Mr. Navarrette has, as his side so often does, personified inanimate objects.
Yep. Like I said, the way he talks you'd think there were herds of feral weaponry roaming the countryside and terrorizing the Mexican people all by themselves.
Just once I'd like to come across a herd of feral free-range N-frame Smith & Wessons trying to cross my street. (They are always "on the streets" aren't they? Carolyn McCarthy wouldn't lie to me!)
I stand by what I said in the other thread: As long as the people calling for bans on guns are the same people encouraging illegal immigrants to come and stay, I call bullshit. Mr. Holder, you don't give a rat's ass about gun smuggling, if you did you'd be raising cain about actually attempting to secure the border.
You are right, but you don't focus on the main issue here. You focus on the fact that our libtard politicians are idiots. That's true, but the fact remains that it's the war on drugs that makes drug running profitable.
Take away the profit motive and you take away the problem. The USA needs to decriminalize drugs now. The government should be the sole supplier for "hard" drugs, and people should be allowed to grow their own for limited consumption. If you can't afford your drugs you can pick them up for free. They cost very little to produce, and you've taken out virtually all of the profit motive and excitement about producing/selling/using them. Seems to be working in Switzerland.
people should be allowed to grow their own for limited consumption.
Really. And you don't see an obvious problem there with those two emphasis-added areas?
If you can't afford your drugs you can pick them up for free.
*sigh*
And this is why I have to almost always respond to the druggies.
Why would anybody bother to make their own if you can get it for free?
They cost very little to produce, and you've taken out virtually all of the profit motive and excitement about producing/selling/using them.
People aren't using drugs for the excitement of them. So the government hands out drugs for free, you know, just to destroy the profit motive.
... Hopping bloody crimony, do you druggies have the capability to even pay attention what happened when we did that to money with welfare's various forms?
And you think that somehow, addictive and easily-overdosed DRUGS will work out BETTER?
Look at the metrics in his language, "...as many as...most of...many purchased...many...come in as..." A long time ago, from a single course in statistics I recall the trinity of the mean, the medium and the mode. The number I want to know is the medium, that number of which half of the "as many as 2000!!!!!!" are above and half are below. I also want to know how many days, that is, what is the unit of time being measured? One day? One week? Here it sounds like a unit of time called "as many as 2000 a day". (I am tempted to say what's the problem/ At this rate all the guns in American should be south of the border at the end of the Age Of Obama, some 2800 years from now.) Nevertheless, over the course of a year, if the medium of "illegal alien guns sneaking south" per day was say, 1877, half the daily quantities/occurances would be above this number and half below. This is quite different if the medium number 11 quantities/occurances per day. It's easier to understand using grades and percentages. In a class of 100, if the medium grade was 97%, half the class scored above 97% and half scored below. A very different result if the medium was 33%. Just saying as many as 11 in some cases got as high as 100% on the test tells us nothing. What's the mean, the average number of "sneaking south killers" per day Ruben? Anyone, anyone, Bueller? How about the mode, that number which is the most frequent score? Was it a B+ or a D+? You are quite right about cognitive dissonance Kevin, but you shouldn't use such scary words to describe 'journalists'. It's just not fair that as many as 2000 journalists a day don't know what the facts are.
I want to find some FALs or G3s foraging for 7.62 NATO (or .308 Winchester). After all, for as much carnage they're leaving across Mexico, there must be A LOT of it down there.
Thanks for the heads-up. I posted the first two comments on the article. :-)
All the folks who posted here - please go and post on that article as well. We absolutely must own the comments. We have no choice but to expose and debunk the lies every single time that they happen. You have to register for the site - please go and do it.
You're actually referring to the "median". Also, knowing either the mean (average) or median (mid-point) would be infinitely more informative than knowing only the peak (an estimated one at that).
But giving us either would probably not be feasible, because all of the numbers regarding this are estimates at best, and more likely just completely fabricated bullshit.
What's your suggestion, Unix-Jedi? The war on drugs has given us this. As more and more of our money goes to the cartels, we'll just get more and more of the same in return.
Fine, take the government out of it. But drug use/production must be decriminalized. This is the only way to take the profit motive out of criminal equation.
"And you think that somehow, addictive and easily-overdosed DRUGS will work out BETTER?"
Well, U-J, I'm not a druggie. I've never smoked anything in my entire life, and I mean never, not a cigarette, not anything.
But I do like the idea of exchanging one deadly problem for another, if it changes who the problem is deadly to and how deadly it is, and does so in an advantageous way. I have no quibble about a druggie doing to himself whatever he wants to, provided when he does it to himself he does it to only himself. Legalizing drugs changes the dynamic from the producers, distributors, and dealers killing competitors, police, and bystanders so the druggie customers can kill themselves to only the druggies killing themselves. Given that the druggies will do so either way, I can live with that.
DJ: if it changes who the problem is deadly to and how deadly it is, and does so in an advantageous way.
Right.
But there are some severe issues with that.
I have no quibble about a druggie doing to himself whatever he wants to, provided when he does it to himself he does it to only himself.
