Dopers/gang bangers/dealers...etc. all go hand and hand
only if the drugs are illegal
alcohol and mob killings and organized crime used to all go hand in hand too. Are you saying we should go back to that?
So what your saying is that you would welcome a non-violent drug dealer who laced his cocaine to kill people into your house with open arms? Are you nuts?
he killed someone and you call him non-violent?
and because of this guy someone who was done nothing to anyone except smoke pot has to be in jail with him?
it's only because of the bad law that gang bangers and dealers exist in the first place.
You offer no ideas on what to do with people when they are released from prison except to employ them in a non-existent hemp factory. How more laughable than that can you get?
you want to keep people in prison because you don't have something for them to do if you don't?
what do you do about all the prisoners who complete their sentences now? Tell them that since they don't have a job (since they have, you know, been in prison) that they can't get out?
it sounds like you are talking about keeping the homeless and unemployed in prison because they are homeless and unemployed because they are in prison because they don't have a home or a job because they are in prison...ect...
perhaps a better question is what do you do about the violent criminal who you release because there is no room in the prisons because they are filled with non-violent drug offenders with longer mandatory sentences?
is that the guy that YOU want to welcome into your home with open arms? Keep that pot smoker who never hurt anyone in prison, but let out that wife beating alcoholic?
You offer no ideas on what to do with people when they are released from prison except to employ them in a non-existent hemp factory.
You don't REALLY want to debate the merits of industrial hemp, do you?
In case you do, here's a good starter: Hemp can be used to replace a lot of things that are currently made from petroleum. Plastics, some metals, lubricants and more. Should we go there?
Crabgrass has done a great job defending legalization on what most crtics of legalization consider the least defensible argument: recreation. But there are other arguments for legalization that are more easily defensible, and industrial hemp is a big one.
I would argue for legalization even for recreational purposes, since, as crabgrass has exhaustively pointed out: the consequences of prohibition are worse than the consequences of legalization. If you want some data on the whole social impact question, fine. Take a look at what has occured in countries where pot is legal or decriminalized, like the Netherlands.
no, we tried Phohibition once and it was a failure, remember?
We learned that it's bad law to put someone in jail for using drugs (in this case alcohol) and we repealed that law. It was a bad law.
Releasing these "pot smokers" to a dope factory.
you don't release them "to" anywhere, you release them.
then they are free to do what they like. If they want to get a job growing hemp, fine...but the point is, when you free someone, they can do what they like.
What ever happend to not using crabs? A law is a law. Don't break it.
a bad law is a bad law
it's like Jim Crow laws...if they pass a law that says you can't associate with someone that isn't the same race as you are, do you obey it?
to say a law is a law is to say that you should obey all sorts of bad laws that get made.
you shouldn't obey bad laws, you should get rid of them.
Show me where a person ends up in federal prison JUST for smoking the stuff.
Of the people incarcerated in federal and state prison and in local jails, 37,500 were charged with marijuana offenses only and an additional 21,800 with both marijuana offenses and other controlled-substance offenses. Of the marijuana-only offenders,15,400 are incarcerated for possession, not trafficking.
Sorry I bothered to answer your questions, or that you didn't like the answers, or whatever it was. Sorry I wasted my time, basically. There are lots of books and papers written about ways to end drug prohibition...they might not answer all your questions (since you have six new questions for each one that gets answered), but suffice it to say, plenty of people have thought through all the details.
The problem with answering your third degree is that it all depends. If the Fed stayed involved, that would impact all the other issues below it. If only pot is made legal and not other drugs, then all the answers are different than if all the drugs were made legal. There's decriminalization, full legalization, regulated legalization (like alcohol). It could be handled by localities or by states. Prisons could be sold, converted, rented, or demolished. As is the case with alcohol, some states would have state-run stores, and some states would have a licensing program. Some states would fund drug treatment, others would lean on hospitals, clinics, and other care centers to pick up the slack.
The issue, I think, is that no matter how almost any of your questions get answered -- one way or the other, or the other -- it's still better to end the drug war than not. I don't recall any questions you asked where it was like, "Oh...we better not end the drug war until we settle that one. That's a true sticking point." You're acting like you can't accept the idea of ending the drug war unless all your infinite supply of questions are answered, and it seems to me to be an unreasonable burden.
What's the guy who's released from prison going to buy his girlfriend for her birthday? Where's he going to get the money? How's he going to get to her house? Will he walk? Will he have to take the bus, and if so, will he be crowding someone out of a seat? Will he have exact change? Where's he going to get the change? Will there be a run on change machines? Who's going to fill them? When he gets to her house, will he ring the doorbell, use the knocker, or just knock with his fist? What if his hand is dirty and he smudges the door? Who's going to pay to clean it? What if the girlfriend doesn't like the gift? Will the guy be able to return it? Will he need a receipt?
