Rethinking The Drug War (John Stossel Hits Home Run In Argument Against Futile WOD Alert)

Getting high can be bad. Putting people in prison for it is worse. And doing the latter doesn't stop the former.

I was once among the majority who believe that drug use must be illegal. But then I noticed that when vice laws conflict with the law of supply and demand, the conflict is ugly, and the law of supply and demand generally wins.

The drug war costs taxpayers about $40 billion. "Up to three quarters of our budget can somehow be traced back to fighting this war on drugs," said Jerry Oliver, then chief of police in Detroit, told me. Yet the drugs are as available as ever.

Oliver was once a big believer in the war. Not anymore. "It's insanity to keep doing the same thing over and over again," he says. "If we did not have this drug war going on, we could spend more time going after robbers and rapists and burglars and murderers. That's what we really should be geared up to do. Clearly we're losing the war on drugs in this country."

No, we're "winning," according to the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, which might get less money if people thought it was losing. Prosecutors hold news conferences announcing the "biggest seizure ever." But what they confiscate makes little difference. We can't even keep drugs out of prisons -- do we really think we can keep them out of all of America?

Even as the drug war fails to reduce the drug supply, many argue that there are still moral reasons to fight the war. "When we fight against drugs, we fight for the souls of our fellow Americans," said President Bush. But the war destroys American souls, too. America locks up a higher percentage of her people than almost any other country. Nearly 4,000 people are arrested every day for mere possession of drugs. That's more people than are arrested for aggravated assault, burglary, vandalism, forcible rape and murder combined.

Authorities say that warns people not to mess with drugs, and that's a critical message to send to America's children. "Protecting the children" has justified many intrusive expansions of government power. Who wants to argue against protecting children?

I have teenage kids. My first instinct is to be glad cocaine and heroin are illegal. It means my kids can't trot down to the local drugstore to buy something that gets them high. Maybe that would deter them.

Or maybe not. The law certainly doesn't prevent them from getting the drugs. Kids say illegal drugs are no harder to get than alcohol.

Perhaps a certain percentage of Americans will use or abuse drugs -- no matter what the law says.

I cannot know. What I do know now, however, are some of the unintended consequences of drug prohibition:

1. More crime. Rarely do people get high and then run out to commit crimes. Most "drug crime" happens because the product is illegal. Since drug sellers can't rely on the police to protect their property, they form gangs and arm themselves. Drug buyers steal to pay the high black market prices. The government says alcohol is as addictive as heroin, but no one is knocking over 7-Elevens to get Budweiser.

2. More terrorism. The profits of the drug trade fund terrorists from Afghanistan to Colombia. Our herbicide-spraying planes teach South American farmers to hate America.

3. Richer criminal gangs. Alcohol prohibition created Al Capone. The gangs drug prohibition is creating are even richer, probably rich enough to buy nuclear weapons. Osama bin Laden was funded partly by drug money.

Government's declaring drugs illegal doesn't mean people can't get them. It just creates a black market, where even nastier things happen. That's why I have come to think that although drug addiction is bad, the drug war is worse.

My point is, many laws today are in place because people are no longer restrained by morality and character.

The Founders recognized that people should live their lives largely free of federal interference. This is not to say that the Founders intended or imagined a libertine America. On the contrary, they envisioned an America with vibrant religious, family, social, and civic institutions that would shape a moral nation. They understood that strong private institutions, so important in a free and just society, could not coexist with a strong, centralized government.-Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX)

Gambling laws.

Gambling is not an immoral activity.

Eloquently written, solidly reasoned, although you would strengthen your argument considerably if you eschewed quoting Ayn Rand. The lady was not sane.

Proponents of legalization keep trying to blur the distinctions between qualitatively different things. The Prohibition experiment against alcohol as a comparison to the illegality of cocaine, marijuana, and other mind-altering drugs only goes so far. For one thing, alcohol has been around since men learned about fermented fruit and grain, and its use has become, over thousands of years, part of the cultural fabric virtually worldwide, with the exception of Islamic countries out there chasing the dragon. Crack cocaine, meth amphetamine, and heroin, for example, kill the user a great deal faster than heavy alcohol consumption. And by the way, have you ever heard of a 'casual' crack cocaine user? Crack and meth users are also significantly more violent while under the influence than even the stereotypical drunken lout.