But that's the problem. Most of the current drug laws aren't because of what the drugs to do a person, but those around them.
Additionally, the action of taking almost all of the drugs in question impairs judgement. Meaning once the drug's taken, you cannot expect to reason logically, or use conventional means to punish/reward. Hell, look at drunk driving alone. Now imagine how hazardous it would be to be anywhere near any road when meth is legal to buy and even more widespread.
As I said to perlhaqr, I'm sympathetic to the "liberty" argument. But from any sort of a utilitarian argument, drug legalization fails horribly. Not only are the people usually advocating it also demanding free-to-the-patient health care with no restrictions, they're usually also the ones who are least likely to demand personal responsibility. But even those who would like to demand it (like you, for example) understand how unlikely it is we'll actually be able to force that massive culture shift as a precondition.
Ben: What's your suggestion
Stop the invasive war and militarizing the police. Arrest people when their other contact brings them into drug discovery with the police. (Which is the vast majority of drug-related arrests anyway.)
The war on drugs has given us
Many things. Sure. Bad. Many of them, don't get me wrong.
But what you're advocating is policy for sheer damn folly.
As more and more of our money goes to the cartels
Well, then you should be reassured. That problem is mostly solved, they're getting as much money as they can.
Really. The serious crimp on drug smuggling these days is getting the money BACK home. I've seen a stat that for every pound of concentrated cocaine that goes north generates 2 pounds of dollar bills that have to go south.
Fine, take the government out of it. But drug use/production must be decriminalized.
To any and all extend, beyond what we criminalize now for say, alcohol or prescription meds?
This is the only way to take the profit motive out of criminal equation.
No, it makes it far more lucrative.
(Perlhaqr, do you see now why I kind of jumped down your throat this weekend? :) )
If you remove risk then the profit motive goes up. Removing criminal sanctions means that it's more profitable to produce and sell drugs. Ever taken econ? If you did, wasn't one of the textbook cases drug criminalization?
You'll reduce costs, reduce risk, and you think that will reduce profit?
That is why decriminalization is simply not enough. The only way to live with this thing is to fully legalize to the extent that alcohol and tobacco have been legalized. You take the profit away from the criminals by taking the business itself away from criminals, or simply allowing/forcing them to function as a real business.
Will this make drug abuse more manageable in this country? Duurrrr, of course not. But this is the only way to end the cycle of drug gangs and cartels shooting it out with each other. Instead, they will have the same protections as any other legal manufacturer of deadly intoxicants, such as booze. Coors and Budweiser distributors don't kill each other.
Recreational drugs, vetted by the FDA, will still be cheaper and safer than illegal drugs sold by criminals. And "gun crime" will be reduced enough to lessen the pressure on our freedoms.
Where am I getting all this? Simple. It's exactly what happened when they repealed alcohol prohibition. Alas, the NFA passed right at about the same time, both as reactions to prohibition's rampant criminality.
There was an interesting article posted recently by an American who worked in Mexico for about 5 years. The title says it all: You and I Can't Buy the Guns Mexican Cartels Own:
The Administration is Not Dealing Straight With Us on Mexico's Gun Problem. It's worth the read: http://www.gunnewsdaily.com/rw807.html
Full auto weapons, completely unmarked weapons, grenades, RPGs and the like do NOT come through US "gun show loopholes." Such weapons as DO move from the US, such as semi-auto rifles and handguns, tend to go to middle class Mexicans for personal protection FROM the cartels (and frequently purchased, BTW, from corrupt Mexican police departments, as gun ownership is generally highly restricted down there.) The heavy stuff, the things the cartels use against each other and the police, comes from elsewhere, since you just can't get it in the US.
Me:"I have no quibble about a druggie doing to himself whatever he wants to, provided when he does it to himself he does it to only himself."
U-J:"But that's the problem. Most of the current drug laws aren't because of what the drugs to do a person, but those around them."
I'm quibbling about how you worded that, and I think it is a significant quibble. The drugs don't effect those who do not use them, but the people who use the drugs do. So, I think it's more accurate to say: "Most of the current drug laws exist because of what drug users do to the persons around them." Legislation doesn't prevent the undesired behavior, does it? Don't we make precisely the same argument about gun control?
"But from any sort of a utilitarian argument, drug legalization fails horribly."
I disagree.
I do subscribe to the Libertarian argument about it. Consider what percentage of prison inmates are incarcerated only because they did something only to themselves that the law prohibits, being careful to consider the cost to society at large in terms of the costs of prosecution and incarceration, as well as the cost of keeping out of prison people who prey on others because there is no room in prison for them. What is that current percentage, something like one in three?
Prohibition of alcohol didn't work, prohibition of recreational drugs doesn't work, and prohibition of tobacco wouldn't work, all because people quite willingly do stupid things to themselves and will do so even if it is illegal. Making it illegal doesn't stop the use or the effects the user has on others, but making it legal does stop the undesired, dangerous, and destructive activities that go on only because it is illegal. On balance, I think that is a good tradeoff.
