Drug Wars in Mexico, On Our Borders (McLaughlin Group) * Open Thread

The “war on drugs” has yielded this nightmare. The druglords are making money beyond the dreams of avarice and we have thrown good money down a bottomless pit trying to fight it.

I’m all for legalizing drugs, using the same sort of controls applied to alcohol. We can wring our hands, use some sort of irrelevant moral argument, perhaps get even tougher on drugs, if possible, or turn a blind eye but this is one war we will never win-ever. The cost-benefit analysis doesn’t look good in this war and never has.

USA has no business to defend OUR borders from Mexican side, it is Mexican Government no USA. USA troops must stay on OUR soil and beefup a big time. It is about time, that Mexican Regime start doing thweir job and stop taking OUR money to “FIGHT DRUG Cartell”. Why they dont ask their ex President Fax,He became a stinky rich just beying Mexican President. OUR People must stay here and to start a real war with ILLEGALS and DRUG DEALERS!!!
LOOK WHAT IS HAPPENING WITH CALIFORNIA, AND IF WE DONT STOP SELLING our LAND AND COUNTRY TO MEXICANS AND OTHERS , WE WILL GO DOWN WITH FLAME!!!! AMERICA MUST BE ONLY; LEGGAL RESIDENTS AND AMERICAN CITIZENS!!!!!

SO, YOU WILL JUST RISE yOUR HANDS AND ILLEGALS TO TAKE OVER. YOU MUST BE OUT OF TOUCH. WHO IS PAYING YOU FOR A SUCH STUPID COMMENT???

I am so glad NQ is looking at this issue. I blogged about it a few ays ago…mostly from the standpoint that it seems to be being overlooked.

I tend to the liberal side of the of the illegal debate. However, we will have no choice but to put thousands of troops on our border building a real and defacto wall.

The implications for my hometown, Los Angeles, are alarming. Drug violence in Mexico is often mirrored in LA. If things fall apart soon, Obama will be forced to seize the border.

What kind of an idiot are you? Legalize drugs and take the money away from the narco-terrorists, dumbass.
The war on drugs is a patent example of insanity–do the same thing over and over (and over) again and expect different results.

This alleged war has gone on for over 30 years and we are even further behind the 8-ball,

Give us an answer to that, oh enlightened one.

You’re an idiot

Mandi, tone it down or i’ll put you on moderation. Thanks.

The war on drugs is lost and was so a long time ago. The answer is two-fold:

1) Seal the borders
2) Legalize drugs.

If nothing else, at least 2) would take the money out of the hands of the narco-terrorists, irrespective of what the petty moralists would say.

This insanity has to stop to allow a chance for reality to set in.

This has already crossed into the United States.

http://www.upi.com/Emerging_Threats/2009/02/27/Mexican_drug_violence_Congress_probes_border_spillover_threat/UPI-18381235754766/

We need to regain complete control of our southern border and we’re going to need a military presence there to do so.

As stated, Phoenix is already experiencing a wave of kidnappings. American criminals aren’t responsible. It’s an indication of rapidly expanding Mexican drug cartel activity. Escalating chaos will soon follow. These people are as brutally violent as any al Qaeda terrorist. What we’re seeing in Juarez will soon be on the local news all across the southwest if we don’t stop it now.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=6848672

We need to regain complete control of our southern border and we’re going to need a military presence there to do so.

And until drugs are legalized, those troops will be there till the end of time and we will still be doing the same thing over and over and over again, thus creating our own 21st century definition of collective insanity.

Your idea won’t work any better than the other 2-dozen or so that have been tried since Nixon went on the warpath. How long, cynic, should we keep up this bogus “war” and the bottomless pit into which we are throwing our money? 10 years? 20 years? A lifetime? How do we define a “win”? How much is this “war” destabilizing Mexico? Can we afford a country on our southern border run by narco-terrorists?

Actually, I’m pro-decriminalization on weed. Legalization, regulation, and taxation is my view. But damn, we can’t let foreign gangster paramilitary jackasses take over the American southwest. We’ve already got highly organized MS-13 people in nearly every major American city. I kinda go with the idea that good fences make good neighbors. Sometimes a good fence requires razor wire.

You’re several tens of billions and 38 years short. Your plan will fail, too. Just ask one of the Kennedys and bootlegging.

surprise. surprise.

