Rating: 
Summary: Reefer Madness
Review: This book is extremely informative, and upsetting. I enjoyed Schlosser's style of telling this story immensely, and highly recommend it.
Rating:
Summary: Journalism as social criticism--or vice versa
Review: There are three long, but very well-written essays in this book, portions of which previously appeared in the Atlantic Monthly, Rolling Stone and the US News and World Report.The first, the title essay, is on the marijuana business in the United States with a concentration on the "killer weed's" legal history, its economics and how it is cultivated today. Schlosser presents the unembellished facts along with some vivid detail about the growers, the sellers, the law enforcement people, and the politicians. Reading this reinforces my belief that the "new prohibition" (not so new anymore of course) is really a full employment program for the law enforcement establishment endorsed by hypocritical social conservatives (Rush Limbaugh would be a fine example) and Christian fundamentalists, most of whom have little idea about what is going on. The second essay, entitled "In the Strawberry Fields," is about Mexican laborers in virtual peonage in California, the history of this phenomenon, its politics, its economic consequences, and the reality of today's conditions in the field and across the border. The endemic political and economic hypocrisy is illustrated by Scholosser's eye-opening observation on why Mexican migrants are routinely rounded up and sent back to Mexican in a kind of (wink, wink) revolving door policy. When migrants are allowed to settle here and raise their children, the states end up paying for their education and welfare. However by periodically deporting them we benefit from their cheap labor "while Mexico...in effect...[pays] for the education, health care, and retirement of California's farmworkers." (p. 95) The third essay, "An Empire of the Obscene" is about the pornography business with the focus on porn king Reuben Sturman and his nemesis IRS agent Richard N. Rosfelder, Jr. who finally got Sturman for tax evasion. Although this is the longest essay in the book (longer than the other two combined), I found it the least interesting. That Sturman was able to launder and hide his profits off shore in the same manner as drug dealers (and, for example, Enron) was interesting, as was the way Schlosser chronicles how pornography has become such a huge business that it now accounts for a significant part of the revenues of some Fortune 500 companies. Holding the essays together is Schlosser's idea that the private morality of Americans is inconsistent with our public morality, and that the evidence for this is especially compelling in these three domains of the black market economy. He frames the essays with an introduction called, "The Underground," and a postscript named rather hopefully, "Out of the Underground." Some highlights: "Today approximately three-quarters of all $100 bills circulate outside the United States." As Schlosser notes, this "serves, in essence, as a gigantic interest-free loan" from them to us. (p. 7) (I just hope that George W. Bush's huge deficients don't lessen the world's love for the Yankee dollar and lead them to adopt the Euro instead.) "Import barriers [on marijuana] drove prices high enough to make domestic production extremely profitable," allowing UCLA professor Mark A. R. Kleiman to note that this is "a rare instance in which protectionism actually worked." Schlosser adds, "Some American marijuana is now worth more per ounce than gold." (p. 36) "The new mandatory minimum laws [for marijuana possession and trafficking] took...power from the judge and handed it to the prosecutor" who could decide who to prosecute and for what. (p. 45) This results in an uneven application of the law and "de facto sentencing by police and prosecutors." (p. 53) Added to the power the police have because of the forfeiture laws, and one sees that justice in marijuana cases can be anything but. Schlosser cites an example in Ventura County, California in which drug agents had first obtained an appraisal of a $5-million ranch and then raided it for marijuana cultivation only to find nothing growing there. (p. 62) A further point about the forfeiture laws (which I think are unconstitutional since they are seizures without due process) is that informers may get up to one-quarter of the proceeds. Schlosser claims that this has resulted in a "new business: the buying and selling of drug leads. Defendants who hope to avoid a lengthy...sentence...can now secretly buy information from vendors on the black market." (pp. 62-63) Recalling that justice Douglas H. Ginsburg (nominated by Reagan) declined nomination to the US Supreme Court "after confessing that he smoked marijuana as a young man," Schlosser recalls the McCarthy era's "defining political question"--Are you now, or have you ever been, a member of the Communist party?--with today's question that congressmen and political candidates have to answer: Are you now, or have you ever been, a pot smoker? (p. 49) On page 51 Schlosser notes however that "Legislation to impose drug testing on members of Congress has repeatedly died in committee and never reached the floor for a vote." Finally, Schlosser compares America's attitude toward the drug Viagra with its attitude toward marijuana. He recalls Bob Dole's TV commercial for Viagra and then notes that "Elizabeth Dole, now a US senator from North Carolina, apparently doesn't oppose this sort of recreational drug use." Bottom line: social conservatives will deplore this book, and right wing AM shock jocks will rant against it, while most of the rest of the country will ignore it. Too bad. This is a fine piece of work by Schlosser and everyone involved in the project, and an engrossing read.
