It's all vodka. It matters not whether you drink it, smoke it or shoot it in your veins, it is all just a way of modifying your consciousness. It's simply hypocritical and unconstitutional to put someone in a cage for smoking a flower. The restriction of a thing should not be in the doing of it, but the getting behind the wheel and putting others at risk. Until it's all viewed the same as vodka, we will live in a hypocritical land.

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Alcohol and tobacco kill far more people every year than illegal drugs do - but when was the last time you heard about "restricting the supply" or "cracking down on the suppliers?" Every once in a while the police might send an underage undercover officer to try and buy alcohol, but that's about it.

Alcohol use is kept in people's homes and in bars - there are laws against public consumption of alcohol, laws against minors in possession of alcohol, and laws that prohibit adults from buying for minors. Despite all this regulation, alcohol is for sale everywhere in the U.S. It's also heavily marketed to teenagers and adults.

Make no mistake - excessive alcohol use is the #3 killer in the United States, behind tobacco. Still, no one is suggesting going back to Prohibition days.

(The leading causes of death in 2000 were tobacco (435,000 deaths; 18.1% of total US deaths), poor diet and physical inactivity (400,000 deaths; 16.6%), and alcohol consumption (85,000 deaths; 3.5%). Other actual causes of death were microbial agents (75,000), toxic agents (55,000), motor vehicle crashes (43,000), incidents involving firearms (29,000), sexual behaviors (20,000), and illicit use of drugs (17,000)).

A sane drug policy would apply equally to alcohol, tobacco, cannabis, opium, cocaine and to other drugs. Recreational drugs could be made legal, sold to people at licensed locations (just as alcohol and tobacco are today), and the taxes would go to state and local governments. Laws banning drug use by minors, illicit traffic, and so could be implemented.

Today, around half of all newly sentenced prisoners are drug offenders (In 1970, it was 16%). Of the 2.2 million people in U.S. prisons, perhaps a quarter are there on non-violent drug charges. Since it costs as much as $50,000 a year to hold and feed a prisoner, releasing all those people (around half a million people) would save the government about $25 billion dollars a year!

What's with all the drug convictions? See: Bay Area counties toughest on black drug offenders, Dec 2007, SFC

Half of all drug offenders in prison are black, even though blacks make up about 13% of the population, and drug use rates between all racial groups are similar. Furthermore, the penalties are often selectively applied by prosecutors - rich white kids from the suburbs who get caught with a few grams of powder cocaine are treated quite differently than black kids from the ghetto with a few grams of crack cocaine.

All in all, the "Drug War" isn't about stopping drug use - it's about entrenched government agencies like the DEA, who want to stay in business, and private prison contractors, who want to keep their cells full, established drug dealers in the pharmaceutical, alcohol and tobacco corporations who don't want any competition, and, last but not least, puritanically-minded social maniacs who can't stand the idea of people enjoying themselves, whether it be booze, pot or sex that's involved.

This goes all the way back to Harry J. Anslinger, the first anti-drug crusader in the U.S. government, who stated before Congress in 1937 that

"There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos, and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz, and swing, result from marijuana use. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers, and any others."

"...the primary reason to outlaw marijuana is its effect on the degenerate races."

"Marijuana is the most violence-causing drug in the history of mankind."

Straight from the mouth of the founding father of the DEA. . .

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It all comes down to the same old puritan "strict father" conception of life (its the second time I use this idea today...). Whenever one steps outside what some people consider normal and good there need to be consecuences, there must be a price to pay. Original oposition to drugs come not from health related issues but from a puritan moral point of view. Drugs were bad not because they made you feel bad but because they made you feel too good for your own good. And pleasure is antagonic with fear. And their idea of society is fueled by fear.

So there is not really a War to erase drugs from our societies, but to keep them in the fringes, to keep them unregulated and illegal so there are consecuences. Legal ones and health related ones, because with prohibition the manufacture of these drugs fall in the hands of people who wont hesitate to mix the product with whatever will give them a better profit. Ive heard of bricks turned to dust to be mixed with heroin injectable doses... Truth is the most dangerous drug healthwise, heroin, can be compatible with a long productive life when medical heroin is avaliable, like that of many cronic disease patients.

But for some people to push their model of society down our troaths, we need to see people suffer, be ill and in jail for not following the rules. And if that people also make a buck while fear-mongerin, all the better. Run down addicts on the street work as cautionary tale not only against drugs but against any kind of rebelious impulse.

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I agree with Vox: it is all vodka. Europe has shown that legalization can work. Do they do random tests for public safety hi-risk jobs? The comment that "most people who use drugs are like the responsible alcohol consumer, causing no harm to themselves or anyone else" is silly. I can tell you for a fact that narcotics addiction within healthcare is a BIG problem. Do you want your loved one's dying days spent in an ICU, pumped up with morphine by a heroin addicted RN? Do you want a mother or brother treated with the chemically clouded judgement of a hardcore addict? Then Come to the City of Brotherly Love. Teaching Hospitals here don't bother randomly testing their staff or students. Risk management and safety oversight are a farce, legalized drugs or not.

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it all goes back to Economics 101, people: illegal drugs are a business, the biggest business in the world today. to destroy a business...ANY business...TAKE THE PROFIT OUT OF IT. it seems to me that legalizing 'controlled substances' [an oxymoron] would do this more effectively than our current system of incarcerating the consumers.

if there were little profit in drugs...

