Insights · Author
Andrew Drasen
Author · ReturnPath curriculum designer · Speaker on recovery, reentry, and drug policy
Published essays
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The Bottleneck of Bureaucracy: How Wisconsin Moves the Prison Pressure Around
Wisconsin's prison count fell when courts slowed, then climbed back toward its old peak. Here is how overcrowding, contract beds, and program scarcity move through the same machine.
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Why Peer-Led Reintegration Groups Matter After Incarceration
How shared experience, credible role models, mentorship, and belonging can help people process reentry and keep building after incarceration.
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Identity-Based Recovery vs. 12-Step and the Disease Model
How identity-based recovery relates to 12-step and disease-model approaches: recovery beyond sobriety, without replacing meetings, sponsorship, or clinical care.
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When the Government Can Make the Evidence
Courts admit video on a low authentication standard, and no AI-specific evidence rule is in force. Here is what actually protects a defendant when proof can be manufactured, and why judicial independence is the safeguard.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 28: Preventing Big Tobacco 2.0: Cannabis Marketing Restrictions for a Regulated Drug Market
Part 28 explains how cannabis marketing restrictions, drug advertising restrictions, youth drug prevention, public health drug policy, and risk-based drug regulation can stop corporate capture before it starts.
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What Grief Support Curriculum Works for Bereavement Groups and Healing Circles?
Grief support curriculum for bereavement groups and healing circles: structured facilitation, meaning reconstruction after loss, and grief workbook practice in a 16-week ReturnPath arc.
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Dear AI Developers: Of Course the Agents Cheated. You Rewarded Them for It.
An open letter to AI developers on OpenAI and Anthropic disclosures: agents left sealed tests and reached real companies because the scoreboard rewarded the shortcut.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 27: Drug Impaired Driving Laws and Workplace Safety - How Regulation Strengthens Enforcement Where It Matters Most
Part 27: drug impaired driving and workplace safety improve when regulation focuses enforcement on actual impairment, not possession.
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What Curriculum Works for Veterans Reintegration and Moral Injury Peer Groups?
Veterans reintegration curriculum for moral injury peer groups: TAP support, peer boundaries, and identity reconstruction after service.
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Wisconsin’s Prison, Reentry, and Supervision Machine
An honest look at Wisconsin’s justice machine from someone who lived it: prisons, reentry, supervision, agents, cops, lawyers, PDs, laws, and lawmakers.
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Benzene in Sunscreen: Contaminant Language, Recalls, and Late Testing
Benzene is a known human carcinogen. Some sunscreen batches tested far above the drug limit. Soft words change when accountability arrives, not exposure.
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How People Rebuild Identity in Recovery (3 Research-Backed Models)
Research-backed identity reconstruction: narrative identity, possible selves, and redemption scripts in daily Workbook and ReturnPath practice.
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When Seeing Is No Longer Believing
Deepfakes can make fake evidence look real and real evidence look fake. Here is how public trust in video breaks, what Content Credentials can (and cannot) prove, and how to judge what you see.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 26: Protecting Youth and Families - Youth Drug Prevention Through Age Controls, Packaging, Marketing, and Liability
Part 26: youth drug prevention through cannabis age checks, packaging rules, marketing limits, child-resistant packaging, and accountability.
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What's a Good Recovery Workbook for Treatment Groups or Reentry Programs?
Recovery workbook for treatment groups and reentry: A Vision of Hope 90-day Workbook with daily accountability, plus ReturnPath for programs.
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Reentry Resources That Actually Help You Rebuild
Practical reentry resources after prison: 211, CareerOneStop, and SAMHSA for concrete needs, plus identity work families can support at home.
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What Curriculum Fits a 90-Day Inpatient or Short-Stay Track?
Identity-based workbook pacing for 90-day inpatient and short-stay residential tracks. ReturnPath complements clinical care, not a replacement.
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How Recovery Memoirs Treat Identity and Change
How recovery memoirs treat identity and change: shame, repair, and becoming someone new. Narrative psychology, not clinical neuroscience advice.
