothers. And then when they were tested at four and five their team found absolutely no difference between the children of ganja moms and children of non-users.” 56:58 – These studies showed little side effects, seems quite beneficial. Nancy Reagan was a chronic user of prescription tranquilizers. Her daughter basically said her mother's anti-drug advocacy may have been a form of denial. Dangers of overstating the harmful nature of cannabis has other effects. “Uncle Sam cried wolf too often first. Marijuana was said to create maniacal Killers then to produce inert masses of lazy indulges when teens caught on they weren't getting the Straight Dope about marijuana. They were more likely to ignore warnings about genuinely dangerous drugs.” 01:00:26 – Perception of marijuana impacts other harder drugs. Whenever an authority says something is unhealthy we now re-consider if that is true or not. Fortunately we are now in a time we can fact check anything instantly. Nutritional value of red meat and checking what is true. 01:04:04 – It's really clearly a racism thing, whites and blacks use illegal drugs at the same rate however blacks were arrested prosecuted and jailed at much higher rates. This book covers the war on drugs and how it escalated from the 50’s through to the 90’s. Benefits of marijuana, fasting and ketosis on chemo patients. There could be so much more research on these things. Feels like a crime to make something so helpful, illegal. Horribly ironic in some sense because you know Reagan died of Alzheimer's. It seems like doctors just have known of these benefits it for years. 01:10:37 – Oxycontin and number of deaths. It’s crazy how something so deadly is legal. “Purdue Pharma multi-billion dollar blockbuster was linked to thousands of Overdose deaths. Of the almost 500,000 Hospital emergency room visits in the US in 2004 more than 36,000 involved Oxycontin.” No one has ever died from marijuana ever write as far as we know. People will say it's a gateway drug. The only way it's a gateway drug is when it's illegal as it forces you to create a relationship with a dealer. 01:12:53 – Since legalization teen marijuana use is unchanged in both, Colorado and Washington State. Amazing how political the history is, in a mix of racism and fear mongering. All of the research around the benefits is fairly compelling. “The Economist, the blue-chip British magazine editorialized that the FDA's stance on marijuana lacked common sense adding, if cannabis were unknown and bio-prospectors were suddenly to find it in some remote mountain crevice, its discovery would no doubt be hailed as a medical breakthrough. Scientists would praise its potential for treating everything from pain to cancer and marvel at its rich pharmacopoeia, many of whose chemicals mimic vital molecules in the human body.” 01:15:46 – There has also been significant reduction in opioid usage in the states with active dispensaries for cannabis. 01:16:08 – If you’d like to support the show go to patreon.com/madeyouthink. You get access to fun things like all of our bonus material our detailed notes for each episode and hangouts. You can get that at Patreon and we appreciate the support of the show. We like to keep it ad free and natural. We appreciate everyone who is already supporting us there and everyone who is going to go support us after this show. It means a lot. If you haven't left a review on iTunes, we'd really appreciate that as well. Let your friends know about the show and you can always message us on Twitter at @NatEliason and @TheRealNeilS. There are other options at madeyouthinkpodcast.com/support related to shopping. We'd love to hang out with you in the Patreon community and talk more there we'll see you there and we will see you next week. Thanks everyone. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe at https://madeyouthinkpodcast.com  