Why do I get the feeling that since the advent of Obama that America is a sinking ship, and Obama's trying to save it by drilling holes to let the water out?
I'm quibbling about how you worded that, and I think it is a significant quibble.
I'll grant you the degree of the quibble matters. But the point is, look at a law concerning drugs, or even alcohol, and in almost every case, it's not written and targeted at the person taking the drugs, but the effect once they take effect.
The drugs don't effect those who do not use them, but the people who use the drugs do. So, I think it's more accurate to say: "Most of the current drug laws exist because of what drug users do to the persons around them."
Or are thought to have done, or might do, or the like.
Yes. Right.
Legislation doesn't prevent the undesired behavior, does it?
In totality, no. But there is a deterrent effect that illegality has. As Chris Rock says, "If you jump a [subway] turnstile, you might get a warning. But if you jump a turnstile smoking a blunt with a gun in your waistband [carrying illegally] maybe you need your ass kicked."
Don't we make precisely the same argument about gun control?
If we do, we shouldn't. The problem with these drugs under consideration is that they affect the mind. Otherwise, who'd bother with 'em?
Guns don't. (Yes, they're claimed to by some, but it's hyperbole and easily and often fisked and laughed at.)
That takes your previous quibble and blows it out of the water in terms of quibbling. :)
Guns aren't addictive. (Really, I can quit any time I want!) You can't accidentally pick a gun up, or be snuck one on the sly.
But drugs are addictive. Some people, once they've had a hit of cocaine, heroin, meth, will be immediately hooked. Look at the entire product line of tobacco, which is our closest analog. But tobacco for all it's other vices, doesn't cause reality and perception changes in the mind.
The legality or -il of those drugs, as a result, affects where and how they're taken, pushing them away from the outside world where they might be arrested for mere possession. Remove that, and it's kitty bar the door. The risk-taking you see with drunk driving ("I'sh ko to drivsh, wally. Ish onwy shrresh blocks.") is now available to any of the now-legal substances.
Consider what percentage of prison inmates are incarcerated only because they did something only to themselves that the law prohibits, being careful to consider the cost to society at large in terms of the costs of prosecution and incarceration, as well as the cost of keeping out of prison people who prey on others because there is no room in prison for them. What is that current percentage, something like one in three?
I've seen those stats, they don't jibe with my experiences [people I've known] and those reported through those that I know in Law enforcement. There's a difference there in the numbers of whom are solely convicted for drug possession, versus those who's only crime was drug possession. It's a substantial difference.
The cops I know have a lot to say on that. I don't know one who says they've ever made an arrest solely on drug charges, other than dealers. IOW: No just users.
What they will tell you is how often they arrest someone for some hard-to-prove something. Domestic violence. Suspicion of stolen property. All sorts of things that are actually hard to prove, require testimony from people that in their experience either will change their story or not testify.
But when you arrest the BG, and he's got dope in his pocket... There's your conviction. No matter you can't find out whose 20 stereos are in the back of his car, or that the car he was in was stolen from some illegal immigrants (Who aren't going to report it, and won't testify.)
You can probably drop all of those charges that will cost a bunch to try him and might get him acquitted, if he'll plead out on the drug charges.
When I've discussed this with the cops I know, they tell an almost identical story. They have a lot of people they've arrested and have plead guilty solely to drug charges aren't in prison just because of the drugs.
When you look at those 1 in 3 that have been cited... Look at the original charges against them. It's a game, the police and prosecutors play. A sure conviction with a guilty plea, or try for a jury trial with the costs and uncertainty? (And even then, you might want to check on the prior records of those in jail. In order to get more than a 60 or 90 day stint, they've pretty much had to have a long and distinguished record.)
The few people I've known personally were in that range. They did something illegal, the cops found them, and they ended up writing off the other charges for a guilty plea on the narcotics. In one case, he did this several times before he spent more than a month in jail.
Prohibition of alcohol didn't work
Per what measurements? Alcohol consumption dropped to under 10% of what it had been in some areas, 20% nationally. Crimes involving alcohol, even with the organized crime stepping in dropped dramatically.
The Prohibitionists declared victory early on, due to the changes that were occurring (before the Chicago Mob made it big, press-wise.).
Prohibition - depending on your metrics - can be seen as a success or failure.
prohibition of tobacco wouldn't work
(Actually, it would probably be easier on that than the others - just due to the volume needed for curing and treating and smoking the tobacco prior to sale)
Making it illegal doesn't stop the use or the effects the user has on others, but making it legal does stop the undesired, dangerous, and destructive activities that go on only because it is illegal. On balance, I think that is a good tradeoff.
But it can cut down severely on the use, as Prohibition demonstrated. It can push the use "underground", and hidden, not out in the open.
And I agree with you about the tradeoffs. But they're tradeoffs. Not magic. And looking at other cultures who've either not illegalized mind altering drugs, or allowed their use either legally or via turning a blind eye, I can't see any long term success stories.