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Peer Recovery Groups for Young Adults Leaving Treatment or Justice Settings
Age-specialized peer recovery groups for young adults leaving treatment or justice settings: belonging, identity work, and guardrails beside clinical care.
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Why Guided Writing Works in Recovery (and What Research Says)
Guided journal for recovery and workbook science: what expressive writing research shows, and how structured daily practice differs from a blank notebook.
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When Recovery Stories Help, and When They Harm
Ethical use of recovery narratives: consent, coercion, co-option, and trauma-informed storytelling for facilitators, peers, and authors.
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The Identity Recovery Trap
After a Meta Business Suite phishing attack locked me out of a nearly twenty-year Facebook account, recovery took months. The hard part was not the password. It was proving I was me inside automated support.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 25: Punishing Pain or Saving Lives - The Real Choice in Drug Policy Reform
Part 25 reframes drug policy as punishing pain or saving lives: public health, overdose prevention, treatment on demand, and risk-based regulation.
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What Is Identity-Based Recovery?
What is identity-based recovery? It focuses on who you are becoming, not only behaviors to stop, via three self-identifying steps and ReturnPath beside clinical care.
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When Looking Like You Is No Longer Proof
Can deepfakes fool identity verification? Yes, when synthetic faces, voices, and ID images arrive together. How remote proofing works, where it weakens, and what still holds.
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The AI Identity Problem: Can AI Agents Hijack Your Digital Identity?
A plausible AI-agent takeover could lock you out of your accounts, move money, and keep acting as you. What is possible now, and how do we prevent it?
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Drug Legalization Series Part 24: The Ethical Case for Regulation - What We Owe People We Know Will Use Drugs
Part 24 on drug legalization ethics: we owe regulation that cuts preventable death instead of outsourcing safety to a black market when use is inevitable.
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What Curriculum Can Halfway Houses Use for Reentry Programming?
ReturnPath halfway house curriculum: 16-week reentry with workbook accountability, rolling enrollment, and facilitator guides for transitional housing.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 23: What Failure Looks Like If We Don't Change: Projecting the Status Quo Forward
Part 23 models drug overdose death projections under today's laws, showing what failure may look like if we keep the status quo.
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What Substance Abuse Curriculum Works for IOP and Sober Living?
IOP substance abuse curriculum for peer support and sober living, ReturnPath 16-week program with daily workbook practice between flexible group sessions.
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How Do I Quit Using Drugs Without Treatment?
How do I quit using drugs without treatment? Safety-first steps when rehab is unavailable, you are not ready for formal care, or fear keeps you from asking for help.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 22: Public Buy-In Is Built, Not Waited For: How Public Opinion Actually Shifts on Uncomfortable Drug Policy
How leaders build public support for drug policy that feels uncomfortable first, and why public perception shapes what lawmakers pass and fund.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 21: Drug Legalization Is Bipartisan: Political Reality, Not Political Fantasy
Part 21 explains why bipartisan drug policy reform is viable now and why regulated legalization is a public health and safety upgrade, not ideology.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 20: Urgency Without Panic - Why This Can't Wait Another Decade
Part 20 explains why an overdose prevention strategy can't wait another decade, and lays out urgent, measurable steps that reduce death without panic.
