Tulsi Gabbard Endorses Legalizing Drugs

Forbes ^ | Jan 19, 2020, | Tom Angell

[conservative98]

Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) is calling for the U.S. to legalize currently illicit drugs.

“If we take that step to legalize and regulate, then we're no longer treating people who are struggling with substance addiction and abuse as criminals and instead getting them the help that they need,” the 2020 presidential candidate said at a campaign stop in Merrimack, New Hampshire on Friday.

She was responding to a voter who asked whether her plan to end the war on drugs centered on more harm reduction and treatment or if it involved moving to “legalize and regulate narcotics so that you're no longer seeing tainted drugs on the street...and involvement in the black market.”

The congresswoman replied that her answer was “all of the above.”

“The costs and the consequence to this failed war on drugs is so vast and far reaching, socially and fiscally, that if we take these necessary steps, we'll be able to solve a lot of other problems that we're dealing with in this country,” she said.

Gabbard, who has sponsored several marijuana legalization bills during her time in Congress, had previously said in an interview last year that she supported “decriminalizing an individual’s choice to use whatever substances that are there while still criminalizing those who are traffickers and dealers of these drugs.”

Gabbard’s latest comments, which were first noted and recorded by journalist Michael Tracey, go beyond that by indicating she backs a legally regulated method of producing and distributing drugs.

The stance also puts her a step further than former South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, a rival Democratic presidential candidate, who has endorsed simply decriminalizing possession of all drugs.

[Does so]

Hardcore alkies ARRIVE at liquor stores drunk.

In NH, its not unusual to see 3 and 4 serial DUIs getting still another license revocation.

I don’t recall your defense of Trump’s wall.

[HANG THE EXPENSE]

Preach it brother.I totally agree.

[HANG THE EXPENSE]

You can call whatever you like.Its a free country.We get it.Most of the people who want drugs to be legal dont have children or grandchildren.Maybe you do and maybe you dont. Most of the people I have come in contact with that are for legalizing drugs dont have children.No skin in the game.

[HANG THE EXPENSE]

But not in Singapore.I get it.They will choose the path of least resistance and avoid places that fight back.The war on drugs is a failure IMO because we dont execute, on the spot,the dealers.

[HANG THE EXPENSE]

And hollowing out the middle class in this country,Brilliant,just brilliant.

[HANG THE EXPENSE]

We have all seen the destruction of the family and it is heart breaking.This drug shit is killing small towns across this country.I have watched people I know who have been good people turn to complete shit and you have people say it should all be legalized. Phucking MORONS.

[HANG THE EXPENSE]

You raise any kids?If so then you know the forces at work trying to corrupt young minds on a daily bases.Its everywhere.

[nathanbedford]

From a post now 10 years old:

What Warren Buffett and Adam Smith Tell Us about the War on Drugs

If you want to know why the war on drugs is lost start thinking about it the way Adam Smith and Warren Buffett would think about it.

Adam Smith would talk about the law of supply and demand and he tells us that when the demand goes up so does the price; when supply goes down, the price goes up. When the demand is inelastic, that is, when it is the product of an addiction, the price curve is even more radical in its upward thrust when supply is reduced. Therefore, the more the government succeeds in interdicting the supply of addictive drugs, the more it increases the price and thereby increases the incentive to increase supply. The more the government succeeds, the more it must fail.

That is why drug smugglers and dealers are so wonderfully inventive in evading the law and will ever continue to be so unless you want to live in North Korea.

Without putting words in Warren Buffett's mouth, his criteria for investing in an enterprise are well-known. He wants a company with a unique product and a huge market potential. What better than an addictive drug? He wants company with high barriers to entry against competition. What better barrier than the law and what better barriers than drug enforcement agencies raiding your competition? And if competition becomes too serious, this business model says you simply eliminate it by murdering them.

Buffett would be very intrigued by the idea that costs are extremely low, markup extremely high, and the price is ever supported by the government! By making drugs illegal, the government in effect has enacted price supports. By selling into an inelastic demand of addicts, the market as well as price are virtually guaranteed.

Because the price is high, addicts are incentivized to push the drugs onto others in order to addict them, to create a mini market which funds their own addiction. What a wonderful business model! On the macro level it is a multilevel marketing scheme on steroids, or should I say, powered by addiction, and supported by the government.

