Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Your Friendly Neighborhood Drug Dealer

theatlantic.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 165 posts

Re: Your Friendly Neighborhood Drug Dealer

#31

Post by spada »

peterwwillis wrote: post #21

It's funny that they didn't interview any actual neighborhood-dealers. The people sitting on the corner slinging dope have a much more dangerous job than people with clientele who are discreet and wealthy. I suppose it's because they're perceived as so dangerous that reporters never talk to them. But ask a corner man his life story and he'll tell you about serving time, getting shot, and paying off cops to stay alive…

it's because the angle you mention has been covered plenty of times. watch a few episodes of Drugs Inc. and you'll see.

this covers the end we rarely hear about and is far more interesting as it's far removed from the street.

Re: Your Friendly Neighborhood Drug Dealer

#32

Post by Spooky23 »

Jun8 wrote: post #12
mabbo wrote: post #3

It's become obvious that laws can't stop drugs. Imagine a world where the level of convenience described here was normal, but without the bullshit. No more money wasted on police trying to stop it. No sales to minors (at least, no more than cigarettes and alcohol have now). Taxes on income by drugs dealers (Colorado is showing a hell of a windfall). Reliability and safety in quality, so that you get exactly what you…

"No sales to minors" If law enforcement cannot stop drug sale en masse, how do you propose that sale to minors will be prevented? The analogy with cigarettes and alcohol is not very apt: a lot of chain stores sell these (although some are pulling out: http://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewherper/2014/02/05/cvs-to-... ). It's clear that such outlets will not be open to drugs like heroin or MDMA.

Through licensing, taxation and regulation.

We don't limit alcohol to minors terribly effectively, but we're very good at nearly universally collecting excise tax revenue.

States can aggressively police liquor licenses and enforce regulations with respect to sales to minors and get better compliance there. In my state, they clamp down regulation of kegs and made the traditional keg party much harder to execute on than it was in the past.

Re: Your Friendly Neighborhood Drug Dealer

#33

Post by dlsx »

beat wrote: post #24

"If you get jammed up, you can become a convicted felon and that damns you to do it for the rest of your life, because you won’t get anything but a $7.50 an hour job—if that. You give somebody a felony record for life, what did you accomplish? You’ve just created a lower-class idiot that has to commit more crimes to survive.” That's the problem right there. We can spend tens, hundreds of thousands of dollars incarcer…

LSD and Marijuana increase IQ.

I have smoked and dosed for 20+ years and only notice my mental abilities sharpen. Alcohol and cigarettes are the real issue, but they are legal of course :).

Perhaps the title should be renamed socially marginalized friends have to break the law to help people get what they want. The government and police should be removed from the equation, and let the shock commence when violent crime actually dwindles.

>2014 >still war on drugs

SMFH

Re: Your Friendly Neighborhood Drug Dealer

#34

Post by mcherm »

blhack wrote: post #7
jlgaddis wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We might even get there soon. I don't think the country, as a whole, will, but I do believe the more liberal areas will get there much quicker (as we're already seeing). I live in Indiana, the only state where one cannot buy alcohol on a Sunday. I don't think marijuana is gonna be legal here anytime in the near future.

Marijuana is probably going to be federally legal very soon. What's currently happening in Washington and Colorado is a good example to the rest of the world that marijuana is not the devil-drug that they thought it was. The best thing that will come out of all of this, imho, is that people will stop looking at marijuana and methamphetamine like they're the same thing. We might actually get sane drug policies, and we…

> What's currently happening in Washington and Colorado is a good example to the rest of the world that marijuana is not the devil-drug that they thought it was.

This raises an interesting point: it is very useful to have a diversity of government because then one can see the effects of a variety of different legal and governmental structures and learn from them.

Except for stubborn stupidity. Diversity in how heath care is delivered worldwide, for instance, has delivered plenty of examples to learn from. Yet the US quite intentionally refused to learn from it when redesigning our health care system -- suggesting that a plan had learned from the experience of other countries was a sure way to kill it. I don't have any idea what to do about this sort of jingoism.

Re: Your Friendly Neighborhood Drug Dealer

#35

Post by marssaxman »

peterwwillis wrote: post #21

It's funny that they didn't interview any actual neighborhood-dealers. The people sitting on the corner slinging dope have a much more dangerous job than people with clientele who are discreet and wealthy. I suppose it's because they're perceived as so dangerous that reporters never talk to them. But ask a corner man his life story and he'll tell you about serving time, getting shot, and paying off cops to stay alive…

This story is neither romantic nor unrealistic; this is just a different kind of drug dealing.

If anything, those exotic "street" stories full of violence and danger seem awfully romanticized to me; they certainly have nothing to do with any experience of drug culture I have ever had.

Re: Your Friendly Neighborhood Drug Dealer

#36

Post by smacktoward »

throwaway13qf85 wrote: post #5

I found this sentence interesting - I surmised that Viktor serves a large segment of the East Coast and personally takes in $24,000 to $32,000 per month after all his other costs are covered. Let's say he takes in an average of $30,000 per month. Does $360,000 annually sound like quite a small amount of money for running a highly illegal business that serves a large chunk of the East Coast? Small-to-medium sized busi…

$360,000 tax free, remember.

Re: Your Friendly Neighborhood Drug Dealer

#37

Post by dlsx »

saraid216 wrote: post #29
damon_c wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I was a kid, it was much easier to get illegal drugs than alcohol. I assumed this was because one of them was only available to those over 21.

That's basically correct, with a bit more nuance. There's no profit in selling alcohol to kids. Not only does the law come down on you if you get caught, but they can't provide enough demand to make it worth the risk. Plus, a chunk of your clientele will get antsy about it. Illegal stuff, on the other hand, already has fully-operational structure measuring risk versus reward. The law is going to come down equally har…

No one seems to touch on the fact the government and the law is wrong. Simple as that.

The USA government leaches off humanity. Absolute power corrupts absolutely, and the USA is the most corrupted country on the face of the earth.

Re: Your Friendly Neighborhood Drug Dealer

#38

Post by smacktoward »

mabbo wrote: post #3

It's become obvious that laws can't stop drugs. Imagine a world where the level of convenience described here was normal, but without the bullshit. No more money wasted on police trying to stop it. No sales to minors (at least, no more than cigarettes and alcohol have now). Taxes on income by drugs dealers (Colorado is showing a hell of a windfall). Reliability and safety in quality, so that you get exactly what you…

> We might even get there soon.

For pot, sure.

For cocaine? I seriously doubt it.

Re: Your Friendly Neighborhood Drug Dealer

#39

Post by atom-morgan »

JamesArgo wrote: post #19
0xdeadbeefbabe wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Was it the war on drugs what kept you from using it more than once a year or so, or something else?

The metabolites of MDMA are thought to be neurotoxic. Though it's known the chemical itself is not. In a sane world, we would use drug discovery to find drugs with similar effects but without the toxic metabolites. But we love to punish people for their vices, so there is no research on creating safer alternatives to existent drugs.

> But we love to punish people for their vices, so there is no research on creating safer alternatives to existent drugs.

And even in the areas where people are creating safer alternatives (e-cigarettes), there are politicians nearby ready to use their banhammers.

Re: Your Friendly Neighborhood Drug Dealer

#40

Post by pantalaimon »

badman_ting wrote: post #15

See, I've always wanted someone like this, but never found it. I've always found people that sell one thing only (cannabis), or maybe a couple, but not the "drug supermarket". I mean, it makes sense as the article points out, if you're going to take on a big risk you might as well not do it halfway. I probably travel in the wrong circles, to put it lightly.

http://www.reddit.com/r/darknetmarkets
Post reply on HN