The war on Americans who use drugs...

The received wisdom is that if all banned drugs were legalized then all drug crime would stop, warlords would go out of business, druggies would get bored with drugs and everything would be mellow.

That won't happen.

Druggies, like drunks, are losers. Make drugs legal and you get more losers.
You get more people driving under the influence, you get more crime by people who spent every penny on drugs, it all gets a lot worse than it is now.

Yes, the WOD is debatable in its efficacy and sometimes draconian in its enforcement, but it maintains the stigma and the fear of punishment thereby limiting the number of losers per square inch (LPSI).

And no, it has no relationship to guns. Only druggies who own guns (scary?) feel like their gvt is trying to spoil their fun.
Non-druggies with guns realize that we are in a continuing fight against Socialism - a scheme of gvt that mandates removal of guns from civilians.
Drugs are banned because they dangerously screw people up.

So to recap:

Drugs = losers
Gvt to keep LPSI to a minimum

Fighting over growing three plants "for person use" is rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. There are huge problems with drugs that legalizing and de-stigmatizing will only exacerbate.

G
 
Last post on this thread by Pipoman

If 1/2 of the money spent on enforcement and incarceration of drug possessors was spent on free inpatient treatment the problem would be diminished.

There are countless addicts who would love treatment but who cannot afford it or cannot wait 3 to 6 months for a free spot in the grossly lacking current system.

I believe we are throwing money at the wrong end of this very real problem.

We are not going to solve the problem by enforcement...ever.:(
 
The received wisdom is that if all banned drugs were legalized then all drug crime would stop, warlords would go out of business, druggies would get bored with drugs and everything would be mellow.

That won't happen.

Druggies, like drunks, are losers. Make drugs legal and you get more losers.
You get more people driving under the influence, you get more crime by people who spent every penny on drugs, it all gets a lot worse than it is now.
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If drugs were legal there would indeed be more drug abusers. I have no doubt at all about that. And I know from personal experience how many problems that would cause. I have relatives who have abused drugs, and unlike most Drug Warriors I've volunteered in shelters where many of the clients are recovering drug abusers. So I'm well aware of the dangers from legalization.

But most of the new drug abusers would be people who are already losers: Drunks. And eliminating the black market would mean that most drug abusers could sustain their habits without spending every penny on drugs, just like most drunks (except a few homeless guys) still have money left over after buying booze.

Sadly, I don't think that legalization will ever happen. There's a giant criminal underground with hundreds of billions of dollars, and they would lose everything if drugs were legalized. They won't let that happen.

Anyway, I have to go score some caffeine from the Starbucks. I'm getting kind of shaky right now, time to get some more.
 
People who drink and drive are the major safety problem on our highways!

Today in the U.S.:

Over 40,000 people die on the highways each year.

About half of the fatalities involve alcohol.

Each year, drinking and driving results in:

Millions of arrests

Hundreds of thousands of serious injuries

Tens of billions of dollars in alcohol related costs

And remember - drinking is illegal for people under the age of 21 in all states.

Many people don't drink. About 50% of the population does not drink.

Common uses of alcohol are:

with a meal (wine)

for social drinking

as part of a celebration, such as a wedding.

People that contribute to the drinking problem are heavy drinkers, social drinkers, and people who drink moderately but still feel that they are competent to drive. Heavy drinkers are people who have an addiction to alcohol, and frequently drive while under the influence constantly. Social drinkers are people who are usually responsibly when drinking, but at one time, may drink just "one drink too many" and in this time, they decide to drive, and the results can be disastrous.
For people who drink "moderately", they forget that alcohol affects judgment and they insist they can drive perfectly fine, even though they are impaired by alcohol.
 
@ Redworm

I am interested in what a person's intent is with regard to the intake of alcohol or cannabis. I don't do cannabis but I do drink alcohol occasionally. However I have never been drunk. I typically have a maximum of two alcoholic drinks when I'm out and then I switch to Cola. If you were to ask me why I drink alcohol at all I would say it is because of the taste. I tend to like liqueurs too and I usually have a bottle of one liqueur or another here in the house.

