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

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

#231

Post by greedo »

fosk wrote: post #98

Besides the controversial political agenda behind the "War on Drugs", I guess we all agree that drugs are obviously bad for society as a whole. But it's kinda hard to do a war on drugs without - you know - arresting the drug dealers on known corners. Looking at you San Francisco. Drugs enable misery, poverty, overdoses and homicides. Especially the ones that create physical addiction (opioids, meth, fentanyl, etc). B…

Almost all of the dudes I've know who sell drugs never thought of it as a way to "level" up. It was a way of making money where there were absolutely no jobs. And most of them didn't make much above minimum wage. Several of them had minimum wage jobs on the side.

If you haven't already, you should watch The Wire (HBO) about how futile street busts are in either combatting the drug trade or improving the lives of people living in the city.

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

#232

Post by coderintherye »

ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #180
tetranomiga wrote: post #23

> On Tuesday, two House Democrats introduced legislation that would decriminalize all drugs in the U.S., shifting the national response to a public health model. The measure appears to have zero chance of passage. If that isn't just the perfect description of politics in the US, I don't know what is. I don't know what your political ideology has to be to think the War on Drugs is a good thing, after all the money was…

>If that isn't just the perfect description of politics in the US, I don't know what is. I don't know what your political ideology has to be to think the War on Drugs is a good thing, after all the money wasted, all the lives lost, all the people pointlessly locked up for things half the country can now do openly and legally. Well it does sound like you're equating the War on Drugs to the War on Marijuana. There are…

>Is it even possible to be a responsible Heroin user? Or even Meth?

Yes! And this is what is so fascinating is how well the "drug war" has helped shape societal opinion to think it's not possible to be a functional user. Yet, you may be surprised to learn we have millions of people prescribed Adderall, an amphetamine mixture that is functionally equivalent to methamphetamine. They go about their daily lives on this drug.

Likewise, we have beyond millions of people on oxycotin and other functionally equivalent drugs to Heroin going about their daily lives as well.

Does this mean they live great lives? Not necessarily, but just as we have millions of functional alcoholics we also have many functional drug users in our country.

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

#233

Post by K0balt »

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…

OTOH, the war on drugs has made an incredibly powerful covert foreign policy tool, in terms of being able to arbitrarily restrict or provide funding, as well as using martial force to control the right to manufacture and distribute illicit substances. None of this would work unless drugs were incredibly profitable… and they aren’t incredibly profitable without strongly enforced artificial scarcity.

Simply by turning a blind eye to one group and continuing aggressive enforcement against another the USA can tilt the political balance of power in many smaller nations.

When you create a default state of War against most of the world, selective peace becomes your most powerful weapon. Destruction is so much cheaper than building value, it creates a wildly disproportionate incentive to cooperate.

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

#234

Post by NaturalPhallacy »

The war on the freedom to do drugs*

It's no more a war on drugs than "gun control" is about controlling guns. "gun control" is actually citizen disarmament, because every law they pass exempts the police, military, and retired police. So its' not about guns, but who can have them.

Both of these represent a propaganda technique known as 'framing': https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framing_(social_sciences)

When people think of it as "gun control" it presupposes the notion that guns are out of control when that isn't the issue.

Same with "the war on drugs" drugs are an inanimate set of chemicals. It's not a war on drugs, but a war on personal freedom to do them. But when you frame it that way, it's obviously reprehensible. Especially in the "land of the free".

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

#235

Post by dylan604 »

howenterprisey wrote: post #195
pmoriarty wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm about as anti War on Drugs as it's possible to get, but agree with those who consider that quote to be highly suspect. Ehrlichman supposedly said it in a private interview with Baum, and there was no public record of it for 22 years after it was said, and 17 years after Ehrlichman died. It's very rare to hear such mea culpas from powerful, politically adept figures that cast their subjects in such a negative ligh…

Ok, what about this? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:John_Ehrlichman#San_Franc... . > NIXON: [...] Let's look at the strong societies. The Russians. Goddamn, they root 'em out. They don't let 'em around at all. I don't know what they do with them. Look at this country. You think the Russians allow dope? Homosexuality, dope, immorality, are the enemies of strong societies. That's why the Communists and left-wingers…

>"Homosexuality, dope, immorality, are the enemies of strong societies."

Is it really though? It seems like it would be the enemy of an uptight conservative society that only speaks of freedoms from the side of their mouth while limiting the freedoms to only those things which they agree.

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

#236

Post by cwkoss »

lettergram wrote: post #66

If you look at violent crime over the last 50 years it has steadily decreased. I think it’s reasonable to see a correlation. It’s possible decriminalizing could lead to a huge wave in crimes as people try to pay for their fix. That being said, I’m pro-liberty. I feel all drugs should be accessible

Do you think drug usage rates have steadily decreased over the last 50 years?

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

#237

Post by thaumasiotes »

klyrs wrote: post #150
jimbob45 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>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.

Hi, white liberal raised by an addict here. I've known quite a few meth addicts over the years. The ones who get sent to prison are uniformly worse off than those who get sent to rehab. A notable distinction, white addicts I know have been mostly sent to rehab; everybody else winds up in jail/prison where there's a booming drug trade and surprise surprise, they don't get clean.

> I've known quite a few meth addicts over the years. The ones who get sent to prison are uniformly worse off than those who get sent to rehab.

But your parent comment said "my methhead sister-in-law is in prison and I certainly feel safer", not "my methhead sister-in-law is in prison and she certainly feels safer."

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

#238

Post by ridgeguy »

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…

A good read on the genesis of the American War on Drugs is the book "Chasing the Scream", by Johann Hari.

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

#239

Post by whakim »

drdavid wrote: post #199
whakim wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only this, but in many cases felons permanently lose their right to vote, even after they serve their sentence. Edit: I stand corrected, this is true in some states but not others.

You may want to see this: https://www.aclu.org/issues/voting-rights/voter-restoration/...

I stand corrected. Thanks for this.

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

#240

Post by cowmoo728 »

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…

Nixon is actually quite removed from the beginning of the War on Drugs. That quote is also of questionable authenticity, so doesn't illustrate the point very well. Reefer Madness, for example, was released in 1936 when Nixon was only 23.

Harry Anslinger was actually one of the most influential figures in the beginning of the modern big-government war on drugs. The anti-marijuana movement was a marriage of convenience between sensationalist yellow journalism from the Hearst empire, and good old-fashioned racism.

"By the tons it is coming into this country — the deadly, dreadful poison that racks and tears not only the body, but the very heart and soul of every human being who once becomes a slave to it in any of its cruel and devastating forms. ... Marihuana is a short cut to the insane asylum. Smoke marihuana cigarettes for a month and what was once your brain will be nothing but a storehouse of horrid specters. Hasheesh makes a murderer who kills for the love of killing out of the mildest mannered man who ever laughed at the idea that any habit could ever get him."

"Reefer makes darkies think they're as good as white men."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_J._Anslinger

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