Just on the basis of these drugs' effects, they are not the same as alcohol. Legalizing them would generate a whole new set of problems. And most importantly--at least from my point of view--the illegality of these drugs puts addicts in legal trouble, which is the best way I know to engineer a psychological bottom from which they can begin recovery. This last argument doesn't wash with the libertarian 'self-determination' crowd, but I don't particularly care. When libertarians start winning elections above the level of school district, then I might take what they say more seriously.

So from what i understand of your post, would you be in favor of separating the drug market, for "soft" mind altering drugs such as pot, mushrooms, and plants that can be grown naturally?

"the illegality of these drugs puts addicts in legal trouble, which is the best way I know to engineer a psychological bottom from which they can begin recovery."

i understood from your experience, it helped...but from my experience a lot of people do not understand and just goes deeper in their "trouble"...feeling not understood, and feeling that all we want is to lock em up...which is not the right way to think obviously, but the majority of hard drug user actually does think this, feeling only excluded...sad but true... i would prefer a softer approach to trigger the recovery procedures, like a real education, not in the way of a brainwash though...

a lot of drug user are seeking freedom but don't know what to do...drug is a gateway to "freedom"...therefor letting the user the freedom of taking their stuff they "need", but educating them at the same time, them having a better confidence in the new institution that permits them to consume, they would maybe take the tips a lil easier..don't you think? (obviously not for all user, but a satisfying majority...)

Canada voluntarily signed off on international treaties and conventions calling for prohibition of certain drugs. If they want to back out, they can. Do you think the U.S. would invade Canada if Canada legalized marijuana? There is some threat of trade sanctions but those in our government who make that kind of noise are just worried that if Canada legalizes it won't be long before it happens here too. Publicly they'll say they worry about pot coming over the border here, but that's totally irrational. More pot comes in from Canada now that the industry is unregulated than would ever come in if it was regulated. The fact is that Canada wouldn't have much to worry about from us if they legalized marijuana. Canada is an important trading partner. Trade sanctions against Canada would hurt American business interests too, and the fact is that most Americans could care less if Canada legalizes marijuana. There was a recent Zogby poll asking Americans if they believe our federal government should allow states to tax marijuana and regulate it similar to the way we regulate alcohol and almost half of those surveyed said that the feds should allow states to do that if states want to do that. If almost half of all U.S. citizens think states should have the right to do that, what percentage of us do you think would care if another country legalized, taxed and regulated marijuana within their own borders? My guess is that most U.S. citizens wouldn't care, and they would not support major sanctions against Canada for passing such laws in their own country because such sanctions would hurt us too.

The fact is though that there is not enough support in your country to fully legalize marijuana yet. You feel the need to blame someone for this so you pick the U.S. We do not rule the world. Do we ever exert political and economic pressure on other countries to further our interests? Sure we do, and so does every other country. Canada does it too. The U.S. is a powerful country, no doubt about that, much more powerful than Canada in the global community. But we do not control Canada. We do not control Europe or any other country. Our government only controls our country and that's only because we let it. Canada is a sovereign nation. It can pass whatever internal laws it wants to pass.

Again though, the problem is that there isn't enough support to legalize marijuana in your country and those in your government that want to do this don't have the testicles to stand up for what they believe in. They just pass the buck and blame it on the U.S., just like you are doing. You need to stop blaming your problems on us and tell your politicians to grow some balls and run your country the way you want it run.

"There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them." - Ayn Rand in Atlas Shrugged

Paraphrased:
The only real power government has is the power to crack down on criminals. -- So, there is only one way to rule innocent men, by making them into "criminals" with prohibitory 'laws'.

Eloquently written, solidly reasoned, although you would strengthen your argument considerably if you eschewed quoting Ayn Rand. The lady was not sane.

Your own sanity is questionable, seeing that you agree that the principle is "eloquently written, solidly reasoned", yet you object that its author is insane.

When -- the libertarian 'self-determination' crowd -- start winning elections above the level of school district, then I might take what they say more seriously.

Again, its pretty weird to claim you'll take libertarianism 'seriously', - but only when it becomes PC.

Can you explain your own confusions?

"Crack and meth users are also significantly more violent while under the influence than even the stereotypical drunken lout."

I hate crack and meth and would not want to see them legalized, but I doubt this claim you made would stand up to close scrutiny. Most people are not violent on any of these three drugs, but all three can contribute to that kind of behavior. I am appointed to represent people on violent crimes all the time and in most cases the person exhibiting the violent behavior was drunk. Now, there are a lot more drinkers than there are people who use meth or crack, so naturally we would see a lot more violent crime in which alcohol was a contributing factor than we would with these other drugs. But we have a lot of people using these other drugs you mentioned here too as is evidenced by the large number of possession and delivery cases we get and I'm not seeing just a whole lot of cases where people on these drugs were violent. When we do get those cases usually it's one where a hardcore addict has been binging on the stuff for a long time and he's getting all irrational and losing his mind, or sometimes we'll get one where there has been a fight over drug money or against someone who is a "snitch." Some people can just drink alcohol every once in a while but every time when they drink they just get mean as hell. You don't really see that as much it seems with the people who only use these stimulants on an occasional basis. I don't know if I would go so far as to say that alcohol intoxication is more likely to cause a person to be violent than intoxication from either of these two other drugs, but I would not be surprised at all if that turned out to be the case. These drugs are worse than alcohol in a lot of ways, but I don't think propensity of intoxication to lead to violent behavior is one of them.

extremely good reply! thanks!

but a thing a bit weird is why does our politicians doesn't have the balls to stand off against georgy? there's a reason behind it other than cowardness!

Also by saying invading, i wasn't talking about a war or something, i am not that paranoid!

"and they would not support major sanctions again" that is something i cannot rely on after watching CNN..let me explain... it happens oftenly where they mention that we should be careful with the borders from Canada and one more precise exemple is we had in toronto a weird case of 10 really old people died in an hospital almost all at the same time...cnn forgot to mentionned the fact they were old and said that no death was reported after but they "found" out it might be a super virus that would mutate into an epedemic case of death all around the country and what would be worse is one of those infected canadians getting through the borders" he said that word by word...that is bad, and that's why i am getting out of humour easily on that matter...

but unfortunately more than half of canada is supoprting legalisation, but harper clearly said : i will not get back on the issue of decriminalization and harper is well known to have a really good relation with georgy, again... now sorry for the way i wrote my post, it seemed a lil bit like a blame like you said but i wanted to catch the attention to discuss the issue and i didn't find a better way to do this than to shock a lil bit...but you bring me some hope in the way you expressed your self! but still, the US govern the world, in the sens they could do whatever they want with it... but what's your positiopn on this WOD, i do not recall one of your post??

I am not a big fan of the war on drugs, but I do not want to see drugs like meth, cocaine, and heroin sold legally to any adult who wants them. I think marijuana should be legal and regulated similar to the way we regulate alcohol. The rest should remain illegal, but we should treat it more as a health/nuisance problem than a criminal problem. I do not think people found to be in possession of a small personal amount of any drug should receive a prison sentence for that or even a felony conviction. I do think though that we should try to identify problem drug users and get them under control by keeping them on probation with frequent drug testing and small sanctions like a couple of days in jail or community service or something each and every time they backslide. If it were up to me people in a program like this would never be able to get off probation until they went a year or so testing clean. Our focus with respect the hard stuff should not be on arresting and incarcerating as many people as possible. That only fills up our prisons such that we have to keep building more of them. Success from a law enforcement perspective should be measured in how much drugs they seize and how well they interfere with and stop drug production and smuggling. High prices, while they do contribute to the amount of crime committed by addicts needing cash to buy drugs, reduce the likelihood that people will have the opportunity to try these substances, and high prices make it harder for those who do try these drugs to use them enough to become addicted before they grow up and grow out of their wild drug taking phase, as most who take drugs seem to do if they do not become addicted.

You know, you might want to work on your communication skills a little, and I'm not talking about your English. Understand that the people you are talking to in these forums are mostly Americans, mostly conservative, mostly Republicans, and in large part are supporters of President Bush. When you, a foreigner, come in and call our president "georgy" and other demeaning names; when you label us all as closed-minded; when you refer to our venerable Constitution as "f*cking BS;" when you accuse us all of trying to rule the world; well, let's just say that is not the kind of talk that is likely to lead to productive discourse. You piss people off and they won't hear what you have to say. I am proud of my fellow freepers for showing such restraint with you so far. I would suggest to you that you might use a little tact from this point forward in these forums. If you would like people to listen to you and treat you with respect, then proper decorum requires that you do the same. I understand the things you have been saying and am not entirely in disagreement with you, but there are better ways to say things. Work on that, will you?

