Posted on 06/06/2006 4:32:38 AM PDT by LowCountryJoe
Meanwhile, politicians puff sanctimoniously about ``cleaning the streets" and ``ridding the projects of drug dealers
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
This is certainly an option. Prohibition of alcohol didn't work, it created a powerful mafia. How successful was this legalization in the netherlands, or Holland. I don't know.
Another example of normalizing deviancy
Now, equating drug usage with experienced good is a stretch, I know, but drug enforcement has created some very nasty consequences as this editorial points out. You should actually read it.
Common Sense Ping.
Bill is probably fried most of the time.
This is where my quasi-libertarian side kicks in. Here in the Pittsburgh area, the media for the past few days has been innudated with stories of a supposed epidemic of heroin overdose deaths (three I believe). All the politicians and do-gooders are wringing their hands. My view? Good and good riddance. This is not some disease where you become ill and die through no fault of your own. This is a behavior choice. These individuals make the choice to take these drugs. They take the risk. Why should I weep and gnash my teeth over them? In my view, these are three fewer lowlifes my tax dollars have to support.
On the other hand, there is money that could be made from legalization. If we have to spend so much money treating the addicts, not to mention feeding, clothing and housing them, then why not legalize the drugs? In doing so, we could regulate and tax the stuff. In taxing the drugs, we could recoup at least some of the money we lose on these lowlifes. And the supply would be a heckuva a lot safer.
I don't know if the country would be safer. I do support the decriminalization of marijuana. That's a start. I don't know how effective treatment is. Probably not too effective because many people enjoy getting high and do not want to be treated.
Violent crime rates remain at the lowest levels in the history of the Bureau of Justice Statistics' survey (which started in 1973). We are experiencing the sharpest decline in teen crime in modern history.
Why the urgent push for a "safer society"? Why the push to legalize drugs? Seems to me that we're pretty safe, and it seems to me that giving the Green Light to rampant drug use might end up hurting a lot of folks.
It will never, ever happen for one simple reason. Trial Lawyers.....
It will never, ever happen for one simple reason. Trial Lawyers.....
I read this opinion piece this morning and disagreed with it entirely. While I fully support the legalization of marijuana, I think legalizing drugs of this nature---heroin or even cocaine---is not the same, and does not offer a solution, because the nature of the drug is different, as is the nature of the user. I have a hard time believing someone who'd resort to violent crime in order to maintain his or her drug-centric lifestyle would suddenly reform himself or herself if their drug of choice were legalized. In fact, I'd wager that the criminal element involved with this lifestyle is as attractive and addictive as the drug itself. Legalize heroin and "Eddie" becomes a legitimate contributor to society? Those are long odds, at best.
Did anyone else see Nightline night before last about the counterfeit drugs coming from China? Drugs like Crestor, Lipitor, Procrit and others. Some are made from drywall, cement, and the yellow lead-based paint used for highways. I fell asleep and missed the ending telling how drugs get to the drugstore. Dummy me, I thought they came from the manufacturer. I will be looking for a replay. Pfiser is aware. These drugs have reached drugstores such as Rite-Aid and are dispensed unnoticed as they are such good counterfeits. Pretty scarey stuff going on all over.
Methinks Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP) exaggerates just a little. The 2007 Federal ONDCP budget (which includes the DEA) is $12.7 billion, and the states spend about the same. That's excluding incarceration.
Half of the federal money is spent on drug education, anti-drug advertising and treatment. The other half is spent on overseas inderdiction and local border control. Which of these areas the author would eliminate is unknown.
Is there a culture around smoking cigarettes? No, they are cheap and plentiful. The violence comes from protecting turf. How many rum runners do you see around today? Damn few. Except for a few moonshine stills out in the sticks, most people are very content to get their booze from the store down the street (its cheaper and safer thanks to gov. regulations). The same store I buy my rum from also sells Everclear (100% alcohol by vol.).
Now, our boy Eddie may never be a contributor to society, but he will be much less a burden and much less of a threat to the kids on the streets.
I have to deal with a lot of gang stuff at my very rural high school here in SC. If pot and cocaine where legalized the Bloods, Crips, FolkNation, MS13, etc would dry up for lack of funds and a lack of a need to protect turf. The people of south central LA would be much safer and the inner cities might see a renewal as the crime gangs melt away.
In a free society shouldn't one be free to be a deviant provided they aren't infringing on anothers natural rights?
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