Drug Prohibition: Still Stupid

[Raz'r]

Happy loves big govt. maybe he thinks he would be an addict if the stuff was easily available?

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

Hey Tom

About your any drug, anyone, anytime outlook.

Any age restriction for possession or purchase?

If no, then you are ok with a 6 year old having access to Krocodil ?

if you do favor an age limit then how have you eliminated the illegal trade?

Second question

How do you feel about people dosing others without their knowledge?

Make drugs legal, easy and cheap won't that make this a more common problem when Rophenol etc are over the counter?

To the first question, I'd say we should treat cannabis like alcohol and then work on eliminating the drinking age and putting that responsibility back on parents for both drugs.

After that, I'd be OK with most anything a parent did. I think parents are generally more responsible at parenting than government.

We eliminated alcohol prohibition and destroyed most of the black market without letting youngsters buy booze, so I'm not sure why you think that impossible.

You would not have asked your fourth question (the one labeled second question) if you had read this thread. I can save you the trouble. Read posts 40 and 78.

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

i'm pretty sure there's no traffic on these threads as most here seem to agree. If we agree, what do we debate? It just becomes a circle jerk. Sorry, not interested.

Actions speak louder than words. Most here seem to be Duopoly voters. To me, that means agreement with the drug war, regardless of words.

Government will give up power only when keeping it costs votes.

I'm tired of getting the government that Duopoly voters deserve.

I'd like to see (mostly Republican) drug prohibitionists lose votes over the issue just as I'd like to see (mostly Democrat) gun prohibitionists lose votes over that issue. In both cases, voters are slowly coming around to libertarian positions and our "leaders" are following even more slowly.

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

...If no, then you are ok with a 6 year old having access to Krocodil ?

That's a heck of a beefy leg for a six year old. How is that picture relevant?

Should I look for a pic of the child referenced in the article I posted above? The one whose parents are giving the child CBD oil and THC oil because over in Israel, where research into naughty plants is allowed, they've found the two ingredients have a beneficial synergy and those parents have observed it in their child?

Should they be arrested for giving THC to a child?

 

[GRUMPY]

NYC Council members say criminalization of marijuana pushes people to dangerous K2

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/city-councilors-pot-criminalization-pushes-users-k2-article-1.2369398

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

NYC Council members say criminalization of marijuana pushes people to dangerous K2

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/city-councilors-pot-criminalization-pushes-users-k2-article-1.2369398

This is a liberal mayor in a liberal city:

But Elizabeth Glaser, director of Mayor de Blasio’s criminal justice office, said the mayor disagrees.

“We still think there are adverse consequences for drug use,” she said. “Decriminalizing marijuana entirely, the sale, the possession with intent to sell, is not something that the administration supports.”

I find the argument here to be the same as the argument we have already seen in court about tools. "You can keep and bear them, you just can't actually buy and sell them. Or make your own." I said before that one is so childish that it should really come with a "neener, neener, neener" at the end.

It's just another way of maintaining a nanny state prohibition. How much of what you consume did you actually grow or build? We don't do that in modern society. I grow lots of fruits, but depend on tools and chemicals and knowledge from society to do it. And my wife still visits the produce section at the grocery store.

Decriminalizing possession only is a good step, but really a pretty insignificant good step. It does nothing about the black market, little about the number of arrests, even less about the number of prisoners, virtually nothing about expansive government powers that are needed to try to catch and prosecute victimless crimes where no one will complain to the cops if the crime is successfully pulled off.

But I guess even a liberal mayor in a liberal city would rather continue most of the bad parts of the war on weed. If the people don't throw him out over it and seem to like it, that's what he's going to do.

But I know there are libertarians in NY and no, we don't all agree on that issue.

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

California political leaders follow the will of voters... two decades later

The issue is medical marijuana. After struggling to put together regulations dealing with this quasi-legal industry, a bipartisan group of state legislators—with last-minute negotiating from the governor’s office—passed a package of bills. The most significant is AB 266, which “establishes a comprehensive licensing and regulatory framework for the cultivation, manufacture, transportation, storage, distribution, and sale of medical marijuana...”

