After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?' • Hacker News Board

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#71

Post by jimbob45 » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 6:48 PM UTC

ElViajero wrote: post #8

> "The war on drugs was an absolute miscalculation of human behavior," said Kassandra Frederique, who heads the Drug Policy Alliance, a national group that advocates for total drug decriminalization. For me it would be incredibly interesting to know how much it was a miscalculation or actually it was very well calculated. The "War on Drugs" have failed to make USA safer, healthier or any other positive metric. But, i…

>The "War on Drugs" have failed to make USA safer, healthier or any other positive metric.

Speak for yourself. My methhead sister-in-law is in prison and I certainly feel safer. Addicts cannot be trusted and bring families down.

People raised away from addicts (read: white liberals) don’t understand how destructive they can be to a community.

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#72

Post by tyingq » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 6:48 PM UTC

MuffinFlavored wrote: post #25

pope_meat wrote: post #3

Created a lot of jobs in the industry of arresting and detaining humans. Being number 1 per capita in prison population isn't a lean operation, a lot of people's lives depend on the system continuing. I think the solution is to rent bulldozers, armor them, and just level a bunch of them. Too many prison beds, too many laws, it's all gotten very dumb.

> Created a lot of jobs in the industry of arresting and detaining humans. What portion of those arrested + detained are the type of people we want in society/civilization?

>What portion of those arrested + detained are the type of people we want in society/civilization?

Check a list of countries by rate of incarceration[1]. Then ask yourself if it's likely that the US, El Salvador, Turkmenistan, Palau and Rwanda are the grouping that have it right. That's the top 5, in order, all at 511+ per 100k.

For comparison, Australia is 160, England is 130, Canada is 104, France is at 93, etc.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarcera...

Edit: Generally, I read all that as "probably 3 or 4 of every 5 US prisoners don't need to be in prison".

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#73

Post by livueta » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 6:48 PM UTC

dlsa wrote: post #45

ElViajero wrote: post #8

> "The war on drugs was an absolute miscalculation of human behavior," said Kassandra Frederique, who heads the Drug Policy Alliance, a national group that advocates for total drug decriminalization. For me it would be incredibly interesting to know how much it was a miscalculation or actually it was very well calculated. The "War on Drugs" have failed to make USA safer, healthier or any other positive metric. But, i…

Personally I think it had more to do with corruption than anything. The CIA was happy to profit off it. The anti-drug people loved it, particularly those who were against cannabis. anyone who hated hippies. Anyone working against the antiwar movements. Those against hemp were happy. That's a lot of money just there. Politicians could use it to demonstrate a hard line stance against crime. Or just use it to target par…

Indeed, "bootleggers and baptists"[1] very much didn't go away with the end of prohibition.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bootleggers_and_Baptists

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#74

Post by coopsmoss » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 6:48 PM UTC

bgroins wrote: post #19

ElViajero wrote: post #8

> "The war on drugs was an absolute miscalculation of human behavior," said Kassandra Frederique, who heads the Drug Policy Alliance, a national group that advocates for total drug decriminalization. For me it would be incredibly interesting to know how much it was a miscalculation or actually it was very well calculated. The "War on Drugs" have failed to make USA safer, healthier or any other positive metric. But, i…

The reasoning is well established at this point. It was started by the Nixon administration to reduce the amount of left and left-leaning voters, particularly black Americans. "The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the…

I still find it abhorrent that incarcerated people can't vote in the US. That seems so obviously exploitable.

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#75

Post by slownews45 » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 6:49 PM UTC

dcolkitt wrote: post #24

BitwiseFool wrote: post #9

This is one of those weird things about American Democracy where everyone I speak to thinks the Drug War was a terrible thing and should be stopped. And yet, our politicians never substantially do anything to change the status quo.

You almost certainly occupy a bubble in this. I hate the War on Drugs with every fiber in my being, but it’s broadly popular. Cannabis legalization may recently be popular. But I’d be shocked if more than 5% of Americans supported the legalization hard drugs, and if more than 20% supported by Portuguese style decriminalization. Even soft drug prohibition, like MDMA and LSD, are supported by sizable majorities of vote…

Even Cannabis legalization may get rolled back a bit I think, there's been a bit of a backlash locally where I around it.