You wrote, "Your own sanity is questionable, seeing that you agree that the principle is "eloquently written, solidly reasoned", yet you object that its author is insane."

Your comment on my sanity was a bit over the top, sport. So much for civility. I was referring to the poster's argument in toto, and thought the inclusion of an Ayn Rand quote detracted from that argument, since her objectivist philosophy is essentially a watered-down Nietzschean muddle. Read Whitaker Chambers' review of 'Atlas Shrugged' for the definitive conservative critique of that work, which I'm sure is available on the 'net somewhere.

Insofar as my comment on dismal libertarian electoral performance is concerned, I was pointing out--albeit in a roundabout way--that in our type of government, the value of political philosophies is measured by the vote; the vote is the coin of the realm. Ergo, libertarianism--as a party, as a platform, as an ideology--is pathetically penniless. I'd use the term 'bankrupt', but that would imply that at some point in the past, the libertarians actually had something worthwhile to say. The term 'PC' has nothing to do with anything I wrote.

So by all means, keep voting Libertarian. Your party is a nice place for like-minded folks to hang out and affirm each others' beliefs without needing to submit to the rigor of opposing debate--a rigor, by the way, which you and your buddies don't seem to like much, given the infantile spitefulness of the ad hominem attacks aimed my way. The insults don't have much effect, though, because in my mind's eye, I can see the Libertarian presidential candidate now, standing in front of his bathroom mirror, practicing his acceptance speech, thinking to himself, 'This year for sure.'

And then I break out laughing, drawing strange looks from my kids.

You wrote, "So from what i understand of your post, would you be in favor of separating the drug market, for "soft" mind altering drugs such as pot, mushrooms, and plants that can be grown naturally?"

No, I am not in favor of making those kinds of fine distinctions. Without a doubt, skillful attorneys representing cocaine cartels, for example, would use 'soft' legalization as a wedge to force the door on their particular product. Besides, there is very little 'natural' growth to pot plants, for example. Even domestically grown marijuana is several times stronger now, containing THC levels unheard of in the Sixties. Mushrooms are powerful hallucinogens; I see nothing 'soft' about them.

In any event, pro-legalization arguments are moot unless and until its proponents elect legislators sympathetic to such measures. It's possible dope smokers, crackheads, heroin users, et al might achieve their hearts' desire, but I guarantee it won't be the result of any organized effort on their part. It will be because otherwise well-meaning people forget that individual rights are enjoyed only if a given society is strong enough to protect and perpetuate those rights. Legalizing mind-altering drugs weakens a society, for a number of reasons, in a number of ways. The war on drugs is, in a very real sense, a war on the notion that reality is a subjective construct, that seeking chemically induced self-delusion is as valid a pursuit as striving for character and seeking objective truth. No society can take that stance and exist for long.

Equally dead.

Galileo, Newton and Einstein are dead too. Remembered globally because each profoundly advanced science, technology and man. Galileo is of particular interest because almost nobody remembers Pope Urban VIII. For, Galileo stands larger than the Church -- he always has and always will. That it took the Catholic Church until 1992 (276 years) to formally admit that Galileo's views on the solar system are correct is a yawn and a big SO WHAT!

Neo-Tech is to honesty what Galileo, Newton and Einstein are to scientific advancement.

"We deny many rights to 12 year olds, right or wrong. We call them minors."

A minor has an inalienable right to life. A minor has an inalienable right to liberty. A minor has an inalienable right to the pursuit of happiness.

You can't take away those rights. You have no authority to do so. They are inalienable. They are God-given.

Other, natural rights, sure. We may deny a minor the right to drink or smoke, for example. Those are not inalienable rights.

Neither is the right to do drugs.

"She was threatened by your attempt to urinate on her or worse, rape her and perhaps spread AIDS to her."

WHAT???

Geez, why do you add that she was threatened by my attempt to hit her with it! Well, obviously, you've now changed your argument from "She was harmed" to "She was threatened with harm".

No probem. If she was threatened with harm, then I agree she has a case. Now, was this threat real or imagined?

In the other thread that discussed the incident, the guy just stood there, exposed, saying and doing nothing. Where's the threat?

There is none, Zon. Admit it. In your little libertarian world, she couldn't prove harm or a threat of harm in a million years. This activity, like drug use, would be legal in your world.

And that's all I'm trying to point out.

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