Jason and Alan are joined by a panel of experts to talk about bonding and composite restorations! Our Brain Trust panel consists of podcasting rock star Dr. Joshua Austin of the Working Interferences podcast, Dr. Marc Geissberger and Dr. Adam Hodges! We delve into everything about bonding in this round table! Some highlights: How should we treat composite differently than other materials? What's better about composite now than 10-15 years ago? The evolution of bonding systems...is simpler better? Total etch vs. selective etch vs self etch How can you maximize enamel engagement in your preps? What are the properties of newer composites, including the newer bulk fills? How do you evaluate information about materials? Who is a good source of information? If you have any questions for us or for our panel of experts, drop us a line at info@dentalhacks.com! Links from the show: Premier Dental Two Striper 204.3.5f (for occlusal preparations) Josh Austin's article on Instagram: Porn for Your Practice: Make Yourself Miserable with Social Media 3M Filtek One (bulk fill) 3M Filtek Supreme Ultra The "weapons grade" 3M Deep Cure S Clinical Hack of the Week: adjusting occlusion when you aren't changing the bite. Almore Shimstock The Dental Hacks Nation closed Facebook group has almost 25,000 members! Head over there to interact with other Dental Hacks listeners, guests and Brain Trust members every day, all day! Remember…if you don’t have anything “dental” on your FB page, we might decline your membership request. So IM the group or email us at info@dentalhacks.comGo check out the Dental Success Network! Jason and Alan are part of this amazing 3 pronged network: social network, CE network and buying network! Sign up and let them know the Dental Hacks sent you by using our code: DHN! Mirror Image is really good provisional crown material. Fast setting, easy trimming, great colors and holds a great polish. We're huge fans. But now...you can get it in 10ml syringes! No longer are you limited to the big impression gun sizes! So go check out Mirror Image provisional material in 50ml cartridges or 10ml syringes at dentalhacks.com/mirrorimage. Go Hack Yourself: Alan: Dreamland: The True Tale of American's Opiate Epidemic, by Sam Quinones If you have any questions or comments for us please drop us an email at info@dentalhacks.com or find us (and like us!) at www.facebook.com/dentalhacks. Or, if you prefer…give us a call at (866) 223-5257 and leave us a message. You might be played in the show! If you like us, why not leave us a review on iTunes? It helps us get found by like minded people and might even help us get into “What’s Hot” in the iTunes store! Go to this link and let the world know about the DentalHacks! Finally, if you aren’t an Apple person, consider reviewing us on Stitcher at: stitcher.com/podcast/the-dentalhacks-podcast! If you would like to support the podcast you can check out our Patreon page! Although the show will always remain free to download, our Patreon supporters get access to special bonus content including (at least) one extra podcast episode every months! Also be sure to check out the Dental Hacks swag store where you can find t-shirts, stickers coffee mugs and all sorts of other things that let the world know you’re a part of the Hacks Nation

Join us Wednesday, August 1, 2018 at 4:00 p.m. PST and 7:00 p.m. EST for a live show with host Denise Messenger. Dr. Christopher Metzler is our guest and will be talking about the U.S. opiate epidemic. Educated at The University of Oxford in Oxford England and Columbia University, Dr. Metzler obtained a Ph.D. in International Legal Philosophy from The University of Aberdeen. A former faculty member at Cornell University, he too, stood as Senior Associate Dean of Applied Management Degrees at Georgetown University. Today, he is a Senior Fellow at the Thomas Jefferson School of Medicine Institute of Emerging Health Professions — home of The Sidney Kimmel School of Medicine. A non-Executive Chairman in the global healthcare enterprise, Dr. Metzler’s business portfolio spans wide in the medical and Management Consulting fields, where he stands CEO of Gordium HealthCare, City Place Pharmacy, Next Generation Labs, JMI Consulting, Medicine on Wheels, 911 Urgent Care, FHWFIT, MelixMJ and others. Author of The Construction and Rearticulation of Race in a “Post-Racial” America(2008), Dr. Metzler’s forthcoming works include Divided We stand: The Quest for America's Soul(Post Hill Press, 2018). In the charitable sphere, he serves on the boards of The America Red Cross and The ARC. He also works tirelessly at All Saint’s Soup Kitchen in Fort Lauderdale, FL providing meals, clothing and other assistance to the homeless. You asked for it and we deliver.    

The “opiate epidemic” in the USA can be traced directly to the specific actions of various Lobbying groups, and various politician pressure on DEA policies as outlined in both CBS documentary and Sarasota HT researched with various news organizations.

Dr. Fitz and Brandon Soderberg discuss media consolidation in Baltimore from Baltimore Beat and the City Paper to Tronc and the Sinclair Media Group. Music: Be More by TT the Artist and Mighty Mark Kid Radium by Ed Schrader's Music Beat Invocation: Dear Baltimore by Erricka Bridgeford and Judah Adashi Book Recommendations: Why We Matter by Eaton Thomas Things that Make White People Uncomfortably by Michael Bennett Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic by Sam Quinones

Sam Quinones, American journalist and author of the critically acclaimed book, Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic, shares the story of how he discovered the truth about the Opiate Epidemic. 