...dealers wouldn't be hanging around outside schools giving away free samples to build a future customer base

...addicts could be treated as patients rather than criminals, so that their drug habit could be either eliminated or brought under control

...if the cost of drugs was, say, 10% of what it is now, in order to support his habit a hard-core criminal addicted to drug use would only have to knock over the head and rob 10% of the little old ladies [like me] who are just trying to get home with their social security check

...law enforcement and incarceration cost tax dollars. if drug use is not a crime, then what ...40%? more?...of the dollars we spend on our failing War on Drugs could be devoted to something more potentially rewarding. a War on Illiteracy. a War on Unemployment. a War on our Tragic Dependence on Fossil Fuel. a War on our Deteriorating National Infrastructure. We can still have the Wars we seem to be so fond of, people. we can even win some if we choose our opponents more wisely.

after all, if I'm completely wrong and legalization won't improve the situation, we can always declare a NEW War on Drugs and go back to the excellent system we have today, which is producing such grand results.

finally, please, PLEASE don't tell me I'm 'soft on drugs'. I have five kids born between 1956 and 1964; I have seen up close and personal the damage drugs can do to a life. if it would do any good, I would cheerfully advocate roasting drug dealers over a slow fire on a sharp stick. unfortunately, as long as the enormous profits are available, there are always gonna be more drug dealers than sharp sticks.

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Medical maintenance would be fine with me. But there is NO comparison between vodka and meth or heroin. The long term affects of coca (cocaine) on the brain put all others at risk.

Minorities and the poor would be affected the most - in the worst way - if narcotics were legalized.

Despair and the lack of education would not go good with addiction.

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Excuse me-- haven't you heard that there is a multi-billion dollar industry that depends on a steady flow of docile drug users into the jails to generate income? The prison industry is the main stay of the rural economy in many states. If the supply of drug prisoners dried up, thousands of prison staff would lose their jobs and the economies of several states would collapse. If anything, we need to start jailing more people for more trivial offenses. If Jesus Christ came down on earth tomorrow and crime stopped, the prison lobby would hunt him down in three days and drive a stake through his heart.

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If Jesus came down and saw how drug addicted "America" is he would buy stock in Corrections Corp of America.

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The analysis, though sensible and agreeable, is disappointing in its political naivete. It ignores the political realities that have configured the drug trade for over fifty years. Ever since the OSS worked with the Mafia to invade Sicily there has been active collaboration between the highest levels of the U. S. government (OSS to CIA, Meyer Lansky to Ollie North) and the engineers of the drug trade. The U. S. doesn't just support narco states, it creates them. Afghanistan was created through the collaboration of drug warlords and Columbia (our only "friend" in South America) is run by drug lords.

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The argument made in the article has many excellent points, however, rather than push for legalization, I believe that the next step should be to decriminalize drug use, and treat the problem as a health care issue. There is a difference between legalization and decriminalization.

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The CIA is the biggest dope dealer in the world.

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Leagalizing drugs would pull the rug out from underneath the brutal criminal element benefiting from it, including our banks (money laundering), our "intelligence" community (black ops), our prison industry, and our "lawmakers" (kickbacks).

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Living in a most drunken state, errrr as a resident of the state ranked highest for binge drinking and drunken driving, I also point the finger of blame directly at lobbyists funded by alcohol and tobacco corporate interests. They march hand in hand and will spend a fortune to stop any effort to legalize drugs. Perhaps the solution lies in pitting the corporate beasts against each other by reversing the decision to place drugs under the control of the AFT branch and place it under the control of the FDA - then "sales" and marketing incentives would cause big Pharma to begin battling big Alcohol and Tobacco by adding medical marijuana to their lobbying agenda. Then it's just a slippery slope, greased with PROFIT... to ease restrictions.

Historian David T. Courtwright explains The Controlled Substances Act: how a “big tent” reform became a punitive drug law.

Here's a summary:
The 1970 Controlled Substances Act was part of an omnibus reform package designed to rationalize, and in some respects to liberalize, American drug policy. While the legislation provided additional resources for law enforcement and a systematic means for regulating the use of most psychoactive drugs, it also did away with mandatory minimum sentences and provided more support for treatment and research. Over the next three decades, and in response to public alarm about drug abuse, the US Congress continuously amended the law to produce a more punitive system of drug control. The amendments, which gave the Drug Enforcement Administration greater control over scheduling and maintenance and which substantially increased penalties for illicit trafficking, transformed the law into the legal foundation of America’s “drug war,” as the stricter criminal approach came to be known. By the 1980s, the flexibility and innovative spirit of the original Controlled Substances Act (and that of Nixon-era drug strategy generally) had largely disappeared from American drug policy.

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...by definition, if cultivation were legal.

(Just a minor semantic point.)

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Educating people on that reality would itself be more than powerful enough to SHUT DOWN THE PHONEY "WAR ON DRUGS". Besides, what have "legal" drugs such as Viagra and other "FDA approved" but dangerous poisons, "Happy Meals" and other junk food filled with petroleum and chemicals, alcohol, and tobacco done for you anyway other than DAMAGE your health from moderate to SEVERE?

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Drug dealers have been highly vilified in a lot of comments on this story. These people are vilified as being the cause of all drug use and addiction. In actuality, all these people do is supply a need by selling a product to eager customers.

The old legend of drug "Pushers" is just plain false. Why would selling illegal drugs require any real salesmanship skills, including provision of free samples, when there is a large market among people who are actively seeking to buy the product? New users are not introduced to drugs by unscrupulous dealers, they are introduced to them by their friends, usually occasional casual users.