It creates a new mini-marijuana bureaucracy called the Bureau of Medical Marijuana Regulation. After they were done fighting over who got credit for the bill, legislators were quoted praising the “historic” nature of the bills. Mainly, they require distributors to have state licenses, track all medical marijuana distributed throughout the state, and allow local governments to tax and even ban dispensaries.

The package is comprehensive—and has the support of many powerful Capitol players, from local government to law-enforcement. It even has the imprimatur of some of the key players in the state’s large and growing medical-marijuana industry. Like all major bills, it has its share of useful and controversial elements.

But a little history will help put the legislative back-patting in perspective. Nineteen years ago, California voters — over the objections of most of the political establishment—approved Proposition 215, known as the Compassionate Use Act of 1996. Basically, the voters allowed patients and caregivers to possess and grow certain amounts of marijuana for medical use and protected physicians from punishment if they prescribe it to patients.

California voters approved of the measure by more than 10 percentage points, thus circumventing a governor (Pete Wilson) who vetoed medical-marijuana bills and a president (Bill Clinton) who also was something of a drug warrior. Backers said it was a classic use of the initiative power as intended by its Progressive-era founders: to let the people circumvent the politicians.

...

Furthermore, it’s clear what’s driving the effort: the prospect of yet another voter initiative. Other states recently have legalized marijuana for recreational purposes, and an initiative to do the same in California may be on the 2016 ballot. For instance, Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom (D), chairman of a Blue Ribbon Commission on Marijuana Policy, views a well-developed medical-marijuana regulatory system as the foundation for a coming recreational system.

“They did get some things right, but they are creating so many significant barriers to the industry it’s not going to … minimize the harm of the illicit market,” said Diane Goldstein, a former Redondo Beach police lieutenant and spokesperson for Law Enforcement Against Prohibition. She can’t understand why legislators continue to treat marijuana “like it’s plutonium.”

Meanwhile in Florida...

BALLOT TITLE: RIGHT OF ADULTS TO CANNABIS

BALLOT SUMMARY: This amendment guarantees the right of persons over twenty-one years of age to possess, use, and cultivate cannabis (commonly referred to as marijuana), reserving to the State the power to regulate its purchase and sale in the interest of health and safety. This amendment applies only to Florida law and state action, and does not immunize violations of federal law.

If that amendment gets on the ballot, a stunning number of Floridians will vote for it and at the same time vote for politicians who disagree with it. Seems pretty foolish but ballot access restrictions on non-Duopoly candidates and district gerrymandering leave us few choices. Like California, we'll have to go around the politicians and then wait a couple of decades for them to catch on and follow along.

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

Reefer madness causes murder!

Or something.

In a report submitted by the defense last August, a physician said the THC that Kirk ingested had triggered a psychosis-mimicking delirium. The relevance of that conclusion to Kirk's defense is unclear, however, since under Colorado law "the voluntary ingestion of alcohol or any other psychoactive substance" cannot be the basis of an insanity defense. Rather, a defendant must show that a "mental disease or defect" rendered him "incapable of distinguishing right from wrong" or incapable of "forming a culpable mental state."

A psychologist hired by the defense reported that Kirk "is prone to unraveling both cognitively and emotionally when under stress, and symptoms are likely to include features of paranoia, significant distortions in thinking and unrestrained affect." Before his next hearing, which is scheduled for December 17, Kirk is supposed to receive a psychiatric evaluation at the Colorado Mental Health Institute in Pueblo.

In short, instead of a mild-mannered guy transformed into a murderer by marijuana, we have a man who been bitterly fighting with his wife for weeks, who seemed to be contemplating a separation if not a divorce, and who, according to his own lawyer, was unstable psychologically as well as financially. Was too much THC the essential ingredient that made this toxic stew lethal? The answer is unknowable, just as it would be impossible to say whether the influence of alcohol made a crucial difference if Kirk had been drinking that night.