While Codeine is now taken off the shelves and will only be available by prescription, weand're talking about the Opiate Epidemic that is sweeping the world. Help Vision to keep 'Connecting Faith to Life': https://vision.org.au/donate See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Part one of a detailed look into the so-called opiate epidemic. I've had experience with friends and family members who have used these miracle pills for good and bad and I've also known people that have sold them taking advantage of the continued legislation to basically make them illegal and making the black market flow! Sit back and get educated on one of the most controversial medications around!!

The United States is in the midst of an epidemic of addiction and overdose deaths due to opiate painkillers. Its causes are varied, but there’s no question that physicians share a large part of the blame. Little discussed is that this is actually the second time this has happened. Almost a century ago, a remarkably similar epidemic struck the country. In this episode, called “The First Opiate Epidemic,” I discuss what happened, the parallels to today, and the lessons we can learn from our forebearers. Learn about all this and a new #AdamAnswers in this month’s Bedside Rounds, a tiny podcast about fascinating stories in clinical medicine!   Sources:   Courtwright DT. Dark Paradise: A History of Opiate Addiction in America. Harvard University Press, 2001. Meldrum ML, “The ongoing opiod prescription epidemic: historical context,” Am J Public Health. 2016 August; 106(8): 1365–1366. Courtwright DT, “Preventing and treating narcotic addiction -- a century of federal drug control,” N Engl J Med 2015; 373:2095-2097. Adams JFA, “Substitutes for opium in chronic diseases,” Boston Med Surg J 1889; 121:351-356. Macht DI, “The history of opium and some of its preparations and alkaloids,” JAMA. 1915;LXIV(6):477-481. Hamilton GR and Baskett TF, “In the arms of Morpheus: the development of morphine for postoperative pain relief,” Can J Anesth. 2000;47:4, 367-374. Weiner JP, “A shortage of physicians or a surplus of assumptions?” Health Aff January 2002 vol. 21 no. 1 160-162. Gudbranson BA et al, Reassessing the Data on Whether a Physician Shortage Exists. JAMA. 2017;317(19):1945-1946. Kirch DG and Petelle K, Addressing the Physician Shortage: The Peril of Ignoring Demography. JAMA. 2017;317(19):1947-1948.  

Podcast #29- Soaring Life Radio; Opiate Epidemic by Carolyn Dolan

Renee speaks with journalist Sam Quinones, author of Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic and other books. A reporter for almost 30 years, Quinones lived and worked as a freelance writer in Mexico from 1994 to 2004. He is a former reporter for the LA Times.