And that's where I really don't like trying to conflate gun ownership - where we accept as reasonable all sorts of restrictions and requirements, and insist on responsible gun handling, especially when using them as designed - and mind-altering drugs, which by definition you can't hold people responsible for their actions while under the influence and for whom many are not able to resist the addictive influence.
I've been checking in on the original article and it has been stuck on 2 comments all day. Do you think they are not allowing any more through? Maybe getting ripped a new one?
As for the drug legalization discussion, I'm in favor of ending the war. As it is currently being waged we have the worst of both approaches at the same time. We have millions of people using with all the destruction of lives that creates (the laws aren't doing squat to stop that, sorry Unix-Jedi), while the costs to the leagal system keep going up with no reduction in either the number of users or the amount of drugs available. How that can be considered anything other than a failure I have a hard time understanding.
The number of users would probably increase with some form of legalization, but the number is not an increase from 0 as the drug warriors try to frame it, but the difference between what we have now and the potential increase.
For that increase we gain the billions spent on interdiction, the assault on individual freedoms, less money available for corrupting politicians in all countries, less danger of getting caught in a shoot-out. I'd consider that a good tradeoff.
Oz: "There's a difference there in the numbers of whom are solely convicted for drug possession, versus those who's only crime was drug possession."
Not in the legal system I grew up with...
The one where you aren't guilty unless you're convicted? Or have we changed to a system where the government can claim you committed crimes and that claim stands absent any evidence to support it?
I'm not so naive to suggest that people never get away with crimes. I do question, however, the crude implication that the numbers are ridiculously skewed. I mean, if it's so obvious that there are other crimes going on why aren't they prosecuted? Don't infer more than the data provide.
"I'll grant you the degree of the quibble matters. But the point is, look at a law concerning drugs, or even alcohol, and in almost every case, it's not written and targeted at the person taking the drugs, but the effect once they take effect."
Horse hockey. It's targeted at the ones who make, sell, and use them; they are the ones who spend time in jail if they are caught.
I have known three people who have served time in jail on charges of possession of marijuana. No other charges or suspicions were involved. Two were simply seen purchasing a small amount, and one was stopped and frisked because he smelled of weed. All three are, and always have been, fine, upstanding people, all gainfully employed professionals, all taxpayers, and all with Ph.D's. They have not been deterred from using marijuana since then. For the life of me, I can't see anything positive resulting from these three people being in jail, or from such an approach to drug use.
A small sample, you say? Yup, it is. But read on.
Me:"Prohibition of alcohol didn't work."
You:"Per what measurements?"
It didn't work because it didn't stop people from making, selling, or drinking it. Recreational drug prohibition doesn't stop people from making, selling, or using it. Tobacco prohibition wouldn't stop people from making, selling, or using it. Prohibition doesn't work.
"And that's where I really don't like trying to conflate gun ownership ..."
I prefer to be consistent. The same argument applies to each.
We both make the argument that gun control doesn't work, and that the the primary effect of such prohibition puts law-abiding people at risk and denies them their best opportunity to defend themselves. It's about rights, and the lack of results mitigages against denying those rights.
I also make the argument that drug prohibition doesn't work, and that the primary effect of such prohibition puts law-abiding people at risk from which they have little ability to defend themselves, even if they are armed. Again, it's about rights, and the lack of results mitigages against denying those rights.
Let's do a bit of comparison, shall we?
Begin with tobacco, which is used by somewhere between 20 and 25 percent of adults in this country. One in three who use it as intended by the manufacturers will die from it. Likely my father did, as he died at age 45 from a heart attack that dropped him in his tracks, as it were. Likely my mother did, as she died at age 84 from lung cancer. Both were lifetime smokers, beginning in the 1930's with unfiltered cigarettes.
There's more. About half of all fires (house, grass, and the like) are caused by careless smokers. Lots of traffic accidents are caused by drivers who cannot muster the attention or coordination to keep control of their vehicle while fumbling with a goddamned cigarette. Even worse, tens of thousands of people die every year simply because they breathe the same air as smokers.
It is addictive and it is expensive. It's easy to start, if you can get past the goddamned stink, but after it's been used for a while, it's goddamned nearly impossible to stop using it.
It's a product that kills people and breaks up families. I was made a victim of it at age nine. It wasn't nice.
Continue with alcohol. I don't know the percentage of adults who use it, but I know very few adults who don't. Even my cardiologist (a Muslim from Pakistan) suggests strongly that I drink red wine every day, citing his own confidence in the studies which show the benefits to the heart thereof.
But it kills an awful lot of people who use it, and it kills many others who don't. The effects range from the destructive effects of the lessening of inhibitions in assholes, to the lessening of judgment and coordination in drivers, and ends with the rotting of livers and whole bodies in habitual users.
It, too, is a product that kills people and breaks up families. I wasn't a victim of it, by my cousins were. It wasn't nice.
I have no personal experience with recreational drugs. I just ain't interested. But many such drugs are quite similar to tobacco and alcohol in that they are addictive, destructive to the user directly, and destructive to others because of the effects they have on the user.
They, too, are products that kill people and break up familes.