Now as far as my alcohol intake is concerned, am I correct in saying that it matches what you would call responsible drinking behaviour? If so, then I must assume that my drinking habits and the quantities imbibed fall below a certain threshold, such threshold representing a line which if crossed would render me less capable of attending to whatever duties or tasks I may doing. The bottom line is, do you dispute my assertion that for all intents and purposes my drinking habits exclude alcohol as a mind-altering drug (as measured by effect)?
This leads me to ask what the equivalent threshold is in terms of cannabis use. Could you for argument's sake say that smoking only one joint leaves you in the same boat as me in terms of the threshold of impairment? If your answer is yes, then I must ask whether you do in fact smoke one joint only per given time period, and furthermore what is the motivation for smoking the joint if you are to remain under the threshold of impairment as measured by effect? Can you say that there are cannabis users out there who have been smoking joints as long as I have been drinking alcohol (say 17 years) but who have never got high? Is there such a person as a cannabis smoker who does not intend to get high, and if so what is his motivation for smoking it?

Do you see what I'm trying to outline here? I maintain that a cannabis user intends to get high, whereas an alcohol-drinker does not always intend to get drunk. Do your smoking habits match my drinking habits, and if not, why not?
 
Why should it? Why should it be a problem for me to get blazed out of my mind to the point that all I can do is sit on the couch eating cheetos and watching cartoons? :confused: I work, I pay my rent, I pay my taxes, and not once has any chemical made me hurt anyone else. Why does it matter if I decide to drink two beers or half a bottle of scotch? The latter will certainly get me drunk but if I don't drive then why should you or anyone else care? Why does anyone else have the right to tell me what state of sobriety is too much for my mind? If I hurt someone then you can punish me but until I do, persecuting me when I haven't hurt anyone is no different than persecuting a gun owner for the simple fact that he owns a gun.
 
I don't drink or use illegal or illicit drugs..I remember when the president's dad passed a weapons ban back in 1989 supposedly because the police were "outgunned" by drug dealers :rolleyes:
 
Government Property Seizures out of Control

Jarret Wollstein
Saturday, June 30, 2001
Across America, the Drug Enforcement Administration is seizing the luggage, cash and cars of hapless travelers. Under America's new civil forfeiture laws, mere possession of a large amount of cash or a drug dog barking at your luggage is sufficient probable cause for police to legally seize everything you are carrying.

In Albuquerque, N.M., in February 2000, DEA agents detained Sam Thach, who was traveling on Amtrak from Fullerton, Calif., to Boston, and seized $147,000 in cash he was carrying. Thach had no drugs. His crime? He had bought a one-way ticket with cash and didn't give Amtrak his phone number. (1)

The DEA seized $640,000 from Jennifer Leigh Ames while she was traveling on Amtrak on April 5, 2001. Agents say she looked nervous and had refused permission to search her luggage. (1)

Former Newark, N.J., policeman Carlos Hernandez discovered police searching his Amtrak sleeper cabin and demanding to search his luggage on July 22, 1999. Hernandez’s crime? He’s Hispanic and paid for his $694 ticket in cash. (2)

At Houston’s Hobby Airport, police stopped 49-year-old Ethel Hylton and seized her luggage because a drug dog had scratched it. Agents searched her bags and strip-searched her but found no drugs. They did find $39,110 in cash from an insurance settlement and her life savings, accumulated through over 20 years of work as a hotel housekeeper and hospital janitor.
Ms. Hylton completely documented where she had gotten the money and was never charged with a crime. But the police kept her money anyway. Destitute, she had no way to fight them. (3)

These outrageous seizures are completely legal and have been upheld by the highest courts in the land, including the U.S. Supreme Court.

The DEA's Web site claims, "Property is seized by the DEA only when it is determined to be a tool for, or the proceeds of, illegal activities such as drug trafficking, organized crime, or money laundering." But the above examples show the reality.

Under civil asset forfeiture, your property – not you – is charged with a crime. Hence the bizarre title of civil forfeiture cases: "United States vs. one 1998 Mercedes Benz," "California vs. 1711 Main Street," and so forth.

Once your property is charged with a crime, it can be seized and kept by police, even if you are never convicted of anything. An appeals court in Florida even ruled that police can personally receive bounties of 25 percent of the value of anything they seize from you, such as your car, bank accounts or home.

There are now more than 400 federal offenses and thousands of state and local offenses for which your cash, car, bank accounts and home can be seized – including shoplifting, hiring an illegal alien such as a maid (California), playing a car stereo too loud (New York), transporting illegal fireworks, gambling, having illegal drugs on your property, and merely discussing violating any law ("conspiracy”), such as underpaying your taxes.