Dealer vilification is a creation of governments who cannot stand the fact that someone is making money without paying any income tax on it. Pointing out that it is a tax issue might create some sympathy for drug dealers, so the government started the urban legend that dealers are the cause of the drug problem.

Legalisation is the answer - some people will take drugs whether they are legal or not, and others will choose not to take drugs.

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There's only one candidate openly calling for the repeal of most federal drug laws. We all know who that is.

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Here's what some honest police say:


http://www.leap.cc/cms/index.php

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When I am weary I think of the relentless and courageous and highly focused activists like Ethan Nadelmann.

The persistance of people like Nadelmann is a real source of hope and inspiration.

He is correct on almost all his conclusions which are based on lifelong scholarship in this area built on a foundation of human health values

(I can't resist adding the harm done in ths "war" by Big PhRMA)

Let us get behind him NOW. His day has arrived.

Dr. Rick Lippin
http://medicalcrises.blogspot.com

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We discuss this issue endlessly here and in other arenas, and nothing ever changes.

Like the war on terra, it's based on inflaming people's passions with disinformation, leading to massive corruption due to greed in all levels of government, from your local sheriffs in podunk towns to the highest levels of government.

if there weren't tons of money in it, the war would not be fought!

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The sovereignty of my conscience is sancrosanct.
My freedom of consciousness not only equals my freedoms of speech and assembly but also precedes them.
There must be greater distinctions and definitions in drug jargon as to what is and what isn't psychoactive. As the article mentions, we are innately moved to alter our consciousness, but we can either do that crudely through body drugs or more sublimely through head drugs. Cocaine and it's derivatives muddle those distinctions. Thanks to our government, we have an even more muddled mess with the ever greater derivatives. Upon the flow shifting to Mexico, we then even got the blowback of the popular uprising of ephedrine-based crank.

Recently the Netherlands felt forced to regard psychedelics differently than their old evenhanded approach vis a vis marijuana. Well, duh. Mushrooms are useful but still considerably a larger undertaking than any joint of primo.

I submit not all drugs are equal. They should each be regarded uniquely.

Personally, I would fully legalize marijuana just as quickly as I would seek to regulate the concentrated dose hits of THC that would be sure to follow.

Legalizing drugs must be done for it's own sake. Doing so will solve one set of [ethical and moral] problems and create another set [of practical and cultural], but justice will be served and liberty regained.

Strongly consider what Terence Mckenna had to say with his book, 'Food Of The Gods'.

Consider South America's future place, especially given the way things are going all around.

Consider the good done us by these things, eh?
This bounty of our Earth.

http://zuma.vip.warped.com/z/#points

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Hear! Hear! Legalization would:

(1) Drive the criminal element out of the drug business; shut it down; cripple it; put where Al Capone has gone.

(2) Make safer, more responsible drug use a reality, doing much to end overdosing, the cutting of drugs with toxic substances, and the dispensing of "hot shots."

(3) Divert the billions spent on the hopelessly useless "War on Drugs" to such things as school and infrastructure funding, making sure no child goes to bed hungry, &c.

(4) Convince more people to eschew such genuinely harmful drugs as alcohol in favor of less harmful, more haimish things like pot.

(5) Do away with bureaucracies like the D.E.A. which is as worthless as tits on a boar hog.

(6) I could go on but you get the idea.

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I had an offer to join the NYPD a long time ago. However, I couldn't see myself busting people for dealing in nickel bags at street corners in the middle of a lonely friggin' night. So, alas, I passed up on that opportunity.

I see some cops wearing medals on their uniforms. How many, I wonder, were those awards given to them for busting disenfranchised youths trying to make a few bucks???

Bernie Kerik, Rudy Ghouliani's flunkie, did so as an undercover cop. The system just sucks!!!!

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I’d say that drugs are mostly about sex, and so is vodka. People are going to use drugs as they use alcohol, to suppress their deeply ingrained societal inhibitions and jump-start their sexuality. Nothing else gets good Christians through to the make-out stage, or beyond. So they learn to rely on their new tools. There was a recent anti-pot ad that showed a teenage girl getting high again and again and she’s finally unable to stop getting sexually molested by a boy. The ad increased pot usage.

We need drug education that deals functionally with sex. For non-sex drugs, we need better age-appropriate education about huffing. Cigarette smoking and roids are often about body sculpting.

Decriminalize/Legalize which drugs?

Pot is the good poster child. Pot isn’t quite vodka because vodka is physically addictive. We have millions of drunks (and drunk drivers) who can’t quit their drinking until they die early.

Crack cocaine and heroin are the bad poster children simply because the poorer class uses them. Upper crust addicts do Oxycontin and snort cocaine powder.

Steroids are legal with a prescription. Steroids are famous for roid rage and losses of life expectancy.

Huffing materials are legal and in every home. Huffers like to get drunk for a couple of minutes on airplane glue, on Glade cans and on magic markers. Huffing kills brain cells like crazy, but it leaves no clue, just a deadbrain holding the tube. It’s the first choice of little kids. Maybe 1/5 of little kids huff.

Behavior counts as much as the drug

Drunk driving is more dangerous to society than drinking at home. Going to gay anonymous sex parties is a good way to become an AIDS vector, and the same for heroin addicts not cleaning their works. We need to criminalize certain behaviors which affect society.