Enteprise Plugged In - June 23, 2017

Author of “Jerry (from accounting)” Interview starts at 14:56 and ends at 45:09 "I love what Amazon is doing in terms of giving access to a platform in a kind of populist way. I think that is incredibly helpful. I think the distribution is amazing. It creates new readers. I love the $2 price point for a novella. I think that's definitely expanding who can have access to the writing and quality writing. Historically speaking the Big Five were very focused on content and less on how the distribution was happening, and that was what they were pretty good at. Amazon's strength was in more distribution and being ahead of the curve on the eBooks. I think Amazon now is catching up and really focusing on content across the board." News “Amazon's Ambitions Unboxed: Stores for Furniture, Appliances and More” by Nick Wingfield at The New York Times - March 25, 2017 “Amazon, the world's most remarkable firm, is just getting started” at The Economist - March 25, 2017 “Amazon could become our leading physical retailer before very long” by Mike Shatzkin - March 21, 2017 “Busy Week for Amazon Ends with Stock Surge to Record Close” by Angel Gonzalez at The Seattle Times - March 31, 2017 Tech Tip Is your Amazon Fire HD 8 sluggish? Try shutting off some apps. Interview with Timothy DeLizza Day One Magazine (send submissions to dayone-submissions@amazon.com) Jerry (from accounting) by Timothy DeLizza Goodreads page for Jerry (from accounting) My Medium post which mentions Jerry (from accounting) - March 8, 2016 The Collected Poems of Wallace Stevens “Spiritual and Menial Housework” by Dorothy Roberts at Yale Journal of Law & Feminism - 1997 Growing Up Absurd: Problems of Youth in the Organized Society by Paul Goodman Latham & Watkins Amazon Publishing's Little a imprint for literary fiction and nonfiction Books Timothy DeLizza is currently reading: There Are More Beautiful Things than Beyonce by Morgan Parker, Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic by Sam Quinones, Human Acts: A Novel by Han Kang Outro “Dr. Ruth Readies for Blast Off!” (video released by Amazon Publishing for April 1, 2017) Next Week's Guest Bufo Calvin of the I Love My Kindle blog and I will rendezvous in Virtual Reality via an app named vTime to discuss how Amazon may get involved in VR this year. Music for my podcast is from an original Thelonius Monk composition named "Well, You Needn't." This version is "Ra-Monk" by Eval Manigat on the "Variations in Time: A Jazz Perspective" CD by Public Transit Recording" CD. Please Join the Kindle Chronicles group at Goodreads! You can follow my essays on travel, authors, technology, politics, and daily life at Medium. Right-click here and then click "Save Link As..." to download the audio to your computer, phone, or MP3 player.

This week we sat down with Jack Meredith, head of Marketing at Kettle & Fire Bone Broth. You may think that you’ve got an hour of broth talk ahead of you…but you’d be wrong. This is probably the most diverse show we’ve ever done in terms of topics. From bone broth basics, to identifying your audience and monetizing your blog, then over to the opiate epidemic in the US and dealing with addiction, and finishing up with some thoughts on International Women’s Day. We aren’t kidding. This one is all over the map. Follow up with Jack at his website, JackMeredith.co Catch Kettle and Fire on Instagram @KettleandFire Catch up with Kristin at thegirlwiththebutter.com or @TheGirlWithTheButter. Get more from Everett at paleofatkid.com or @PaleoFatKid Don’t forget about our awesome sponsors!! This episode is brought to you by PureWOD. PureWOD offers high quality, junk-free, additive-free, dairy-free protein, pre workout, and more. We’re loving the GREENS Micronutrient Powder. Filled with 14 servings of organic fruits and vegetables, like alfalfa leaf, wheatgrass, barley grass, broccoli, cabbage, kale, spirulina, pineapple, blackberry and goji berry with the added boost of liver support from N-Acetyl Cysteine, ALA, and Milk Thistle with MCT Oil to increase absorption. We LOVE it for everyday but especially for staying nutrient-packed when traveling. Don’t forget to try the NEW Vanilla Build! As a special offer for our community, PureWOD is offering a 10% discount to our awesome listeners. Simply head over to purewod.com and use promotion code “PALEOPODCAST” (all caps no spaces!) at checkout.  Catch up with Kettle & Fire Bone Broth! Get 20% off you’re order PLUS free shipping when you visit Kettle & Fire with the code PALEOPODCAST. I love making my own bone broth but there’s something really nice about having the work and the wai ting done for you. Sometimes ya just want it without having to wait two days for those bones to simmer.  Kettle & Fire is fresh, never-frozen bone broth that won’t go bad, doesn’t require freezing and doesn’t ship with harmful styrofoam containers and dry ice.  It’s shelf-stable, using NO preservatives or additives of any kind. 100% of the bones are from organic, pasture-raised and grass-fed cattle. Actually, every ingredient in their broth is from organic sources. They simmer their bones for over 24 hours to get all of the protein, amino acids, collagen, and glutamine that you would enjoy from a homemade broth. Check it out and try some!  