With Neopolitian from Arizona (look at the mess in Phoenix), in charge of Homeland Security, we are all in big trouble. I am glad I have stocked up on my gun, ammo, and food supplies.

PS, the McLaughlin group makes me puke, they were all ga-ga over OB during the election.

The problem is MUCH bigger than the percentage of the 95,000 people in the fallow fields of the central California who are out of work. The illegal aliens, who broke our laws getting here, will not go south due to the current climate.

While military presence IS require at this time, it should be to train and assist and to respond with overwelming firepower when required, acting in support of law enforcement, who are pitifully out gunned and under manned…

What does it say when two border patrol officers are arrested for doing their job? Do I care if some drug running idiot seeks to evade the law and gets shoot in the a** for his troubles? Hell no. What kind of message does that send when he becomes a state witness and the jury was not fully informed?
1Human slavery and bondage,
Drug’s coming into this country and more importantly, guns leaving the U.S. to Mexico.

The gangs and violence are in 250 US cities, as it relates to the problems of a lack of emphisis on enforcing all relevent US laws on the books.

What I have never understood is why this national security crisis is playing second fiddle to the money made on both sides of the border in persuit of illict activites. Shut it down.

As a retired CBP agent, I can truthfully state that both Elenaor Clift and Janet Napalatano are both F***ing idiots. Neither one has a clue !!

Clift and Napalatano are both FU**ing morons.

I agree, John. I’ve been reading about the escalating violence along the US/Mexico border for months, wondering when the MSM would start picking the stories up. That’s not even mentioning the serious on-going problems in LA.

But it worries me when I read that Janet Napolitano denies that violence is spreading into the US when $14 billion in illegal drugs are smuggled into the U.S. every year through Mexico. And Phoenix, the capital city of Napolitano’s home state of Arizona, recorded 370 kidnappings last year, placing it only second to Mexico City worldwide.

Denial doesn’t mean it isn’t happening. Merely that we’re putting on blinders. I’ve been reading reports for weeks that the Mexican Govt. is losing control.

Obama better have a plan! And Napolitano better be fitted for glasses, quick.

Fred,

I appreciate your passion on this, so not picking a fight…just tossing my thought out…

If you legalize it, even without regulation, I believe the problem of the importation and the associated violence won’t go away.

Here’s my thought…again, even without regulation, there will be heavy demand for lower prices or better control of “markets.” Whether it’s a drug corp or rival gangs, the fight for control or just access to the market will be fierce.

Regulation would probably only make this worse. People would fight literally and figuratively to get their product to market.

And lastly, who will pay for companies to test their employees? Or the money involved in rewriting millions of employee handbooks regarding “regulated” drugs.

Again, just throwing out thoughts…

Um…pssst. How can Obama lead a war on drugs when he, himself, admitted in his book, he’s done weed and coke. I’m sorry. But it’s all about the hypocricy for me.

And Bush also loved the white stuff as well.

The Drug Cartels are now also investing in small (difficult to detect) submarines that are used to bring in thousands of pounds of drugs (worth millions of dollars) to the United States.

These particular submarines (used by the Drug Cartels) have small engines and they cruise just below the surface of the water. The subs cost about $250,000 a peice; however, even with the fairly large price tags the subs are usually abandoned after being docked for unloading in a secluded area along the coastline.

Needless to say, US Home Land Security is also very concerned about these subs.

Anyone notice the Globe at your check out stands this week. http://www.globemagazine.com/story/143

What some people aren’t realizing is mexico is going thru a crash and debt just like the rest of the world. more $ in drugs than in fighting them. I can only imagine the infultration the drug lords have in every part of the government.

What needs to be legal is the training of regular Mexican citizens in intercepting and destroying (killing and murdering) those that engage in drug trafficking activity. Special licenses as detectives and law-enforcement should be given to any citizen that applies and get involved in the enforcement of drug interdiction activity. Bounties should be established for bringing in dead or alive people at all levels of participation in drug cartels.

Instead of carbon emissions cap and trade the U.S. and Mexico should establish a CAP and TRADE of CREDITS and REWARDS given to those who capture, arrest and bring to the authorities dead or alive anyone that participates in the drug trafficking mafia.

Make drug capitulation a viable industry taught at universities and colleges and make the stopping of illegal drug trafficking a legal business for all of those who want to become professional drug laws enforcers.

