So, drug wise, were is your cut off point … if pot is legalized, what is the next drug to be legalized (and if pot is legalized, there will be a “next” drug)? To reiterate, we all know to well that if pot is legalize, some other drug will be next on the list of.
Freedom : Freedom requires courage, it is better than a fear of plants, and much better than a lust for government power.
Basically, the law should just state that if a drug is fun to take, it should be illegal. That’s what it’s all about. We’re opposed to people having fun taking drugs. Alcohol, okay. Drugs, no. I’m right, aren’t I? Can you think of any drugs that are fun to take that aren’t illegal?
Why do we know that? Are there any other illegal drugs that are used by anywhere close to the number of people that use marijuana. More people use marijuana than all other drugs combined. It is not particularly addicting. Some people become heavy users and then actually remain heavy users. Most grow out of their marijuana smoking phase with little difficulty. People don't die from overdoses from it. Very few are ever compelled to steal to get money for it, and those that would steal for marijuana money would probably steal to get anything they might want. People certainly aren't selling their bodies for “marijuana fixes.” It doesn't contribute to a great degree to domestic violence like alcohol. It's not harmless, but it is one of the most benign of all intoxicants.
I could see us legalizing marijuana and nothing else. You aren't going to see a big push to legalize drugs like meth and heroin and cocaine except from a few voices, mostly libertarian types. We'll never see anywhere close to a majority pushing to legalize those drugs because they are so bad, so harmful to society and the risk of using them so great, both to the users and to society as a whole.
And what about drugs hardly anyone does, like LSD or ketamine? Well, really hardly anyone does drugs like heroin. Hardly any do LSD either, and almost none who do it continue to use it for any length of time. The government estimates that less than one percent of Americans do heroin. Only a tiny percentage do most other drugs. There is not a huge market for most drugs, and really very little reason to legalize them. At least with legalizing marijuana we'd take billions and billions of dollars from organized crime and drive a stake in the heart of drug smuggling and distribution networks for all the other drugs that in most cases piggy back off of the massive marijuana smuggling and delivery networks. Again, the marijuana industry is the backbone of the illegal drug trade. More than half of all American adults under 60 have tried it, and millions and millions use it at least occasionally today.
I could see us legalizing just marijuana. I'm all for it, but I'd be dead set against legalizing drugs like meth, heroin and cocaine. There really aren't many good arguments for legalizing most drugs, and the risks are too great. But marijuana, like it or not, is a part of our culture now. It's not going away. We aren't keeping anyone from using it with our current policies. If people want to do it they do it. All we are doing is providing billions upon billions of dollars to organized crime. Marijuana is the one and only currently illegal drug we really need to legalize and regulate similar to the way we regulate alcohol now.
I think every so often we ought to legalize everything. In a just few days we could level out the gene pool to people who aren’t tempted to abuse drugs or booze. Imagine the annual financial savings that would do for our budgets!