In their weekly update podcast, Chuck and Rachel discuss the final article in Chuck's series about the economic impacts of the Shreveport highway project. They also dish about the current standings in the Strongest Town Contest and reveal how their brackets have fared. Mentioned in this podcast: "The Economics of the I-49 Connector, Part 3" by Chuck Marohn Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic by Sam Quinones Strongest Town Contest

In this episode of Dudes and Beer host Christopher Jordan is joined by Steven Bishop as well as special guests and hosts of #The Breaks on Austin's own KUTX 98.9 FM as well as the Those Damn Comic Book Guys podcast Aaron “Fresh” Knight, Confucius Jones and DJ Amora to discuss the American opiate epidemic and the resurgence of heroin on the streets. Is heroin on the rise in again in America? Since the early 1800s America has had a love affair with opiates, but has the demon of Heroin yet again raised it's head on our city streets? Has the industry of “big pharma” helped or hurt this situation in our country? Why are millenials turning not only to opiates, but to heroin to escape their problems? Is the situation in the World today so dire that we must anesthetize ourselves? What are the dangers behind a society that is disconnected from feeling? These questions and more in this revealing episode of the Dudes and Beer podcast

Since the late 1990’s there has been an explosion in the prescribing of opiate pain medication. As a result of advocacy programs such as treating pain as the “Fifth Vital Sign” and aggressive marketing by the pharmaceutical industry, the number of prescriptions has tripled from 76 million in 1991 to 219 million in 2011 (Vector One National). Listen as Chris Johnson, MD, walks you through his journey and experience with the opiate epidemic in the United States. Dr. Johnson works with the Institute for Clinical Systems Improvement on their Pain Management Work Group, which develops evidence-based guidelines for treating pain applicable to all specialties. He is also a member of the Minnesota Medical Association’s Board of Trustees. Chris Johnson received his medical training at the Medical College of Virginia in Richmond, VA, graduating in 2000 and completed his residency training in Emergency Medicine at Hennepin County Medical Center in 2003. He has been practicing in the Twin Cities for the last 13 years and is currently part of the Allina Health Care system. He has been involved in fighting the prescription opiate epidemic for over a decade and currently serves as Chairperson for the Dept. of Human Services Opioid Prescribing workgroup. In addition, he is a Board Member of the national organization Physicians for Responsible Opioid Prescribing and is a Board Member of the local advocacy group – the Steve Rummler Hope Foundation, whose mission is to raise awareness of the problem of chronic pain and opiate addiction. He works with the Institute for Clinical Systems Improvement on their Pain Management Work Group, which develops evidence-based guidelines for treating pain applicable to all specialties. He is also a member of the Minnesota Medical Association’s Board of Trustees. Dr. Johnson’s Articles: CNN: The other tragedy behind Prince’s death MN Physician’s Profession Update: Dying from prescription heroin: A perspective on the opiate epidemic