Privatize the damn drug war. Lets turn Hollywood into real life drama.

Oh dang, if it were only true! Great fodder.

Business licenses should be awarded in states like California for anyone that after being trained at universities like UCLA and the like would capture and arrest the people who operate those vessels and a payment of 250K should be made for the trade of the vessels to government authorities.

People who are convicted of drug trafficking should be temporarily blinded with drugs that cause temporary blindness and be send home and a mobile clinic should be establish that goes to these parolees and administer in their homes the blinding drugs for the time that the blinding punishment requires.

In other words, drug trafficking convicts should be tortured with temporary blindness. Once they promise not to engage anymore in drug trafficking then they could get back their sight.

“never smack”

I am more than a little stunned by your comment lark. Answer violence with violence and you end up with a lot of dead bodies and the problem still exists. What is happening in Mexico is nothing more than what happened in large cities in the US during prohibition. Mob wars, shoot out with federal agents and in the end, legalization of alcohol. A few years ago a book, The Kings of Cocaine, was released about the Medellin Drug Cartel and Pablo Escobar. When the DEA entered his house they found boxes of American money in the closets and weapons more advanced than those carried by the DEA. Addicts engage in crimes here to support their habits, end up in prison, get out and begin the cycle again. I know a man who was on methadone treatments for several years and he was able, finally, to break his heroin habit and then the methadone. Pot is far less damaging than alcohol and less dangerous. More deadly accidents are caused in the US by drunk drivers than any other cause, not to mention the ruined families and sever health problems. There is only one way to stop the killing and that is legalization. Then we can begin to ask ourselves why our country is the number one destination for most drugs. Most states do not even consider possession of less than an ounce of marijuana a felony.

The end of prohibition ended the wars on alcohol. If there are legitimate farms and profits taxed, there would be no place for a black market in pot. It can be regulated the same way and sold the same way. Such cafes already exist in CA for medical marijuana. We can spend billions more fighting on our borders and pay for helicopters to spray fields in Durango and Sinaloa and never ending war or collect taxes on American pot.

Ferd Berfle –

There are numerous problems with “legalizing drugs”. Even with alcohol, states still insist on regulating alcohol content, the age of consumers, hours of sale, where and when it can be possessed, drinking and driving and any number of other concerns.

For many people, the fact that drugs are illegal is what keeps people from using them and becoming addicts.

There are vastly increased health care, welfare, and child support costs involved. ERs in small communities treating meth fire patients are already causing hospitals to go under.

What about the crappy work drunks do? Now you want to add millions of drug addicts to their ranks?!

There are any number of legal drugs that people currently use and abuse with or without a prescription. They break into pharmacies to get them. They forge prescriptions. They kill people to get them. Legal drugs. I have known people who were killed over legal drugs.

I’ve worked extensively with drug addicts and the misery they cause. Alcohol abuse is bad enough. Meth addicts will likely die from cancer.

Legalizing crack isn’t going to help people. It’s already cheap. PCP, LSD, date rape drugs, and Ecstasy aren’t good for you.

What about codeine, morphine, Oxycontin, hydrocodone, and any other Scheduled drugs? Why shouldn’t they be regulated?

Addicts sometimes kill their relatives or best friends when they’re high and can’t remember it the next day. More of that won’t be good.

They have more money than the US government.

I think that legalization will simply make the problem spread to every home in both countries.

What needs to be done is to empower citizens by teaching drug interdiction in colleges and universities as a profession, issue business licenses to empower citizens to enforce the laws, and punish drug dealers and traffickers with punishments that they will not want to be punished with. Create a service industry dedicated to the eradication of illegal drug trafficking.

It is violently imposing peace and quite in the country and making citizens proud of their contribution to law enforcement.

Just wait until someone high on drugs that you approve to be legalize will cause you some personal damage like killing one of your children (God forbid) or something of the kind and you will not be so keen on legalizing drugs.

Legalizing drugs would mean more drug addicts driving under the influence and doing many more felonies in order to get to the drugs. Many more homes and students ravished by drug consumption.

What is needed is a professional service industry dedicated to drug interdiction, and treatment of addicts as well as criminals. Service professionals in that industry could have a cap and trade agreement that the more they interdict and treat the more money they make.

Drug enforcement professionals should have the same rights as cable operators to enter right of way areas to patrol and talk to home owners about things related to drug related criminal activity.

