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Posted on 05/10/2011 9:54:08 AM PDT by aic4ever
A conservative will join a libertarian in thinking that the federal government largely oversteps its bounds by doing something like limiting the gallons-per-flush on a toilet, or making 100 watt light bulbs illegal. These are not, after all, life-altering choices of a moral bent for conservatives. But drugs are. And because the Superior Republican Morality comes into play, ultimately you just don't know what's best for you.
But the federal government sure does. And it ain't Freedom.
(Excerpt) Read more at organizedexploitation.blogspot.com ...
I imagine there are probably lots of people that do not take more than 2 hits from a bong or whatever it takes to achieve what they do from a drink or two, just as there are those that only have a beer or two.
I agree with the drunkeness stuff, I just think it should be treated like alcohol.
Examples
A lot of unplanned pregnancies between unmarried couples are due to light alcohol. Light alcohol lowers their inhibition to doing what they would otherwise not do.
A lot of auto crashes are due to light alcohol, totally apart from the crashes due to DUI levels. Statistically look at the crashes where there was no DUI involved. Separate them into where light alcohol was involved and no alcohol was involved. The statistics are clear. (14 years in loss prevention for insurance companies, 30 years in insurance company databases for me.)
The same is true of accidents in the home, accidents on the job, recreational accidents (swimming, boating, snomobiling, skiing, etc). Statistically it is clear that those with light alcohol have far more accidents than those with no alcohol.
There are 100,000 million more men than women in China.
I'd do drugs too if there were zero chance of having a normal life.
False analogy my butt. You are talking about now. China's experiment (Forced upon them by the British) with drugs began in 1758 and continued till the Japanese over ran the far larger, and theoretically superior Chinese. Mao Tse Tung ended Drug usage in China by killing the Addicts.
In 1905, 3/4ths the population of Manchuria were addicted to opium. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.
Why on Earth would anyone want to repeat that disaster here?
You do realize that the government is composed of human beings, right?
Easily corruptible human beings.
You deserve to have your neighborhood overrun by the cartels.
I'll be cheering when it happens.
Don't try putting words in my mouth. I said no such thing. What I said was the last time this idea was tried, it was a disaster that destroyed the nation of China.
You do realize that the government is composed of human beings, right?
Easily corruptible human beings.
You deserve to have your neighborhood overrun by the cartels.
I'll be cheering when it happens.
A non sequitur. The one thing does not equal the other. I blow a big hole in your theory by pointing out a real world example of your idea put into practice, and you wish ill on me?
Classy.
Don't try putting words in my mouth. I said no such thing.
But you do believe that government is the only hope for keeping people off drugs.
That's not putting word-one in your mouth.
I won’t argue with you, Bob, I have no experience in the insurance industry or doing actuarial tables. I don’t plan to start! So I’ll take your word for it.
If what you say is true then you are making an argument for temperance, I guess. I suppose it depends on what we call “light” alcohol use, a .05 or a .02 or what?
I can understand looking at it that way. But I would ask where morals begin.
What is the first moral? Our founders intimated that it was that we were all created equal, therefore free.
Shouldn’t freedom be the first moral, with all other morals growing from it?
If you want to find good morals, I mean REALLY good morals, biblical principles are it. I’m not arguing for a theocracy, but I believe biblical moral principles should influence how we view society.
I don’t disagree with you on that at all. I was raised Lutheran, and while I am personally agnostic, have always felt that if I have kids, I will raise them in the church as well. It is a good basis for developing the concept of a difference between right and wrong, that is otherwise difficult to cultivate.
There is a lot of good there, but there is also a lot of authoritarianism in there, and we should be careful to recognize that authoritarianism is authoritarianism, whether based in biblical principle or not.
Is that in one of the videos on LEAP’s site, or is it just coming from that one commenter? It’s a strong argument if there’s coherent source data for it.
I didn't say that, and I don't know that. I expect Social pressure and genetics play a role as well. I do know that over the course of a hundred years, China became so addicted to opium that it couldn't defend itself from much smaller Japan.
Drugs, are apparently a military threat to a nation.
That's not putting word-one in your mouth.
I dare say it is. I didn't mention anything about the government doing this or that. I said that in a real world experiment involving a highly addictive drug and complete freedom to become addicted, it resulted in an addiction rate of 3/4ths of the Male population of Manchuria in 1905.
THAT is a military threat, as far as i'm concerned. A helpless population will protect none of it's rights.
So WTF are you proposing?
Do you even know?
Do you even know?
Yeah, i'm proposing that we worry about bigger problems right now. The 25 billion dollar cost (per year) of the war on drugs may or may not be worth it, but in the overall scheme of things it is a pittance compared to the economic problems we currently face.
If I were to propose anything at all along the lines of what your position seems to be, it would be some form of licensing people for recreational drug use, the same as we do with chemicals, explosives and other dangerous substances.
I personally don't feel as if the lack of legality for recreational drug use is a particularly onerous burden for the citizens of this nation. I don't see any value to our society in introducing new victims to addiction.
People are too dumb to not do drugs themselves.
There will always be a certain percentage of dumbshits. No laws will change that.
So once we license all the dumbshits, then what?
People are too dumb to not do drugs themselves.
There will always be a certain percentage of dumbshits. No laws will change that.
So once we license all the dumbshits, then what?
Supposing we did experiment with this idea, The legal availability of recreational narcotics would damage the profitability of the criminal element, reducing their market share, possibly to the point of driving them out of the drug business. (Consider what the legalization and regulation of Alcohol did to the bootleggers market.) The people with the biggest addiction problems would possibly see illegal supplies drying up, and leaving legal supplies with requirements they will either have to follow, or be barred from.
It would impose a measure of self discipline on people who seriously need it. You can party if you can be responsible. If you can't, then society doesn't want you being a problem for others.
If there is a downside, i'll leave it to you to explain what it is. I'm not seeing it.
The people talking about already have no problem breaking laws, but you think that your law is special.
Plus, there is lots of evidence that a significant proportion of law enforcement is involved in the drug trade.
I hope your town is one of the first to have open warfare with the cartels. Hint: You'll be outgunned.
They have no problems breaking man made laws. The law of Supply and Demand is a Different kind of law. It is unbreakable. Surely a conservative (or Libertarian) would know this?
Plus, there is lots of evidence that a significant proportion of law enforcement is involved in the drug trade.
All the more reason to get the profitability out of the illegal component of it.
I hope your town is one of the first to have open warfare with the cartels. Hint: You'll be outgunned.
Eh, no I won't, but that's beside the point. You can't win the argument so you try to frighten me into believing your ideas?
You're going to have to work on your argument some more. That's it for me dude. Believe whatever you wish.
As alcohol in blood rate increases, impairment increases. So it starts out slight and gradually get to severe. Most states call .08 severe and criteria for drunk driving.
As impairment increases, risk of a crash increases.
And, of course, alcohol does not affect all peoople the same. (BTW pot does not affect all people the same. Pot smokers are allegedly non-violent. But I’ve seen the exceptions to the rule.)
The biggest problem of light alcohol drinkers is that it makes them feel good ...so good that they take chances they would not take when totally dry. With the increase in taking chances is the increase in crash possibilities. Then the question is whether they can avoid that avoidable crash situation.
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