But there is one great distinction between recreational drugs and both tobacco and alcohol. The former is illegal, while the latter are not only legal, they are condoned and used in public by ordinary people, including those who make and/or enforce the relevant laws. I think the law ought to be consistent. I cannot see why tobacco and alcohol are legal, while recreational drugs are not.
My focus is on the wholesale destruction that comes about as a result of making such things illegal. My concern is with the wars that the producers, distributors, and sellers of illegal drugs wage against, not just law enforcement, but everything from individual neighborhoods to whole countries. We don't find that with legal products, now do we?
"But it can cut down severely on the use, as Prohibition demonstrated. It can push the use "underground", and hidden, not out in the open."
Sounds Puritannical to me. Are you afraid people might be having fun?
"I'm very upset that you're not following the closed mindset that was VERY EXPLICITLY DETAILED in the memo and AGREEMENT YOU SIGNED to join the VRWC."
The one where you aren't guilty unless you're convicted?
Which is.. Where?
That's not what it means, and I described what I meant. You would have had to read past it, and deliberately misunderstood my point to say that.
Or have we changed to a system where the government can claim you committed crimes and that claim stands absent any evidence to support it?
Doesn't matter.
You can be guilty with no conviction.
(You can be convicted and be innocent.)
I do question, however, the crude implication that the numbers are ridiculously skewed.
It's hardly crude, and it reflects on your ability to read far more than my descriptive ability.
I mean, if it's so obvious that there are other crimes going on why aren't they prosecuted?
You've got a choice. 3 doors. One door has $0 behind it. the one you picked has $100 behind it. The last door might have $400 or $0.
Do you take the $100? That's the example and the situation. You can go to trial and try and convict, or you can plead it out. The system rewards you for pleading it out, and most defendants are happy with it. But it means that all the other charges aren't prosecuted. It doesn't mean that you aren't guilty of beating your wife. Or stealing the car stereos. Or the car. Because the DA was happy to get you in jail for the drug charge.
Don't infer more than the data provide.
Data, absent any context is worthless. The "1 in 3" statistic deliberately omits relevant data to analyze it, and I think on purpose, to distort the debate.
It's targeted at the ones who make, sell, and use them; they are the ones who spend time in jail if they are caught.
Sorry, DJ, but that's wrong. Drunk Driving laws aren't targeted at drunk drivers. They're targeted at those of us they're going to drive their cars into. Same for the vast majority of drug laws. They're justified because of the actions of the drug-affected towards others. Either directly, or in criminal activities to gain the money. **
For the life of me, I can't see anything positive resulting from these three people being in jail, or from such an approach to drug use.
On that, we can agree. Plus, of all the illegal drugs under discussion, pot's gonna be the "safest" to legalize.
It didn't work because it didn't stop people from making, selling, or drinking it. Recreational drug prohibition doesn't stop people from making, selling, or using it. Tobacco prohibition wouldn't stop people from making, selling, or using it. Prohibition doesn't work.
You didn't tell me your metrics, your measurements. So I'll have to assume you mean that it's an absolute. Without absolute cessation of drugs, alcohol, tobacco use, it's a failure.
But, DJ, dammit, that's not a fair metric. NOTHING is that absolute. But it doesn't mean we shouldn't make murder illegal. Or parking in handicapped spaces. Or .. ANY CRIME. The fact that every law, no matter HOW liberty-preserving will be violated does not mean it doesn't work. Using that metric, what are you left with?
People murder, murder should be legal. People pimp other people, that should be legal. People abuse their kids, so....
No, DJ, that's just past the pale.
During alcohol Prohibition, people drank. But they didn't do it in public. They did it discreetly, and in many cases, people stopped. Crimes dropped.
I once saw a map of DC overlaid with a small dot where there had been a violent crime. There were areas that were near-circles. In the middle of those circles was a green dot. Where a liquor store was. From a metric of crime reduction, Prohibition worked. It made a huge difference! Alcoholism rates dropped dramatically. Inner-cities saw jails running at a fraction of capacity because of the lack of drunken fights breaking out on the weekend.
You may not like that metric. But you can't just ignore it.
I prefer to be consistent. The same argument applies to each.
I disagree, and stated why. Gun ownership doesn't intentionally disrupt the mind. It's almost opposite of the same argument.
But there is one great distinction between recreational drugs and both tobacco and alcohol.
What's the difference between tobacco and alcohol?
They're treated radically differently. Go out, have a smoke. Have 3! Go back to work.
Go out, have a martini at lunch. Have 3! Go back to work.
Will the two outcomes be identical?
Probably not. Because in one case, you're altering your mind and consciousness. With something that isn't physically addictive. Tobacco is. Yes. Incredibly. Alcohol isn't. (To most people. Until you reach a VERY saturated level that usually takes months/years of constant drinking.)
I think the law ought to be consistent. I cannot see why tobacco and alcohol are legal, while recreational drugs are not.
The law's not consistent between alcohol and tobacco (for some obvious reasons.) And what drugs are you calling "recreational"?
My focus is on the wholesale destruction that comes about as a result of making such things illegal.