What is needed is a professional service industry dedicated to drug interdiction, and treatment of addicts as well as criminals.

We’ve already got that. It’s one of the main reasons marijuana has been illegal for so long. Drug interdiction is big business, taking in billions of taxpayer dollars over the years. It keeps private, run-for-profit prisons filled to capacity. In most states, non-violent drug offenders represent more than half of the prison population. They also represent more than half the population of federal prisons.

Drug enforcement has all of the authority it needs. They’re already empowered to confiscate your property without the due process guaranteed by the constitution. They can take your car, your house, your land, and your bank accounts without ever obtaining a conviction in a court of law. They aren’t even required to charge you with a crime in court. If you don’t believe me, Google forfeiture laws and browse what comes up.

Julie, you are 100% correct about the far reaching harmful effects of drugs, even (or especially) alchohol. If there was no desire for them there would be no problem, I’m sure we can agree on that. Drugs destroy lives, yet we’re still plagued with them. If it wasn’t cheaper to smuggle them across borders, then crafty criminals would simply make them here, as they do with highly destructive meth, and deceptively destructive pot. So what’s the solution?

People need to be informed in the most graghic ways possible about the extent of horrors that are associated with the drug world. Although I firmly believe that man made global warming is a fiction, look how the whole world has been willing to make ridiculous sacrifices at the alter of a myth that not a single life has been lost to. Thousands, if not millions of lives have been lost in the world of drugs, yet where is there the global warming kind of attention given to this problem? We really need to reconsider our priorities. We’ll save more lives, especially the lives of those we love, if we concentrate a little less on “recycle, re-use, and reduce” and “carbon footprints” and focus more on the immediate and effective results that will be realized with an intense, loving, and patriotic embrace of our children, while we whisper in their ear that our love is better than any drug.

I believe the cartel will always find a way to control the drug market. They regularly rip off so called “legitimate growers” for medical marijuana.

The only way to win with drugs is to for the demand to dry up. That means education, decriminalization and treatment rather than prison; addicts have the opportunity to be treated as an outpatient (if they are able to stay clean) or be sent through in-patient drug rehab. Instead of the billions spent on incarceration, in-patient facilities need to be built to meet the demand. I have worked with many people in AA, NA programs and it does work. I have always believed that people use drugs or outer stimulants in an attempt to connect with the inner self. Drugs and alcohol are what’s widely available and that is the real crime when there are so many different way to promote the growth of consciousness to bring more satisfaction in a natural way. People are uneducated as to the possibilities.

i agree. the “war on drugs” is wrong and counter-productive on so many levels. people say, “but…but..you don’t understand how much harm drugs do…” i say, what does that have to do with the current policy? it isn’t preventing anyone from using drugs. if drugs were legal today, would YOU start using them? they always say no, but somebody else would. the fact is that people are already using whatever they want to use; that wouldn’t change if drugs were made legal. we would just save a lot of money and possibly come up with a more productive strategy to reduce drug use.

word, ferd.

So legalizing drugs will make the cartels go away?

Just like legalizing alcohol made the mafia go away, huh?

This mess in Mexico has been brewing for years and years. It is rooted in a culture that does not particularly value human life and a country whose history of poverty and injustice has made corruption a way of life. We can’t even begin to imagine the level of brutality and fear most Mexicans live with each day. Add to that our country’s market for buying drugs, and you have a problem that cannot be controlled or solved by anything less than legalizing drugs.

That is a terrifying idea for most people in this country, but if it were planned and set up properly we would have less crime, fewer people in jail and fewer people with drug problems on the streets. As soon as we acknowledge that a government cannot control drugs, we will begin to find ways to allow their use in ways that will undermine corruption and crime.

This “war on drugs” is a lost cost and an one that is destroying us and the countries that supply drugs to our citizens.

NoBamaNoWay –

And they won’t have sex either…

You either haven’t studied how people make decisions or are denying such knowledge.

Far greater numbers of people would try these drugs and become addicts if they were legalized and thereby deemed O.K. and much more widely available.

Would you make it a crime to advertise drugs?

Who knows if they would become more or less expensive? There might be a quality control issue then.

What is the purpose behind allowing people to take meth? Driving hospitals out of business? Or are you going to continue to criminalize making drugs?