More than $1 billion in property is now seized without trial each year from innocent Americans, according to the national forfeiture defense organization FEAR (Forfeiture Endangers American Rights) (4). Seizures range from the pocket cash of poor street people to the cars of men accused of soliciting prostitutes to multimillion-dollar apartment buildings.

Once police seize your property, the burden of proof is on you to prove your property’s innocence. Any suspected illegal actions of your relatives, guests, friends and employees on or even near your property are sufficient grounds to seize it.

In Montgomery, Ala., police seized the home of 69-year-old Gussie Mae Gantt after videotaping police informants buying drugs in her yard. Ms. Gantt had previously called the police, complaining about drug dealing in her neighborhood, and had posted no-trespassing signs, but the drug dealers ignored them. Police waited until there was a drug deal in her yard and then seized her home. (5)


Easy Money for the Government

Once your home, car or bank accounts are seized under civil asset forfeiture laws, you can pretty much forget about ever getting them back. It's you versus the police and courts, who divide up the proceeds from your property according to formulas such as "80 percent for police, 20 percent for the court."

If you want to fight seizure of your property, expect to spend at least $15,000 just to hire a competent asset defense attorney. Also expect the police to introduce hearsay evidence and to go through trial after trial, because the normal constitutional protections afforded criminal suspects don't apply to civil forfeiture of your property. (6)

With all of this easy confiscated money, asset confiscation is now big business across America. In Volusia County, Fla., police seized more than $8 million worth of cars from motorists stopped for minor traffic violations along Interstate 95. (7) In Alameda County, Calif., police auction off hundreds of seized cars and boats every month.

The latest wrinkle in civil asset forfeiture is police working with Amtrak, Greyhound, airlines and hotels to seize cash from travelers. The Albuquerque Journal reports that Amtrak gave the Drug Enforcement Administration access to its booking system in exchange for 10 percent of any monies seized by police.

The DEA has similar deals with airlines at major airports and many hotel and motel owners in Los Angeles, Las Vegas and other large cities. DEA agents are now permanently stationed at major airports and hotels.

So, the next time you pay for an Amtrak ticket, airline flight or hotel room in cash, don’t be surprised if you get a knock on your door from machine gun-armed DEA agents.

Sources:

(1) "Railway Bandits," Reason, July 2001, p. 14.

(2) "Railway Bandits," Reason, July 2001, p. 15.

(3) "Presumed Guilty: The Law's Victims in the War on Drugs," Andrew Schneider and Mary Pat Flaherty. Reprinted from the Pittsburgh Press, Aug. 11-16, 1991, pp. 5-6.

(4) Forfeiture Endangers American Rights, www.fear.org.

(5) An analysis of U.S. asset forfeiture laws, with extensive legal citations, can be found in the book "Your House Is Under Arrest," by Brenda Grantland, one of America's leading asset defense attorneys. Copies are available from ISIL, 707/726-8796, www.isil.org. Another excellent source is "Forfeiting Our Property Rights," by U.S. Rep. Henry Hyde, R-Ill.

(6) Brenda Grantland, "Your House Is Under Arrest," Institute for the Preservation of Wealth, Burnsville, Minn., 1993, p. 61.


(7) Orlando Sentinel, Aug. 2, 1992.
 
@ Redworm

If I hurt someone then you can punish me but until I do, persecuting me when I haven't hurt anyone is no different than persecuting a gun owner for the simple fact that he owns a gun.
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I don't see it that way and that's why I carefully engineered those questions in my previous post. I'll now word it differently, instead of talking about intent, I'll talk about purpose. You should surely agree with me that the purchase of a gun or alcohol or weed is for a specific purpose. When assigning a purpose to each one of these purchases, weed is the odd one out because it can only satisfy the purpose of its use by rendering the user chemically impaired. I don't think its use is subject to degrees and stages such as alcohol, I think it is used expressly for the purpose of getting high. A firearm can serve its purpose even tucked in a holster, and indeed my firearms have served their defensive purpose even though I haven't shot anybody. If anybody asks me whether I have purchased the firearm with the intent to cause impairment to either myself or another, I can say no. I don't have a picture in my mind of a person I intend to impair with my firearm at the time that I purchase it. The same applies to alcohol. When I purchase it, I don't intend to render myself or another impaired by its use. That's because I can have two drinks and not be impaired. I don't drink to be impaired, whereas a weed user has the express purpose of rendering himself impaired. I would feel the same way about alcohol if drinking even small quantities of it would lead to impairment.
I don't judge your use of cannabis, I am commenting on the intended use of cannabis on the whole, and the fact that it is taken to promote impairment. That impairment is what causes the problem and although you claim to not harm anyone else (or yourself) it is perhaps not so strange that people may be concerned about the use of drugs with the sole intent of rendering yourself "out of it". After all if you are high how can you be 100% sure that you are in fact not a danger to yourself or someone else?
That is the distinction that I draw between alcohol, cannabis and firearms: of the three I can easily accept that there is no nefarious motive for the use of firearms and alcohol, but not so for cannabis.
 
Irvin Rosenfeld has been using US government supplied cannabis for over 20 years, and claims to have never gotten high. Nefarious?
 
weed is the odd one out because it can only satisfy the purpose of its use by rendering the user chemically impaired. I don't think its use is subject to degrees and stages such as alcohol,
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One doesn't have to be impaired to enjoy the effects of THC. It is certainly subject to degrees and stages if one decides to use it that way, but the majority of people who smoke pot, like the majority of people who drink, expect to get at least a good buzz going. You may drink alcohol purely for the taste but you are rare among drinkers in that you've never been drunk in 17 years.

I simply don't understand why it matters. If my roommate and I decide to get drunk and play video games all day long, who are we hurting? Now what if we decide to use a different drug, legal or otherwise? Either way we still haven't hurt anyone so why does it matter how inebriated I decide to get?

After all if you are high how can you be 100% sure that you are in fact not a danger to yourself or someone else?
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Can you be 100% sure that you are no danger to anyone else when you're sober? Of course not, no one can be 100% sure of anything. But considering I make conscious decisions not to get drunk or otherwise too impaired when I'm not in the safety of my own home or in the presence of trustworthy friends then I am no more likely to cause harm to anyone else as you are to cause harm to anyone with your gun.


I have to laugh when people use the exact same arguments against drugs as gun control advocates use against the rest of y'all. "No, they haven't hurt anyone but they could and that's enough. If it saves the life of one child...!"
 
@ Publius42

Irvin Rosenfeld has been using US government supplied cannabis for over 20 years, and claims to have never gotten high. Nefarious?
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Well, he claims to use it for medicinal purposes. That has no more bearing here than the use of cocaine in nasal surgery in the hospital.
 
@ Redworm

But considering I make conscious decisions not to get drunk or otherwise too impaired when I'm not in the safety of my own home or in the presence of trustworthy friends then I am no more likely to cause harm to anyone else as you are to cause harm to anyone with your gun.
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Well it seems you are at least not likely to be discovered/prosecuted under such usage conditions because you aren't smoking it in public.
 
Well it seems you are at least not likely to be discovered/prosecuted under such usage conditions because you aren't smoking it in public.
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To be honest I see no issue with smoking or drinking in public as long as I'm not interfering with anyone else. Even where legal I rarely drink in public because I prefer to remain sober unless I'm, as I said, in the company of friends I trust but that doesn't mean that if I decide to have a couple beers or hypothetically enjoy an illegal substance that I'll turn into some mad raving lunatic throwing children into traffic.

What I don't get is why people assume that just because one can do something wrong that they will. I don't get stumbling drunk in public but I've been around friends that have. At worst I've had to babysit them, apologize for a rude comment, or lead them to a bathroom so they don't pee on the nearest alley cat. But none of them have killed anyone, started bar brawls, stolen cars, attacked old ladies, molested children, or any of the ridiculous things that people think drug users, alcohol included, do when inebriated.

I don't hurt people sober or otherwise so why the hell should I be limited on what can go into my body? :confused:

Well, he claims to use it for medicinal purposes. That has no more bearing here than the use of cocaine in nasal surgery in the hospital.
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Do you realize how painful his condition can be? How is pain relief not a valid medicinal purpose? Or are those who get prescribed Vicodin and other dangerous and potentially addicting narcotics just trying to get high? Anyone here that has ever taken narcotics for pain relief after surgery and then spouts about the "evils" of marijuana is as much a hypocrite, in my opinion, as those who claim the same while sipping brandy or holding a bottle of Miller Lite. I don't mean to be rude but I find it disgusting that people who demand the tools to defend freedom would dare to justify the limitations of my freedoms despite having done nothing wrong.
 
What I don't get is why people assume that just because one can do something wrong that they will.
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Because it's a fact that people do all sorts of bad things while under the influence of mind altering chemicals. People have almost no self control (proof - look at how fat we are getting on average).

I don't get stumbling drunk in public but I've been around friends that have.
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Yet you can't understand that just because YOU don't doesn't mean that others don't either. In the meantime you just babysit your friends who don't have the self control you do and wonder why the world won't let you play without rules. The answer is because your friends screwed you because they're the sort of jerks whom we need protected from. And since we can't determine if/when any particular person is going to be a jerk, EVERYONE gets treated as if they are a potential jerk. Thank your friends for this.

I don't hurt people sober or otherwise so why the hell should I be limited on what can go into my body?
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Yet you babysit your friends who can't control themselves, apologize for their indiscretions, protect the general public from their antics, and forget the wonderful events portrayed on the evening news nightly about people who stalk, kill, main, and injure innocents while under the influence and who lack friends who will act as their conscience at those times.

You are most likely a good person. Unfortunately your friends aren't like you and resemble the gen public more than you do. That being the case, don't you think that the world is safer without them being able to imbibe anything and everything with no limits on what or how much? When you realize that the above is true, you'll also realize that your particular desires don't matter in the grander scheme of things.
 
Because it's a fact that people do all sorts of bad things while under the influence of mind altering chemicals. People have almost no self control (proof - look at how fat we are getting on average).
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It's also a fact that people do all sorts of bad things wiith guns while completely sober. No self control = government regulation of every aspect of our lives? :rolleyes:

Thank your friends for this.
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Oh yeah, my buddies that do no more harm than giggle like fools and eat raw cookie dough are real dangers to society and to blame for all the ills in America. :rolleyes:

When you realize that the above is true, you'll also realize that your particular desires don't matter in the grander scheme of things.
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Then neither do yours. Y'know, red meat causes plenty of heart attacks. Let's ban that. TV rots the mind, no need for that. Hell, computers only make us lazy so why should your desire to communicate on the internet take precedence over what's good for society?

Please. :rolleyes: You are using the exact same arguments that the anti-gun people do.


I'm sorry to sound harsh or angry but this is extremely frustrating. If people can't be trusted with chemicals then why are they trusted with projectiles?
 
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Rob P.:
Because it's a fact that people do all sorts of bad things while under the influence of mind altering chemicals. People have almost no self control (proof - look at how fat we are getting on average).
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People do all kinds of bad things period. Be it sober, doped up on illegal drugs, or doped up on alcohol.

Giving the government more control over our lives does not change a ****ing thing. The government cannot protect everyone from themselves or others. It is up to individuals to protect themselves.

The founding fathers of this country did not write up any laws regarding narcotics when they wrote the U.S. Consitution. This country got alone just fine without laws outlawing them, I'm sure we will get along just fine if they were legalized.
 
The founding fathers of this country did not write up any laws regarding narcotics when they wrote the U.S. Consitution. This country got alone just fine without laws outlawing them, I'm sure we will get along just fine if they were legalized.
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Speaking of which, several of our founding fathers including Jefferson, Washington and Jackson used cannabis. There are friendly letters between Jefferson and Washington talking about smoking hashish (which was the prevalent method of the day to prepare cannabis for consumption) and it is fairly well known that they both grew the stuff. I wouldn't call three of the most important, successful and influential people ever to live on this continent losers.

Oh yeah, and according to the bible even Jesus liked to catch a little buzz now and then, his drug of choice was wine.

Just because someone likes to get out of their mind for a little while it doesn't make them irresponsible, dangerous or a loser. Sure, some people lack self control in regards to drugs, be it alcohol, cannabis or crack cocaine, but a society designed with the lowest common denominator in mind is not the sort of place I want to live. I say let people make their own choices, if they screw up their own lives it is not my problem and if they hurt others they should be punished.

Should all guns be banned because there are a few jack***es who are irresponsible with them?
 
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