If hemp was legalized, there would be hemp factories open within two weeks, I predict. The industry is alive and well in other countries, and there are companies a'plenty who would love to set up shop in the U.S. Not to mention all the farmers who would find themselves busy in a way they haven't been in a long time.
The factories are no more non-existent than the theoretical released prisoners who would work in them. I suspect that hemp being made legal would kick in much quicker than releasing prisoners, which involves paperwork and Justice Dept. rigamarole. With hemp, the industry would kick into gear the day the President signed the law legalizing it.
we have been liberating Iraqi prisons (and Iraq itself, if you can believe the news), what are all those prisoners going to do now (and how many of them were violent criminals)?
Lance, I thank you for answering my questions. I was able to carry on a civil discussion with you and Crabby on things. I don't want things to go down a Jethro path. I've just decided that I don't think either of us is going to affect each other that much. I don't see the need to go back and forth endlessly. I'm sorry if I asked too many questions, but I felt that a number of questions would be asked, so I raised them. I would rather, and I think you would too, question things instead of blindly accepting them.
You think once drugs are legal, those gangbangers/drug dealers are all of a sudden going to be legitimate and respective business men?
What do you think they'll do THX? Keep trying to sell drugs at 100 times their value? Keep fighting over drug turf so they can keep selling those drugs to whoever's stupid enough to pay 100 times the market value?
They'd be out of business. At worst, they'd move to gambling, prostitution, and the other remaining consensual "crimes", like the mob did once we took away their cash cow in the 30's. Take away those, and all you have left is gunrunning. But the guns in gunrunning are bought and sold to support those other activities, and with the falsely inflated profits from them. I suppose you'd still have hired killings, too, but you'd have a lot less incentive for them (take a guess how many hired killings are probably related to drug turf or battles or debts), a lot less money fueling them, and a lot more enforcement ability to stop them.
I've just decided that I don't think either of us is going to affect each other that much.
I'm not sure what you were trying to affect with me. I recognize that there are lots of questions relating to ending the drug war. There are lots of answers to those questions. None of your questions came close to making me doubt whether the drug war should be ended -- is that the effect they were supposed to have?
No, because I don't think that your mind can be changed on the subject. I was just wondering if you and Crabby had thought of the different aspects, considered various concerns.
No, because I don't think that your mind can be changed on the subject.
That's probably true. I've been waiting over ten years to hear a credible case for continuing the Drug War, and I haven't heard one. I'm inclined to believe that that's because there isn't one.
I was just wondering if you and Crabby had thought of the different aspects, considered various concerns.
Okay, so I'll ask it since I just thought of it. I am not asking it to get into some big debate, just think it is interesting. Has anyone ever asked drug dealers what they would do if drugs became legalized?
are you suggesting that we keep them illegal so that drug dealers don't find themselves out of work?
Settle down Crabby. I was just curious. I'm done debating with you on all of this. I am just curious as to if anyone had posed the question to them, and what their response was.
Has anyone ever asked drug dealers what they would do if drugs became legalized?
They say, variously, that they don't want it legalized, that it would put them out of business, or that they would go legit, and take their skills and knowledge into the above-ground market.
Most drug dealers I've talked to about it don't think it will be legalized, and they're glad. (Some are mixed-glad -- glad for themselves, though ideally they wish it would be legalized).
"...buying drugs from those people, funds Terrorists."
BECAUSE it's a very lucrative source of funds, BECAUSE it's illegal and therefore the price is wildly inflated. You can try to control something out of existence or you can try to tax something out of existence, but if the demand is there, people will go to the illegal sellers to get it.
Here's a quote from Liberty magazine:
"The FBI says that Hezbollah, an Islamic terrorist group, has been partially financing itself buying cigarettes in North Carolina (where cigarette taxes are low) and reselling them in Michigan (where cigarette taxes are high). The lesson for state legislators? If you impose high taxes, you are supporting terrorism."
If you make the cost of acquiring a product that people want very high, either through laws or taxes, you create a black market that will be entered by outfits that use the money for illicit purposes.
Crabby, I took issue with you about the drug laws being racist. But the other night we were watching "Hooked" on the History Channel, and they showed how the drug laws were enacted. They were indeed designed to prevent certain "classes" (i.e., anyone but white middle class people) from using cocaine and heroine, and eventually marijuana, because of race prejudice and fear.
The U.S. Congress enacted federal drug laws, clearly unconstitutional, by using their favorite "out," the control of interstate commerce.
I read that report crabby. 3.2% of federal prisoners are in for possession? That's it? We are not talking about ounces here crabby. We are talking about possession of kilos probably. But I suppose even that much is perfectly ok with you.
I lost count on how many times that report said "estimated" or "assuming".
You don't care what the dopers do after being released from prison? Well isn't that forward thinking.