Do you want to watch them die horrible deaths? Do you have a clue what is in drugs from Mexico?

Would you let people do any thing they want re: drugs? Perform surgery? Drive cars? Fly planes? Operate Day Care Centers? Otherwise you’re back to fighting the war.

Even if they were made legal, there would still be an illegal drug problem. Or would you hand them out on street corners to children?

How would the kiddies be able to hold down responsible jobs?

The “War on Drugs” is the term for the enforcement of laws involving drugs. It shouldn’t be taken so literally.

I know that you really didn’t think we would “win one for the Gipper”, right?!

The US spends millions enforcing alcohol and legal drug offenses currently.

Legalization would cost much more in both treasure and lives.

cynic –

You’re wrong about not having to be charged with a crime. And the property has to be from the proceeds of criminal activity.

Ferd Berfle –

If the Kennedys hadn’t made millions more of them would be locked up for their murder and mayhem.

You are only wanting to add to the lethal mix already out there.

It won’t save lives or taxdollars. Who do you think pays for addicts’ health care and neglected kids?

Yeah, and I’ve seen those “medical” facilities and the folks who come out of there. It’s not a pretty sight.

And they don’t stop with getting their fix there.

Unfortunately I’m correct. And I take no pleasure in it. This whole forfeiture business strikes me as being fundamentally unAmerican.

The situation improved somewhat with passage of the Civil Asset Forfeiture Reform Act of 2000, but property can still be permanently seized without ever bringing criminal charges against the property owner. Essentially what happens is that the property itself is charged. To recover the seized property, the owner must prove that it was not utilized in the commission of a particular crime. In effect, your property is guilty until proven innocent, is forfeited as a result, and you yourself need never be charged with the crime that was the basis of the action. (That actually happened locally. Rural property owned by a landlord was forfeited because the people renting it were growing marijuana there, without his knowledge. He was never charged, but he lost his land, nevertheless.

Before 2000, there was no process whereby you could attempt recovery, and it never even had to be proven that the property was actually used in the commission of a crime. That, at least, has changed. Now they at least must establish that the alleged crime actually occurred and that the property in question was involved. During the 10 years before 2000, 80% of all persons who permanently lost property due to such seizures were never charged with a criminal act. The value of the seized property runs into the billions.

Here’s a good website on the topic, if anyone cares: http://www.fear.org/

A close friend of mine died of cancer in Canada a few years back. She had breast cancer that metastasized when it recurred 5 years later. She got another 2 years of reasonable-quality life owing to several courses of radiation and chemotherapy. The only thing that alleviated extreme and prolonged nausea during her treatments was medical marijuana, which controlled the problem completely. Her doctor simply wrote her a prescription, as he might for any other theraputic drug. A local visiting nurse was licensed to dispense, and filled the prescription periodically in the form of brownies. A side effect was relief of the depression associated with a terminal illness, and a better appetite until the final stages.

My friend had one alternative, in the form of an anti-nausea drug imported from the United States, to be taken before each chemo treatment. She found it didn’t work very well. It also cost $100 per dose. The Canadian health care system was willing to pay for it, but equally willing to provide something cheap that worked far better.

I would imagine a lot of the people you see coming out of those medical facilities aren’t a “pretty sight”. You’re probably seeing AIDS patients, cancer patients, MS patients, etc. My friend wasn’t a pretty sight, either. If you could have rolled the clock back 2 years, she was beautiful.

Not to mention the financial (and worse) costs of so many more children born deformed or brain damaged to drug addicted mothers. Furthermore, they’re finding out that children who are neglected and not intellectually stimulated or adequately nurtured at the very beginning of life (as is common with an addicted parent) often fail to develop many neural circuits (I’m not a scientist, so I may not be saying this accurately). But these children then grow up to be literally incapable of empathy and become antisocial adults. So we’ll also see an increase in all kinds of criminals.

I don’t think anyone can compare alcohol and meth, for example. Meth is so much worse in its potential to destroy people after very little exposure to it. I just can’t see legalizing it.

While I wish people could understand the utter stupidity of putting this stuff into their bodies, I know that won’t happen. I understand that legalization might have an impact on the violence associated with delivering drugs to idiots, but it won’t have any impact on drug use itself, IMO.

Also, even if legalized, drug use will still be frowned upon and have consequences in the work place, etc, so people will have incentive to hide such use. “Legal outlets” will likely not service all the people who use drugs and and underground will remain.

