Make all drugs legal; stop the myths~

Because the only way to stop locking people up for drug possession is to decriminalize drug possession.

 

And then put them in rehab? I don't think so. The duration of quality rehabilitation, the cost of medication alone, and the number of new people from first-time addicts (situational ones, like from the article) would have it be quite costly. There is no place for methamphetamine in a developed nation.

This isn't Breaking Bad.

 

What makes you think most of these people want to go to rehab?

Maybe at some point they will, and that is the key. Treatment is highly effective when people want to be there.

If treatment works there is nothing that could have a better return on investment.

the idea that treatment is more expensive than incarceration is absurd!

 

Treatment has to be tested on various levels; not just efficacy but efficiency. It's government mandated now-a-days.

 

That would work much better than the system at present. Getting pulled over and having a cop stick is finger up your backside looking for Pot does not seem to pass the liberty test.

Way excessive measures and infringement on individual freedom on so many levels for what .. "Pot" ? When you put the harm of pot on the balance scales of justice .. what justification can one come up with ?

By this I mean .. name one thing that can be put on the scale justifying these harsh penalties, restriction of rights and expenditure of massive resources.

Without getting into a long justification (which can be easily done) but for the sake of brevity the stuff you put on the other side of the scale has to meet the bar of "justification of why pot is not just bad .. but worse than Alcohol or cigarrettes, skiing or driving a car"

We do not just make something illegal because it is dangerous .. it must reach a certain level of danger.

OK .. what goes on the scale against pot ?

 

No, hard drugs such as PCP, meth, cocaine, should never be legal.

 

I don't have an alcohol addiction, or an addictive personality or genetic makeup. Alcohol is addictive in about 10% of the users. Anyone that would be so stupid to knowingly use known dangerous and highly addictive substances like meth, heroin or cocaine deserve the concequences of their actions. I am not a socialist, and unlike you, I do not feel the taxpaying public should encourge the use of these dangerous materials by taking up the tab for their medical care and rehab.

What great assets are the druggies in Holland to their country? They are dead weight.

 

Newsflash: We already are picking up that tab. And prohibition of these substances makes "the tab" much, much, higher, by making rehabilitation and treatment more difficult.

Drugs are harmful. We should make every effort to be a drug-free society, or at least to minimize their harmful effects. We can all agree on that. However, prohibition of drugs does nothing to fight those problems, and in fact makes fighting those problems much, much worse.

 

What is a definition of insanity- doing the same thing over and over expecting it will be different the next time.

Prohibition by any rational analysis was a failure. Crime went up, binge drinking went up- and organized crime flourished.

Our drug war follows the exact same pattern as Prohibition. We are spending billions of dollars fighting behavior, and our war results in increased violence and funneling money directly to organized crime.

I don't want people addicted heroin or cocaine but there is no evidence that our "War on Drugs" is effectively preventing it. Our current policy is irrational and based purely upon feelings that this is what we must do for the benefit of 'others'- while putting many of those 'others' in jail.

I would rather a heroin addict be in a treatment plan than have a felony conviction for possession of heroin and be essentially unemployable for the rest of his life.

Sadly politicians prefer the irrational because it sells better than the truth. No politician has the cojones to say that the Emperor is wearing no clothes.

 

It's just a matter of people understanding that making something illegal does not make it go away.

 

That's a pretty good snapshot of socialism, fairness or redistribution---whatever you call it. What incentive is there for a lazy and poor person to go to school, work and contribute to society. Liberals have made it profitable for anyone to drop out of school, use drugs and get free medical care, housing, food and money.

Why should a teenage girl with limited smarts graduate from high school, get married and work a low income job when she can make more in welfare benefits by getting high of narcotics, dropping out of school and having children out of wedlock and then reaping all the entitlements? These sum benefits run 40+ thousand dollars a year. Much more than she would make working in a chicken plant. Why do you think all the illegal aliens are comming here? 1) To take the jobs our lazy poor won't do. 2) to score all the other free benefits.

There is no way out of this mess for the US unless we scale back all the stupid welfare programs from the "Great Society" on. This won't happen.

 

Seriously unable to follow a conversation regarding our drug laws, aren't you?

 

I think we can have a conversation about legalizing pot(I support decriminalization, not necessarily legalizing it so that it's sold in stores). I think hemp should be completely legal, and I don't view hemp as a drug in the first place. There are a variety of legal means to get a cheap high(morning glory seeds come to mind, they have a chemical similar to LSD) so I don't see hemp as being a problem because it's such low potency.

However, once you talk about legalizing harder drugs, you've lost me. I just don't see how any good comes of that other than the drug addicts don't have to worry about running from the cops on their way home from scoring. Harder drugs effect on society is too much to dismiss as a personal rights issue.

 

So why are you OK with hard drugs like Oxy, Vicodin, Valume, ect.?

 

Because they're regulated by a series of healthcare professionals in accordance with a series of federal, state and local checks.

 

So why can't we put hard drugs under the supervision of medical professionals.

Seems like a health issue to me.

 

They are. They're on various schedules according to their addictive capabilities and clinical applicability.

 

So why do we need other hard drugs to be illegal, but not Oxy, and Vicodin?

 

They're not like that, understand that. It's illegal to sell or take those drugs without a prescription. It's the same thing.

 

Can you list the medical benefits of cocaine, pcp, and meth that would warrant those substances being prescribed over others? Do those substances bring anything to the table that overshadows the negative effects they have, even with controlled usage(if that's even something that happens with those substances)?

 

Except that their isn't a legal way to do drugs if that is what you decided you want to do, unless they are made by Phizer.

 

If they're prescribed to you, you can get them. I dispensed cocaine regularly. Legally.

 

Two pronged answer here.

Opium is heroin, which is also OXY, Vicodin, and every other opiate. So these two drugs have the same advantages as prescription pain killers. All uppers can have the same effect amphetamine pills. Can't offer one for PCP. Acid and Mushrooms can be used to stop withdrawals.

I'm guessing the next point you are going to make is that these drugs are more dangerous than their pharmaceutical counterparts, and this is really the case to legalize all drugs right here.

Drugs will become safer if they are legalized. We could have drugs that have zero physical withdrawals in time, so a mental addiction is all that would have to be beat.

We could have drugs you can't overdose on.

Hell in 50 years we could have drugs that get you high, and make you healthier.

All one needs to do is look at prohibition and the number of poisonings that resulted because of bootleg liquor, to understand that drugs would become safer if they were regulated!

 

Must be a VA doctor then, or it aint legal.

 

How does any of this impact on the War on Drugs? One (*)(*)(*)(*)ty failed government program deserves another?