Who can be against that? But it's not a either-or proposition. And it ignores the wholesale destruction that would follow with making them legal.
Sounds Puritannical to me. Are you afraid people might be having fun?
In a way, I suppose you could say that. I've seen people fall down that rabbit hole of drugs, "having fun". Having so much fun they'd do anything to continue.
** As a side note, the "failure' of the "war on drugs" is usually cited by the plummeting prices of drugs over the last 30 years.
Yet crime to obtain these drugs is still as rampant. Despite the fact that cocaine and meth are incredibly "cheap" by comparison. Property and personal crime has gone UP as prices have done DOWN.
How would legalizing (other than pot) these other drugs change that?
I was mostly trying to be funny, but there's a kernel of truth in there. In our legal system, you aren't guilty until you're convicted. I don't give a damn what they were arrested for. Drug possession in the context you described is a catch-all bludgeon that the police can use to put people in jail because collecting evidence for real crimes was too hard. It's a bullshit victimless crime, just like having an unregistered .50 BMG rifle sitting in a hypothetical California closet.
UJ, you're attempting to conflate an action that directly harms others(murder, pimping, drunk driving etc) with actions that harm no one but the person doing them.
Oh, and in answer to your last question, the change would occur in that the cops could be called if someone tried to nab your stash, and guards could be legally hired to ensure it's integrity. Gangbangers aren't that likely to try their luck against professionals, not after the first couple times. Not to mention there's not nearly as much of a percentage in it for them since the original sellers will no longer have to use the gangs as channels.
They're justified because of the actions of the drug-affected towards others.
Bullshit. Driving while intoxicated on anything and that would be true. But there sure as hell is no law against being blind drunk in your own home.
Drunk in public? I don't think anyone questioned that law. So, stoned in public could be treated the same. But that should not lead anyone to the conclusion that you are saving that person from himself, which is ultimately the moral crusade that underlies all prohibition.
I've seen people fall down that rabbit hole of drugs, "having fun".
You don't even want to discuss my family history of alcoholism. That doesn't mean I'm going to argue in favor of prohibiting alcohol. Largely because the vast majority of people are not and will not become alcoholics.
UJ, you're attempting to conflate an action that directly harms others(murder, pimping, drunk driving etc) with actions that harm no one but the person doing them.
Nope. I asked a question, and by the metric that I was answered, evaluated the other laws. DJ (apparently) put a pass/fail on it that if it's not totally stopped, it's a failure. I'll say that's not a sensible metric at all.
Where is a reasonable metric for intoxicants?
Oh, and in answer to your last question, the change would occur in that the cops could be called if someone tried to nab your stash, and guards could be legally hired to ensure it's integrity.
Which doesn't have anything to do with my last question. (You can call the cops NOW if someone steals your stash. And they'll go looking for it. Not to give back to you, but they will go looking. In terms of effectiveness, I'll take the "illegal" guards over Brinks Rent-a-cop in mindset and equipment.)
You not only didn't answer my question (referring to drug users committing property and personal crime), your reply was a non sequitur and not even that sensible. If drugs were legalized, why would there be a "stash" needing guarding?
What does that have to do with the fact that the dropping prices haven't resulted in dropped crime by those using the drugs? The argument is that by legalizing them (according to the argument dropping the price), that there would be "no need" for crime to pay for them. But we've never seen crime drop even with cost drops.
They're justified because of the actions of the drug-affected towards others.
Sorry, editing error on my part.
"Justified." I meant to put in quotes. Because that's the rationale used for them.
But that should not lead anyone to the conclusion that you are saving that person from himself, which is ultimately the moral crusade that underlies all prohibition.
I understand that prohibition will always have crusaders. But in my particular case, I'm actually not against saving anybody.
I'll let them rot - but only if I can be assured that their rot won't slop on me, mine, or anybody else who doesn't want to be around them.
I'd be OK to have a "Escape from New York" setup where you go in and do whatever drugs you want.
But I'm not going to be oblivious to the obvious problems that are going to pop up, and especially when I'm going to be buying the damn drugs AND paying for medical treatment for the drug users, as well as dealing with crime as a result of drug use. Merely "legalizing" drugs (or alcohol) doesn't deal with any of those issues.
Nope. I asked a question, and by the metric that I was answered, evaluated the other laws.
The proper metric is does the prohibition cause more harm then good. Well, let's look at the Constitutional law effects - very bad on the 4th, bad on the 5th and not looking very good for the 2nd. Not to mention that the whole goddam apparatus is hinged on a such a hideous deceit about "regulating commerce" that it would make even Markadelphia cringe.
The worst part of Prohibition was not the violence of rum runners - it was the expansion of federal power and the general corruption it engendered; crooked cops & judges and citizens who knew it was a farce. Any law that does that should be highly suspect to any thinking person.
The proper metric is does the prohibition cause more harm then good.
I'll disagree on "proper" but it *is* a metric. :)
But that's a very hard one to measure. If you only limit to to the Constitution, probably.
