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"My point is that people are not guided by morality -- they're guided by the law. Hence, the plethora of laws."

Hogwash. Do you think that the reason most people don't steal or rape or kill is just because these activities are illegal? Most people don't do these things because they know these things are wrong. Most people don't want to go out and hurt other people. They are guided by their sense of morality, by their sense of right and wrong. You put so much stock in the power of laws to deter conduct, as if the laws create some magical wall along the edges of the straight and narrow path of righteous living. I don't see that laws are endowed with such magical powers. The fact is that those who might be inclined to engage in conduct that happens to be unlawful are rarely deterred by the laws themselves. They may certainly be deterred by the possible legal consequences of violating the laws, but the level of that deterrence is directly proportional to the perceived risk of getting caught. When the chance of getting caught is nil or next to nil, as would usually be the case in the situation where one is offered a puff from a marijuana cigarette at a friend's house, the magical deterrent effect from the law is just not going to be there. And if the person wants to smoke the marijuana and is not worried so much about the possible health ramifications of doing it, and if he doesn't feel that taking a hit off of a joint is going to hurt anyone else, he's probably going to do it despite the laws against it. Just like I might drive a few miles an hour over the speed limit down a vacant country road if I'm in a hurry and I know there are no police there to write me a ticket.

I said:
"People certainly do get caught with pot, but the chance of that happening to most is so remote that the deterrent effect is just not there."

You said:
"The deterrent effect is mitigated by court-appointed defense attorneys who weep and gnash their teeth when their client, who "didn't think he'd get caught", is facing serious time for trafficking drugs. Start sending 100% of these scum sucking "mules" to prison and maybe we'd see some deterrence.

Oh no, robertpausem, you don't understand. They're being used. They're the pawns. They didn't mean it. They have a family.

F&^* 'em. They "didn't think they'd get caught". They got caught. Do the crime, do the time scumbag. Get out of the way TKDietz, and let deterrence work."

My what a nasty tone you have there, Robert. Did you get up on the wrong side of the bed or something? Maybe if you weren't in such a foul mood you would have been better able to read the sentence you quoted in context. I was talking about pot smokers. These are the people I talking about who in reality are highly unlikely to ever get caught by the police. I was not talking about mules. I suppose I could have made myself more clear.

Now, apparently I have offended you with some past comment about marijuana mules. Let me see if I can clear the air. I do not feel particularly sorry for pot mules who get caught and go to prison. They were trying to profit by breaking the law. They knew up front what might happen to them if they get caught. They played the game, lost, and it's only fair that they have to pay the price that they knew they might have to pay when they agreed to haul the drugs.

I do though think that it is unfortunate that we have to send so many people to prison for driving down the road with a load of pot, and believe me Robert almost everyone charged with this does go to prison for a long time at least in my neck of the woods. A tiny few might be spared by the prosecutor in plea negotiations or by a jury at trial if there is fairly convincing evidence that they didn't know about the drugs stashed away in the trailer or trunk or false compartments. And in almost every single case like that where one person might escape conviction, one or more others in the vehicle will go to prison for a long time. The only other cases where someone might receive a lesser sentence or in rare cases escape prosecution altogether is when they are able to help law enforcement put bigger fish away, which usually involves doing something particularly risky like wearing a wire and participating in a controlled delivery where the police try to catch the people on the receiving end of the load.

Oh and also I suppose I say something about those who escape prosecution when the judge excludes evidence because of an illegal search or seizure or some other constitutional violation by the government. Contrary to popular belief, that almost never happens. One was dismissed a few months ago in our county for a bad stop where the lawyer was able to prove that the officer was lying, but I can't remember any other marijuana mule cases in this county in the last several years getting tossed completely over a motion to suppress. And we get several of these cases each month in our office alone, usually involving loads in excess of a hundred pounds. We got one last week with over 400 pounds and have had other cases involving loads much bigger than that. The interstate running through our county goes from the west coast to the east coast and is a major drug trafficking pipeline.

It is true that I believe that in the grand scheme of things the guy driving the Budweiser truck is probably helping cause more misery and suffering in this country than the guy with a load of pot in his trunk. And it is also true that I believe that while certainly many of the drug mules are rotten evil career criminals, quite a few of those I've represented have been people fairly goodhearted people who aren't the type who would intentionally hurt other people. They're like the rum runners from the alcohol prohibition days, some hardened criminals and some pretty regular folks. Most all of them think of marijuana as being a relatively harmless drug compared to alcohol and they don't see the harm in helping transport it. And they know that if they say no someone else will transport the load. While they are breaking the law and should be punished for it I don't think they are all as bad as the child molesters who usually get probation here and the career thieves and violent offenders and other depraved thugs I often end up representing who more often than not get lighter sentences than the marijuana mules, if they get sent to prison at all.

You try to insult me for it, but I'm not ashamed of the fact that I sometimes feel some measure of sorrow when I see some of these people sent away for years and years to a place where a lot of bad things will likely happen to them. They did bring it on themselves so I can't feel too sorry for them, but it's often depressing to see this happening and it's always frustrating because it is clear to me that sending all of these people to prison is never going to put an appreciable dent in the marijuana supply. This Mexican marijuana, thousands of pounds of which are seized every year from the small patch of interstate highway running through the tiny county where I work, thousands of tons of which are seized at the Mexican border and throughout the various states every year, is cheaper and probably easier to get at least where I live than it was twenty years ago. There is absolutely no shortage of cheap marijuana on the streets here. Demand is high and there is a never ending supply of people willing to take the big risks involved in transporting this product to meet that demand, and as long as there is great demand for marijuana in this country, that is never going to change.