Meanwhile, this wonderful marketing scheme generates so much money that corruption is inevitable. Worse, our enemies in the Muslim world and elsewhere have exploited this market to our disadvantage and national security peril. Meanwhile, our only politically correct response is a full throated roar: "do more of the same."

[HANG THE EXPENSE]

Good for you. Im an old man with young kids and I worry daily about mine.

[HANG THE EXPENSE]

Well put.

[HANG THE EXPENSE]

Bullshit.Ive seen plenty show up drunk and buy beer and liquor at stores.Its called they ran out and had to go get more.

[HANG THE EXPENSE]

Loosertairians

[SunkenCiv]

[singing] they'll stone you when excluded from debates...

• The New York Times endorses both Amy Klobuchar and Elizabeth Warren for president
• Bernie Sanders Said "Everybody Brings Some Negatives" When Asked If Gender Is An Obstacle For Women Running For Office
• John Cusack: 'We Have 10 To 12 Years' To Save The Planet From Climate, Capitalism [at rally for Sanders]
• Did You Know That 2020 Socialist Candidate For President Bernie Sanders Supported Iran During the 444 Days of the 1979 Iranian Hostage Crisis?
• Joe Biden Wants To Destroy Free Speech on Social Media. Biden tells the New York Times he would revoke Section 230 protections and hold Facebook (and other sites) liable for their content.
• 'I didn't want anything to do with him': Hillary says Chelsea saved marriage to Bill after Lewinsky affair
• Peter Schweizer: Secret Empires and How U.S. Political Corruption has Evolved (with meme)
• Nadler says Dems unwilling to Negotiate on Hunter Biden Testimony
• 'Miracle on Hudson' pilot slams Lara Trump for mocking Biden's stutter
• Michael Bloomberg Discovers America is Bigger Than New York
• Bloomberg pledges $70 billion to bolster black America in new plan

[Does so]

“Kill the drug dealers, stop the problem”

Most of the drug dealers in Massachusetts are Illegal Hispanics from the Dominican Republic—headquartered in Lawrence—feeding opioid and fentanyl into NH. (NH, said by DJT, to be “a drug-infested den”

For thousand$ recently, four Massachusetts’ DMV Hispanic employees were selling them genuine MA drivers licenses and fake PR birth certificates.

https://www-bostonherald-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.bostonherald.com/2019/09/23/operation-devils-highway-in-lawrence-nets-38-drug-arrests-14-kilos-of-fentanyl/amp/?amp_js_v=a2&amp_gsa=1&usqp=mq331AQCKAE%3D#aoh=15795101675700&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&amp_tf=From%20%251%24s&ampshare=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bostonherald.com%2F2019%2F09%2F23%2Foperation-devils-highway-in-lawrence-nets-38-drug-arrests-14-kilos-of-fentanyl%2F

[NorseViking]

Marijuana almost always causes depersonalization and derealization disorders. Sometimes it has lasting effect continuing in sober condition. All frequent users are demented. I can easily see a pothead.

[Gene Eric]

>> Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) is calling for the U.S. to legalize currently illicit drugs.

And not one objecting clown will acknowledge the WOD industry that pays for colleges, vacations, pensions... and has no track record of solving anything.

[NobleFree]

Suggesting to them that using ‘recreational’ drugs is ‘OK’ - because it’s legal, and adults do it

So we should make illegal for adults everything we don't want kids doing? Alcohol? Tobacco? Sex?

Alcohol and tobacco have been with us for centuries. I don’t think you can compare them to all of the substances available now.

Marijuana and opiates have also been around for centuries. And what does longevity have to do with your original point (above) about kids and legality?

I’m never exactly sure what people mean by ‘legalize and regulate’.

Treat them pretty much like alcohol.

It seems to me that we should make wise judgments about individual things

Yes, AS INDIVIDUALS; a majority has no ethical authority to impose its notion of 'wisdom' on a minority, but only the authority to defend the rights of individuals.

[NobleFree]

Murder has an unwilling victim - drugs are self-administered.

You still have the pushers

Only in a legal regulated market can we minimize genuine pushing.

[NobleFree]

There is ZERO drug zombies in Singapore.

But they do have them in other tough-on-drugs regimes like China and Iran - so contrary to what some have suggested on this thread, adopting Singapore's drug policies is far from a guarantee of getting Singapore's results.

[NobleFree]

Marijuana almost always causes depersonalization and derealization disorders.

I call BS. Link?