Posted on 02/03/2003 9:54:04 AM PST by MrLeRoy
As law enforcement lobbies members of Congress and state legislators coast-to-coast for more funds to finance the war against illicit drugs, Utah's Legislature considers liberalizing Utah's liquor laws.
As leaders obsess over how governments will help pay for the costs of medical treatment, Utah's Legislature is considering liberalizing Utah's liquor laws.
Someone should teach Utah's legislators that alcohol is the most abused drug.
Pretend for a minute that humankind had not discovered alcohol until Drexel distilled it in 2000. After years of testing, would the Federal Drug Administration allow it to be sold as a drink? At best, the FDA would place it under a restrictive prescription schedule, complete with a list of warnings against side effects and addiction potential.
Studies that tout alcohol's benefit on heart health illustrate that some "scientific" testing is actually designed to justify our habits. If Drexel had discovered alcohol and tried to market it as a heart medication, the FDA would have denied the proposal because of its dangerous and addictive side effects.
Ancient beers and wines had minor food value. In specific times and places, they were safer to drink than the waters. Through the ages, humans experimented with wines and spirits, not to improve their food value, but to increase their alcohol jolt.
The snobbishness surrounding wine consumption is misleading, for vintners are just as obsessive about high alcohol contents as are the distillers of whiskey.
Alcohol, with tobacco and marijuana are the big-three hypocrisies in the American war on drugs. Proponents of these substances would have us believe they are really good for us because they are (in the popular cliché) "natural."
This logic is laughable. Mankind has so hybridized the plants involved in wine and the various types of cigarettes that nothing is natural about any of the products.
For example, mankind has so thoroughly hybridized marijuana in the past four thousand years that the original plant probably does not exist anywhere on earth. People tinkered with it -- especially since the late 1970s -- to increase the psychoactive buzz, not its dubious medical properties.
Neither the war on drugs nor the medical crisis can be taken seriously when billions are squandered to treat conditions and illnesses caused by culturally accepted drug abuse. When we are really serious about decreasing medical costs and drug abuse, we will end recreational consumption of alcohol, tobacco and marijuana.
#2 How come you never post about anything but drugs?
Pretend for a minute that you live in the real world. You know, the world where alcohol plays and has played a significant role in health, religious ceremonies, social customs, and societal acceptance.
I already rebutted this stupid argument in http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/834463/posts?page=53#53, to which you never replied; how cowardly and dishonest of you to repost it here.
#2 How come you never post about anything but drugs?
That is a lie; see, for example, http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/833634/posts?page=26#26.
Provide evidence that alcohol plays a significant role in health.
religious ceremonies, social customs,
Relevance?
and societal acceptance.
Alcohol plays a significant role in societal acceptance? Now you're just babbling.
You forgot to mention alcohol's major role in domestic abuse, bar fights, broken homes, liver disease, car wrecks and early deaths. Something most illegal drugs are not close to being involved in on the same scale as alcohol.
But you knew that.....
Uh, after you. But don't hold your breath.
Not as strange as those who obsess about the topics of other's posts.
And not nearly as strange as those posters who only frequent threads with "drugs" or "libertarians" in the titles to flame them.
Sounds to me like they've got some catchin' up to do! Legalization should help.
I use no drugs, including the deadly addictive drugs alcohol and tobacco.
That makes one post out of fifty you made that is not about drugs.
Here are more:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/833929/posts?page=36#36
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/831272/posts?page=34#34
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/828093/posts?page=62#62
Not much. From the U.S. Department of Justice's National Criminal Justice Reference Service (publication NCJ 145534): "Of all psychoactive substances, alcohol is the only one whose consumption has been shown to commonly increase aggression. [...] Marijuana and opiates temporarily inhibit violent behavior [...] There is no evidence to support the claim that snorting or injecting cocaine stimulates violent behavior. [...] Anecdotal reports notwithstanding, no research evidence supports the notion that becoming high on hallucinogens, amphetamines, or PCP stimulates violent behavior in any systematic manner."
Keep up (what you think is) the good work.
Who said it did? Amazing how you've addressed NONE of the issues I raised in post #7.
No evidence of this other than anecdotes and hyperbole.
Why should I? Like it would make a difference to you? I'll give you an example of how you waste my time. Let's take the first one.
"Provide evidence that alcohol plays a significant role in health."
First of all, I said alcohol plays and has played a significant role in health, so already you're mis-quoting me. Alcohol has played a significant role as a disinfectant and the making of tinctures and elixers. It is used today as a disinfectant and in medicines such a cough syrups and sleep aids.
So what is your problem with that? Do you deny a long history of alcohol and health? Isn't is safe to say that alcohol has been used, and is being used, by our society in a health related capacity?
What's the first thing you think of when you hear medical disinfectant? Not significant?
So, did I waste my time, or are you convinced?
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