We also have regulations shutting people off at bars when they’re really drunk. The amount matters.

We should have a regulation prohibiting the addition of sugar to cigarettes, in order to create a chemical through combustion that makes cigarettes harder to quit.

Rich people’s penalties versus poor people’s penalties.

A family member got busted for running a red light while drunk. He’s upper middle class if not wealthy, and the penalties laid on him were severe enough. He found someone to drive him to work for 90 days so that no one at his expensive job knew, and so he saved the job. With no threat of prison, he cleaned up and never drove drunk again. He still drinks a bit.

We need laws tailored to the person’s wealth. Everyone needs a proper incentive, not draconian and not a slap on the wrist either, to not drive drunk or stoned.

Maybe we specifically need weekend-only drunk driving prisons that you can find in Europe.

Many U.S. prisons don’t work.

Too many times we put people away forever. We get Geritol cons, these old wheelchair-bound guys who show up at religious services in the medium-security units. Cons dumped on the street will commit crimes because they don’t know how to live on the outside anymore. Other cons commit suicide when released.

Legalizing drugs only because our justice system is the world’s most incompetent, is too simplistic.

Using, dealing, and kingpins

Anti-cancer pot clubs deal pot without murdering other dealers.

We need to remove the money incentive from violent criminals.

Our government springs from a truly idiotic electoral system, where campaign contributions, e.g. bribes, always win majorities in Congress. Our government will always take the “everything is subordinate to creating tax revenue” theme and run with it. We need the health of our society.

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SWAT teams kicking down residential doors in the middle of the night and shooting innocent victims is the perfect example of collateral damage at home accepted by the general populace and perpetrated to the extreme in Iraq and Guantanamo; The End Justifies the Means including murder, torture and collateral damage by the millions of lives and trillions of $$$.

US society is uncivilized. By sanctioning war on it own people it thus insures that its own people will support war anywhere else. What goes around, comes back around.
IM
Belteshazzar

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Drug use is a social issue not a criminal one. What someone put in their own body is not my business but doesnt mean we cant help eachother as a society.
Locking up drug users with murders and rapists is a human rights nightmare. It also does not help the situation but will make it worse. legalize drugs and you stop the major funding for criminal elements dropping them out of business.
Hemp is only illegal because it is easy to grow and hard for the government to regulate(tax). It also can be used for many things which would cut out corporations and their chemicals.
The war on drugs was created to steal more money from the public and to take away more freedoms from us. It also jacks up the police with military grade weapons they should never have.
There is no benefit to the war on drugs. It also was enver amended to the constitution like prohibition of alcohol was which makes it illegal.
Anytime the government declares war on anything it is for their benefit and at the cost of regular citizens.

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Let me start by saying that all drugs are not the same. I have no problem with legalizing some the "softer," for lack of a better word, drugs (pot, mushrooms, PCP, etc -- essentially those that are not highly addictive.)

When you start talking about things like heroin, meth and cocaine, the situation is more complicated, and legalization advocates have to start honestly addressing the social costs to legalization of these substances.

First, use will be more widespread. There is no reason to suspect that it wouldn't be. When you make something easier to get, more people will get it. Anyone who advocates for greater gun control understands this. Banning machine guns will not eradicate machine guns, but being able to buy them at the corner gun shop will certainly increase their presence.

Second, with increased use comes increased addiction. Now, the libertarian in me that says that people should be able to put whatever they want into their bodies is now saying "wait, now I have to PAY for the drugs that people put into their bodies?," as the author suggests.

Third, addiction brings crime. Unless you are Rush Limbaugh or Amy Winehouse, you probably can't afford to maintain a drug habit for very long without resorting to crime. That has social costs as well.

Even given all of this, it may still make more sense, both economically and socially, to legalize these drugs, considering the costs of the so-called war on drugs. I don't know if it does or doesn't, but I do know that ignoring the flip side of this debate and pretending that legalization is going to be nothing but positive is useless. We need to have an honest discussion of the costs and benefits if we're going to get anywhere.

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... For all the reasons listed here in favor of it. Bottom line, it's all about money, and right now many people are making money by policing, incarcerating, and selling all the things that support current drug policies... Yet the pharmaceutical companies keep pushing their own legal drugs, and people get rich (and other people get addicted).

We need to tax and control the distribution of drugs, so that we have a better idea of who is dealing, and then use the tax money for awareness programs, and to help those who do become addicted. This is the only sane and human approach to the problem.

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One has to remember that illegal drugs is big bucks, not just for the gangsters who control some of the distribution, but also for those who feed at the government troughs, from politicians, to law enforcement and judiciary, to incarceration and social welfare, shareholders in incarceration ( Halliburton!!!), not to mention the extras for co-operation by authority to turn a blind eye.

Few of these employees would like to see their jobs go astray, and their incomes depleted, and would rarely apart from the social workers, perhaps, take up any flag of decriminalisation or for legalisation.

There is systemic corruption with the current policies and only society as a whole can take a stand for legalisation and decriminalisation, much as it did in regard to the prohibition of alcohol. The idea though that the gangsters will then go away is equally ludicrous, when prohibition ended they set up Las Vegas, not just alcohol but gambling and prostitution as well, for sale.

High Times magazine reported how drugs legally sold in Amsterdam had come from villages in poor rural Asia, where villagers were forced to grow the marijuana, but given little in return, due to their enforced labour through national criminal gangs. The villagers were literally held captive and enslaved by criminal elements.

