End Prohibition; Yes on Proposition 19

Townhall.com ^ | September 19, 2010 | Debra J. Saunders

[fr_freak]

Prohibition attempted to ban an activity that had broad public acceptance and practice for centuries. That does not apply with marijuana consumption. Whle many people have tried it, it is not publicly acceptable to most of society.

Sorry, but you couldn't be more wrong here. I don't know how old you are, but I have noticed a significant age gap in the understanding of how the public views marijuana usage. For anyo0ne under the age of 40, for example, marijuana usage is nearly as common as drinking and I suspect the same could be said for the boomers, given that their 1960s excesses really kicked off the drug culture.

As a more concrete example of the changing societal standards, when I went in to the Army in 1989, a recruit was immediately disqualified from service if that person had smoked marijuana even ONCE (that they admitted to). When I looked into going back in in 2003, marijuana usage was no longer an automatic disqualifier. One had to have used more than 7 times total, or anytime in the last 3 years to be disqualified. One of the recruiters explained that military realized over the years that marijuana had become so acceptable that even otherwise solid recruits would be eliminated with the zero tolerance policy, so they scrapped it.

Also, you should realize that money is power. The more money criminals have (or can get) the more power they have. Right now, marijuana sold in the US is the number one source of revenue for Mexican drug cartels. If we eliminate that source of money, the cartels won't get real jobs, but they will be far less powerful and thus far less able to recruit new criminals or subvert governments.

[fr_freak]

I am a smoker, constantly quitting, constantly going back after months or years, who wishes cigs were illegal.

Seriously? You would wish an entire set of laws governing your fellow citizens along with the requisite police agencies and powers to enforce it, just because you can't get your self to quit? Unbelievable. If you get too fat, do you want our loving, nurturing government to outlaw Twinkies, too?

[November 2010]

Yes, I seriously think outlawing cigarettes would be the best thing to do. It’s not important enough to debate very long, but I think cigarrettes are far more harmful than people realize.

[fr_freak]

The Netherlands’ expenditure in a nation the size of the United States would translate to one hundred and fifty billion dollars. (Data is from a 2006 report, based on 2004 data.)

Also of note: the consumption of drugs other than marijuana has risen sharply in the Netherlands.

You are overlooking a couple of things. First, $150 billion spent in rehab programs would be a drop in the bucket next to the current expenditure on drug enforcement and incarceration for non-violent marijuana offenses AND for existing drug rehab programs, even if we were to assume that the Netherlands model would translate perfectly to the US.

More importantly, however, you forget that when the Netherlands decriminalized pot and a couple of other drugs, it became the only European region to do so, and therefore became the number one destination for those who wish to do drugs. Any associated increase in reported drug usage or crime cannot be divorced from that fact. It's kind of like San Francisco, when they decided to make themselves a haven for the homeless, they got more homeless and the associated pathologies. Well, the Netherlands got the druggies from the EU and beyond.

California, of course, would be in a similar situation, since the other 49 states would still have marijuana illegal, but I think we can safely say that California has already drawn to itself pretty much all of the commies and assorted freaks from the rest of the country, so I'm not sure there'd be many more left to come over. However, of greater concern to California is something that the Netherlands doesn't have: a corrupt narco-state next door which runs a vast drug pipeline through the heart of the state on the backs of the huge tidal wave of illegal immigrants. In such a circumstance, limiting the earning potential of these gangs by taking their main cash crop off of the black market would seem like a very logical thing to do.

[fr_freak]

Yes, I seriously think outlawing cigarettes would be the best thing to do. It’s not important enough to debate very long, but I think cigarrettes are far more harmful than people realize.

I agree with you completely that cigarettes are harmful. That's not in question. I just disagree that the government should be used as Big Nanny to make sure everybody drinks their milk and brushes their teeth and doesn't eat too many sweets.

[November 2010]

Cigs are the most addictive drug out there and more people’s lives are harmed and ultimately destroyed by them than any other drug.

[fr_freak]

Cigs are the most addictive drug out there and more people’s lives are harmed and ultimately destroyed by them than any other drug.

Yes, I think we have already established that we agree on that point. The point where we are having a disagreement, as far as I can tell, is where you think the government's proper job is to keep people from using bad judgment in their consumption choices.

[caseinpoint]

I happen to be in the Baby Boomer Generation, not quite adult in the 60s but close. I still maintain that marijuana usage is not accepted nearly as much as many want to believe. While a lot have undoubtedly tried it, I suspect there are not that many regular recreational users. But, even if it were, I would still oppose legalization. It is a step way too far and is likely to severely cripple the rising generation, a generation that is crippled enough already with the self-esteem movement, the lack of real challenges in life, the helicopter parents and more.

The example of the Army is interesting but I don’t consider that a measure of public acceptance. The Army has its own problems with recruiting and have had to lower its standards in a lot of ways besides past drug use. I don’t know how the Army handles drug use by current soldiers but I suspect it is not much tolerated.

I know money is power but I disagree that the criminals will simply fold their tents and steal away if the money is no longer there for marijuana. Their human nature will not change with the law; they will merely move on to some other lucrative criminal enterprise, most likely much worse than pushing marijuana. As I pointed out in another post, in Amsterdam, the pushers now sell marijuana much more potent than the law allows. Criminals are criminals and they will commit crime, by marijuana pushing or some other means.

