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Now hold on a minute. I mentioned drunk driving laws to illustrate one point and one point only: That laws and public opinion can and often do reflect and reinforce public opinion.

If you want to discuss whether our current drunk driving laws are reasonable or constitutional, that'd be both interesting and off the subject. Surely we have legitimate points of disagreement we can discuss without pretending that I held up our drunk driving "as an example for no nonsense state drug law". So back to those.

State drug laws operating within all of those limitations are perfectly fine.

I confess that's not a statement I expected to hear from you, but if you indeed hold that view, I'm glad of it. No, we're not a democracy, though our republic has a clearly democratic element to it. Democracy in America has distinct limits, as Madison pointed out: The will of the majority must be right in order to rule.

The majority, for instance, is prohibited from killing you just because they don't like you. They're prohibited from silencing you just because they don't like what you say. But in matters on which they do have authority to act, the majority will prevails. That's a democratic republic, democracy limited by the res publica - the law. (As you already know, I'm certain.)

So where do we still disagree, you Bitter Clinger you? Does the majority (at any level, state, local, federal) have authority to ban drugs? If so, then it's up to you to sway the majority to your way of thinking, and me to do likewise.

Or does individual liberty trump, and overrule the majority no matter how large?

The government in this country rests on one thing- the CONSENT of the GOVERNED. With the Constitution we, the People, set up a compact with the Several States to establish a central government. We, the People are the bedrock for this authority which we granted to government with our consent for the government to act in our names and on our behalf in certain LIMITED matters. However, the key phrase here is “Consent of the Governed.” Which also applies to our relationship with the several States.

As you know (or SHOULD know), I, as an individual, can only consent to having someone do for me THAT WHICH I MAY RIGHTLY DO FOR MYSELF. For example, I may not rightly put a gun to YOUR head to get you to pony up to pay for my wife’s facelift (or even life-saving cancer surgery). If I as an individual cannot do that, how can I LEGITIMATELY consent to having someone else do it in my name and on my behalf? I cannot. Period. The same is true for compelling you to either ingest or put something into your body, such as vitamins or vaccinations, or refrain from ingesting or putting into your body (tobacco smoke or White Castle gut-bombs).

On the other side, since I can rightly screen who comes into my home and take measures to keep out undesirables, then it must follow that, since my country is ALSO my home, I can consent to rules regarding who may enter and on what conditions. I may rightly use whatever level of force is necessary to defend my own person or my loved ones, my neighbors and my/our property; thus, I can properly consent to hiring someone (government) to do that in my name and on my behalf.

So, ANYTHING that government proposes to do to expand the scope of its authority MUST absolutely be looked at through the prism of “CONSENT OF THE GOVERNED.” Which, in essence, is what the Tenth Amendment is: that prism.

So given the above, apply it to your question.

I confess that's not a statement I expected to hear from you...

I tried to put in the post my recognition that we are not so far apart, because I don't believe we are. Certainly, public opinion does sway lawmaking, and should, but we need to be vigilant on those constitutional principles as the line of defense against tyranny they are meant to be.

That having been said, we must also check our own (the people's) power. Just as constitutional does not equate with good and proper, so it is with popularity. I suppose our elected legislators are intended to be the necessary check on both, but we know them to be, all too often, just as reactionary as the least informed (or most misinformed) of the populace.

My tearing apart of state drunk driving laws was done to illustrare an example of the above principles not being so carefully followed.

Now, for the sake of argument let's toss aside DEA enforcement and examine where we are in the states as opposed to where we might rather be.

For the most part, the deadly raids continue, the vast majority of them are in the name of state enforcement involving state and local forces. I think it's one of the major contributors to drug related violence in the US, and in the absence of any other changes, the tactics ought to be rethought. The drug trade is mostly non-violent I believe, and probably warrants a more civil approach as is done with other illegal trades.

Asset forfeiture as a primary mission needs to go. You know it has been challenged from all fronts and for some reason continues to pass muster, but the reality is it's a huge incentive for enforcement agencies to make big captures, and I think it motivates and inspires those agencies to do things they wouldn't normally do on the more solid foundation of the traditional police mission. Better, I think, we should abandon the quest for the spoils and return penalizing, in name and in fact, to the realm of criminal courts where it rightly belongs. Sure, some of the booty is going to escape the reach of the government, but why do we have drug laws? To get as much of a dealers' stuff as possible, or to remove drugs from the streets?

So there are two of the things I think need reexamining first and foremost and I believe my thoughts in that regard stand on firm ground. More should be done beyond that - I have an ideal in my mind but you and I both know it's not a universal vision. I'd be quite happy to see incremental de-escalation and trial of various decriminalization and legalization schemes over time, to see if we can reach a point where more can say we seem to be doing something right.