US Drug Czar wants to end the "war on drugs" and it's about time. It's ineffective, a waste of money and far more importantly a waste of lives. Non-violent criminals shouldn't be in jail. They are heading off hopes of what many, myself included, consider the real solution - Legalization. They are NOT going to legalize drugs or marijuana. Maybe during his second term...
But yeah a war on drugs is a stupid as a war on terror, its like a war on sadness. Guess what people have been finding ways to chemically alter themselves for thousands of years. We know beer has been around for at least 4,300 years possibly more like 9,000. Oh and in case the beer reference seems outta place, alcohol is a drug, a very very popular one thats socially acceptable here but its still a drug, so is caffeine. Natural drugs like marijuana, psychedelic mushrooms, and peyote to name the first three that come to mind have probably been used even longer but it's harder to tell, less evidence left behind. The only way to get people to not want to get fucked up is to make them perfectly happy while sober, which of course isn't going to happen and really isn't going to happen in our consumer driven keeping up with the Joneses society. So as long as people are going to be indulging in their vices we might as well make a profit (taxes) off it on the front end so that as a society we break even or maybe stay a little ahead when we then have to pay for the damages done by said vices. Its a whole lot better than the current situation where we lose money, time and resources ineffectively try to stop the flow of drugs, lose more time and money when we catch people and throw them in jail, ruin those peoples lives making them no longer productive members of society, and in the end still have to pay for the damages done by the vices cause you only stopped a tiny percentage of the users.
I'm not even going to get into the obvious similarities between the "war on drugs" and prohibition, I've done it before, so I'll just say how did we solve all the problems caused by prohibition?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
Debaters debate the two wars as if Nixon’s civil war on Woodstock Nation did not yet run amok. Continuing the persecution of the half-a-million-strong flower-children assembled in August 1969 can’t be good for America, the world-leader in percentile behind bars. Madam Secretary Clinton need not travel to Tibet to find a minority subculture stripped of human rights. If we are all about spreading liberty abroad, then why mix the message at home? Peace on the home front would enhance credibility.
The witch-hunt doctor’s Rx is expensive. Each bust piles new costs on taxpayers’ progeny. Police investigation, prosecution in clogged courts, bloated prisons with high recidivism, are all at taxpayer-expense. My shaman’s second opinion is homegrown herbal remedy. Consumer dollars can stimulate the economy better if they aren’t depleted by prohibition’s black market.
Only a clause about interstate commerce provides a shred of constitutionality. The commerce policy on the number-one cash crop in the land is no taxation; yes eradication. But money to frustrate enforcement grows on trees. Did the authors of the Constitution intend to divert the Treasury’s natural revenue to Mexican cartels? America rejected prohibition, but its back. Swat teams don’t seem to need no stinking amendment.
Nixon said the Schafer Commission would support the criminalization of the hippies, but it didn’t. No matter, the witch-hunt was on. No amendments can assure due-process under an anti-science law that never had any due-process itself. Science hailed LSD as a drug with breakthrough potential, until the CSA (Controlled Substances Act of 1970) halted all research. Marijuana has no medical use, period. Lives are flushed down expensive tubes.
The RFRA (Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993) allows Native American Church members to eat peyote. A specific church membership should not be prerequisite for Americans to obtain their birthright freedom of religion. Denial of entheogen sacrament to any American, for mediation of communion twixt the soul and the source of souls, violates the First Amendment.
Freedom of speech presupposes freedom of thought. The Constitution doesn’t enumerate any governmental power to embargo diverse states of mind. How and when did government usurp this power to coerce conformity? The Puritans came here to escape coerced conformity. Legislators who would limit cognitive liberty lack jurisdiction.
Common-law must hold that the people are the legal owners of their own bodies. Socrates says, know your self. Mortal law should not presume to thwart the intelligent design that molecular keys unlock spiritual doors. Those who appreciate their own free choice of personal path in life should not deny self-exploration to seekers. The right to the pursuit of happiness is supposed to be inalienable by government.
Simple majorities in each house could put repeal of the CSA on the president’s desk. The books have ample law on them without the CSA. The usual caveats remain in effect. You are liable for damages when you screw-up. Strong medicine requires prescription. Employees can be fired for poor job performance. No harm, no foul; and no excuse, either. Replace the war on drugs with a frugal, constitutional, science-based drugs policy.
Post a Comment