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Drug Legalization and Recidivism: What the Evidence Shows
How does drug legalization affect recidivism? It can cut drug-related arrests and re-incarceration cycles when reform pairs legal access with treatment, housing, and reentry support.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 19: This Is Already Being Administered - The Myth That Regulation Is Too Complex to Run
Part 19 argues regulation is already administered across health, safety, and controlled-substance systems, and how that capacity can scale responsibly.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 18: Public Health, Not Moral Panic - Building a Public Health Drug Policy That Actually Reduces Harm
Part 18 makes the case for public health drug policy that replaces moral panic with overdose prevention, harm reduction, and treatment on demand.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 17: Case Studies Without Cherry-Picking - What Worked, What Failed, and Why
Part 17 reviews drug decriminalization case studies across the U.S. and abroad to show what worked, what failed, and why, without cherry-picking.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 16: How to Run a Drug Legalization Pilot Program Without Betting the Farm
Part 16: a drug legalization pilot framework, risk-based regulation, measured outcomes, diversion control, privacy, and results-based funding.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 15: Arguments Against Drug Legalization: The Hard Objections, Answered Directly
The strongest arguments against drug legalization deserve direct answers, pros and cons, youth access, public safety, and whether use rises.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 14: A Regulated Pharmacy Model for High-Risk Substances
A regulated pharmacy model for high-risk substances could replace street chaos with standards, cut overdose risk, and connect people to treatment fast.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 13: Mental Health, Housing, and Despair
Part 13 explores drug addiction and homelessness, mental illness, and housing-first recovery in the drug legalization and regulation series.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 12: The Reentry Window We Keep Wasting
Prison release overdose risk peaks in the first days and two weeks. Care continuity, MOUD, naloxone, and housing decide who survives.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 11: Prevention That Isn’t Propaganda
Evidence-based drug prevention beats scare tactics, what reduces youth use, why fear-based education fails, and how prevention fits regulation.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 10: With Drug Legalization, Accountability Still Exists
Part 10 explores drug legalization accountability: what gets enforced when use isn't a crime, and how a regulated market protects the public.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 9: What Regulation Would Actually Look Like
Risk-based drug regulation in practice: supply control, age and potency limits, licensing, taxation, enforcement priorities, and recovery infrastructure.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 8: Fear Is Not a Policy: The Known Failure vs the Imagined Risk
Part 8 explores fear-based drug policy, Oregon's Measure 110 results, and what effective drug policy would require in the legalization series.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 7: Recovery Lockbox: Fund Addiction Treatment Without Raising Taxes
A recovery lockbox captures enforcement savings and regulated-market revenue to fund MOUD, housing, and reentry, using FY 2025 budget realities.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 6: Tusi (Pink Cocaine), Xylazine, and THC Analogues: Why Enforcement Can’t Keep Up
Tusi, xylazine, medetomidine, nitazenes, and THC analogues prove enforcement can't keep up. Regulation creates testing, labeling, and accountability.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 5: How Illegal Drug Markets Power Gangs and Cartels
Drug prohibition violence is predictable, illegal markets fuel gangs, cartels, and violence. How prohibition creates the chaos it claims to stop.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 4: What Drug Legalization and Regulation Actually Buys Us
Legalization and regulation isn't endorsement, a regulated supply with testing, labeling, fentanyl strips, and accountability prohibition can't deliver.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 3: The Hidden Sentence
Drug felony conviction: voting rights, gun rights, and the permanent sentence rarely discussed. Part 3 in the drug legalization series.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 2: How Drug Criminalization Creates a Permanent Underclass
Drug felony consequences go far beyond court: employment and housing barriers, ruined credit, and traps that follow people after release.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 1.5: Legalization vs Decriminalization vs Regulation: Drug Policy Explained
Legalization isn't one policy. This post explains legalization vs decriminalization vs regulation, and what strict regulation delivers.
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Drug Legalization Series Part 1: Drug Legalization Isn’t Endorsement. It’s Regulation and Harm Reduction.
Drug legalization isn’t endorsement. Part 1 explains why punishment fails, why reentry is deadly, and why harm reduction saves lives.
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The Psychology of Setbacks: Why Growth Often Looks Like Failure
Why setbacks in addiction recovery often signal growth, for people in recovery and the people who love them, plus daily workbook practice.
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Top 10 True-Story Addiction Recovery Memoirs (2025 Edition)
Best addiction recovery memoirs for 2025: ten true-story books on redemption, relapse, and healing for readers, families, and recovery programs.
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Addiction Recovery Resources That Could Save Your Life
Free addiction recovery resources: SAMHSA helpline, AA and NA, FindTreatment.gov, and 988. For people in recovery and families who need help now.
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3 Events: How a Pen, a Sales Floor, and a Goodbye Shaped My Life
Personal transformation journey, three turning points from addiction, loss, and sales floor to purpose, the memoir, and ReturnPath curriculum.
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Why Redemption Stories Matter: Now More Than Ever
Redemption stories and second chances, why honest recovery narratives matter for healing, identity, and the memoir behind ReturnPath.