Fortunately, that is not a question opponents of pot prohibition need to answer. If drunken killers do not clinch the case for banning alcohol, stoned killers (who seem to be much less common) cannot clinch the case for banning marijuana. Nor is marijuana's impact on Kirk a question a jury will have to address in deciding whether he should be held responsible for his actions. Colorado's law says people are responsible for the effects of psychoactive substances they deliberately consume, and according to Kirk's attorney he chose to take more than the recommended dose...

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

One cannabis arrest every 54 seconds during 2014

Most for possession. A colossal waste of time and money, ruining lives for no good reason.

Yep, still stupid.

 

[slatfatf]

One cannabis arrest every 54 seconds during 2014

Most for possession. A colossal waste of time and money, ruining lives for no good reason.

Yep, still stupid.

The WOD could be the stupidest war of all time. For anyone who doubts it, the primary gateway drug to Heroin is Oxycodone, and people switch to Heroin not because it is stronger, but because it is cheaper. The illegal drug is cheaper to get and easier to access than a prescription drug you are not supposed to take. There is absolutely zero reason left to try and fight the WOD except to protect the industries and professions which depend on it for their profits. Nobody has been saved by this war, but plenty have been killed by it.

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

Tuk Tuk will be along to point out that we have armed government agents eradicating pot plants here and protecting poppy plants in Afghanistan.

Which might explain the market distortions.

 

[sparau]

It amazes me how little traction this thread gets and how the gun threads generate page after page day after day. The low hanging fruit in stopping gun violence, or any violence, is ending the stupid war on drugs. It is the war on drugs, more than any other thing, which contributes to:

1) conflicts between the police and community

2) high incarceration rates for the poor, which disproportionately affects African Americans and Hispanics

3) which then results in dead ending any escape of poverty for those who carry the scarlet letter of a drug conviction

4) gang and turf wars over territory which then catches innocent people in the crossfire

5) the money which drives illegal trafficking in arms which then flood the battlefield in the war on drugs

This, of course, does absolutely nothing to address the aberrations and outliers in gun violence which capture all the headlines, but it would actually save a lot of lives, would result in an improved quality of life for tens of millions of people, would offer a path out of poverty for millions of people who are trapped there, and offer the type of hope that chokes off the feed pump to gang violence. It would not just be "doing something" it would be doing something positive that would benefit all of us, or at least all of us who do not derive power and wealth from continuing this stupid unwinnable war.

I would add to your list:

6) erosion of privacy rights. The drug war has set numerous precedents unfavorable to our rights when it comes to permissible searches, technologies for surveillance and their (lack of) oversight, etc.

7) erosion of property rights. As detailed in the FAIR Act thread.

But the drug war concentrates power in government and provides a profit center for private prisons, law enforcement unions, and other interest groups.

As for the lack of interest, it's hard to get partisan Dems interested in reducing government power, especially when there's a D in the White House and we're talking about devolving that power all the way down to the individual, not just a lower level of government. So that leaves partisan Republicans, who sometimes like reducing government power but can't stand it if someone smokes a joint instead of drinking a shot of liquor.

So if you take away the partisan Dems and partisan Repubs from this place, what are you left with? Me, mostly.

But you said the G-word, so maybe this thread will attract some interest now and maybe people will stop voting for drug warriors. And maybe I'll start reeling in a fish with every cast. Hey, it COULD happen.

How about:

8) Not destabilising your neighbours by giving their criminal organisations more power then their governments.

You could argue that in a world of vastly different monetary values the US's WOD has DIRECTLY been the cause of 1,000's of deaths and cost Columbia and Mexico legitimate economy $1,000,000's.

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

That's a good addition, sparau. In addition to the problems that the black market causes in those places and others, there's another problem. When the cartels are deeply intertwined with the government and have more power than the government, we get weird results here like the DEA laundering cartel money and the ATF arming cartels.

