JUST SOME TIDBITS ON THE "WAR ON DRUGS" I believe people convicted of drugs only crimes should be given amnesty..instead of being tortured with 30 and 40 year plus terms.
http://serendipity.nofadz.com/wod.html


The U.S. government propaganda about the "war on drugs" disguises the fact (if we must speak of "war" at all) that this is a war on people — people who (responsibly or otherwise) choose to use drugs — or rather, drugs whose use authoritarian governments actively discourage — in contrast to their encouragement of the officially-condoned disease- and death-causing drugs alcohol and tobacco.

In a civilized society, war is a response by the government to a military attack from a hostile power. In a civilized society, the government does not make war upon its own people. Viewed from the perspective of the "war on drugs" the United States is no better than some tin-pot dictatorship in which those whom the government disapproves of regularly disappear and the rest live in fear of the same thing happening to them.

In America the "war on drugs" is big business. Lots of people make a lot of money from it — police, judges, lawyers, probation officers, prison guards, companies that build prisons, companies that provide "security", hand gun manufacturers and many others — including those supposedly "rogue" elements in the government itself (which are hardly "rogue" if they originate from the highest levels of government) that import heroin and cocaine to supply both the inhabitants of urban ghettos and the inhabitants of corporate boardrooms (more cocaine goes up the noses of affluent whites than of poor blacks). This is one reason why development of a saner drug policy is so difficult in the U.S. — there are too many people in positions of power profiting from prohibition.

Another reason is that any major revision of the government's prohibitionist position would require it to admit it has been wrong all these years, that it has in effect lied to the people while claiming to provide reliable information and guidance, and that its policies of encouraging the use of dangerous drugs and prohibiting the use of drugs which have few (if any) harmful effects have resulted in enormous suffering and loss of life. A government which prides itself on being a superpower — and (according to its view of itself) practically infallible — is unlikely to admit voluntarily that it has made a mistake of this enormity.

In Rethinking Drug Prohibition Peter Webster also points out that there are multiple factors sustaining the Drug War:

* It's a useful tool for politicians seeking to whip up the electorate.
* It profits the prison industry and even the weapons industry.
* Legalization would threaten the profits of the pharmaceutical industry.
* Legalization would threaten the profits of the tobacco and alcohol industries.
* Users of marijuana and psychedelics are less enamored of material consumption, so legalization would threaten the profits of those promoting consumerism.
* Drug prohibition facilitates control of the population.
* Enforcement agencies (police, DEA, customs, etc.) profit greatly from the civil asset forfeiture laws.
* The illegality and high prices for heroin and cocaine allows the CIA to obtain secret funding for its activities.
* The Drug War has lead to draconian "money laundering" laws, which are a way for the U.S. to pry into the details of everyone's financial transactions.
* The Drug War provides an excuse for invasions of South and Central American countries.
* Following the demise of the Red Threat another scapegoat is needed, and "drugs" (and drug users) are it.
* The Drug War provides a distraction from the failure of the U.S. government to solve the real problems facing U.S. society (poverty, unemployment, poor health and educational systems, etc.).
* The Drug War is a tool of racism, providing an excuse to disenfranchise the black population.
* The DEA is a major bureaucracy and lives from the Drug War, so it's in the interests of the DEA to keep the "drug menace" on the front burner.
* Puritanism is a major component of the American psyche, and the advocates of drug prohibition appeal to this.
* For the U.S. govt. to reverse its stance on drug prohibition would mean admitting it was wrong, which it will never do.


Ok..just stirring the pot a bit. I don't do drugs by the way, bad for the brain but I truly believe incarceration is a far greater health risk.

That last point was a great point. What's worse for someone - drugs or being in jail for X number of years?

My thought about drugs, or seeing it legalized is my same thought about cigarettes.

If legalized, wouldn't it become another consumer product multi-billion dollar corporations try to serial-market to everyone?

Would it become another thing that messes up peoples' bodies that corporations can get away with making money on?

:jock: Just to get this discussion rolling :)

Those are interesting and very valid points, GS. As it stands now, the ones making money on the illegality of drugs are the DEA, the Prison Industry, and of course the thugs on the street corners. If it were decriminalized to the degree they could not allow the "products" to be marketed to young people. But it wouldn't have to go so far as to allow it to be sold at stores, it could be decriminalized so that people could get treatment instead of jail...especially for heroin or cocain users. Those drugs kill. Marijuana on the other hand is no worse than alcohol and has medicinal uses yet it is villified by the federal government.

One day people will take a look at this beautiful world and will realize how BORING drugs really are. Until then we should not lock people in cages for decades for not making the right life choices.

I was reading something not too long ago about a man in a wheelchair who was caught with marijuana..probably for help with pain. He was sent to jail and died there, so essentially he was sentenced to death. Alone..in a jail cell with no family or friends near. That is a far greater crime in my opinion.

Here is a good article on the subject:
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0103-29.htm

Can One City Reduce U.S. Drug Law Madness?

by Neal Peirce


Can a single city do anything to change drug policies that are delivering terror to our inner city streets, diverting police, clogging our courts, breaking up families and making a once-proud America quite literally the incarceration capital of the world?

