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Tuesday, August 20. 2013

82 Percent Say US Losing War on Drugs


Prohibition doesn't work, and most people see that. All it does is to drive up the price of illegal drugs, fill prisons, and support a booming illegal drug industry.


Here's George Shultz (he's still alive!):  We should consider decriminalizing them and treating abuse as a health problem.




Posted by The Barrister in The Culture, "Culture," Pop Culture and Recreation at 13:51 | Comments (22) | Trackbacks (0)

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We get it, you are anti-police. Stop the war on drugs? And just when they got all the cool ninja gear and armored cars with the seizures? You want to take us back to 1972?

QUOTE:
Questions were raised. SWAT is a legitimate concept, and is needed in cases of barricaded persons, hostage situations, etc. But most agencies, even big ones, go for months and sometimes years without experiencing such events. The toys gathered dust. Officials and concerned taxpayers asked, “What do you NEED this stuff for?”

No need? CREATE a need!
#1 JKB on 2013-08-20 14:08 (Reply)
I'm no fan of these local gov paramilitary type units but to say they had to 'CREATE a need' is a bit of a stretch.

It's easy to sit in the comfort and safety of your safe suburban or rural location and have no real understanding of the level of violence and weapons that are on the streets in many urban areas dominated by the vibrant culture(s).

Gangs of all sorts are not a trivial matter. And no, the drug laws did not begat the gangs. The culture from which the gangs come from begats the gangs and drugs and various crimial acts are their chosen line of business. Legalizing drugs is not going to make gangs magically disappear.
#1.1 phil g on 2013-08-20 14:46 (Reply)
Tough drug laws have been good for at least providing a reason to pull violent males from the vibrant culture off the streets. That is not a trivial benefit. That has meant literally millions of feral vibrant yutes pulled out of circulation. If you think urban areas dominated by the vibrant culture are bad now, think how much worse those areas would be had those vibrant yutes not been put away.

It seems to me a whole bunch more need locking up.
#2 phil g on 2013-08-20 14:40 (Reply)
But Prohibition CREATES many of those thugs.

We have a prior example - 1920 - 1933.
#2.1 M. Simon (Link) on 2013-08-29 00:01 (Reply)
Wasn't much of the drug traffic we are fighting today legal in 1900 (opium, cocaine, marijuana)? I don't remember reading that drug abuse was worse then than it is today. Was it?

Clearly the war on drugs is not being won and criminally bad policies like asset forfeiture have emerged and are now being used on innocent people.

If we wanted to win the war on drugs, what politically feasible ideas could we employ that have not already been tried?
#3 feeblemind on 2013-08-20 15:25 (Reply)
You need to read more history. Prohibition didn't just fall from the sky out of thin air. It was a response to a growing public issue in the late 19th and early 20th century of increasing alcohol and likely other substance abuse.

Prohibition wasn't sustainable but it did provide some space for people to get their lives back in order. An unintended consequence is that it provided the means for the Kennedy clan to get rich and dominate politics for a generation.
#3.1 phil g on 2013-08-21 07:24 (Reply)
You would have to decriminalize everything, every drug, every distributor, every maker. All of it. Otherwise, you will still have a black market, drug cartels and gang wars over markets. Colorado failed to legalize pot entirely, they merely lowered some fences. So they left a black market in place and a place for drug cartels to operate. Muy fun to follow.

Moreover, even if you did it, you would still have gangs because that is the basic social structure of the ghetto, and because there would be other black markets. The Mafia profited for years on bootleg booze, gambling, protection shake downs, labor unions and prostitution.

And Phil g is right. We need excuses to put violent NAMs in cages.
#4 BOB sykes on 2013-08-20 15:31 (Reply)
If prohibition doesn't work, why would we keep it illegal for minors?

I'd appreciate a cogent reasoning to that.

If it doesn't work, then you should be able to sell meth to a three year old, or drop acid into your 5th grader's juice, without penalty.

What reason would have to ban that, if prohibition does not work? Or do we allege it only works on minors?
#5 Maria on 2013-08-20 15:38 (Reply)
That is a strawman argument. In a certain way, no laws "work", but some make the problem worse like prohibitions.

Minors are not judged to be competent to decide to or not to do drugs. Making drugs legal but illegal for minors would work as well as drinking laws.
#5.1 mudbug on 2013-08-20 20:50 (Reply)
I don't propose it as a strawman, but as a serious question.