 

[jzk]

“See, if you look at the drug war from a purely economic point of view, the role of the government is to protect the drug cartel. That's literally true.” - Milton Friedman

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

Uncle Milty was talking about the role of government in creating risk, which creates the opportunity for return. Even a government that refuses to launder their money and arm them is helping anyone in the drug trade by maintaining the risk.

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

DOJ Releasing Thousands of Drug Offenders

Hat tip to Obama.

...The panel estimated that its change in sentencing guidelines eventually could result in 46,000 of the nation’s approximately 100,000 drug offenders in federal prison qualifying for early release. The 6,000 figure, which has not been reported previously, is the first tranche in that process.

“The number of people who will be affected is quite exceptional,” said Mary Price, general counsel for Families Against Mandatory Minimums, an advocacy group that supports sentencing reform.

The Sentencing Commission estimated that an additional 8,550 inmates would be eligible for release between this Nov. 1 and Nov. 1, 2016.

The releases are part of a shift in the nation’s approach to criminal justice and drug sentencing that has been driven by a bipartisan consensus that mass incarceration has failed and should be reversed.

Along with the commission’s action, the Justice Department has instructed its prosecutors not to charge low-level, nonviolent drug offenders who have no connection to gangs or large-scale drug organizations with offenses that carry severe mandatory sentences.

The U.S. Sentencing Commission voted unanimously for the reduction last year after holding two public hearings in which members heard testimony from then-Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., federal judges, federal public defenders, state and local law enforcement officials, and sentencing advocates. The panel also received more than 80,000 public comment letters, with the overwhelming majority favoring the change...

It has failed because the black market replaces those who are caught before the justice system can sentence them, but also because keeping those people locked up is costing a lot of money and needlessly ruining lives. It's nice to see a failed and destructive big-government program being wound down.

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

The war on meth is as big a failure as the rest of the drug war

Meth is as prevalent and easy to acquire as ever. Like squeezing a balloon, restrictions can sometimes make the market change shape and location but do nothing to reduce it.

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

Sanders is the best of the major party candidates on cannabis prohibition

First ever to say he would support a state legalization effort.

Until last week, Sanders sounded a lot like Clinton on marijuana policy, saying he was interested to see what happens in the states where voters have approved legalization. By publicly admitting his support for legalization, he instantly became the pot-friendliest major-party presidential candidate. Even Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), the most libertarian candidate in the Republican field, has declined to take a position on the merits of legalization, saying only that the federal government should not try to force pot prohibition on the states.

If Rand Paul would take a cue from Sanders and say what he actually thinks, I suspect he would say he favors legalization as well. But he doesn't say what he thinks. I guess he hasn't noticed how much support Trump and Sanders have gotten simply by saying what they think.

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

Federal Judge Says Dept of Justice Must Obey Law

Breyer did not say whether his reasoning would also apply to criminal prosecutions. But he emphatically rejected the Obama administration’s argument that the congressional action allows federal agents to act against individual marijuana suppliers as long as the Justice Department doesn’t directly challenge state laws.

“It defies language and logic for the government to argue that it does not prevent California from implementing its medical marijuana laws by shutting down these ... heavily regulated medical marijuana dispensaries,” Breyer said.

There's a novel concept! Good for him.

In fairness to the DOJ, they are not the ones who should be mocked here. Congress should. Congress prohibited the spending of money to enforce the marijuana prohibition that was ordered by... Congress.

Conflicting signals. If Congress really doesn't want money spent on their prohibition, they should repeal it, not just defund it.

But if they are not going to be consistent, at least this federal judge sees that a prohibition on spending is a prohibition on spending, even when conflicting signals imply strongly that the spending is lawful.

 

[Pertinacious Tom]

Ben Carson wants to intensify stupidity

Because if you try something stupid and notice decades later that it has not been working out as planned, the best answer is to try intensely stupid.