In the early 2000s, the press–at least in Boston, where I was living at the time–was full of shrill stories about drug-crazed addicts breaking into area pharmacies in search of something called “Oxycontin.” I had no idea what Oxycontin was, but I was pretty sure there must be something remarkable about it if ordinary drug fiends were risking jail time and worse by robbing mom-and-pop drug stores to get it. As Sam Quinones explains in his remarkable book Dreamland: The True Tale of American's Opiate Epidemic (Bloomsbury Press, 2015), the Oxycontin crime wave was an early moment in the emergence of a full-blown Opiate epidemic in the United States. For many young doctors working in “pain management in the 90s and naughts, Oxycontin was remarkable indeed. It gave them just what their predecessors in the eternal fight against pain lacked: a supposedly non-addictive opium-based medication that they could prescribe far and wide without fear of hooking their patients on it. And with all the best intentions, prescribe it far and wide these doctors did. But it wasn't non-addictive at all; masses of patients become dependent. And not only them. Drug-users learned that “Oxy” afforded a wonderful high, and it became highly coveted “on the street.” The rub was that this new “wonder drug” was either hard to get–unless you had access to a “Pill Mill”–and/or very expensive. So Oxycontin addicts got desperate. Some, like the ones the press was screaming about in Boston, stole the drug from the local CVS and the like. Most, however, turned to an old drug that was easier to get and cheaper: Black Tar Heroin from Mexico. In the wake of Oxycontin, Black Tar spread from the Southwest across much of the U.S., even to places like Western Massachusetts, where I live now and the heroin epidemic is in full, tragic swing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the early 2000s, the press–at least in Boston, where I was living at the time–was full of shrill stories about drug-crazed addicts breaking into area pharmacies in search of something called “Oxycontin.” I had no idea what Oxycontin was, but I was pretty sure there must be something remarkable about it if ordinary drug fiends were risking jail time and worse by robbing mom-and-pop drug stores to get it. As Sam Quinones explains in his remarkable book Dreamland: The True Tale of American’s Opiate Epidemic (Bloomsbury Press, 2015), the Oxycontin crime wave was an early moment in the emergence of a full-blown Opiate epidemic in the United States. For many young doctors working in “pain management in the 90s and naughts, Oxycontin was remarkable indeed. It gave them just what their predecessors in the eternal fight against pain lacked: a supposedly non-addictive opium-based medication that they could prescribe far and wide without fear of hooking their patients on it. And with all the best intentions, prescribe it far and wide these doctors did. But it wasn’t non-addictive at all; masses of patients become dependent. And not only them. Drug-users learned that “Oxy” afforded a wonderful high, and it became highly coveted “on the street.” The rub was that this new “wonder drug” was either hard to get–unless you had access to a “Pill Mill”–and/or very expensive. So Oxycontin addicts got desperate. Some, like the ones the press was screaming about in Boston, stole the drug from the local CVS and the like. Most, however, turned to an old drug that was easier to get and cheaper: Black Tar Heroin from Mexico. In the wake of Oxycontin, Black Tar spread from the Southwest across much of the U.S., even to places like Western Massachusetts, where I live now and the heroin epidemic is in full, tragic swing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the early 2000s, the press–at least in Boston, where I was living at the time–was full of shrill stories about drug-crazed addicts breaking into area pharmacies in search of something called “Oxycontin.” I had no idea what Oxycontin was, but I was pretty sure there must be something remarkable about it if ordinary drug fiends were risking jail time and worse by robbing mom-and-pop drug stores to get it. As Sam Quinones explains in his remarkable book Dreamland: The True Tale of American’s Opiate Epidemic (Bloomsbury Press, 2015), the Oxycontin crime wave was an early moment in the emergence of a full-blown Opiate epidemic in the United States. For many young doctors working in “pain management in the 90s and naughts, Oxycontin was remarkable indeed. It gave them just what their predecessors in the eternal fight against pain lacked: a supposedly non-addictive opium-based medication that they could prescribe far and wide without fear of hooking their patients on it. And with all the best intentions, prescribe it far and wide these doctors did. But it wasn’t non-addictive at all; masses of patients become dependent. And not only them. Drug-users learned that “Oxy” afforded a wonderful high, and it became highly coveted “on the street.” The rub was that this new “wonder drug” was either hard to get–unless you had access to a “Pill Mill”–and/or very expensive. So Oxycontin addicts got desperate. Some, like the ones the press was screaming about in Boston, stole the drug from the local CVS and the like. Most, however, turned to an old drug that was easier to get and cheaper: Black Tar Heroin from Mexico. In the wake of Oxycontin, Black Tar spread from the Southwest across much of the U.S., even to places like Western Massachusetts, where I live now and the heroin epidemic is in full, tragic swing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the early 2000s, the press–at least in Boston, where I was living at the time–was full of shrill stories about drug-crazed addicts breaking into area pharmacies in search of something called “Oxycontin.” I had no idea what Oxycontin was, but I was pretty sure there must be something remarkable about it if ordinary drug fiends were risking jail time and worse by robbing mom-and-pop drug stores to get it. As Sam Quinones explains in his remarkable book Dreamland: The True Tale of American's Opiate Epidemic (Bloomsbury Press, 2015), the Oxycontin crime wave was an early moment in the emergence of a full-blown Opiate epidemic in the United States. For many young doctors working in “pain management in the 90s and naughts, Oxycontin was remarkable indeed. It gave them just what their predecessors in the eternal fight against pain lacked: a supposedly non-addictive opium-based medication that they could prescribe far and wide without fear of hooking their patients on it. And with all the best intentions, prescribe it far and wide these doctors did. But it wasn't non-addictive at all; masses of patients become dependent. And not only them. Drug-users learned that “Oxy” afforded a wonderful high, and it became highly coveted “on the street.” The rub was that this new “wonder drug” was either hard to get–unless you had access to a “Pill Mill”–and/or very expensive. So Oxycontin addicts got desperate. Some, like the ones the press was screaming about in Boston, stole the drug from the local CVS and the like. Most, however, turned to an old drug that was easier to get and cheaper: Black Tar Heroin from Mexico. In the wake of Oxycontin, Black Tar spread from the Southwest across much of the U.S., even to places like Western Massachusetts, where I live now and the heroin epidemic is in full, tragic swing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/medicine

