You FAILED the test. Consuming unlicensed rotgut was/is still illegal. Evidently, your argument is that the government should provide pure heroin, cocaine, etc., to users so you don't buy some "bad stuff" on the black market and harm your body. You DO realize how assinine such a position is, I hope.
I will ask you once again. Can you name for me a SINGLE activity that has DECREASED in occurence when that activity was made LEGAL after being illegal? NAME ONE.
If you don't have the common sense to know that ANY activity will INCREASE once legalized (and thus blessed) by a government, then I can't help you. I can educate you with the facts, but I can't make you use simple reason and logic. Of course you know that I'm correct - that any activity that is legalized will increase. You may not want it to be so, but if you strip away all of your biases and desires, you know the truth. I'm sure of it.
Blovations by bureaucrats and foreign police authorities...
I see. So when you quote somebody, it's the "facts". When I quote people on the front line, and not some fat, liberal beauracrat behind a desk, then it's "bloviating". Yeah, right. LOL
Could you kindly explain why Holland's parents and teachers haven't rioted in the streets in the last couple of decades to correct this?
You know what happens when you "assume" don't you? Don't make the mistake of assuming that parents and interested citizens haven't lodged their protests of government policy. But that's beside the point, isn't it? You could care less what they say, isn't that right? You just want your drugs legalized. If somebody agrees with you, then they are brilliant geniuses. If somebody disagrees, then they are big brother, witch hunting Nazis. You do see what you are doing, right? You claim everything's hunky-dory in Holland and everyone there knows what a great success their drug policies are. Then when you are presented with many cases showing what a disaster the policies actually are, you want to shoot the messengers. Be careful what you ask for. If you don't want to know how things are in Holland, don't ask.
You ignore all the stats that I quote, and then complain that I don't provide any stats. I BOLD-FACED the stats so you wouldn't miss them, but you STILL managed to ignore the content of the BOLD-FACED comments, while at the same time complaining about the BOLD FACE type.
I could quote the Alaskan figures for you as well, but I'm sure you'd find a reason to dismiss them as well, but I'll give you hint as the findings - drug usage increased greatly under the liberalized policies. Shocking, isn't it? LOL
Look. You are obviously very committed to your cause of making drugs legal and free. You are not happy when the facts show what a disaster your policy would be, and is, in action.
You make the point that we have a drug problem in the U.S. I couldn't agree more. Let's not make it worse.
It is not; any more than consuming heroin is illegal. Possession of heroin is illegal, possession of rotgut, insofar as I know, is not, on account of the overturning of the Prohibition Amendment.
Nice screed, however, it is just trying to blow away my point with smoke and mirrors. You know we don't report rotgut poisoning in the local newspapers on a weekly basis anymore, don't you? Virtually all the alcohol that is consumed nowadays is produced under licensed conditions, which is far safer, and you know this also, don't you?
Could you kindly explain why Holland's parents and teachers haven't rioted in the streets in the last couple of decades to correct this?
You know what happens when you "assume" don't you? Don't make the mistake of assuming that parents and interested citizens haven't lodged their protests of government policy.
I'm totally unsurprised to hear that there are Hollanders who disagree with Holland's policies--how much cheese does that cut? There are US citizens who loudly protest the US's policy--with about equal effect.
Answer the question asked--They've had decades to change their minds--why haven't they?
I see. So when you quote somebody, it's the "facts". When I quote people on the front line, and not some fat, liberal beauracrat behind a desk, then it's "bloviating". Yeah, right. LOL
I didn't quote "somebody" I quoted the DEA's Judge-Advocate, charged with determining the scheduling of marijuana w/respect to the controlled substances act, and the chief scientist of the Nixon Commission on Marijuana. The unscientific opinions of a handful of cops who get paid to hate marijuana is hardly a reasonable comparison. Furthermore--what I am quoting is the expensive summary judgement of a year or more of comparative evaluation of scientific findings by a panel of conservative scientists, appointed by prohibitionist governments hellbent on proving marijuana harmful.
Look. You are obviously very committed to your cause of making drugs legal and free.
It's not my cause, and I am not overly commited to it. I'm just opposed to stupid behavior, like putting kids in jail over something that's clearly less harmful than cigarettes or alcohol, by at least an order of magnetude.
You are not happy when the facts show what a disaster your policy would be, and is, in action.
Really--what Swiss drug disasters would you be referring to? Heroin was available by prescription in Britain in the 50's and 60's--were there heroin riots then? What huge social cost, that you can actually measure, accompanied the Alaskan experiment with de-criminalizing marijuana? If something isn't very harmful, a bit more of it isn't very harmful either. What horribly damaging affects accompanied the perfectly legal contagion of heroin addiction of civil war vets and housewives between the Civil War the the first World War? --you know--the period of time when the US rose to until-then-unknown levels of wealth and influence in the world by frogmarching the rest of the earth into the industrial revolution?