Given these criminal gangs access to vast amounts of wealth from the period of illegality, these same gangs may well become the "new suppliers" of an older trade, and poorer communities throughout the globe become the victims of drug feudalism ( as opposed to oil/timber/mobile phone minerals/gold/uranium feudalism - international corporation is "king"), where they are required by gangsters to grow drugs rather than their own food needs. Just so people in the "West" can get high.

As legal groups this may be of benefit, to the larger community by paying taxes for profits, but as current mega-companies breach national laws in the almighty pursuit of profit, I fear there can only be some real change if in the case of marijuana people were legally allowed to grow their own.

I think it would be great if drugs were decriminalised, and the horrific statistics of incarceration in the US and around the world for marijuana ( in particular),were laid to rest, but any future markets for a total decriminalisation of all drugs will be beset with the previous leaders in the field, the gangsters, and their hangers-on, the politicians and officials who have allowed the illegal system to flourish.

Only an intergovernmental system, that cannot be privatised, and is able to monitor quality (of product and the lives of production)through International regulation, may hold some hope, though as evidenced by various other protection agencies ( environment), this too seems another opportunity for corruption.

The real challenge is to build a world society where mind altering drugs are not needed, especially when drug use further entrenches human exploitation for the benefit of the already rich, to the detriment and prolonged misery of those already over-exploited by the civilised "West".

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At least one positive outcome for legalization is the elimination of workplace drug testing. That is perhaps THE biggest waste of time and money and a real burden foisted upon businesses. While the Congressional Republicans were in power preaching deregulation, cutting taxes and reducing red-tape, they did nothing concerning a real thorn in the ass for businesses (oh, they can't be "soft on crime!!!")

Let's take a former employer of mine, Citigroup, as an example. This is a HUGE entity. Every new employee must undergo drug testing as a condition for employment. The company must spend a significant fortune for this. That's money that could have gone to employee raises, shareholders, fringe benefits like daycare or expanded vacation/sick days, increased training opportunities, etc. Stuff that brings demonstratively good things to people.

Drug testing supposedly making the workplace safer??? Give me a break!!! Ironically, since the inception of drug testing during the Reagan era, businesses suffered high rates of sensational violence in schools and in the workplace. Not one incident was from the result of controlled substance use. Many times, however, the violence is usually precipitated from regular alcohol and prescription drug consumption.

How much money is spent for drug testing? Those who really benefit are the drug testing outfits who lavishly lobby congress to perpetuate this scheme, and the folks who make the "toxic flusher" solutions that guarantees u pass a drug test. That nullifies any real purpose to drug testing. I know, I took a dose and IT WORKS!!!

So go to a bathroom and pee while someone is watching. How humiliating is that, Mr Big Brother?? And what's the point, really.

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Having close friends and family members caught up in the legal system because of "illegal" substances they choose to use, I've seen the effect of our current policies on drugs firsthand. I've also seen the lives of family and friends completely destroyed by alcohol use.

My personal opinion is that the devastation alcohol wreaks on the body and mind is far greater than any drug I've ever seen... but alcohol is "legal"?

It's all just a game our government plays involving the population. We are the pawns they feed their biased bullshit to, ignoring both truth and science, instead focusing on keeping corporations happy and a large segment of our society on the fringes, with no voice or vote. Then they conveniently under-fund mental health programs nationwide, denying much needed treatment to millions. (Just sweep them all under the rug)

How many more "liberal" voters would go to the polls on election day if the policies denying felons the right to vote were rescinded? Hmmmm...

Not all drug users are felons, and not all felons are drug users, but a large percentage of people in prison are there because of drugs. Many more are introduced to drugs inside those same prisons, where drugs flow freely, but not for free. Prison guards sell everything from tobacco to heroin, while "the system" turns a blind eye to the problem.

The DOJ is considering using Blackwater in the "War on Drugs". The "Governator" wants funding for more prisons and prison beds to ease overcrowding in CA prisons, but twice vetoed legislation allowing industrial hemp farming in the state! One costs billions in taxes to fund, the other would bring in much needed tax revenue, put an end to the required importation of a crop with more uses than any other plant on this planet, and would totally piss-off corporations whose products would be replaced by something more natural.

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You act as if there actually is a war on drugs, rather than just a war on the drug sellers at the very bottom of the food chain. On the contrary, the biggest drug importers to this country and the biggest drug dealers and pushers are the various secret services, intelligence agencies with aconyms you and I have never even heard of, and the US military. All this money goes to fund black ops, and you have no chance in hell at ever putting this particular genie back in the bottle. You would have to completely disband all the agencies and organizations I listed above (as if), and even then be willing to really dig underground where they'd all crawl. Nothing short of nuking this country from sea to shining sea will accomplish that, and believe me, the rest of the world is working on that as we speak and has been working on that solution for a LONG time now.

Give it up already. Illegal drugs will never be legalized, they're far too profitable for the main mob groups that really run this country. And provide the perfect way these groups can act unilaterally with impunity and complete lack of accountability to anyone, anytime, indefinitely.

And you thought we bombed Afghanistan back to the stone age to get even for 9-11, instead of to restart the opium poppy heroin trade that had completely ended for religious reasons under the Taliban.

Welcome to Amerika, the "greatest country on earth".

Not even close.

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If you are really serious about ending the war on drugs, you need a president committed to making that happen. Ron Paul is that man. (Note - you must be registered republican to vote for him in the primaries)

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This fool's errand has gone on much, much too long.