Freedom no matter what eh crabs? Ever heard of recidivism? I suppose that won't happen with your doper buddies. Of course they haven't and would certainly not commit a crime while smok'in dope.
Tons of dope for your own personal use crabs? None of that would ever get sold and cause some stoned moron to cross the centerline and take out a family now would it? But in your mind that "still couldn't hurt anyone". Maybe just maybe that is why I'm "so damned concerned if someone else takes drugs".
It's painfully obvious you are not. You just want to sit back and smoke some "good shit". To hell with anyone or anything else.
Of course they haven't and would certainly not commit a crime while smok'in dope.
People commit crimes while drunk too. People commit crimes when they have had too much coffee. Drunk, stoned or hyper or sober, people will commit crimes. I very much doubt that legalizing drugs will change that one way or another. One thing is for sure, though: tens of thousands of people who have committed no crime EXCEPT to smoke a doobie won't be crowding the jails if we legalize.
None of that would ever get sold and cause some stoned moron to cross the centerline and take out a family now would it?
Alcohol is your biggest problem there. Guess we should outlaw that too. Point is: Committing a crime like murder or robbery or whatever isn't going to be less of a crime if we legalize drugs. We don't have people getting gunned down in the streets to settle who has control of the bootlegging territory anymore, do we?
You really have no way of knowing that one way or another. What makes you think that people who have been selling marijuana illegally can't find a way to market it legally? They could grow it themselves and reap all the profit alone.
Initially, the market would be wide open. Pot will grow wild if you let it.
They choose that "product" because there is a huge market and the profit margin is insane. Think about it. One ounce of good marijuana costs $400. One ounce. That's just over $6,000 a pound. A pound of corn, in contrast, costs about a buck. That's not really a good comparison, though, because corn is probably more costly to grow than pot would be on that scale.
A sheet of acid can be bought (or could ten years ago) for 100 or 200 bucks or less. It has 100 hits. Each hit can be sold -- to voluntary, willing buyers, who don't need any "pushing" -- for anywhere from 4 to 7 or 8 dollars. Do the math. A "book", which is 10 sheets, can be bought for under a thousand dollars (again, could ten years ago). Do that math.
Coke and stuff like that is often sold by the gram. The friggin' gram. I don't know how much for -- 10, 20 bucks, more maybe. Meanwhile, sugar, a comparable agricultural product, is about 20 cents a pound.
That unworldy profit motive is what drives people to become drug dealers. They're not genetic mutants or something. Once one gets past not wanting to break the law -- which the majority of Americans do, when their own self-interest and moral compass diverges from the government's -- and worrying about getting caught, it's no big stretch to sell something to people who want to buy it. Especially when one can make 5-10 times more than one could at any "legitimate" job.
It's not a propensity to commit crimes just for the sake of committing crimes that motivates people to sell drugs. The only reason genuine crime, like stealing, killing, and so on enters the picture is because the law drives otherwise non-criminal activity, like selling people something that they want, or ingesting something one enjoys ingesting. If "drugs" were legal, none of that shit would be attached to the drug trade -- no more than is so in the pharmaceutical, alcohol, tobacco, coffee, chocolate, TV, and exercise equipment industry...or any of the other industries that sell things people enjoy.
The criminals -- those who enjoy violating other people's rights -- would indeed probably continue on being criminals, and we should catch them and punish them, and we would have a lot more law enforcement resources available to do so. The folks who were just selling drugs because of the massive money to be made, would find other jobs. They might shift over to one of the other consensual crime industries where our laws have created falsely inflated profit margins, I'll grant that. They've grown used to overruling the government's judgment about what is right and not right, and grown used to a 6-digit income, and if they can find a way to continue that by selling people something they want, they probably would. If they didn't want to run a sports betting franchise, or prostitute or pimp, then they would have to find a "real" job. Like they would have done in the first place if drugs hadn't been illegal.
The mobs, the gangs, the crime rings and cartels, they simply wouldn't have much if anything left to do business in. If any guy with a dream can go and open a pot bar or a drug store and sell what they used to sell for 10-100 times less, they won't be able to compete, no matter how big and tough they are. They would lose the markets that they currently have cornered. That they have cornered by the use of force, which they can only get away with because everybody they're doing business with is breaking the law. They operate under cover of the black market shield from accountability, where the strongest makes the rules, and enforcement equals physical harm.
It's the only difference between the alcohol industry and the illegal drug industry. Again, Prohibition provides a vivid example. During Prohibition, the alcohol industry was run by the mob (with the help of the police -- oh, but that's just another coincidence), and perpetrated entirely by lawbreakers. After prohibition, the legit folks went into (or back into) legit alcohol enterprises, most folks left the game entirely and went back to just being consumers, and the rest found themselves with a lot less money to fuel their illicit activities and/or acts of harm. And they focused on other products they could sell for outrageously high prices to willing customers, using their black market status to give themselves a false corner on the market via use of force.