In the early 2000s, the press–at least in Boston, where I was living at the time–was full of shrill stories about drug-crazed addicts breaking into area pharmacies in search of something called “Oxycontin.” I had no idea what Oxycontin was, but I was pretty sure there must be something remarkable about it if ordinary drug fiends were risking jail time and worse by robbing mom-and-pop drug stores to get it. As Sam Quinones explains in his remarkable book Dreamland: The True Tale of American's Opiate Epidemic (Bloomsbury Press, 2015), the Oxycontin crime wave was an early moment in the emergence of a full-blown Opiate epidemic in the United States. For many young doctors working in “pain management in the 90s and naughts, Oxycontin was remarkable indeed. It gave them just what their predecessors in the eternal fight against pain lacked: a supposedly non-addictive opium-based medication that they could prescribe far and wide without fear of hooking their patients on it. And with all the best intentions, prescribe it far and wide these doctors did. But it wasn't non-addictive at all; masses of patients become dependent. And not only them. Drug-users learned that “Oxy” afforded a wonderful high, and it became highly coveted “on the street.” The rub was that this new “wonder drug” was either hard to get–unless you had access to a “Pill Mill”–and/or very expensive. So Oxycontin addicts got desperate. Some, like the ones the press was screaming about in Boston, stole the drug from the local CVS and the like. Most, however, turned to an old drug that was easier to get and cheaper: Black Tar Heroin from Mexico. In the wake of Oxycontin, Black Tar spread from the Southwest across much of the U.S., even to places like Western Massachusetts, where I live now and the heroin epidemic is in full, tragic swing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/drugs-addiction-and-recovery

In the early 2000s, the press–at least in Boston, where I was living at the time–was full of shrill stories about drug-crazed addicts breaking into area pharmacies in search of something called “Oxycontin.” I had no idea what Oxycontin was, but I was pretty sure there must be something remarkable about it if ordinary drug fiends were risking jail time and worse by robbing mom-and-pop drug stores to get it. As Sam Quinones explains in his remarkable book Dreamland: The True Tale of American’s Opiate Epidemic (Bloomsbury Press, 2015), the Oxycontin crime wave was an early moment in the emergence of a full-blown Opiate epidemic in the United States. For many young doctors working in “pain management in the 90s and naughts, Oxycontin was remarkable indeed. It gave them just what their predecessors in the eternal fight against pain lacked: a supposedly non-addictive opium-based medication that they could prescribe far and wide without fear of hooking their patients on it. And with all the best intentions, prescribe it far and wide these doctors did. But it wasn’t non-addictive at all; masses of patients become dependent. And not only them. Drug-users learned that “Oxy” afforded a wonderful high, and it became highly coveted “on the street.” The rub was that this new “wonder drug” was either hard to get–unless you had access to a “Pill Mill”–and/or very expensive. So Oxycontin addicts got desperate. Some, like the ones the press was screaming about in Boston, stole the drug from the local CVS and the like. Most, however, turned to an old drug that was easier to get and cheaper: Black Tar Heroin from Mexico. In the wake of Oxycontin, Black Tar spread from the Southwest across much of the U.S., even to places like Western Massachusetts, where I live now and the heroin epidemic is in full, tragic swing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices