Can we just start calling this position by its real name: Drug Jester. The War on Drugs is a joke and would be laughably stupid if not for the massive financial and social damage it causes.
Do we really intend our police forces to be armies on our streets, waging war against our citizens?
No wonder we are the world's greatest jailer-nation. Now that's something to be proud of. Think I'll go slap a flag sticker on my SUV. (Gotta have one so I can get at my gardens out in the woods on other folks land, right? Only way to make it through hard times.)
Jesting, folks. Just jesting. But it is the reality -- people like the laws because it keeps the risk high, keeping the prices high, too.
Maybe cold turkey won't work for politicians and media addicted to high cost/high damage/low effectiveness wars against drugs. But how about trying an element in the temporary fiscal stimulus which spends a good deal extra quickly on policies which have some chance of really working, balanced by later rundown of useless measures and increases in alcohol and tobacco taxes?
With drugs you are going to have massive financial and social damage. It is a matter of who is the victim? You can be all the libertarian you want and say it is your body, but history is littered with wrecked societies who let the individual decide. I believe we should let the individual decide but then again I am single and childless with no real stake in the outcome. Still I would hate to see it all go down in a haze.
With drugs you are going to have massive financial and social damage. It is a matter of who is the victim? You can be all the libertarian you want and say it is your body, but history is littered with wrecked societies who let the individual decide
Name some. Come on Blaine, stop repeating mindless drug war boilerplate and actually offer some citations that we can verify. Name these wrecked societies that so littered history, in short, put up or shut up.
Well, China, after losing the opium war with the UK was a bit of a mess, but introducing the sale of opium certainly didn't help things.
Chemical recreation + welfare results in a large number of addicts. Libertarians should rail against the welfare state that distorts the results of chemical recreation. I'd tolerate decriminalization if I could be assured that my tax dollars weren't going to support some junkie's life stile.
Half Canadian beat me to it. "Well, China, after losing the opium war with the UK was a bit of a mess, but introducing the sale of opium certainly didn't help things.” Bit of a mess seems to be a bit of an understatement. Over 60% of the populace used opium habitually. Scores of commentary on the lack of production from the people using the drug.
Early 19th century America, one of the reasons for prohibition of alcohol, was the success of the prohibition of narcotics. And the prohibition of narcotics was made possible by the obvious evidence of the disruption to family life, whether by direct use or by physical abuse of the users. A near miss in the wrecked society column.
Boilerplate has its uses and its origins. I shouldn't have to reinvent the wheel every time we have a discussion.
Neither Blaine nor Half-Canadian offers any facts or citations, just regurgitated drug war crap and a broadside against junkie welfare recipients. Blaine can't even get the century right when he talks about prohibition, which makes every other claim that he makes fairly ludicrous as well, there sure as Hell wasn't any prohibition of alcohol in early 19th century America or any other controlled substances. What I'd like to see from either one of you is some actual real evidence and not a bunch of crap you got out of an old Fu Manchu novel or ONDCP propaganda, which is about as substantive as the ravings of Sax Rohmer but far less entertaining.
"I'd tolerate decriminalization if I could be assured that my tax dollars weren't going to support some junkie's life stile."
Well, I'm not a huge fan of welfare either, but right now you can thank the robbed, looted and burgaled for supporting junkies, as well as your taxes.
"And the prohibition of narcotics was made possible by the obvious evidence of the disruption to family life, whether by direct use or by physical abuse of the users. A near miss in the wrecked society column."
What near miss? We have wrecked lives, neighborhoods, and towns all over the place. Prohibition has failed to do anything but exacerbate and multiply the costs we all must bear for the drug abuse of some of us. Drug abuse will occur, legal or not. Better to ask why so many despair of happiness without inebriation.
For those too lazy to use the Google and the Wikipedia , there is a detailed article on opium use in China at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium.
The money quote:
After 1860, opium use continued to increase with widespread domestic production in China, until more than a quarter of the male population was addicted by 1905.
This, of course, doesn't fit the libertarian argument that legalizing addictive drugs like heroin and cocaine won't lead to much higher drug use and a higher level of addicts. Everything about that article makes it clear that the more easily opium was made available, the higher level of addiction.
I'm no fan of the current war on drugs. But let's not pretend that legalizing hard drugs is a simple, easy answer to the question.
I understand the claim that illegal drugs are supposed to make them too expensive for junkies to afford them, but how is legalization supposed to make this better? Sure, they are cheaper, but the users are still junkies. How productive are they going to be?
The facts of life are conservative. People need to work to eat. Remove the safety net for drug abuse, and drug abuse will go down. Libertarians should address this point first. Then, when you fall on your own vices, legalize them and let people reap their own rewards.
That is, after all, the libertarian way. You cannot be a libertarian on social issues while also being a liberal on monetary issues.
Can we just start calling this position by its real name: Drug Jester. The War on Drugs is a joke and would be laughably stupid if not for the massive financial and social damage it causes.
without the war on drugs.. Mr Hicks would not have made me weep.
Wars are fought with armies.
Do we really intend our police forces to be armies on our streets, waging war against our citizens?
No wonder we are the world's greatest jailer-nation. Now that's something to be proud of. Think I'll go slap a flag sticker on my SUV. (Gotta have one so I can get at my gardens out in the woods on other folks land, right? Only way to make it through hard times.)
Jesting, folks. Just jesting. But it is the reality -- people like the laws because it keeps the risk high, keeping the prices high, too.
If we're going to have a drug czar, can we just treat him like the Russians treated the last of their's?
I know it is a forlorn hope, but maybe, just maybe, Obama will have the courage to make the case for decriminalization.
Maybe cold turkey won't work for politicians and media addicted to high cost/high damage/low effectiveness wars against drugs. But how about trying an element in the temporary fiscal stimulus which spends a good deal extra quickly on policies which have some chance of really working, balanced by later rundown of useless measures and increases in alcohol and tobacco taxes?
With drugs you are going to have massive financial and social damage. It is a matter of who is the victim? You can be all the libertarian you want and say it is your body, but history is littered with wrecked societies who let the individual decide. I believe we should let the individual decide but then again I am single and childless with no real stake in the outcome. Still I would hate to see it all go down in a haze.
Blaine writes:
Name some. Come on Blaine, stop repeating mindless drug war boilerplate and actually offer some citations that we can verify. Name these wrecked societies that so littered history, in short, put up or shut up.
.23 What consenting adults ingest is still none of your goddamn business.
Well, China, after losing the opium war with the UK was a bit of a mess, but introducing the sale of opium certainly didn't help things.
Chemical recreation + welfare results in a large number of addicts. Libertarians should rail against the welfare state that distorts the results of chemical recreation. I'd tolerate decriminalization if I could be assured that my tax dollars weren't going to support some junkie's life stile.
Half Canadian beat me to it. "Well, China, after losing the opium war with the UK was a bit of a mess, but introducing the sale of opium certainly didn't help things.” Bit of a mess seems to be a bit of an understatement. Over 60% of the populace used opium habitually. Scores of commentary on the lack of production from the people using the drug.
Early 19th century America, one of the reasons for prohibition of alcohol, was the success of the prohibition of narcotics. And the prohibition of narcotics was made possible by the obvious evidence of the disruption to family life, whether by direct use or by physical abuse of the users. A near miss in the wrecked society column.
Boilerplate has its uses and its origins. I shouldn't have to reinvent the wheel every time we have a discussion.
Neither Blaine nor Half-Canadian offers any facts or citations, just regurgitated drug war crap and a broadside against junkie welfare recipients. Blaine can't even get the century right when he talks about prohibition, which makes every other claim that he makes fairly ludicrous as well, there sure as Hell wasn't any prohibition of alcohol in early 19th century America or any other controlled substances. What I'd like to see from either one of you is some actual real evidence and not a bunch of crap you got out of an old Fu Manchu novel or ONDCP propaganda, which is about as substantive as the ravings of Sax Rohmer but far less entertaining.
I did get the century wrong about prohibition. I apologize for that, and that I can not drop everything and do a research paper on "propaganda".
"I'd tolerate decriminalization if I could be assured that my tax dollars weren't going to support some junkie's life stile."
Well, I'm not a huge fan of welfare either, but right now you can thank the robbed, looted and burgaled for supporting junkies, as well as your taxes.
"And the prohibition of narcotics was made possible by the obvious evidence of the disruption to family life, whether by direct use or by physical abuse of the users. A near miss in the wrecked society column."
What near miss? We have wrecked lives, neighborhoods, and towns all over the place. Prohibition has failed to do anything but exacerbate and multiply the costs we all must bear for the drug abuse of some of us. Drug abuse will occur, legal or not. Better to ask why so many despair of happiness without inebriation.
@quixote:
For those too lazy to use the Google and the Wikipedia , there is a detailed article on opium use in China at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium.
The money quote:
After 1860, opium use continued to increase with widespread domestic production in China, until more than a quarter of the male population was addicted by 1905.
This, of course, doesn't fit the libertarian argument that legalizing addictive drugs like heroin and cocaine won't lead to much higher drug use and a higher level of addicts. Everything about that article makes it clear that the more easily opium was made available, the higher level of addiction.
I'm no fan of the current war on drugs. But let's not pretend that legalizing hard drugs is a simple, easy answer to the question.
Seanooski,
I understand the claim that illegal drugs are supposed to make them too expensive for junkies to afford them, but how is legalization supposed to make this better? Sure, they are cheaper, but the users are still junkies. How productive are they going to be?
The facts of life are conservative. People need to work to eat. Remove the safety net for drug abuse, and drug abuse will go down. Libertarians should address this point first. Then, when you fall on your own vices, legalize them and let people reap their own rewards.
That is, after all, the libertarian way. You cannot be a libertarian on social issues while also being a liberal on monetary issues.