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#76

Post by LorenPechtel » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 6:49 PM UTC

the_economist wrote: post #30

Counterpoint: The war on drugs has been progressively ramped down since the late 90s. NYTimes wrote a long story about how during the feds quit using tactics such as convicted drug dealers to flip on their bosses, etc. We aren't putting as many drug dealers in jail and we aren't putting many drug users in jail. What you get is an epic rise in opioid deaths over the past 30 years and chaos on the streets of our cities…

You realize the opioid deaths are because a certain drug maker encouraged docs to overprescribe? That left a lot of people hooked for no good reason.

Now they've flipped and are underprescribing, leaving a lot of patients turning to the street for their pain control.

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#77

Post by mathattack » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 6:49 PM UTC

I wonder if his sons struggle with addiction changed Biden’s views on the topic.

—— "What we need is another D-Day, not another Vietnam, not another limited war fought on the cheap," declared then-Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., in 1989.

Biden, who chaired the influential Senate Judiciary Committee, later co-authored the controversial 1994 crime bill that helped fund a vast new complex of state and federal prisons, which remains the largest in the world.

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#78

Post by whydoibother » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 6:49 PM UTC

the_economist wrote: post #30

Counterpoint: The war on drugs has been progressively ramped down since the late 90s. NYTimes wrote a long story about how during the feds quit using tactics such as convicted drug dealers to flip on their bosses, etc. We aren't putting as many drug dealers in jail and we aren't putting many drug users in jail. What you get is an epic rise in opioid deaths over the past 30 years and chaos on the streets of our cities…

30 years? The 90s still had police going hard on drug dealers and users.

And I didn't realize the Sackler family was skating by cause the DEA stopped arresting marijuana users.

Also, on the more conspiratorial side, it is curious how opioid supply and use flourished as soon as we were in Afghanistan. Kind of like it did when we were in Vietnam. Two areas known for poppies and heroin. Given what we know about the FBI encouraging terrorism so they can then claim they stopped it, I wouldn't be surprised if the CIA/JSOC was funneling in the drugs for cash and the DEA was mopping that up for cash/reason to exist.

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#79

Post by Aunche » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 6:49 PM UTC

bgroins wrote: post #19

ElViajero wrote: post #8

> "The war on drugs was an absolute miscalculation of human behavior," said Kassandra Frederique, who heads the Drug Policy Alliance, a national group that advocates for total drug decriminalization. For me it would be incredibly interesting to know how much it was a miscalculation or actually it was very well calculated. The "War on Drugs" have failed to make USA safer, healthier or any other positive metric. But, i…

The reasoning is well established at this point. It was started by the Nixon administration to reduce the amount of left and left-leaning voters, particularly black Americans. "The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the…

It's worth noting that Dan Baum didn't publish this quote until 16 years after Ehrilchman had already died.

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#80

Post by setpatchaddress » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 6:49 PM UTC

president wrote: post #29

For someone who hasn't followed closely, what exactly is meant by "War on Drugs" in the article? Is it a specific policy they are referring to or do they mean combatting illegal drugs in general? I think we can all agree that illicit drugs can cause damage to societies. Even the article mentions it in regards to the opioid crisis, which continues to decimate Americans across the nation. Maybe it would be wiser to cal…

"War on Drugs" refers specifically to the series of laws and actions and attitudes that began with the Nixon administration, the publicly stated intent of which was to combat illegal drug use. The actual intent was to demonize the perceived political enemies of the Nixon administration. Despite that, this is still the core of America's drug policy today.

> I think we can all agree that illicit drugs can cause damage to societies

Can we? So what's the root cause of illicit drug use? We have one major suspect with correlation but not causation established:

https://www.addictionhope.com/blog/child-abuse-substance-abu...

> Research shows almost two-thirds of all patients in treatment for substance abuse report physical, sexual or emotional abuse during childhood.

“The sheer weight of the many reports over the years certainly implicates child abuse as a possible factor in drug abuse for many people,” said Dr. Cora Lee Wetherington, NIDA’s Women’s Health Coordinator.

“But we lack hard data that clearly establish and describe the role of child ‘abuse in the subsequent development of drug abuse. Is child abuse indeed a cause of drug abuse, or is child abuse a marker for other unidentified factors?”