House Passes EQUAL Act to Erase Sentencing Disparity Between Crack and Powder Cocaine

Reason ^ | | 9.28.2021 3:32 PM | C.J. CIARAMELLA

[webheart]

Funny name for a bill. It wasn’t an unjust application of the law. It was applied just as it was written. It was an unjust law passed by Congress and the Senate where probably Joe Biden voted for it. They blame law enforcement for legislative inequity that was intentional.

[cgbg]

Politicians’ families will still get the “do you know who I am” exemption...no legislation is gonna fix that.

[Alberta's Child]

Let's look at this in the right context. Here's what this silly cycle of paternalistic sh!t involved:

1980s: "There's a crack epidemic in our cities. The government doesn't care about black people, so it lets this epidemic proliferate in our inner cities."

The U.S. government responds by passing laws that include harsher penalties for crack cocaine trafficking than for any other narcotic.

1990s: As anyone with half a brain would have expected, people trafficking crack cocaine in our inner cities -- most of whom are black -- make up a disproportionate share of the criminals imprisoned under Federal drug trafficking laws.

2000s: "Federal drug laws be racist. They must be overturned."

And so it goes -- over and over again.

You can't win when you're dealing with a subculture of losers and unassimilated misfits.

[sphinx]

Crack was marketed as a street drug and was associated with epic levels of violence as gangs fought over turf. Drive by shootings were sending too many grandmothers and little kids to the morgue. Crack became a COVID-level panic and was heavily criminalized, almost entirely due to the violence. At the time, this was very much demanded by urban democrat political types; crack was killing a lot of black people.

Powder cocaine became a drug of abuse in elite circles, but Hollywood producers and Wolf of Wall Street types weren’t shooting each other on the streets. It did contribute to the ongoing stream of dead celebrity junkies, but most of us do not lose a lot of sleep over dead celebrity junkies.

Some drug dealers are smarter than others. The smart ones keep their business off the street.

[DoughtyOne]

I don’t either, but how many White guys to you see standing
around on street corners in middle income family communities
selling cocaine powder?

Some of this is just comical.

[caww]

I’m all for putting away dealers for life....you buy and sell your way to a full time prison sentence. Better still bring back the death penalty.

[caww]

I heard a black gal saying when they if they legalized marijuana then the black folks would go to pushing heroin and cocaine because “ they have no other way to make money”.... I said to her....Why not get a job of which she said "that's no way to make good money".

[Does so]

Or have a joint. Much better if you want to try something and it’s legal in half the U.S

What do yuo try, when Marijuana doesn't give enough of a powerful thrill?

[NobleFree]

“What do yuo try, when Marijuana doesn’t give enough of a powerful thrill?”

I can’t see how the answer to your question does, or possibly could, depend on marijuana’s legal status.