Rating: 
Summary: one wild saturday night
Review: on some saturday nights i really like to let the cat out of that bag. no, literally. i begin first by putting on my zebra striped panites. next, i parade around the house listening to vivaldi's four seasons. odd one might think but have you tried it. i won't even put on a robe when the dominos pizza delivery man comes knocking at my door. i always, invite him in but, as always, he refuses. after dinner comes desert. this entails lubing up my cat which i have just let out of the bag and chasing him around the house. it's real hard. i hope this review will help you. sincerely, full thrust
Rating: 
Summary: Finally some truth
Review: Eric Schlosser's Reefer Madness gave a great insight into the marijuana world. I did enjoy reading this book and extending my knowledge, however all it was was factual. Maybe if i was doing a report on this subject this would of been a good book to obtain information, but i do like some opinion and emotion in a book that i am reading.
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Summary: Superb look at our undocumented economy and its consequences
Review: Everyone here seems to be commenting on what a great writer Schlosser is and I couldn't agree more. For a non-fiction book to be such a page turner is quite a rarity. This is a lucid, well-researched, and rational look into "taboo" subjects people tend to have extremely strong opinions on. Reefer Madness strips the subjects of their stereotypes: the pothead, the illegal mexican stealing American jobs, the sleazy porn industry and looks into why these things are so loathed in public and yet remain so relentlessly prolific and lucrative. I found the segment on porn some of the most engrossing....growing up mostly in the internet age it's hard for me to imagine supreme court cases and federal investigations into what is basically considered tame by modern standards (and probably available for sale at your nearest mall). But it was the research on marijuana "madness" that fascinated/perplexed me the most. When we look at other countries which have legalized the possession or sale of drugs and see that they have not collapsed in some doomsday scenario...... When we consider how many criminals we've created/locked up simply for possessing a joint.......it simply defies logic. By reading this book I hope we will all finally be able to base our opinions on facts and reason and not propaganda and unfounded fear, opening the way for a genuine dialouge.
Rating: 
Summary: Well written, well researched, but nothing really new
Review: I'd love to write as well as Eric Schlosser, but maybe that's why he's the bestseller. With such a gift he should say more. He makes a good case against the War on Drugs as it pertains to marijuana. He gives the history of Harry Anslinger, the DEA, the politicos from the 40s through today. He tells how the crop is grown, harvested and distributed. How it has benefited from agricultural advances. He'll sell a ton of copies because of "Fast Food Nation". A far better book, by a guy who lost blood earning his story, is "The Big White Lie" by Michael Levine. I flog this book because it is out of print and seems to have had a short run. A chapter is available in "Into the Buzzsaw" Though Schlosser is sympathetic to the immigrants he limns in his second and shortest essay, he does not venture much in the way of suggestions as to a policy for dealing with them. Of the many books on the subject I most highly recommend the section from "Diversity in America". For well reasoned though passionate positions on the matter see online research by the Human Biodiversity Institute. As for porn, so what? Like it or not there isn't much we can do about it. Yawn.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointing
Review: Disappointing. When I first bought this book, I thought it was going to be on the underground market/economy. I found out that it was not the only subject covered. Since this book covers more than one subject, each subject is only superficially covered. Fast Food Nation is much more deeply researched and is definitly a must have "Bible" on the subject matter. Reefer Madness is a book to forget quickly. Don't waste your money on it and let's hope that Schlosser's next book will be better.
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Summary: You can't smoke it, but it's just as good.
Review: The title of the book, Reefer Madness, itself portrays a strong image in my mind. Eric Schlosser is ingeneous to name it so, as it introduces the first essay fairly. The section goes into great detail about the producing, hiding, buying, and selling of marijuana and its governmental punishments in America in the past and in the present. Next up to bat, is the second partition about the sex/porn industry. As done with marijuana, Eric Schlosser gives the whole package about pornography, mainly the players in the industry and how they got away with money laundering and tax evasions and more. Last but not least, the world of cheap labor, the world of illegal immigrants. The shortest section of them all, perhaps because this is the least concealed subject. The majority of people know of this, and Eric Schlosser digs out a little history and the business philosophy to explain the desire for cheap labor with disregard to the benefits of the workers. I recommend this book to anyone interested in any of the above. I enjoyed it particularly because I was learning something new every page, and gaining a better understanding of the underworld and those who run it.
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Summary: Reefer madness the book that cought me, and tought me
Review: To be quite honest i really hate reading. This book really grasped my attention, and it really enlightened my sence of the economy and what we really dont know about it. This book i had to read for my senior class, economics. I am really glad that i got the oppurnity to read these essays put into this book. The next book i will be reading is Fast Food Nations, in the hopes that it will be as good as this noval was. My take is that we know that things go on however we dont really know how much that they effect our economy as a whole. I really recommend this book, hoping that you benifit as much as i did.
Rating:
Summary: too broad an area, too little info
Review: i was very interested in this book after reading Fast Food Nation, however the subject matter covered in this book was far too broad. Each of the three subjects covered here could have been separate ( and quite interesting) books. Instead, each of the subjects get a maximum of 100 pages and a minimum of 50 pages. The book was a quick 2 day read, but it left me wanting more in depth information.
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