Would you rather have the mob controlling the cigarette market, or RJR and PM? The instinctive answer is probably "neither", but that choice is not available. We could wage a war on drugs to the nth power and we won't ever "win" it. We could take away ten times more liberties than we've already done with the drug war, and people would still be getting high, probably in about the same numbers. You could take every single illegal drug user in the country right now and put them in prison, and people would still be getting high, probably in about the same numbers. The idea that it can be stopped is just wishful thinking, a.k.a. dreaming.
The question, if you're into social engineering, is how to most reduce the harmful effects and cost of that use on society, and/or how to reduce the use itself. And prohibition is a tried and true, guaranteed, proven by history way to be a total failure at achieving that goal. And it's being proven by history again as we speak.
You really have no way of knowing that one way or another.
Well, the best indicator of the future is the present. If they're currently breaking the law, logic tells us they will continue to do so in the future.
What makes you think that people who have been selling marijuana illegally can't find a way to market it legally? They could grow it themselves and reap all the profit alone.
Because the government and big business won't allow it. The new system will have no place for the likes of Paco, the street corner dealer.
Initially, the market would be wide open. Pot will grow wild if you let it.
I hope to God not. I hope the Governemnt regulates it, and those that sell it.
The new system will have no place for the likes of Paco, the street corner dealer.
oh...so you are recommending that drugs are illegal because it give the dealers lucrative jobs? and you want Paco to make thousands and thousands of dollars a wekk?
and that you identify the "dealer" with an ethnic name just shows how deeply pervasive the racism of these laws actually are.
uh...people are currently breaking laws while under the influence of milk.
I don't know what the hell your saying here. I don't know how drinking milk is comparable to selling drugs. Unless the act of drinking milk is illegal?
I will say this: Milk drinkers that break the law, will most likely break the law in the future.
Milk drinkers that abide by the law, will most likely abide by it in the future.
oh...so you are recommending that drugs are illegal because it give the dealers lucrative jobs? and you want Paco to make thousands and thousands of dollars a wekk?
You're the one telling me that legalizing drugs will reduce crime. I don't see how. I don't see why you think Paco will suddenly start abiding by the law.
and that you identify the "dealer" with an ethnic name just shows how deeply pervasive the racism of these laws actually are.
Yes, I'm a racist. It has nothing to do with the drug dealer down the street from me being named Paco, and not Steve or Charles.
You're the one telling me that legalizing drugs will reduce crime. I don't see how. I don't see why you think Paco will suddenly start abiding by the law.
What are you missing here THX? post-Prohibition, most bootleggers and speakeasy owners (the ones who hadn't gone full-on Mob, which I bet was most of them) stopped being criminals. There was no market for the deed they used to do. They either got into the legitimate alcohol industry -- production or distribution, or they went on with their lives in some other fashion. "Paco" is not constitutionally different than the people who start microbreweries, or open or work at liquor stores or bars. I know lots of people who work during the summer growing a few pounds of pot, and then spend most of the next year selling some of it and smoking some of it. If pot became legal, these folks would not be breaking the law. Few, if any of them would go off looking for all new laws to break. (And if all drugs were legalized, then none of them would.)
The people aren't just devoted to breaking any and every law...by the same logic, you should have a theft or a murder or something to go along with your law-breaking pot smoking -- since by your theory, it seems that if someone breaks a law, then it's just self-evident that they would break any other law.
The difference is that the vast majority of the people involved in the drug trade don't break the laws protecting other people from harm. In other words, they don't break the laws that have victims. They don't now, and they certainly wouldn't be inclined to start if we stopped criminalizing their victimless "crimes". Were fugitive slaves clearly lawbreakers by nature, or did they just clearly feel that freedom was more important than obeying an unjust law?
If someone's willing to exceed the speed limit, is that a clue toward their criminal nature too? Can you tell me what other laws they would break if we got rid of speed limits?
only if the drugs are illegal
alcohol and mob killings and organized crime used to all go hand in hand too. Are you saying we should go back to that?
he killed someone and you call him non-violent?
and because of this guy someone who was done nothing to anyone except smoke pot has to be in jail with him?
it's only because of the bad law that gang bangers and dealers exist in the first place.
you want to keep people in prison because you don't have something for them to do if you don't?
what do you do about all the prisoners who complete their sentences now? Tell them that since they don't have a job (since they have, you know, been in prison) that they can't get out?
laughable indeed.
it sounds like you are talking about keeping the homeless and unemployed in prison because they are homeless and unemployed because they are in prison because they don't have a home or a job because they are in prison...ect...
perhaps a better question is what do you do about the violent criminal who you release because there is no room in the prisons because they are filled with non-violent drug offenders with longer mandatory sentences?
is that the guy that YOU want to welcome into your home with open arms? Keep that pot smoker who never hurt anyone in prison, but let out that wife beating alcoholic?
because they get released all the time.
