Posted on 12/14/2012 9:19:49 AM PST by GSWarrior
It felt like Christmas had come early when I got my package of Buckyballs in the mail a few days ago. Buckyballs are small, super-strong spherical magnets made of the rare-earth metal Neodymium. A set of 216 Buckyballs fits comfortably in the palm of your hand.
Obviously Buckyballs are adult toys, and Maxfield and Oberton emphatically warns users not to give them to children, eat them, inhale them, or place them near objects (such as pacemakers) that are sensitive to magnets. However, for those who use Buckyballs with common sense and due care, they are reasonably safe—just like countless other objects in or around the home from hammers to knives to sugar to prescription drugs to firearms to bicycles to automobiles.
What has been the government’s response to Buckyballs? Has it been to recognize the outstanding productive achievements of the company that makes them? To leave the company in peace to conduct its business? Of course not. The government has put Maxfield and Oberton out of business so far as Buckyballs are concerned. The sets I ordered are among the last that will be produced, ever.
The unanswered question is, who will protect Americans from the risks posed to our lives, liberties, and happiness by rights-violating government regulators?
(Excerpt) Read more at theobjectivestandard.com ...
'Then they started treating drug use more like a parking ticket. People caught with drugs get a slap on the wrist, sometimes a fine.
'Independent studies have found the number of people in Portugal who say they regularly do drugs stayed about the same. And the best news, said Goulao: "Addiction itself decreased a lot."
'At first, police were skeptical of the law, but Joao Figueira, chief inspector of Lisbon's drug unit, told me that decriminalization changed lots of minds.
'"The level of conflicts on the street are reduced. Drug-related robberies are reduced. And now the police are not the enemies of the consumers!"
'And teen drug use is down.'
“Marijuana itself kills nobody.”
“You can’t overdose on weed” is a fair statement, as is, “you can’t overdose on LSD”, but it cannot be seperated from the impaired decision-making that then follows. That’s sort of like argueing that in the entire history of guns, nobody has ever been killed by one because it is the BULLET that actually kills you. Both are interrelated.
Did government step in because the community stopped policing itself, or did the community stop policing itself because the government stepped in? I think historically the latter has more evidence behind it, though it may be impossible to prove. In any case even if the government is only responding to parental or community failure I atoll blame the government. If not on efficiency grounds then on moral grounds. Arguing otherwise means you think such interference is justified, even if they step in only after private failure. Which might be grounds not to consider you a conservative (there must be some hard boundaries).
Besides, who said the community has failed? Is there really a buckyball problem? Did buckyball tragedies and the people’s inability to respond to them beg for public health intrusion, or were busibodies out seeking for something to ban? I see absolutely no evidence this was something just begging to be regulated.
I can see blaming the people for falling short of the eternal vigilence standard. I can see putting the onus on voters as opposed to dirty politicians and dirty bureaucrats. But treating it as a legitimate substitute for missing private responsibility is anathematic. Perhaps he who will not rule himself will be ruled by others. But that does NOT make others’ rule legitimate.
That’s a pretty serious side effect.
“...the number of people in Portugal who say they regularly do drugs stayed about the same.”
I think we agree.
People die every day under the “influence” of:
Xanax
Tobacco
Caffeine
Valium
Penicillin
Sugar
Ad infinitum
Are those things the proximate causes of their deaths or was plain old fashioned stupid?
That’s sort of like argueing that in the entire history of guns, nobody has ever been killed by one because it is the BULLET that actually kills you.
How about "Guns don't kill people, people do." Is that a bad argument because I see it a lot.
“Are those things the proximate causes of their deaths or was plain old fashioned stupid?”
We can cite plenty of stupidity enhancers out there and there is no lack of stupid people who simply die stupid with no enhancements at all, right? Context matters. But, they should at least be part of the conversation, as should the stupidity of the person in play. We shouldn’t dismiss the contributing factors because you can’t overdose on the drug in question. That was my initial, primary point.
JustSayNoToNannies wisely points to real world facts. The Portugese experience with quasi-legalization changed my thinking on the question.
“How about “Guns don’t kill people, people do.” Is that a bad argument...”
I said “sort of like” lol. I was trying to come up with a semi-ok example of an interrelated cause of death, not an anti-gun arguement. In my current field (tech), we try to look at such things as a mix of percentages; 50% stupidity, 30% under the influence, 20% fighting with spouse, for example. You then analyze each. That’s the idea anyway.
Hey, thanks for the discussion on nanny state dictatorship. We actually agree on broad principle as well as the specific question regarding that common plant. Are we citizens or subjects?
... that could be prevented with a stroke of the pen that repeals criminal penalties for MJ possession and distribution.
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