When middle class parents wailed about junior's 20 year sentence for a joint, those laws changed.
They don't have a problem in Singapore. Guess why?
They don't have a constitution that protects individual liberty?
none that we are aware of. Besides, our society is so much different; having once been dominated by strong respect for individual rights and the "live free or die motto." You would have to lock up 1/4 the country to make any difference. If the drug war ended tomorrow, I doubt seriously the drug problem would be much worse. I have never done any drugs and if the all drugs were legalized, I would have zero interest in any of it. The plain reality is those who want to do drugs, will find them; those who don't, will not. I have a strong faith in most people to do the right thing. To think they drug use would skyrocket because they are legal is false. Please go back and read some of Friedman's and other great thinkers. Some day the War on Drugs will be ended and years after, people will wonder why we wasted our time.
Are you sure? From the State Department website:
The GOS[Government of Singapore] nonetheless is concerned about the increase in addiction rates and recidivism among drug offenders who have undergone treatment. There are currently about 9,000 addicts undergoing rehabilitation in Singapore treatment centers, the same number as in 1995.
Figures for the Netherlands--
Demand Reduction. The Netherlands has extensive demand reduction programs and lowthreshold medical services for addicts, who are also offered drug rehabilitation programs. Authorities believe such programs reach about 7080 percent of the country's 25,000 harddrug users (in a total population of 15.1 million).
http://www.state.gov/www/global/narcotics_law/1996_narc_report/index.html
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Using a figure of 3 million for Singapore in 1996, that works out to an addiction rate of about 0.30%. Using the State Dept. figures for the Netherlands, the addiction rate was about 0.17%.
For comparison, here are the latest govt. figures I could find for the US:
"There were an estimated 980,000 hardcore heroin addicts in the United States in 1999, 50 percent more than the estimated 630,000 hardcore addicts in 1992." [that's a 0.35% rate in a population of 280,000,000]
--www.usdoj.gov/ndic/pubs07/794/heroin.htm
Because, culturally, they are way different. Now, if you want to go live in an authoritarian semi-dictatorship - go ahead. Don't turn THIS country into one.
they also dont have a big problem with chewing gum over there either geuss why
Chewing gum
As an extension of the "no littering" mantra, the import, sale and possession of chewing gum is banned. You are also not allowed to bring in chewing gum for your own consumption. In short, no chewing gum whatsoever.
is that really the kind of fascist police state you want to emulate here?
Actually you can buy illegal drugs in Singapore. They're just far more expensive. Every now and then, you hear about a foreign citizen who's put to death for drug smuggling (like the Aussie, not long ago), but you have to wonder how many natives are killed, and never makes the news). Same with Cuba.
Mark
2. In New York and other states, draconian laws on users continue.