Hemp for Jobs
You don't REALLY want to debate the merits of industrial hemp, do you?
In case you do, here's a good starter: Hemp can be used to replace a lot of things that are currently made from petroleum. Plastics, some metals, lubricants and more. Should we go there?
Crabgrass has done a great job defending legalization on what most crtics of legalization consider the least defensible argument: recreation. But there are other arguments for legalization that are more easily defensible, and industrial hemp is a big one.
I would argue for legalization even for recreational purposes, since, as crabgrass has exhaustively pointed out: the consequences of prohibition are worse than the consequences of legalization. If you want some data on the whole social impact question, fine. Take a look at what has occured in countries where pot is legal or decriminalized, like the Netherlands.
personal freedom
Show me the ACTUAL violence in killing someone with laced cocaine.
You are advocating mass release of all drug offenders. Not one at a time as they are now.
And here's the best one from you yet. Releasing these "pot smokers" to a dope factory. How brilliant is that?
Show me where a person ends up in federal prison JUST for smoking the stuff.
What ever happend to not using crabs? A law is a law. Don't break it.
Das, where did I say industrial hemp was a bad thing?
Crabs has done nothing except advocate the mass release of drug all drug offenders to a dope factory because he doesn't like a law.
There are plenty of alcoholics in prison also. Should they all be mass released to the Coors brewery?
no, we tried Phohibition once and it was a failure, remember?
We learned that it's bad law to put someone in jail for using drugs (in this case alcohol) and we repealed that law. It was a bad law.
you don't release them "to" anywhere, you release them.
then they are free to do what they like. If they want to get a job growing hemp, fine...but the point is, when you free someone, they can do what they like.
a bad law is a bad law
it's like Jim Crow laws...if they pass a law that says you can't associate with someone that isn't the same race as you are, do you obey it?
to say a law is a law is to say that you should obey all sorts of bad laws that get made.
you shouldn't obey bad laws, you should get rid of them.
Of the people incarcerated in federal and state prison and in local jails, 37,500 were charged with marijuana offenses only and an additional 21,800 with both marijuana offenses and other controlled-substance offenses. Of the marijuana-only offenders,15,400 are incarcerated for possession, not trafficking.
Arrests for marijuana possesion alone have soared
Sorry I bothered to answer your questions, or that you didn't like the answers, or whatever it was. Sorry I wasted my time, basically. There are lots of books and papers written about ways to end drug prohibition...they might not answer all your questions (since you have six new questions for each one that gets answered), but suffice it to say, plenty of people have thought through all the details.
The problem with answering your third degree is that it all depends. If the Fed stayed involved, that would impact all the other issues below it. If only pot is made legal and not other drugs, then all the answers are different than if all the drugs were made legal. There's decriminalization, full legalization, regulated legalization (like alcohol). It could be handled by localities or by states. Prisons could be sold, converted, rented, or demolished. As is the case with alcohol, some states would have state-run stores, and some states would have a licensing program. Some states would fund drug treatment, others would lean on hospitals, clinics, and other care centers to pick up the slack.
The issue, I think, is that no matter how almost any of your questions get answered -- one way or the other, or the other -- it's still better to end the drug war than not. I don't recall any questions you asked where it was like, "Oh...we better not end the drug war until we settle that one. That's a true sticking point." You're acting like you can't accept the idea of ending the drug war unless all your infinite supply of questions are answered, and it seems to me to be an unreasonable burden.
What's the guy who's released from prison going to buy his girlfriend for her birthday? Where's he going to get the money? How's he going to get to her house? Will he walk? Will he have to take the bus, and if so, will he be crowding someone out of a seat? Will he have exact change? Where's he going to get the change? Will there be a run on change machines? Who's going to fill them? When he gets to her house, will he ring the doorbell, use the knocker, or just knock with his fist? What if his hand is dirty and he smudges the door? Who's going to pay to clean it? What if the girlfriend doesn't like the gift? Will the guy be able to return it? Will he need a receipt?
If hemp was legalized, there would be hemp factories open within two weeks, I predict. The industry is alive and well in other countries, and there are companies a'plenty who would love to set up shop in the U.S. Not to mention all the farmers who would find themselves busy in a way they haven't been in a long time.
The factories are no more non-existent than the theoretical released prisoners who would work in them. I suspect that hemp being made legal would kick in much quicker than releasing prisoners, which involves paperwork and Justice Dept. rigamarole. With hemp, the industry would kick into gear the day the President signed the law legalizing it.
and you can bet that the plastic and paper corporations will be none too happy to lose the lack of competition in the market.
