First of all, we are talking about cannabis here. But for the sake of argument let's just say that cannabis DOES turn people into violent, aggressive criminals....
We already have have laws in place which address these things. There are already laws against assault, theft, robbery, aggressive pan handling, etc...
Interestingly, these laws have their foundation in millennia old Judeo/Christian beliefs and values. These laws are based on the idea that each individual has the right to themselves and their property and that this right is given to them by God and is inalienable. No other human (or government) has the right to take your property or assault you.
The "extra" laws that you are advocating for are the complete opposite. These laws are NOT based on Judeo/Christian values but instead are based on early 20th century progressive/socialist values. They are rooted in a way of thinking that says we are not individuals with responsibility to ourselves, our families and God but rather, we are part of a collective. The collective is responsible for us and we are rightly told what we can and can't do for the well being of the collective. The collective also has the right to our property to support others in the collective who aren't making productive choices.
Regardless of whether I support the practice or not, it is a fact that there are many costs that the taxpayers end up paying because of drug abusers. Welfare, prison, rehab, and medical expenses are all costs incurred by taxpayers for drug abusers. That is the reality that we live with right now.
I would argue that it is not "regardless" whether you support the practice. It is very important whether you support the practice of the government forcing you to pay for someone else's bad decisions. This policy is a BAD policy. It has BAD consequences. It is morally wrong to force you to pay for someone else's bad choices. You are suggesting that we need to enact other laws which may or may not be bad themselves, may create unintended bad consequences or may be morally wrong in order to mitigate some of the negative consequences (cost) of the first bad law.
The drug of choice is almost irrelevant. The disease is addiction. One component of the disease is that parts of the brain that are involved with impulse control are destroyed, meaning that the addict is lacking the one quality that he/she most needs to kick the addiction.
We already have have laws in place which address these things. There are already laws against assault, theft, robbery, aggressive pan handling, etc...
Um, okay, then. So whenever I visit a city, it is just my imagination that I frequently have to avoid stepping on drug addicts who are panhandling to support their addictions. I'll try to remember that the next time I go to San Francisco, New Orleans, Anaheim, Baltimore, etc. I'm just lucky that I have not been mugged; maybe that's because I always insist that I have no money, and they hear that.
I would argue that it is not "regardless" whether you support the practice. It is very important whether you support the practice of the government forcing you to pay for someone else's bad decisions. This policy is a BAD policy. It has BAD consequences. It is morally wrong to force you to pay for someone else's bad choices. You are suggesting that we need to enact other laws which may or may not be bad themselves, may create unintended bad consequences or may be morally wrong in order to mitigate some of the negative consequences (cost) of the first bad law.
I find it interesting just how far people will go to try to excuse drug abuse (or, honestly, to rationalize their own drug addictions).
The fact is that I have no control over the laws which ensure that drug addicts still receive welfare payments and health care (including multiple rounds of rehab) at taxpayer expense. And for every person like me who would cut off every taxpayer dollar from being spent on addicts, there are radical leftists who hysterically claim that people like me are heartless, and that we should dump tons of money onto addicts. In case you have not noticed, there is a war going on between those who would preserve civilization and those who would destroy it to build a socialist dystopia; the drug war is just one front of the war.
Another fact is that making an activity legal NEVER decreases the incidence of that activity, despite the claims that proponents of legalized drugs often make. Did abortion disappear when the Supreme court deemed it legal? No; in fact the incidence of abortion jumped from a few hundred per year to over 1.5 million per year at its peak (the rate has since dropped, but is still many times higher than pre-legalization). Now, on what basis would I believe that drug abuse will drop with widespread legalization of marijuana? All I see is that marijuana is being legalized, and at the same time, there is an opioid epidemic... and now some jurisdictions are toying with legalizing other drugs. This is a huge problem.