However, the damage to the case of the (especially) 4th is due to our own failures to force government and it's operatives to adhere to the law. Not the law itself. The use of Prohibition as a rationale doesn't mean that the prohibition itself is the reason - it's the rationale. Nor does Prohibition require the damage to the Constitution that we have seen.
Me:"It's targeted at the ones who make, sell, and use them; they are the ones who spend time in jail if they are caught."
You:"Sorry, DJ, but that's wrong. Drunk Driving laws aren't targeted at drunk drivers. They're targeted at those of us they're going to drive their cars into. Same for the vast majority of drug laws. They're justified because of the actions of the drug-affected towards others. Either directly, or in criminal activities to gain the money."
You are using a really bizarre definition of "targeted". To me, the "target" of a law is the person whose behavior is intended to be influenced and/or deterred by the law. Thus, to use your example, drunk driving laws are "targeted" at those people who drive while intoxicated or drive while under the influence.
To say that said laws are "targeted" at "those of us they're going to drive their cars into" makes no sense to me. What behavior of ours would the laws have us change?
You are confusing the notion of whom the law targets with the notion of what justfies the law. The demonstrable risk the drunk driver poses to others is what justifies the law, but the law is targeted at the drunk driver whom the law attempts to deter.
"You didn't tell me your metrics, your measurements. So I'll have to assume you mean that it's an absolute. Without absolute cessation of drugs, alcohol, tobacco use, it's a failure."
I do not argue, and never have, that prohibition laws had no effect or didn't serve as a deterrent. But I note that said laws were widely ignored, all across the country, by people of all demographic groups you care to name. The point is that these laws were ignored by otherwise law-abiding people who believed that they were unjustified. They rebelled, in effect, against those who passed such laws on the grounds that, as Mark Twain noted, there's nothing that needs reforming so much as other peoples' habits.
Now, hold that thought for a bit.
They rebelled in public, quite visibly. "Speakeasies", which are illegal barrooms or saloons, i.e. places for the illegal sale and consumption of alcoholic drinks, were quite common. They were public places that people could walk into and drink alcohol.
You seem to be deliberately missing the point I try to make. I treat the notion of someone trying to do something to himself, i.e. to inflict something only on his own body, as his own business and no one else's. I do so as a matter of right, not of effect. I do not ignore the effects, either on him or others, but I do not think harmful effects to himself overrides the right. That being the case, I see no distinguishing difference between tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, and many other drugs.
Now don't jump to conclusions. Read on.
I try to be consistent in this. I do not support prohibition of alcohol, but I do support severe restrictions on what can be done while under its influence. I do not support prohibition of tobacco, but I do support severe restrictions on where and when it can be used, because using it is one of the very few things you cannot do to yourself without simultaneously doing it to all those around you. I do not support the prohibition of recreational drugs, but, as with alcohol, I would support restrictions on what can be done while under its influence.
You apparently would treat alcohol, tobacco, and various recreational drugs each differently because of their different effects. I, on the other hand, am much more concerned with people's rights, the point being that I would not make self-inflicted harm a crime. The core of this is that I do not supoort restricting self-destructive stupidity, but I do support holding people responsible for the consequences of their actions, including the effects their use of these products has on others.
Now where have I heard this notion before: In this country, we do not restrain people because they might do something wrong, but we hold them responsible for their actions when they do.
Me:"My focus is on the wholesale destruction that comes about as a result of making such things illegal."
You:"Who can be against that? But it's not a either-or proposition. And it ignores the wholesale destruction that would follow with making them legal."
No, it doesn't ignore it, and I haven't ignored it. I'll repeat myself:
"My focus is on the wholesale destruction that comes about as a result of making such things illegal. My concern is with the wars that the producers, distributors, and sellers of illegal drugs wage against, not just law enforcement, but everything from individual neighborhoods to whole countries. We don't find that with legal products, now do we?"
No, we don't find that with legal products. I pointed out in detail the harm that comes from legal use of these legal products. I would expect much the same thing from legal use of legal recreational drugs. Indeed, I pointed that out. I'll repeat myself again:
"Making it illegal doesn't stop the use or the effects the user has on others, but making it legal does stop the undesired, dangerous, and destructive activities that go on only because it is illegal. On balance, I think that is a good tradeoff."
Now, recall that thought I asked you to hold onto. I do not think other people's habits need reforming so much. I prefer to hold them responsible for the consequences thereof, and that could use a great deal of reformation. I think effort would be better spent there than making war on people doing stupid things to themselves.
"Drug possession in the context you described is a catch-all bludgeon that the police can use to put people in jail because collecting evidence for real crimes was too hard. It's a bullshit victimless crime, just like having an unregistered .50 BMG rifle sitting in a hypothetical California closet."
It goes further than that, Oz.
In some states (or perhaps it's a federal law, I don't really know), a law enforcement agency can simply sieze your property, your vehicle, cash, and what-have-you, claiming that it is the result of illegal drug activity, all without arresting you, charging you, arraigning you, indicting you, trying you, or sentencing you. The gubmint can simply steal from you without the slightest pretext of due process of law.