You think once drugs are legal, those gangbangers/drug dealers are all of a sudden going to be legitimate and respective business men?
well, they aren't going to be fighting over who controls the illicit underground drug trade anymore.
other than that, as long as they aren't trying to hurt someone, I don't really care what they become.
we have been liberating Iraqi prisons (and Iraq itself, if you can believe the news), what are all those prisoners going to do now (and how many of them were violent criminals)?
Lance, I thank you for answering my questions. I was able to carry on a civil discussion with you and Crabby on things. I don't want things to go down a Jethro path. I've just decided that I don't think either of us is going to affect each other that much. I don't see the need to go back and forth endlessly. I'm sorry if I asked too many questions, but I felt that a number of questions would be asked, so I raised them. I would rather, and I think you would too, question things instead of blindly accepting them.
What do you think they'll do THX? Keep trying to sell drugs at 100 times their value? Keep fighting over drug turf so they can keep selling those drugs to whoever's stupid enough to pay 100 times the market value?
They'd be out of business. At worst, they'd move to gambling, prostitution, and the other remaining consensual "crimes", like the mob did once we took away their cash cow in the 30's. Take away those, and all you have left is gunrunning. But the guns in gunrunning are bought and sold to support those other activities, and with the falsely inflated profits from them. I suppose you'd still have hired killings, too, but you'd have a lot less incentive for them (take a guess how many hired killings are probably related to drug turf or battles or debts), a lot less money fueling them, and a lot more enforcement ability to stop them.
I'm not sure what you were trying to affect with me. I recognize that there are lots of questions relating to ending the drug war. There are lots of answers to those questions. None of your questions came close to making me doubt whether the drug war should be ended -- is that the effect they were supposed to have?
No, because I don't think that your mind can be changed on the subject. I was just wondering if you and Crabby had thought of the different aspects, considered various concerns.
That's probably true. I've been waiting over ten years to hear a credible case for continuing the Drug War, and I haven't heard one. I'm inclined to believe that that's because there isn't one.
I have...I can't speak for Crabby.
Okay, so I'll ask it since I just thought of it. I am not asking it to get into some big debate, just think it is interesting. Has anyone ever asked drug dealers what they would do if drugs became legalized?
are you suggesting that we keep them illegal so that drug dealers don't find themselves out of work?
are you suggesting that we keep them illegal so that drug dealers don't find themselves out of work?
Settle down Crabby. I was just curious. I'm done debating with you on all of this. I am just curious as to if anyone had posed the question to them, and what their response was.
They say, variously, that they don't want it legalized, that it would put them out of business, or that they would go legit, and take their skills and knowledge into the above-ground market.
Most drug dealers I've talked to about it don't think it will be legalized, and they're glad. (Some are mixed-glad -- glad for themselves, though ideally they wish it would be legalized).
well, they aren't going to be fighting over who controls the illicit underground drug trade anymore.
No, they'll just fight over the control of the newly created legal drug trade.
It's not like they'll get real jobs all of a sudden.
"...buying drugs from those people, funds Terrorists."
BECAUSE it's a very lucrative source of funds, BECAUSE it's illegal and therefore the price is wildly inflated. You can try to control something out of existence or you can try to tax something out of existence, but if the demand is there, people will go to the illegal sellers to get it.
Here's a quote from Liberty magazine:
"The FBI says that Hezbollah, an Islamic terrorist group, has been partially financing itself buying cigarettes in North Carolina (where cigarette taxes are low) and reselling them in Michigan (where cigarette taxes are high). The lesson for state legislators? If you impose high taxes, you are supporting terrorism."
If you make the cost of acquiring a product that people want very high, either through laws or taxes, you create a black market that will be entered by outfits that use the money for illicit purposes.
oh yea...I remember when CVS and Walgreens had that big shootout in the middle of the street.
and do you remember that time when Coors put out a hit on Spuds McKenzie?
Crabby, I took issue with you about the drug laws being racist. But the other night we were watching "Hooked" on the History Channel, and they showed how the drug laws were enacted. They were indeed designed to prevent certain "classes" (i.e., anyone but white middle class people) from using cocaine and heroine, and eventually marijuana, because of race prejudice and fear.
The U.S. Congress enacted federal drug laws, clearly unconstitutional, by using their favorite "out," the control of interstate commerce.
I read that report crabby. 3.2% of federal prisoners are in for possession? That's it? We are not talking about ounces here crabby. We are talking about possession of kilos probably. But I suppose even that much is perfectly ok with you.
I lost count on how many times that report said "estimated" or "assuming".
You don't care what the dopers do after being released from prison? Well isn't that forward thinking.
it's called freedom
check it out
it's pretty damn cool
people are free to do as they please as long as they don't interfere with someone else's freedom
so tell me, why are you so damned concerned if someone else takes drugs?
what business is it of yours what someone wants to do with their own body?
you mean the way you were talking kilos "probably"?
the fact is, people are in prison for simply having marijuana
and so what if it was for kilos...you could have tons and it still couldn't hurt anyone. Pot is virtually impossible to overdose on.
oh yea...I remember when CVS and Walgreens had that big shootout in the middle of the street.
