Posted on 03/28/2006 10:51:21 PM PST by goldstategop
Spread of AIDS and other diseases, discarded syringes, overburdening social services, especially medical.
Quite the contrary. I contend that our constitution allows us to write laws governing immoral behavior.
You so 'contend' without any basis. [see the 14th]
- Nothing in the Constitution allows government at any level to deprive us of life, liberty, or property without due process of law. Both writing & enforcing prohibitory 'laws' violates constitutional due process.
It is the libertarians who insist on restricting our laws to those that only involve harm to others.
Rational people everywhere support our Constitutions restrictions on writing laws that infringe on our right to life, liberty, or property.
And where is the harm in flashing? A person may be alarmed, or shocked, or offended, yes. But harmed? Harmed to the point of monetary compensation? Find a jury that can cope with that one.
Paulsen, when you wag your willy in some innocent young girls face on the subway, - you have not only harmed her, -- you have 'breached the peace'.
I could see a jury fining you heavily in order to "cope with" your behavior, and to compensate your victim.
C'mon---that's a bit of a stretch. We no longer criminalize adultery, and adultery remains socially unacceptable.
Overrun? No. But it was about .5% of the population, higher than today.
Bull.
"There were an estimated 980,000 hardcore heroin addicts in the United States [that's about 0.35% of the population] in 1999, 50 percent more than the estimated 630,000 hardcore addicts in 1992."
--www.usdoj.gov/ndic/pubs07/794/heroin.htm
"The demand for both powdered and crack cocaine in the United States is high. Among those using cocaine in the United States during 2000, 3.6 million [about 1.3% of the population] were hardcore users who spent more than $36 billion on the drug in that year."
--http://www.usdoj.gov/ndic/pubs07/794/cocaine.htm
_______________________________
Using figures from the USDOJ, and a population of 280,000,000, the rate of addiction to either cocaine or heroin in 2000 is about 1.6%, or just over 3X the 0.5% rate in 1900.
The DOJ and ONDCP also says the numbers you cite are bogus:
"Cautious evaluation of this data is necessary because the NHSDA cannot accurately measure rare or stigmatized drug use, relying as it does on self-reporting and on people residing in households. In alternate research, the number of hardcore* users of heroin in 1998 was estimated to be 980,000,"
"Estimates of heroin use from the NHSDA are considered very conservative due to the probable underreporting and undercoverage of the population of heroin users."
No, the government ended the problem. More correctly, they reduced the size and scope of the problem by about 90%.
HAHAHA!
Proving my point that we shouldn't compare different cultures.
"teen abuse of alcohol is double ours"
www.udetc.org/documents/CompareDrinkRate.pdf
"Teens everywhere would rather drink than smoke pot. That is a worldwide fact."
But how much more, is my point.
Yes, it can, but evidently not dramatically enough or quickly enough for the notorious short-commitment span of the American people. For example, drug courts established in my home state and elsewhere are achieving remarkable results in terms of both recovery and in the reduction of criminal recidivism.
In Real Life, we can never remove ourselves from those who mean to govern us. The only thing we citizens can do is restrict our government's power to interfere into our lives to an absolute minimum. Under our form of government, where governmental power and individual rights collide, without a compelling, legitimate reason to exercise power, individual rights must triumph over the power of government to interfere. Otherwise, the whole house of cards comes tumbling down.
The illusion, the house of cards is going to collapse. People will look back in near disbelief. It's not openly talked about much by the people that have a firm grasp of advancement of technology and innovation. The most accurate prognosticators of the future take those into account. There is no way the government in its present form will keep up with the future. It will be rebuilt on its primary responsibility with it's focus on protecting individual life, private property and private contract. Likewise, persons that have a vested interest in maintaining the present form of government will make alternate plans.
Below is an excerpt with URL. If you want I can email you the 11-page PDF.
"In thinking about the future few people take into consideration the fact that human scientific progress is exponential: It expands by repeatedly multiplying by a constant (10 times 10 times 10, and so on) rather than linear (10 plus ten plus 10, and so on). I emphasize the exponential--versus-linear perspective because it's the most important failure that prognosticators make in considering future trends.