I seriously doubt any investment banker eager to drop some cocaine will go to a legal outlet if he wants to keep his job. So some illegal dealer will service him and we’ll still have drug wars.

Certain drugs are essentially poison– meth, heroin, and crack being obvious examples. Few people advocate their legalization or anything that would increase their general availability.

Marijuana is something else altogether.
Millions of people use marijuana in moderation without the dire personal or societal consequences of alcohol or tobacco abuse. Marijuana, by its nature, isn’t particularly prone to abuse. The annual number of deaths and injuries either directly or indirectly attributable to it–when you discount the violence that results from prohibition itself–is virtually nil.

It’s an error to equate users with abusers. Abusers are addiction-prone persons who are equally willing to misuse anything that’s available. These people will be a serious problem for themselves and others regardless of the legal status of anything. Sorry to say, but their problem isn’t an herb or something that comes in a bottle. Their problem lies with themselves.

Christ.

OK, class, let’s look at this from the context of results. What has your war on drugs actually accomplished? Let’s see, we’ve:

1) Destabilized our southern neighbor to the point of its potential collapse.
2) Filled our prisons to overflowing.
3) Created a bureaucracy which throws good money after bad.
4) Created a class of narco-terrorists who, because they can make so much money, do not care about pesky things such as collateral damage and are better armed and sometimes better-trained than our own law-enforcement personnel.
5) Created wealth where it once did not exist–like Afghanistan and supplied money to organizations like the Taliban.

I’d feel a lot safer if the drug companies were allowed to control the drug market than a group of unaccountable drug lords. Do you *really* want me to go on? Christ, your ability to see beyond your own petty morality and is non-existent. I’m more concerned about bozos like you who cannot understand a failed policy if it were tattooed to your forehead. You are a bigger problem than those who use drugs because YOU should know better but dogmatically stick to your preconceived notions about how reality works.

Try doing a cost-benefit analysis before you post again.

Can you understand the concept of failure? That is what your “war” is–an abject, never-ending, ineffective failure. You are insane if you think your line of emotional claptrap will ever work. It hasn’t yet, is not now, and never will. Police don’t work; prison doesn’t work; interdiction doesn’t work; the threat of execution doesn’t work; rehab rarely works; and legal (prescription) drugs are sometimes worse than their illegal counterparts, so one addiction is traded for another. That box you are in defines you so much that you not only can’t think outside of it but you are unable to even conceive that the box is even there.

Lark:

Is this about addiction, which includes legal drugs or is your indignation centered only on illegal drugs? Both can do the same sorts of damage, you know.

My point is that if it is the addictive qualities, then there are a lot of Doctors and drug companies that could be liable. If it is just the illegal drugs, then your stance is hypocritical.

You’re addicted to nonsense, cynic. You need treatment today.

You made my point, oblivious one. As long as the drugs are in the hands of drug lords, tons of money will be made by them. Are you so damn blinded by your own dogma that you don’t see the truth? So long as there is a drug war, the cartels will make millions upon untold millions and will be able to keep their stranglehold on America. Legalized drugs takes the money AWAY from the druglords and puts it into controllable businesses.

Your acknowledgment of Joe Kennedy is point in fact. He made the bulk of his money BEFORE prohibition was lifted.

I am an alcoholic that has not have a drink in over 30 years. Alcohol cause quite a bit of damage in my extended family. You will find none of it in my house. I was delivered of the vice when as a young person I surrender my life to Christ. I cannot explain why or how but after that night I developed a repulsion to rum and beer. It stayed with me through all these years.

Since evangelism of the type I partook is no longer effective, for whatever reasons; I advocate all kinds of different things against all kinds of drug until something sticks.

I advocate that alcohol producers be taken to court by those affected by their products and be sued for their last penny.

I would legalize illegal drugs if drug addicts could bring legal action in court against drug dealers and recover losses plus punitive damages.

I hate the alcohol industry with a passion.

I’m saying control it as we do alcohol. The old adage, “You can’t legislate morality” has held true for centuries, hold true today, and will always hold true. If the converse were true, this “war” would have been over long ago.

All I am saying to those who dogmatically say “no” is look at the RESULTS. They not only aren’t encouraging-they are downright appalling. To continue down this road is patently insane.