It's laughable that you would compare Paco the street corner drug dealer, with Walgreens.
One of your main arguments for legalization is to take the crime out of it.
Well, Paco has no place in the legal drug trade.
He'll have to find another source of income.
I highly doubt it will be a legal source.
I mean, the law didn't stop him before.
Freedom no matter what eh crabs? Ever heard of recidivism? I suppose that won't happen with your doper buddies. Of course they haven't and would certainly not commit a crime while smok'in dope.
Tons of dope for your own personal use crabs? None of that would ever get sold and cause some stoned moron to cross the centerline and take out a family now would it? But in your mind that "still couldn't hurt anyone". Maybe just maybe that is why I'm "so damned concerned if someone else takes drugs".
It's painfully obvious you are not. You just want to sit back and smoke some "good shit". To hell with anyone or anything else.
irrelevant arguments
People commit crimes while drunk too. People commit crimes when they have had too much coffee. Drunk, stoned or hyper or sober, people will commit crimes. I very much doubt that legalizing drugs will change that one way or another. One thing is for sure, though: tens of thousands of people who have committed no crime EXCEPT to smoke a doobie won't be crowding the jails if we legalize.
Alcohol is your biggest problem there. Guess we should outlaw that too. Point is: Committing a crime like murder or robbery or whatever isn't going to be less of a crime if we legalize drugs. We don't have people getting gunned down in the streets to settle who has control of the bootlegging territory anymore, do we?
Just how many fried and re-fried brain cells do you two have?
A ballpark estimate will suffice.
You really have no way of knowing that one way or another. What makes you think that people who have been selling marijuana illegally can't find a way to market it legally? They could grow it themselves and reap all the profit alone.
Initially, the market would be wide open. Pot will grow wild if you let it.
They choose that "product" because there is a huge market and the profit margin is insane. Think about it. One ounce of good marijuana costs $400. One ounce. That's just over $6,000 a pound. A pound of corn, in contrast, costs about a buck. That's not really a good comparison, though, because corn is probably more costly to grow than pot would be on that scale.
A sheet of acid can be bought (or could ten years ago) for 100 or 200 bucks or less. It has 100 hits. Each hit can be sold -- to voluntary, willing buyers, who don't need any "pushing" -- for anywhere from 4 to 7 or 8 dollars. Do the math. A "book", which is 10 sheets, can be bought for under a thousand dollars (again, could ten years ago). Do that math.
Coke and stuff like that is often sold by the gram. The friggin' gram. I don't know how much for -- 10, 20 bucks, more maybe. Meanwhile, sugar, a comparable agricultural product, is about 20 cents a pound.
That unworldy profit motive is what drives people to become drug dealers. They're not genetic mutants or something. Once one gets past not wanting to break the law -- which the majority of Americans do, when their own self-interest and moral compass diverges from the government's -- and worrying about getting caught, it's no big stretch to sell something to people who want to buy it. Especially when one can make 5-10 times more than one could at any "legitimate" job.
It's not a propensity to commit crimes just for the sake of committing crimes that motivates people to sell drugs. The only reason genuine crime, like stealing, killing, and so on enters the picture is because the law drives otherwise non-criminal activity, like selling people something that they want, or ingesting something one enjoys ingesting. If "drugs" were legal, none of that shit would be attached to the drug trade -- no more than is so in the pharmaceutical, alcohol, tobacco, coffee, chocolate, TV, and exercise equipment industry...or any of the other industries that sell things people enjoy.
The criminals -- those who enjoy violating other people's rights -- would indeed probably continue on being criminals, and we should catch them and punish them, and we would have a lot more law enforcement resources available to do so. The folks who were just selling drugs because of the massive money to be made, would find other jobs. They might shift over to one of the other consensual crime industries where our laws have created falsely inflated profit margins, I'll grant that. They've grown used to overruling the government's judgment about what is right and not right, and grown used to a 6-digit income, and if they can find a way to continue that by selling people something they want, they probably would. If they didn't want to run a sports betting franchise, or prostitute or pimp, then they would have to find a "real" job. Like they would have done in the first place if drugs hadn't been illegal.
The mobs, the gangs, the crime rings and cartels, they simply wouldn't have much if anything left to do business in. If any guy with a dream can go and open a pot bar or a drug store and sell what they used to sell for 10-100 times less, they won't be able to compete, no matter how big and tough they are. They would lose the markets that they currently have cornered. That they have cornered by the use of force, which they can only get away with because everybody they're doing business with is breaking the law. They operate under cover of the black market shield from accountability, where the strongest makes the rules, and enforcement equals physical harm.