"...But the future will be far more surprising than most people realize, because few observers have truly internalized the implications of the fact that the rate of change itself is accelerating.
"Exponential growth starts out slowly and virtually unnoticeable, but beyond the knee of the curve it turns explosive and profoundly transformative. My models show that we are doubling the paradigm-shift rate for technology innovation every decade. ...To express this another way, we won't experience 100 years of technology advance in the twenty-first century; we will witness on the order of 20,000 years of progress (again, when measured by today's progress rate), or progress on a level of about 1,000 times greater than what was achieved in the twentieth century. -- The Singularity and Human Destiny, by Patrick Tucker, assistant editor, THE FUTURIST
If you cannot tell me how she was harmed -- not shocked, not insulted, not alarmed, not embarrassed, not offended -- how she was actually harmed through force or fraud (those libertarian standards, mind you), then please be quiet and let someone else chime in.
I'd really like to know.
I am all for that, for both drugs and drink.
Sweell, if they applied to all. They don't. Even when someone dies as a result.
So let's just roll over and legalize everything. We have been invaded by illegal aliens all over the world, we have been run over with illegal substances, and gang warfare on our streets.
Let's just give it all up life is futile...
"Spread of AIDS and other diseases, discarded syringes, overburdening social services, especially medical."
This doesn't fit the description of what I would consider a recreational user. You're talking about addicts of hard drugs, not occasional tokers.
"If we, as a people, lack the moral fiber to avoid massive drug or alcohol abuse, how shall a war on drugs and alcohol save us from same?"
paulsen dissembles:
That philosophy, of course, would also support the legalization of gambling, pornography, prostitution, gay marriage, and a host of other issues (polygamy, bestiality, etc.).
Do you also support those? -- Unlike years ago, our society today relies on the law to guide behavior.
There you go again paulsen. You admit that "years ago" we had the freedom to commit the 'sins' you list above.
How often have you heard, "Yes I did that and it was wrong -- but it wasn't illegal!"?
Owning 'dangerous products' like drugs, guns, porn, - has never been constitutionally 'illegal', - and never will be.
Engaging in morally repugnant activities like gambling, pornography, prostitution, gay marriage, polygamy, bestiality, etc. -- In private, -- has never been constitutionally 'illegal', - and never will be.
You communitarian warriors simply cannot admit that you are anti-constitutional.
I'd really like to know.
An impartial jury will decide if harm did or did not occur and to what extent restitution may be due. How about you tell the people on this thread how you have been harmed by the act of a person smoking a joint in the privacy of their home. You can pretend it's an impartial jury you're "talking" to.
We are not debating state sanction of gambling, drug use or prostitution. We are debating state sanction of a war against the right of self determination found in the Constitution.
Applause!!!
Actually, that's about the last one.
But there are many behaviors where morality, self-respect, and character used to limit the action. Just about all of the PC laws came about because people were no longer restricted by those virtues and needed a law to stop the behavior.
Laws against swearing, ethnic jokes, workplace harrassment rules up the ying-yang, public school dress codes, on and on.
My point is, many laws today are in place because people are no longer restrained by morality and character. If a man made a lewd comment to a woman, it resulted in a slap. And that was it. Nowadays, both would race to the courthouse to file a suit against the other.
Now, take a previously illegal activity and make it legal, whoa, Katie bar the door. Homosexual sodomy? Go ahead and say you're against it in public.
Relax the pornography laws and Hollywood pushes the envelope -- where's the outrage?
Gambling laws. We've got local casinos, riverboats, state lotteries -- unacceptable? Puh-leeze. Once it's legal, no one touches it.
Non sequitur. The penalty for a given real crime (e.g. reckless driving) is properly based on the threat posed by the criminal act. Your notion that some crimes of a given type need to be singled out over others for "draconian punishments" (e.g. doling out a heavier sentence for beating up Joe Blow than for beating up John Doe because Joe happens to be gay) introduces a corrosive element of irrationality into the legal system.
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