All I ask is for everyone to look at the facts concerning the money spent; look at the facts concerning incarceration rates; and look at the facts concerning recidivism.

And then look at all the real criminals that have to be released to make room for the drug abusers and sellers.

And then take a good, hard look at all the “legal” drugs prescribed by doctors that are often worse than the malady they are supposed to alleviate.

Then take a look at your own pill consumption, prescribed by the biggest group of peddlers around-Doctors and drug companies.

Got a hang-nail? Buy hangnailbegone. Got an itch? Buy itchberelieved. Had a bad day? Buy baddayisover. Depressed? Buy getalift.

Not the money they’ve made but it will stop their future profits. You didn’t think about that one, though, did you? So, yes, by all means, let’s continue this stupidity so these cartels can make even money and gain further monetary power.

So let’s keep throwing all that good money after the bad. Arguments that cannot be proven fall on deaf ears, especially when all the evidence for the current war indicate complete and utter failure.

I suppose I am of the opinion that each person can make decisions regarding their own physical being without any input from me so long as they don’t affect others directly. I happen to like a drink or two but would not force it on others nor would I want temperance forced on me. One cannot be a libertarian or even a conservative and think otherwise.

Ferd, sometimes your are far to stupid to merit a response. But since you’ve completely and fundamentaly misunderstood my post, maybe baby talk will work.

There are really bad things that people put in their bodies, they’re called illegal drugs. People think the drugs are a fun so they don’t realize that they are destroying their bodies, their minds, and their lives. Because other caring people see that the drug takers are destroying their lives, they try to stop them. But the drug takers don’t want to stop, or can’t stop on their own. Because of the efforts of the well meaning people, the cost of the drugs go way up. When this happens, bad people do all kinds of nasty things to supply drugs because they make lots of money doing that. This is a big problem. Some very silly people (you ferd) think that if the caring people give up their efforts at preventing other people from taking drugs, then the bad guys will go away. They might go away, but then we still have lots of sad people destroying their lives by taking drugs. In fact, there will probably be a lot more people taking drugs, because it will be easier. Some wise people think that the solution to the problem is to find better ways at convincing drug takers to stop taking drugs, and create better programs to convince others to never start taking drugs. If nobody wants to take bad drugs then bad guys won’t do bad things to get drugs to healthy people.

ferd, I lean more toward the libertarian position, that would be decriminalizing the use of drugs. However, that does not solve the primary problem, people wrecking their lives with drugs. There are programs that show promise at curbing the need and use of drugs. Drying up the need or desire for drugs is the ultimate solution. And if you weren’t so reflexively enraged at any challenge to your brilliance, and more concerned about how you will craft a response filled with your usual childish insults, and actually read my post with an open and less defensive mind, you might have actually understood what I wrote.

Name-calling becomes you Andrew. So much for your argument. And you never did answer my question, probably because you know this is a futile, stupid, and insane war that will be lost much as Prohibition failed.

I do hope the money you will continue to put into this war on drugs is money you can afford to waste. I know mine is being wasted but I can afford it.

Legalization would cost much more in both treasure and lives.

Show me your cost-benefit analysis. Such a bold statement must have some background data to support it. Let’s see it.

cynic is correct. Suspicion is all they need, JulieD. You need to actually read about the laws concerning drugs. They are even more draconian than those the IRS uses to confiscate property.

But by all means, let’s keep this little charade going, shall we?

The problem is you cite information about drugs being harmful without giving us solid facts about statistics of the negative effects of drugs on the human body. Also, what specific “drugs” do you classify as harmful? Chloroseptic Throat Spray, Calamine Lotion, Zoloft, Heroine? Most drugs have hazardous side effects. Do think anything “artificial” put into the human body is bad? Are you a Scientologist?

I believe you are refusing to see that positive and benificial outcomes can result from the legalization of a substance percived by you as “bad.” For your argument to be effective you need suport your claim with hard data (i.e. scientific facts, online studies, fda approved data charts) or reevaluate your own moral perspectives on the use of marijuanna or other illegal substances. speak the honest truth without sounding righteous.

Hey.What website was this again?

who are you talking to?

exactly. Society should take a concise look at Oaksterdam’s business model.

omg. I just realized Mandi is playing a glorified game of risk. To have an action oriented thought like that you must be a dude.

I envy your ability not care that you sound like racist jackass. Speak your mind.