Libertarians argue that banning drugs does not work; yet I see them making that argument for adults only (thankfully).

Yet it is inconsistent, in my opinion, to say that banning them for minors DOES work but for adults DOESN'T work.

I'd appreciate a serious answer to my objection.
#5.1.1 Marie on 2013-08-21 13:55 (Reply)
You won't get a serious answer because it will highlight the hypocrisy. If minors are not judged to be competent to decide why can they make binding contracts at 18 but cannot consume alcohol until 21? All laws that make an act illegal are prohibitions. There are no laws that have stopped those illegal acts and yet the laws stay in place. But some prohibitions have sufficient opposition to get them overturned. And then declared to be stupid "prohibitions" (unless you are under 21).
#5.1.1.1 GoneWithTheWind on 2013-08-21 18:26 (Reply)
Barrister,

You're going to have a hard time decriminalizing drugs when a California prison guard makes more than the average Harvard grad. The prisons, the police and the prosecutors, and all the associated hangers on, along with voters like Bob and Phil, will make sensible reform of drug laws difficult to pass.
#6 Mike (Link) on 2013-08-20 15:41 (Reply)
End it. It isn't worth it.

It isn't worth the loss of freedom, it isn't worth the price tag, and it certainly isn't worth what we have done to our cops.

Police used to be part of the community - now they are an occupying army.

End it and drastically cut back on the outdated FDA.

Here is an outdated map of drug raids gone wrong. Despite the racist rants above, they aren't all in the cities.
Raids
#7 NJSoldier on 2013-08-20 15:52 (Reply)
www. cato.org/raidmap
#7.1 NJSoldier on 2013-08-20 15:55 (Reply)
These are not racist rants but frustrated calls for something to be done about the continued deterioration of our cities and towns where feral populations of the vibrant culture live.

End it and see a dramatic increase in violent male vibrant yutes preying on other other whites and blacks.

Unless you have an idea of how to address a problem which is officially forbidden to be discussed.
#7.2 phil g on 2013-08-21 07:16 (Reply)
NJ Soldier that was a classic liberal argument technique you used by tossing out the 'racist' slur.

There was actually an argument put forward. Instead of dismissing it as 'racist', why don't you counter it with a real argument?

The 'racist' slur is a tell that the argument hit a grain of truth that you apparently want to deny.

I've read your comments over the year's with interest, you're better than this.
#7.3 phil g on 2013-08-21 07:29 (Reply)
I would be in favor of decriminalizing the individual use of all drugs and requiring some form of treatment for those individuals using hard drugs. I am not in favor of decriminalizing the selling of hard drugs.

For those who believe prohibition does not work I ask what is any law but a prohibition? Should we decriminalize rape or robbery? Certainly the laws against these crimes hasn't worked.
#8 GoneWithTheWind on 2013-08-20 19:20 (Reply)
" I am not in favor of decriminalizing the selling of hard drugs."

Like alcohol and tobacco? Alcohol is one of the hardest drugs out there. Heroin is not near as hard as alcohol. Compare the detox regime for the two.

The only way the WoD continues is because people believe the propaganda machine of the Ministry of Truth.
#8.1 M. Simon (Link) on 2013-08-29 00:08 (Reply)
Oh BOY! Just think what an add on that will be to Obamacare health plan !! Yippppeeee--now, I get to pay for all those drug addicts and their ongoing forever rehab. It's not bad enough I have to pay for sex change operations on prisoners incarcerated?
#9 apple pie on 2013-08-20 19:26 (Reply)
These posts represent the nice YUPPIE viewpoint and demonstrates a failure of understanding and imagination of what the 'war on drugs' is really about. It is not about the suburban dad who likes to smoke a joint on the weekend or the urban yuppy who likes the occasional cocaine bump at a party, it is a 'war against the feral vibrant culture who are at war with civilized Americans'.

That is the underlying reality that no one dare speaks of.
#10 phil g on 2013-08-21 07:12 (Reply)
Treating drug addiction as a health problem is exactly what shouldn't be done. Is there any evidence that drug treatment programs (rehab clinics) are as effective as, say, corneal transplants?
#11 ErisGuy on 2013-08-21 09:46 (Reply)
Legalizing drugs will not end the black market. Tobacco is legal and there is still an illicit tobacco market. End taxation, that'll end illicit markets.
#12 ErisGuy on 2013-08-21 09:50 (Reply)

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