Prohibition didn't work for the same reason...Americans like to get high...they like the way booze and other drugs change their consciousness. Duh! It feels good. Because of this, the demand continues. As long as the demand is high the booze and other drugs will find a way yo the American public.

Additionally, addiction is a medical problem and should be treated as such. We do not throw diabetics in jail when they eat jelly doughnuts against the doc's advise, do we?

Time to end all the wasted resources and legalize, because the jails are packed with non-violent drug offenders and the drugs are better and more available than ever before. After 35 years of effort, resouces, and work the situation remains the same or worse.

With the savings, we might be able to pay down the astronomical national debt that Bozo has run up in just seven years.

Wake up America!

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Recently a plane used by the CIA in Europe for extroardinary renditions crashed with 400 tons of cocaine onboard.

The drug war helps to maintain the street price of cocaine sold by the CIA. It also funds increased police presence in support of plans for Martial Law (an oxymoron if ever there was on), and funds the privatized prison system.

This is why drugs will remain illegal.

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I learned about 'drugs' in 3rd grade. The drugs I learned about? Alcohol and tobacco.

Any substance which when used produces chemical reactions in the brain is a drug. It's hypocritical (and very racist, as I've found in 6 years of research) that the government can condone the two biggest killers, tobacco and alcohol, while outlawing everything else that was brought into use in this country by minorities.

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for keeping up the fight! another well thought out and well written article...for those of you who post your support for ending the drug war - put you wallets where your keyboards are and support the drug policy alliance, the marijuana policy project, the DRCnet, etc...and vote KUCINICH, GRAVEL or PAUL.

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Soul and psyche (heart and spirit) and community must be rejuvenated and nurtured, if there are no healthy psychopharmpcplogical advances to keep people in a continual drug-induced state. Soul is a quaint word, isn't it? It's also a loaded word being tied to religion, as well it should be. Religion's rightful place in history has been to help nurture the soul and free the spirit, to plumb the depths to set anchor during ever-changing turbulent times; and to assist the congregate to reach the heights of exihilleration for escape. Although neither soul nor psyche can logically be understood, they need be considered, nurtured and touched repeatedly. The stock and trade of religions had been to do just that: develop, enhance and dispense metaphors and myths in ever more fantastic settings. But M&M's themselves are not four-letter words. At least one isn't. They had their places, and may still in one rejuvenated form or another. But since the early Christian era, possibly earlier, myths and metaphors were turned into historical facts and peddled as dogma to be used to restrain larger populaces under more oppressive governments. Now, however, over the past 100 years as we've intellectually developed a wider knowledge base with larger numbers of people, we're stampeding out of the closet of ignorance and denial. The myths and metahpors once used to anchor and tittilate are are rapidly being pushed aside by secularists, open and other. The church role has atrophied to dispensing myths as history and dogma, and in the ever decentralized society providing a much needed place for peopel to meet. Acceptance of the later is paid for by accepting the myths and truths. Developing and nurturing soul and and pscyhe and community requires time, relaxtion, freedom from survival worries, time for our imaginations to work, to soar, freedom to communicate..at ease. All of these needs are at odds with capitalism and its birthchild, materialism. Capitalism in it current state is suffocating souls and grounding spirits. This must change. If you have an interest in soul and pscyhe I recommend "Care of the Soul" by Thomas Moore, as well as the "Power of Myth" DVD series with Joseph Cambell and Bill Moyers. The big "if" on drugs is what place can chemicals safely have in the long haul to ease the angst of the unkown and pain of loss, and release the potential euphorias hidden within.

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This is a very important statement in this article concerning US drug policy: "cruel indifference to the lives and well-being of people who use drugs." This is precisely the problem of people in power behaving like some narcissistic parent telling us what we can and cannot do with our bodies. It’s the same argument that is made by the prochoicers. Our politicians think the average guy is an idiot although they are too cowardly to say that to our faces. I happen to think the average politician is an idiot and an asshole.They look down on working Americans with scorn, resentment and contempt. We are like a permanent wart or a rash that won’t go away to them, an irritant to be dealt with harshly, cheaply and effectively so they can get on with the business of running our lives, spending our money and destroying our planet. They actually believe that they have somehow been ordained to lead us down the path of whateversake.

I for one don't believe that the drug policy is indifferent for one second. The people that craft it have a very specific purposes in mind, not the least of which is the enslavement of humanity for profit. It also keeps Americans divided along racial and economic lines. If we legalize drugs there would be little way to justify to mass incarceration of nonwhites anymore. That would negate one of the most longly held stereotypes of young black men as drug dealers and thugs. I’m sure the record companies would still make the music however so suburban whites kids can feel cool by trying to identify with a culture they scarcely know a damn thing about. The government is a drug dealer here and abroad of the illegal and legal brands. Have we already forgotten about how the CIA infested poor black neighborhoods with crack cocaine so they could fund the Sandanistas in the Iran Contra affair? They can’t get enough of Ollie North on Fox News. No this government deals drugs and you don't ask a drug dealer to stop selling drugs. That's like asking a prostitute to stop having sex.

I’m tired of the hypocrisy not only of the phony drug war but in the US in general. Nothing is ever what it seems or purports to be. We are a nation of liars and empty rhetoric with no soul or compassion for anyone or anything except our pets and the next paycheck. Capitalism has indeed does it job and until marijuana starts making money for corporations we can literally and legally forget any legalization of pot beyond medicinal use. My brother was killed by a drunk driver in 1992. The driver served a month in jail because the penalties were light back then. I wish like hell that guy had only smoked some herb and not downed a fifth of tequila.

