Posted on 07/25/2013 3:03:09 AM PDT by markomalley
A papal visit is usually a good thing for Latin American leaders, a chance to bask in the Pontiff's halo a bit and distract their largely Catholic voters from their usual woes of poverty, debt, and lousy government. The latest visit by Pope Francis to Brazil is no exception in that regard, although he chucked a bit of a spanner in the works last night with his comments on drug legalisation.
A growing chorus of Latin American leaders have been calling for the decriminalisation of drugs in the last couple of years, arguing that it is the only way to end the drug wars that are now claiming thousands of lives a year in Mexico and central America. Among those who back some kind of rethink is the Pope's fellow Argentinian, President Cristina Kirchner, who says that addicts shouldn't be treated as criminals. And while the argument has support among some on the political Right too, it has a particular appeal among "Chavista" types, who point out the drug wars are ultimately the fault of those greedy, coke-snorting gringos further north.
(snip)
However, in his comments yesterday while visiting a crack cocaine clinic in Rio, Pope Francis made it clear that he didn't agree. “A reduction in the spread and influence of drug addiction will not be achieved by a liberalisation of drug use, as is currently being proposed in various parts of Latin America,” he said. Instead, he said, it was necessary to confront the underlying problems of drug use, “educating young people in the values that build up life in society”.
(Excerpt) Read more at blogs.telegraph.co.uk ...
God Bless Pope Francis!
Yes! He’s absolutely right. But one of the reasons the politicians like drugs is that a stoned or drugged people is a compliant and easily dominated people.
As long as the drugs keep flowing (also giving substantial amounts of money to the politicians and the already wealthy) the people stay in their stupor. People (men, at least) are stoned all the time in most Muslim countries, and I think that is one of the things that makes it possible for them to tolerate such dysfunctional societies.
Thats not the goal of the re-legalization movement - its to prevent the black market armies from devastating the neighborhoods. Let those who do not exercise responsibility suffer and let those who do live without fear of armed thug gangs.
But seeing as how the bloodshed and corruption of cops and politicians is still preferred by certain folks then the let the blood flow.
Pain is a gift from God - its all about how much of it one must suffer until learning comes.
At least Pope Francis is taking a tough stand.
I’m not quite sure it’s a tough stand. Sounds more like going with the flow to me.
I’ll bet politicians get quite some money from gangsters to keep drugs illegal. So going against that would be the tough stand, in Latin America or the US.
When you deny anyone their freedom, you become their jailer/slave owner.
You have much in common with islam, when you own slaves / imprison people that disagree, and do not follow your directives.
Perhaps this Pope can enforce some church discipline for the faithful who will not adhere to Catholic doctrine and teachings, Expell anyone who publicly supports abortion.
once he does that I may staft to listen to him lecture the rest of us on how to write governemnt enforced laws.
it sounds to me like a man he who cannot persuade you to follow his morality so he will have the governemt, at the point of a gun, enforce it for you him. There is no courage or toughness in this proclamation.
Amen.
Right now we basically have addicts roaming the streets, causing thousands of dollars in damage to buy a few dollars worth of product from violent gangsters. Even giving them free drugs and cot for life would be a better policy than what we have now. It would eliminate theft by addicts and stop giving money to gangs/cartels. The WOD only creates an army of addict thieves who steal for the dealers.
The product costs pennies to make in the jungle or any private room and sells for more than gold in the streets. The chance of getting caught is extremely low since there are no victims to report a crime. Even in countries that have death penalty for dealers, there is no shortage of poor people risking their lives to get very rich. For that reason, it can NEVER be stopped.
All attempts at ramping up the WOD on the supply side will simply result in more profits for bootleggers, more government corruption and less rights for us. But hey, maybe that was the plan all along...
How is that tough? To support corruption and violence? How about holding people to their individual responsibility?
That's a tougher road - the weak look for Government to protect them "from themselves".
40 years of the war on drugs has shown how ineffective force is at modifying behavior. Drugs are cheaper, more potent and more widely available than before Nixon declared war.
Pope Francis should teach morals. Force of arms is not the way.
The anti-God/anti-Christian libertarians seem to have shown up on this thread to fight their war for the left.
Unfortunately the Catholic church seems to agree with immigration, which of course for Americans, leads to the rest of the libertarian agenda being voted on and passed.
The agenda:
Throw open the borders completely; only a rare individual (terrorist, disease carrier etc.) can be kept from freedom of movement through “political boundaries”, eliminate the Border Patrol and INS.
Homosexuals; total freedom in the military, gay marriage, adoption, child custody and everything else.
Abortion; zero restrictions or impediments full 9 months.
Pornography; no restraint, no restrictions.
Drugs; Meth, Heroin, Crack, and anything new that science and marketers can come up with, zero restrictions.
Advertising those drugs, prostitution, and pornography; zero restrictions.
Until we have a complete police state and 24/7 surveillance of everyone, fighting drugs on the supply side will do nothing but increase profits for violent bootleggers and take our freedom away.
Even with that police state I don't think it will do anything. Governments are always corrupt so drug sales will continue under that police state with even greater profits for their dope runner buddies.
The amount of money made from bootlegging is so incredible that it controls entire nations and probably has a great influence on ours! (See Fast&Furious, Mena Arkansas, Greg Bell, Nicaragua Contras, the CIA-linked jet that crashed with $billions of cocaine in Mexico, etc, etc, etc). It's obvious that our government is involved with the drug market at high levels.
Do you really want to continue this charade?
Read your Bible. Do you understand what God means when he says "Behold"?
Does it mean, ignore, rationalize away, or Pay attention this is IMPORTANT?
The Creator gave mankind a gift. You can choose NOT to accept this gift. That is up to YOU. Please do NOT CHOOSE FOR ME.
http://biblehub.com/genesis/1-29.htm
And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed,
You take away what God himself has given, and YOU call others anti-God?
If people were free again to grow their own, there would be no black market. The Police State would not be throwing grenades at children in their beds in the middle of the night!
You write like you are high right now, and trying to tell us that God wants us to get stoned on hashish and pot, the drug of the Arabs and Muslims, is laughable.
The Pope is correct on this issue
Incredible, this thread about the Pope really is just another pro-crack thread to the dopers.
Those lovely greens are the leaves of the rhubarb, belladonna, and diffenbachia. Those lovely red berries come from the Jack-in-the-Pulpit ... I made sure to include some hyacinth bulbs, too.
Jus' sayin ...
To the libertines, apparently, it's a thread about legalizing drugs (or not).
Let's see, here ...
What was ol' Franky talking about, again?
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