I know the arguments for legalization and I sympathize to some extent, but the desire of recreational marijuana smokers to get their “weekend buzz” as one poster termed it without hassle comes with a tremendous amount of risk for society as a whole, especially our children. Again, look at what happened to the attitude toward abortion when it went from illegal to legal. Most people were horrified by the act and today the incidents of abortions have increased exponentially and the majority of people now accept it as a right, not an unfortunate necessity.

[behzinlea]

By all means, allow that socialist dystopia known as California to grease its skids on the fast track to hell. Legalizing, encouraging, and superimposing a marijuana paradise on top of the fool’s paradise they’ve already built makes eminent good sense.

[fr_freak]

...but the desire of recreational marijuana smokers to get their “weekend buzz” as one poster termed it without hassle comes with a tremendous amount of risk for society as a whole, especially our children. Again, look at what happened to the attitude toward abortion when it went from illegal to legal.

Exactly how would this put our whole society at risk, "especially our children"? I'm guessing that you don't have a concrete answer for that. There is no answer you can give that doesn't already exist within a country where marijuana is illegal throughout. So, before we toss all of our ideas about limited government and self-reliance out the window out of fear of the downsides of recreational marijuana usage, how about if you explain exactly what you mean.

Also, the abortion analogy is false. Look at how society viewed pre-marital sex and divorce in the years before abortion became legal vs. how nonchalantly they viewed now. Making abortion legal did not increase its acceptance - the degradation of moral standards in general increased its acceptance. In the case of marijuana, the cultural acceptance has already occurred, and I honestly think that you really don't understand the level of acceptance it now has even among otherwise straight-laced, productive members of society. I've said this before, but old-timers don't believe me: I would bet money that the first thing that close to half of our guys in uniform will do, once they ETS, is get high, especially if they go to college.

[MeanFreePath]

Anti-drug laws create more problems than they solve.

It’s amazing to me that many people who are otherwise advocates for small, non-intrusive government still rally to the cause of the war on drugs, particularly given all the abuses that entails...

What right does the government have to arbitrarily ban certain drug use while permitting others? What right does the government have to tell a responsible, tax-paying adult that alcohol is permissible and marijuana is not? How many people are in prison at this very moment, lives ruined, their children missing a parent, unemployable when they get out, because they engaged in a behavior that simply cannot be called criminal in any meaningful sense.

If you think the government has the right to restrict this, then it’s really not an unimaginable a stretch to use the same types of arguments that I’m seeing here to justify limiting Big Mac consumption, with all of the coercive power of the state behind that effort as well. It’s all part of the same kind of nanny-state mentality...

[November 2010]

Addictive substances are not just a matter of judgment. Addiction robs judgment. The libertarian argument is weak when it comes to destructive addictive substances because people are weak when it comes to destructive addictive substances.

Men like to have lots of women. Monogamy remains the law.

[Ken H]

The Netherlands has a very low crime rate compared to the US. For murder, rape and assault, the differences are staggering. We have 3 to 4 times the rate of those crimes vs the Dutch.*

BTW, the murder rate for Amsterdam is comparable to the safest cities in the US.

*nationmaster.com

[Moonman62]

"In almost every respect imaginable, Prohibition was a failure,"

Probably because it wasn't much of a prohibition. People who wanted alcohol could still get it legally, and possession was legal, too.

[caseinpoint]

“Exactly how would this put our whole society at risk, “especially our children”? I’m guessing that you don’t have a concrete answer for that. There is no answer you can give that doesn’t already exist within a country where marijuana is illegal throughout.”

I think I have answered this. It will increase, not decrease the crime rate, and those crimes will be worse than marijuana pushing. It creates a state that draws drug users to it and the state will have to pick up the costs of those who abuse the drug instead of merely using it. It lessens the public approbrium of drug intoxication. It exposes the children to pushers wanting still to illegally push marijuana. I haven’t even mentioned the medical aspects of regular marijuana use or drug intoxication, particularly on young people. My point is that the real ramifications of this policy change may, and most likely will, be catastrophic for the next generation and the generations after that, all so the current folks can enjoy their occasional buzz. All of that is danger to our society.

As to widespread acceptance, I don’t know. I don’t associate with known drug users. How many of my acquaintances use it, I can’t say, but they certainly keep it hidden if they do. I know that publicly it has been largely unacceptable until the past twenty years or so since “I didn’t inhale”. There has been a concerted effort by many to make it acceptable and claim it is widespread. I haven’t looked at reliable numbers who claim to be otherwise law-abiding folks who use it regularly. But I think the number who try it, and who end up using it regularly, are quite different.

[familyop]

"It deprived the government of revenue, stripped the gears of the political system,..."

That's a good idea.

[familyop]

Marijuana is a tool for slavery.

[dangus]

Try comparing Netherlands to nearby European countries with similar demograohics. The Dutch had much lower crime rates before legalizing drugs.

[tickles]

““In March, the Partnership for a Drug- Free America reported that 38 percent of ninth- through 12th-graders studied in 2009 reported consuming marijuana in the past month.”

Dreadful statistic. USA is going to the dogs if the next generation is like that.
Succumbing to this is not a good idea.”

I look at that statistic and think gee things probably haven’t changed that much from when I was in HS back in the 70’s, kinda the more things change the more they stay the same.

[Ken H]

Record low murder rate once again

2 January 2008

AMSTERDAM -- 147 murders were committed in the Netherlands last year, one fewer than in 2006 and therefore a record low, according to the annual report from Elsevier.

http://www.expatica.com/nl/news/local_news/Record-low-murder-rate-once-again.html