It's the only difference between the alcohol industry and the illegal drug industry. Again, Prohibition provides a vivid example. During Prohibition, the alcohol industry was run by the mob (with the help of the police -- oh, but that's just another coincidence), and perpetrated entirely by lawbreakers. After prohibition, the legit folks went into (or back into) legit alcohol enterprises, most folks left the game entirely and went back to just being consumers, and the rest found themselves with a lot less money to fuel their illicit activities and/or acts of harm. And they focused on other products they could sell for outrageously high prices to willing customers, using their black market status to give themselves a false corner on the market via use of force.
Would you rather have the mob controlling the cigarette market, or RJR and PM? The instinctive answer is probably "neither", but that choice is not available. We could wage a war on drugs to the nth power and we won't ever "win" it. We could take away ten times more liberties than we've already done with the drug war, and people would still be getting high, probably in about the same numbers. You could take every single illegal drug user in the country right now and put them in prison, and people would still be getting high, probably in about the same numbers. The idea that it can be stopped is just wishful thinking, a.k.a. dreaming.
The question, if you're into social engineering, is how to most reduce the harmful effects and cost of that use on society, and/or how to reduce the use itself. And prohibition is a tried and true, guaranteed, proven by history way to be a total failure at achieving that goal. And it's being proven by history again as we speak.
You really have no way of knowing that one way or another.
Well, the best indicator of the future is the present. If they're currently breaking the law, logic tells us they will continue to do so in the future.
What makes you think that people who have been selling marijuana illegally can't find a way to market it legally? They could grow it themselves and reap all the profit alone.
Because the government and big business won't allow it. The new system will have no place for the likes of Paco, the street corner dealer.
Initially, the market would be wide open. Pot will grow wild if you let it.
I hope to God not. I hope the Governemnt regulates it, and those that sell it.
uh...people are currently breaking laws while under the influence of milk.
you saying that if we outlaw milk they will stop breaking the law?
oh...so you are recommending that drugs are illegal because it give the dealers lucrative jobs? and you want Paco to make thousands and thousands of dollars a wekk?
and that you identify the "dealer" with an ethnic name just shows how deeply pervasive the racism of these laws actually are.
drug laws are biased. they are biased against stupid people.
Okay, so I have to ask because I'm curious. How can someone be under the influence of milk? They have strong bones and teeth?
uh...people are currently breaking laws while under the influence of milk.
I don't know what the hell your saying here. I don't know how drinking milk is comparable to selling drugs. Unless the act of drinking milk is illegal?
I will say this: Milk drinkers that break the law, will most likely break the law in the future.
Milk drinkers that abide by the law, will most likely abide by it in the future.
oh...so you are recommending that drugs are illegal because it give the dealers lucrative jobs? and you want Paco to make thousands and thousands of dollars a wekk?
You're the one telling me that legalizing drugs will reduce crime. I don't see how. I don't see why you think Paco will suddenly start abiding by the law.
and that you identify the "dealer" with an ethnic name just shows how deeply pervasive the racism of these laws actually are.
Yes, I'm a racist. It has nothing to do with the drug dealer down the street from me being named Paco, and not Steve or Charles.
::Slams head on desk::
uh...people are currently breaking laws while under the influence of milk.
I don't know what the hell your saying here.
It is the effect of the drugs that makes him "think" like that.
What are you missing here THX? post-Prohibition, most bootleggers and speakeasy owners (the ones who hadn't gone full-on Mob, which I bet was most of them) stopped being criminals. There was no market for the deed they used to do. They either got into the legitimate alcohol industry -- production or distribution, or they went on with their lives in some other fashion. "Paco" is not constitutionally different than the people who start microbreweries, or open or work at liquor stores or bars. I know lots of people who work during the summer growing a few pounds of pot, and then spend most of the next year selling some of it and smoking some of it. If pot became legal, these folks would not be breaking the law. Few, if any of them would go off looking for all new laws to break. (And if all drugs were legalized, then none of them would.)
The people aren't just devoted to breaking any and every law...by the same logic, you should have a theft or a murder or something to go along with your law-breaking pot smoking -- since by your theory, it seems that if someone breaks a law, then it's just self-evident that they would break any other law.
The difference is that the vast majority of the people involved in the drug trade don't break the laws protecting other people from harm. In other words, they don't break the laws that have victims. They don't now, and they certainly wouldn't be inclined to start if we stopped criminalizing their victimless "crimes". Were fugitive slaves clearly lawbreakers by nature, or did they just clearly feel that freedom was more important than obeying an unjust law?
If someone's willing to exceed the speed limit, is that a clue toward their criminal nature too? Can you tell me what other laws they would break if we got rid of speed limits?
I'm really trying to understand the thinking behind your lawbreaker theorem. I don't really understand it.
I mean, you've admitted to breaking the law, so what makes you any different than Paco, by your theorem?