From the linked Article:
imports of opium (to the United States) increased from around 113,000 pounds in the 1840s to 1,500,000 pounds in 1909
Posted on 06/26/2017 4:43:36 PM PDT by Antoninus
Firstly, the hypocrisy is irrelevant. There is a very strong national interest at stake in preventing runaway drug abuse as happened in China.
Secondly, you are badly misinformed as to what has actually been happening. The "War on Drugs" is not a war, it is a holding action. If it were a war, it would have wiped out drug suppliers years ago. It is an interdiction effort designed to hold the line as much as possible without upsetting the American people.
It is not a failure, it is actually a massive success. It is simply not allowed to be a complete success because nobody wants to unleash the forces on the drug suppliers that would end it with finality.
The normal progression of drugs in a society is a logistical growth curve. It takes effort to keep the drug menace from growing, and the efforts which have been expended have done exactly that.
Therefore it is not a failure, it is the best people can do without a strong resolve by the American people to eradicate the drug menace.
What a failed "war on drugs" looks like is China between 1840 and 1990. At least one hundred million people in China have died as a result of drugs shipped into that country. The availability of drugs is what collapsed their society and their Emperor form of government. (which had lasted 4,000 years prior to Opium shipped to them by the ton.)
Drugs nearly destroyed China, and they have only recently come back to what they would have been without hundreds of millions of their people addicted to opium.
From the linked Article:
imports of opium (to the United States) increased from around 113,000 pounds in the 1840s to 1,500,000 pounds in 1909
From the linked Article:
imports of opium (to the United States) increased from around 113,000 pounds in the 1840s to 1,500,000 pounds in 1909
Was that anywhere near China levels?
More interesting information from that linked article:
"The opium rush was at its most prevalent during the 1880s and 1890s, which coincided with the rise of the temperance movement."
The law of unintended consequences has always applied in spades to wars on substances.
"the Smoking Opium Exclusion Act banned the importation of opiates used purely for recreational use.
"However it's unclear if this act was part of anti-Chinese backlash as it was thought Chinese men were luring white women to have sex in the opium dens."
Calls into question whether there was a significant problem with opium as such.
‘Addiction among service men became so common that they started referring to it as “The Soldiers Disease.”’
The problems with this theory have been pointed out to you, and your response seems to boil down to that you hadn’t and wouldn’t investigate that information: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3264470/replies?c=303
I count the deaths of Mao's "Great Leap Forward" and his communist revolution as a consequence of the societal collapse of China due to drugs.
In other words, if China did not have at one time about 1/2 of it's population addicted to drugs (that can be found at Druglibrary.org) Mao would have never came to power.
The 100 million number I cite is from the known deaths caused by Chairman Mao's rise to power. It is very likely that there were also 100 million deaths which are directly due to drug usage, but I am not aware of any good records which will prove this.
This book has a lot of good information in it on this subject, but it is mostly anecdotal accounts.
No it wasn't, and that's because it was never allowed enough time to get to that level. We stopped it before it got that bad by outlawing these drugs.
More interesting information from that linked article: "The opium rush was at its most prevalent during the 1880s and 1890s, which coincided with the rise of the temperance movement."
Post Civil War people were becoming aware of the dangers of drug addiction. Yes, several hundreds of thousands of former soldiers addicted to drugs would tend to make people aware that the stuff is dangerous, and so would therefore initiate a temperance movement to stop it.
That's one theory - another, no less consistent with that evidence, is that it was never going to get that bad.
addicted to drugs would tend to make people aware that the stuff is dangerous, and so would therefore initiate a temperance movement to stop it.
The temperance movement was not about opium: http://law.jrank.org/pages/10714/Temperance-Movement.html
The only problem pointed out to me in that linked message is that there is some disagreement as to the scale of the problem. Even David Cartwright (the author of the book cited) admits that "Soldier's Disease" was a real thing. He just argues that there were much fewer people addicted by opiates administered to ease the pain of war wounds than do others.
Read what David Courtwright said at this link.
Beyond that, I note your form of argument is to dig around in things I had written looking for material you could cherry pick instead of putting forth your own arguments based on your own research and experience.
I'm flattered that you felt the need to search my past commentary, but I think it's a poor substitute for a real argument.
"Just"?! Quantity is the crux of your claim.
Beyond that, I note your form of argument
When you're losing on substance, talk about form.
I'm a bit puzzled...hasn't the government labeled it a “War on Drugs”?
I tend to agree with you on the second point. If it were a true war on drugs, we would have had troops inside Messy-co by 15 miles. It could not have been nor will ever be a serious War on Drugs when the border remains wide open.
What should happen lickety split is all persons at the age of 18 should be drafted into military service unless unable physically. Those who cannot serve in the military should be drafted into a national service. Get these punks off the street, teach them how to become men/woman and take responsibility.
The end.
From the DEA:
"Many soldiers on both sides of the Civil War who were given morphine for their wounds became addicted to it, and this increased level of addiction continued throughout the nineteenth century and into the twentieth. In 1880, many drugs, including opium and cocaine, were legal — and, like some drugs today, seen as benign medicine not requiring a doctor’s care and oversight. Addiction skyrocketed. There were over 400,000 opium addicts in the U.S. That is twice as many per capita as there are today.
"By 1900, about one American in 200 was either a cocaine or opium addict."
So we had 400,000 opium addicts in 1880, many of whom were addicted Civil War veterans. The population of the US in 1880 was around 50M. That works out to an addiction rate of 0.8% in 1880. Now, in 1900 the addiction rate to either opium or cocaine was 1 in 200. That is an addiction rate of 0.5%.
So in 1880 there were 0.8% addicted to just opium vs 0.5% to either opium or cocaine in 1900. The DEA is telling us that addiction declined substantially between 1880 and 1900, despite these drugs being legal.
According to the rebuttal you cited.
"The only clear disagreement is the few who estimate the number of addicted Civil War veterans. Some claim 45,000 (Ashley, 1972 and 1978; Geis, 1973; Health PAC, 1970; and Kenny, 1972); others 400,000. (H. Jones and Jones, 1977; Lingeman, 1969; Schwartz, 1980; Starkey, 197 1; Summers et. al., 1975; and Westin and Shaffer, 1972)"
I think the lesser number of 45,000 is still a sufficient number to meet the "quantity" point I put forth.
45,000 new Drug addicts is a pretty good kickstart to a disease with a logistical growth curve.
And why would growth of addiction not continue in the manner that it occurred in China? What magic was going to stop it?
Yes, but they have not conducted it as they would a war. It is called a "War" so that politicians can create the impression that they take it seriously, but an impression is all it is.
I tend to agree with you on the second point. If it were a true war on drugs, we would have had troops inside Messy-co by 15 miles. It could not have been nor will ever be a serious War on Drugs when the border remains wide open.
And we would have wiped out growers in Columbia and Afghanistan. As it is, we pretty much leave them alone.
What should happen lickety split is all persons at the age of 18 should be drafted into military service unless unable physically. Those who cannot serve in the military should be drafted into a national service. Get these punks off the street, teach them how to become men/woman and take responsibility.
That was a task that used to be performed by parents. Nowadays too many kids grow up without a mature adult in their life teaching them what they ought to know to be an adult.
“45,000 new Drug addicts is a pretty good kickstart to a disease with a logistical growth curve.”
Courtwright confirms (https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=VxUuPa3cnLMC) the DEA’s numbers in showing that opiate addiction declined after 1890.
Because this isn't China - as I already posted:
“Genetic factors account for about half of the likelihood that an individual will develop addiction. Environmental factors interact with the person’s biology and affect the extent to which genetic factors exert their influence. Resiliencies the individual acquires (through parenting or later life experiences) can affect the extent to which genetic predispositions lead to the behavioral and other manifestations of addiction. Culture also plays a role in how addiction becomes actualized in persons with biological vulnerabilities to the development of addiction.” - American Society of Addiction Medicine
So now you are accepting the 400,000 number? 45,000 or 400,000, it's still a lot of people with which to kickstart an addiction epidemic.
So in 1880 there were 0.8% addicted to just opium vs 0.5% to either opium or cocaine in 1900. The DEA is telling us that addiction declined substantially between 1880 and 1900, despite these drugs being legal.
Your argument here is that because addiction rate declined in this period, this demonstrates that there would have been no runaway addiction problem?
There are several problems with drawing solid conclusions from these statistics. Firstly, I don't know how the DEA would know what sort of addiction rates they were suffering in 1900 because I don't know how they would have accurately polled all the drug users of that time period. Obviously they are relying on some sort of proxy factor to determine this, or they are merely putting forth some sort of wild @$$ed guess.
Wikipedia has this to say on the subject.
Opium usage had begun to decline by 1914 after rising dramatically in the post Civil War Era, peaking at around one-half million pounds per year in 1896
Secondly, you ignore that addiction can decline when addicted people die off, which they tend to do, especially if they are addicted to something like morphine or heroin. Perhaps the decline in addiction (if there was one) was due to the deaths of the addicts?
I do recall reading that societal opposition to drug usage was increasing in the 1890s and 1900s. I believe the first efforts by doctors to study the problem came about in the 1890s.
Well he and Musto, David F. ((1973). The American Disease: Origins of Narcotic Control. Yale Univ. pages 3-5.) need to get together and hash it out, because David F. Musto says opium usage was peaking in 1896.
Also I didn't see any quotes to support your claim at the site to which you provided the link.
Yes, we know it isn't China, but humans are humans no matter where on the globe they exist, and they are susceptible to the same afflictions wherever they reside.
Occidentals are just as susceptible to opium addiction as are Orientals.
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