It's tough because federal and state drug laws, passed by tragically misguided "law-and-order" politicians, are highly intrusive. But Syracuse, N.Y., with a detailed analysis of drug law impact by outgoing City Auditor Minchin Lewis, followed up by recent city council hearings, is courageously asking tough questions and searching for alternatives.

Lewis' audit, inspired by Syracuse drug reformer Nicolas Eyle, focused on the Syracuse police department. It discovered that 22 percent of the department's 28,800 arrests in a single year were for drug-related incidents, more than arrests for assaults, disturbances and larcenies combined. Almost 2,000 people were charged with possession or sale of marijuana.

Lewis found that drug arrests were focused in six poor, heavily black inner-city neighborhoods. Police raids in search of evidence were rendering housing units, many government-owned, uninhabitable, and forcing many families to split up because of government rules evicting drug users from public housing.

If Syracuse's drug raid and arrest policy is intended to reduce drug use, the Lewis audit concluded, "it is not achieving its goal. The drug activity is continuing with an ever-increasing spiral of violence."

It's true, Lewis concluded, that the city can't change federal or state drug laws. But it can use its authority over police to reduce the emphasis on drug-related arrests and focus on "harm reduction and prevention efforts rather than absolute prohibition."

City council member Stephanie Miner said she found citizens typically unconcerned about people using drugs in the confines of their homes, but deeply alarmed by the violence visited on their neighborhoods by drug-dealing on the street.

"The main effect of prohibition is to drive the market underground," Jeffrey Miron, a Boston University economist and drug trade expert, told the Syracuse council hearing in October. Like the alcohol trade in the Roaring Twenties, he said, narcotics rendered illegal by federal decree soar in price and have created an opportunity for traffickers and dealers interested in getting a share of the $65-billion-a-year nationwide market.

Eyle, head of Syracuse-based ReconsiDer, will meet again with the city council this month to discuss such steps as a resolution asking the federal and state governments to change drug policies that are merely stimulating black-market activity, crime and violence. Instructions to divert Syracuse's police to more important tasks, perhaps lowering the priority of marijuana arrests in the city, will be considered.

"This is a unique opportunity to change the image of the city, from an undistinguished Rust Belt city to a progressive community actively working to improve itself," Eyle argues. But it's clear his long-term goal is much broader: lifting drug prohibition altogether.

What would that mean? Eyle suggests European-style "harm reduction," recognizing that a segment of the population will always use illegal drugs, so that government's role is to reduce the harm to the user and society. A possible approach: decriminalizing personal possession of drugs, leaving importation and manufacture and sale of significant amounts illegal. There would also be voluntary treatment programs for addicts.

What about total "legalization"? It's a good possibility, says Eyle, if we revise, hand-in-hand, appropriate regulations. The parallels in his argument are intriguing:

"We currently regulate alcohol to insure its purity and to keep it out of the hands of children. We regulate its points of distribution and hours of sale. We tax it. Do we still have an alcohol problem? You bet. Can kids obtain alcohol? Absolutely."

But, Eyle asks, do we have "a large market in every community selling alcohol to minors? No. Are beer salesmen spraying bullets at each other to settle arguments over shelf space in the supermarket? No."

Legalization, by this reasoning, is OK, and good for us all, if it can successfully eliminate the gruesome waves of crime that surround today's illegal drug market. The "how" could be complex: Does government do the selling, or does the free market? Is advertising permitted? How do rules differ for marijuana, cocaine, heroin?

But just think what legalization could deliver: radically reduced incentive to crime, far safer streets and cities, fewer shattered families, less crowded and costly prisons breeding new criminals, more racial equity. In a society that prizes freedom and innovation, I'd call this an experiment we owe ourselves.

Peirce is a national columnist who writes about state and local affairs.

© 2004 Pioneer Press

So you're saying that drugs shouldn't necessarily be legalized, but should be decriminalized and people who suffer from drug addictions should be treated in rehab clinics for their problems.

That sounds like a good solution and a great idea. I think some people might still argue against that by saying a rehab clinic isn't a good enough deterrent. If drugs were decriminalized, would rehab deter drug dealers?

You'll never believe this, I was trying to type "yahoo" into my address bar, and just typed "ya" and came across thia. I haven't read through it, but it's relevant.

http://www.yahooka.com/

The war on drugs is indeed a war on the American people. As with most things in this country, it is both irrational and immoral. I've always held that it is quite simply big business. Lets start with all those who are employed as a result of it--the obvious ones are police, DEA, prison guards, security guards, etc... Also, consider all the construction contracts, food contracts, etc... Also, simply the number of people taken out of the unemployment lines gives our unemployment rate a false boost. I would really like to see how much value the industrial-prison complex adds to the American economy.

So right paissat! It is telling when groups like the prison guard union in California come out against lesser sentences, rehab programs, and decriminalizations of drugs in their lobbying efforts. They don't want to lose potential zoo specimens I suppose.

It is a big, frightening business that makes money on the suffering of others. Abu Ghraib. Who in America was really surprise at what happened there? They learned their craft in prisons here.