The Drug Policy Alliance had, for years, fought the United States government's "war on drugs" policy, which had proved to be just one more billion-dollar boondoggle. A complete waste of taxpayers' money, the "war on drugs" was unwinnable, and had accomplished little since its inception over a quarter-century ago. The Alliance quoted prominent Americans in its fund-raising mailings, which were often sent out with a simple return address from Walter Cronkite. "America's most trusted news man" signed his name to the solicitation letter, and each mailing usually included quotes from concerned Americans - liberal and conservative - about this insipid "war":
George Schultz, former U.S. Secretary of State was quoted as saying: "We need at least to consider and examine forms of controlled legalization of drugs."
New Mexico's Governor Gary E. Johnson (1995-2003) said: "Take it from a businessman: The War on Drugs is just money down the drain."
Jimmy Carter, 39th U.S. President, said: "Penalties for possession of a drug should not be more damaging to an individual that the use of the drug itself."
Cronkite himself was quoted as saying: "No punishment could be too severe for those [prisoners] who were kingpins of the [illegal] drug trade and who ruined so many lives. But, by far, the majority of these prisoners are guilty of only minor offenses, such as possessing small amounts of marijuana. That includes people who used it only for medicinal purposes."
William F. Buckley, Jr. said: "Eighty-five million Americans have experimented with illegal drugs. Since the object of criminal law is to detect and punish the wrongdoes, should we reason that 85 million of us should have spent time in jail?"
Nobel Prize Winner Milton Friedman said: "Can any policy, however high-minded, be moral if it leads to widespread corruption, imprisons so many, has so racist an effect, destroys our inner cities, wreaks havoc on misguided and vulnerable individuals, and brings death and destruction to foreign countries?"
Based in New York City, the Drug Policy Alliance raised millions of dollars trying to change the federal government's attitude toward drug use in America, but to little avail.
On Monday, December 1, 2008, the Drug Policy Alliance joined forces with the Patrick-Patrick Team to continue the fight. With the "old school" government leadership having been ousted via a process of political revolution, there was a fresh new audience that might listen more closely to the plea to end the disasterous war on drugs" "we the people...". Patrick "Hammy" Hamilton and Lynn Patrick would continue their quest for the legalization of drugs, backed by the resources and reputation of the Drug Policy Alliance. "Hammy" was so happy he crawled into the back of his lime-green bus and lit up a huge doobie. Within a half-hour he was "higher than a kite tonight". With police wielding unprecedented powers to invade personal privacy, tap phones, and conduct seemingly random searches, Americans' civil liberties had been threatened for far too long. Most people of any wisdom recognized that the 'war on drugs' had not made our streets any safer, had not put the billionaire drug kingpins out of business, and had not lessened Americans' appetite for recreational drugs. This would become the cornerstone of the Patrick-Patrick Team's platform from now on. As soon as the new political candidates took their oaths of office in January, the Patrick-Patrick Team would be ready with its referendum to be put to a vote before all the people of the United States of America. An arrogant, incompetent, cowardly, contemptible, greedy, corrupt U.S. Congress had for years felt threatened by people who indulged in drugs (but apparently didn't feel nearly as threatened by those who indulged in alcohol). Such irrational hysteria was led to unfair persecution and prosecution of small-time drug abusers while the huge drug cartels run by some of the world's criminal masterminds effectively evaded police intervention altogether.
With "Hammy" standing out front among the crowds that surrounded the lime-green O.U.T.R.A.G.E. bus, Lynn Patrick stayed more in the background working with her team of authors and legal experts to draft a referendum that would easily pass into law as soon as the people voted shortly after January 20, 2009. "Hammy's" trademark stance was a sort-of Joe Cocker lean, with an ice cold bottle of beer in one hand and a big ol' fat doobie in the other. 'What's up, Bro?" he would ask the crowd. And, his trademark conclusion to almost every public speaking engagement was, "See ya' on the flip side!" It was the casualness, the lack of any real formality, that gave "Hammy" an advantage over his audiences. They were mostly unprepared for such levity, such cheeky accidentalism, such an "I don't give a damn" posture. Hamilton believed in his cause fervently; he wasn't going to let little things like form or appropriate structure to stand in his way. His coarse hoarseness, from years of chain-smoking, combined with his toothy grin and easy-going mannerisms won people over with little effort. Where his bus stopped, he almost always left town with hundreds of new signatures added to his petition. What the hell, he had recently survived the crash of a runaway bus careeing down into a gulley; was there anything capable of stopping his momentum??
He was enthralled by the public attention, and - every once in a while if gently coerced - "Hammy" would break out in his best impression of Joe Cocker, much to the delight of whatever impromptu audience happened to congregate for the show.
On a visit to a small town in southwestern Montana, "Hammy" got ahold of some bad 'weed'. His eyese glazed over, he twitched insufferably for hours at a time, and his mind seemed to be in a constant state of hallucinatory chaos. Lynn Patrick was concerned enough that she drove him to the nearest hospital forty-six miles eastward. Doctors treated him by pumping his stomach and sedating him for about six hours. When he woke up, Lynn was standing at his bedside as "Hammy" said, "Hey, what's up. Babe? Got any more of that stash?" Lynn Patrick's foremost fears were now confirmed: "Hammy" had no duplicate. He was truly one-of-a-kind in the world of free spiritedness.