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I suspect/believe that classical mythological beings are derived from and by the human mind (a more trivial statement was never made.)

The use and influence of chemical stimulants by humans during our collective development is thoroughly established. I think Oxygen was considered a high at one time. Now, the lack of it seems to be more appealing.

So since we all are descendant from our past, we may consider creating a better prospect for our future. Take some time and give it some thought.

Unfortunately, now the USA is in the business of Drugs. More now than Capone could have dream' t of. So I doubt that the current system will ever kick it's habits. Incarceration is just too damn profitable.

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How does any sentient person think they're going to stop them from coming into the country?

Since the beginning of time, people have gotten high. There will always be a certain segment of the population that will ingest poisons, smoke plants, make psychedelic teas or even lick a certain kind of toad for a good buzz. There are also plenty of people who use mind altering substances as part of their religious practices, and many of these drugs have legitimate medicinal and therapeutic uses that are forbidden by prohibition.

The only people who profit from the current situation are drug dealers. One wonders why all these wealthy politicians think prohibition is a good idea.

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I think it is time to stop the war on drugs because it really is a war on the economy. It's also a war on the needy. Those addicted to drugs are in need of medical, mental, and spiritual(not necesarily religious, justt a program to boost spirit) help. Prison time just worsens the addictions.

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why not be happy with marihuana and hashis???
in holland coffeeshops can have a license for these products as long as they donot sell alcohol and/or hard drugs.

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1. Any drug is available on the street every day for an elevated price.

2. Everyone who has decided to use drugs is already using them or about to obtain them.

There you have it. No amount of prohibition is going to change that reality. So why make all the obscene profits available from illegal trafficking? Legalize!

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Talk about rhetoric! Ethan is long on it and short on facts. Get real Ethan the use of addictive psycho active drugs is not harmeless. Is it not a contradiction in terms that you indicate that abstinence for cigarettes is right, but drugs that percentage wise, kill more people than nicotine ever did are OK? And what about those who go insane using them, or inflict physical and emotion harm on others whilst they're using them?

People who become addicted following your disinformation about drugs will sooner or later become abstinent, it's only a question of whether they live long enough to make the choice, or have it made for them by death.

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Money, human nature, and opiates are combined to form a society of addiction when drugs are legalized. They form an unbeatable powerhouse.
The alternative to the drug war is to keep the drugs illegal for the general population while establishing a mechanism that provide drugs to addicts and makes sure that they don't overdose or share with others. Rehab options could also be provided at distribution locations.
The combination of legal drugs and mass media is also pretty dangerous. Advertising in the media and on labels for addictive drugs like alcohol and cigarettes is incredibly seductive.
I hate to think what the media culture would do with opiates.

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of the drug war. It is a perfect war, we can't win it, we can't lose it. It just cycles billons through the legal, incarceration, and police state. Keeps the Merchants of Death and their minions in a job. And it increases the Gross Domestic Product which we are led to believe is the measure of the welfare of the American people. A perfect WAR.

Many times the real reasons are hard to see. As my old dad said follow the money.

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The simple answer. And if this is true anywhere it is true in the case of "drugs". If one can come up with any simplistic, one size fits all, answer it MUST BE RIGHT!!, Right?
WRONG. If we could learn one thing about the drug question, it would go like this; A lot of people- Not All, of course- like their drug(s) a lot. Therefore, they Will have the drug(s), whether they are illegal or not. Why? Because they are willing to pay to get them, and as long as this is the case there will be someone that will be glad to supply them. This may be a bit simplistic in itself, but it also happens to be an extremely well documented and proven fact.
On the other hand, the myth that more and stronger laws will change this has been proved to be 99% wrong. The well known 'Law of unintended consequences' dominates the situation, and the cpnsequences here are that drugs are everywhere. And they are infinitely more available than they were when we started the so called "War on drugs" And it's no longer just the friend of a friend down the street that's making a few bucks off it, it has -at least in my neck of the woods- recently caught the attention of large organized crime. The local County sheriff gave a report on the radio last night saying that they were encountering Cannabis "grows"as big as a hundred thousand plants (in armed camps)! Local law enforcement can't deal with it , and the sheriff himself has said he thinks flat out legalization is the only answer.
The same general idea holds true for all drugs. There doesn't seem to be any real "answer" but the last thing we need is to throw more and harsher laws at the problem.

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Nadelmann is very good on the costs of prohibition and the war mentality but use was higher before drugs were illegal. Before the Harrison Narcotics Act in 1913 there were many addicts of morphine,heroin and medical concoctions sold by patent medicines; if we legalize drugs there wil be more users and more addicts. The Hague Convention against Opium in 1908 was motivated by the large number of opium addicts in southeast Asia who were largely overseas Chinese. Opium was legal until WWII and 1962 in one country (Thailand or Burma). British opium production in India fed the Opium market until they changed policy in 1918, but they stilled derived substantive revenues from addicts in modern day Malaysia. One colony the Straits Settlements made 44% of their colonial revenue from government monopoly on opium! If we really go to legalization and control the government will have a financial interest in keeping a steady supply of users just as they try to make cigarette smokers pay for health care and everything else. There is a substantive human cost to increased use and addiction and too many legalizers are sanguine and unrealistic about the problems that will arise. I am for harm reduction like legalizing pot but there will be consequences and coca and opiate should be medically controlled and not legalized.

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As a former Meth Addict, I can assure you that there are Satanic Cults all around the country (and certainly along the Russian River area in Sonoma County) heavily involved in the promotion and use of Methamphetamine and other drugs. Reason ? When one is "under the spell" of drugs, one is vulnerable to Satanic Attacks and influences. "Anyone who touches drugs - any drug - is subject to our will" is what one Satanist told me. I know this all sounds "weird", but it is the ugly, "hidden truth". For those reasons ALONE we must not legalize drugs for the sake of our country and others. NOBODY NEEDS OR SHOULD USE DRUGS ! Alcohol is enough, isn't it ? And how much death and destruction occur because of overuse and addiction to alcohol ? My own mother died from alcoholism, as have many others. DON'T BE FOOLED BY "MODERN RHETORIC AND LOGIC" -- DRUGS ARE EVIL AND ENTIRELY DESTRUCTIVE ! That's all.

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- the 'war on drugs' is an important part of the walls of the box - They're Building a Box - and You're In It

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There was a time when many of the natural drugs were used in religious and other ceremonies as a sacred ritual .. usually the priesthood or the shaman controlled the supply.

The mind set of those who use natural substances derived from plants depends upon the reason which can be encompassed by Religious or Recreational.

And what its all about of course is to induce another mindset and if for religious purposes it would be accompanied by such techniques of mantra, yantra, chanting and rhythmic drums .. it is well documented that such experiences have bought about profound inner changes .. the acolyte was guided by the master.

When we get to the recreational use .. it then gets complicated because the recreational purpose has many shades of grey .. and the substances used are widened to take in many of the man made scourges as they tinker with natures molecules.

The mind sets exhibited by the needle people and the Cocaine snorters tends to be hard line cynical Freudian .. whereas the users of untampered with natural substances .. tend be more Jungian in mindset.

Then of course there is the scourge of alcohol abuse .. readily available and cheap by comparison .. it is well known in the bars where people hang out to score .. that a person who has become habituated to a particular drug is not necessarily addicted to other drugs which appears within their ken.

Someone pointed out quite early in this thread that its not the gun but the personality .. I agree with that .. and would like to add .. and to that personality (mindset) one brings all sorts of emotional baggage .. because its not the drugs .. its the abuse of drugs.

For the past 50 or 60 years on a global basis the world has been steadily speeding up .. we have witnessed the assault on family's .. two wages become necessary to meet the mortgage and the financial and emotional responsibility of parenthood .. the gap between the peoples becomes ever wider .. the disenfranchised youth that roam the ghettos of the world .. a grim world of survival of the fittest and young men turned into police dog fodder and incarcerated.

Its the stress engendered .. for many that is the ever tightening piano wire around our collective throats .. there are those of course of sterner moral fiber who do not succumb .. but let them have an emphatic insight into a social problem .. one that cannot be solved by incarceration or coercion in any shape or form .. it must be solved by raising the consciousness of those afflicted and finally start to tackle those horrendous social problems that have given rise to our current impasse.

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The drug war is mindless and cannot be won. The conservatives like it that way as they thrive on conflict and profit from it. They are neither compassionate nor insightful.
My plan is to trade violence and criminality for education and treatment. There will remain some traditional legal issues.
First is the educational component: classes for each mood-altering chemical the person wishes to use and that includes one of the most harmful yet now legal ones, alcohol. Upon successful completion of the course a license will be issued for that person to obtain the drug at a properly licensed pharmacy or store.
Second, certain amounts considered reasonable recreational amounts would be allowed. If the licensee exceeds that amount a psychologist or other trained professional will contact him/her for consultation. Most often drug abuse is a symptom of a person self-medicating for unexplored or denied issues.
Third, we substitute counseling and hospitalization for imprisonment. Legalization will diminish greatly much property crime committed to obtain money for expensive black market drugs. Legalization will remove the cause of much violence in turf wars and vengeance. This will ease our prison population. It will reduce family violence because many people in need of treatment will now get counseling rather than prison. Little needed rehabilitation or counseling is available in prison. Most convicts just get worse.
Fourth; and by no means least it will lesson police criminal behavior and aid to restore respect for the law and our justice system.
Today our computer power and linking make all this easy to implement and track.
I speak as a thoughtful, grateful, recovering addict and alcoholic with nearly 12 years of blessed recovery. It has not been easy yet my spiritual journey, self-discovery and growth continue because I stay active in those pursuits.

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... expertise to grow high quality food, or other types of medicine etc etc...

our 21st century farmers are fortunately potheads who put their labour and love into making the most splendid crop for their friends, family and business!

I'm just asking people to imagine the dedication that these farmers could/would enjoy in growing their own munchies to to offset the high they'd be allowed to grow once Hemp is legal again and how that could benefit the world!

Just another stupid thought on how to justify this un-win able drug policy that profits too many at the expense of others...

Land of the free be dammed
FREE Marc Emery!!!

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So what will happen with the hundred of millions of people that traffic and sell illegal drugs for a living once Walmart and gas stations start selling drugs? Companies will rather hire businessmen and agriculture majors to run the drug business, so druglords will have to find new ways to make money for their people. Robbing, kidnapping and blackmailing come to mind in an economy booming from the introduction of a big new business in legalized drugs.

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