It's a really sad state of affairs when you can be the victim of your own gubmint and be called the victim of a victimless crime, even when there was no crime at all.
Let's go back just a bit:
DJ: You are using a really bizarre definition of "targeted". To me, the "target" of a law is the person
What I said was: in almost every case, it's not written and targeted at the person taking the drugs, but the effect once they take effect.
The effect. Not the person.
This matters. A lot. We treat alcohol and tobacco - both "legal" (For some value of legal) radically differently.
Because of their effect. Tobacco is horribly addictive, but it's not mind-altering in the manner that alcohol is.
There's a reason that doing jobs drunk (Train engineer, airplane pilot, etc.) are federal felonies. Chewing tobacco? Nope.
The point is that these laws were ignored by otherwise law-abiding people who believed that they were unjustified.
Sure. So's every other law. The justness of the law cannot be measured by the brutality of the scofflaws.
They rebelled, in effect, against those who passed such laws on the grounds that, as Mark Twain noted, there's nothing that needs reforming so much as other peoples' habits.
Notable, they didn't vote the bastards out, however.
They rebelled in public, quite visibly. "Speakeasies", which are illegal barrooms or saloons, i.e. places for the illegal sale and consumption of alcoholic drinks, were quite common. They were public places that people could walk into and drink alcohol.
Which is why they were hidden. Behind locked doors. With guards. Open only at certain times. Only to vetted guests. Supplied by alcohol fermented in bathtubs.
Right, those are all hallmarks of "open" and "public" establishments.
I do support holding people responsible for the consequences of their actions, including the effects their use of these products has on others.
And I'm right there with you.
But that's where the analogy with gun rights falls apart - once you start to intoxicate yourself, you're no longer able to be responsible for your actions.
What some of the illegal intoxicants can do make alcohol (which is a depressant) look insignificant.
And are as, or more addictive than tobacco. So you've got the combination of upper, addictive, and mind altering.
Either regulations will limit the effects and dosage (Meaning that the illegal side might still be in big business), or you'll be selling one-shot-death. As I've pointed out, given the current litigation culture, that won't happen.
Unless it's still by the same guys. So if your goal was to defund the vile drug kingpins, you've failed there. (That might not be yours, but it's one that is often cited.)
No, it doesn't ignore it, and I haven't ignored it.
Actually, it does ignore it. We can stop the destruction via government, without legalizing the hardcore drugs.
We don't find that with legal products, now do we?
There's plenty of illegal products we don't see that with, either.
Nothing says we have to do things the way we have been. You're making it an either/or proposition. It doesn't have to be one.
The gubmint can simply steal from you without the slightest pretext of due process of law.
*sigh*
DJ, I like you, but as much as stickler for detail as you, you're shockingly wrong there.
There's complete due process of law. Your item is arraigned, charged, and convicted before asset forfeiture kicks in.
Very processed.
(Nitpicks aside, Asset Forfeiture was a bad idea gone very wrong. The "Due Process" that is conducted is so slanted that Kangaroos are known to complain about the courts. )
There's complete due process of law. Your item is arraigned, charged, and convicted before asset forfeiture kicks in.
Very processed.
Yes, and we're just regulating the commerce in scheduled substances. Oh, what's that? We prohibit that commerce? Well, that's just a form of regulation isn't it? And stop looking at me with that pathetic 'police power' look on your face.
Feh. We've given the bastards the inch and we've taken a mile up the...
Are assets competent to defend themselves now? You don't defend them yourself, you make a claim to them. In other words, you are required to prove that your property is legitimately yours.
Hell, the government can even start the process on hearsay. I have a special place in my heart for those sorts of trials, since I'm from Danvers, MA.
"What I said was: in almost every case, it's not written and targeted at the person taking the drugs, but the effect once they take effect."
Nazzo fast. You also wrote:
"Drunk Driving laws aren't targeted at drunk drivers. They're targeted at those of us they're going to drive their cars into."
I stand by my comments about it.
"We treat alcohol and tobacco ... radically differently. Because of their effect."
Yes, we do. Your concern is more with those effects than with people's rights, and mine is the opposite.
"The justness of the law cannot be measured by the brutality of the scofflaws."
No, but it can be gauged by the gentility of the scofflaws. A law that is routinely ignored by huge numbers of otherwise good, law abiding people, of all demographics across the whole country, is likely an unjust law.
"Notable, they didn't vote the bastards out, however."
Yes, they did, and the law was repealed.
"Which is why they were hidden. Behind locked doors. With guards. Open only at certain times. Only to vetted guests. Supplied by alcohol fermented in bathtubs.
"Right, those are all hallmarks of "open" and "public" establishments."
Of course they used guards and such. It was an illegal activity, remember? But they drank in a place where there were other people whom they didn't know, and anyone who wanted to could do so. They didn't ALL drink only at home in the closet with the light off.
"There's plenty of illegal products we don't see that with, either.
"Nothing says we have to do things the way we have been. You're making it an either/or proposition. It doesn't have to be one."
This country spends huge resources waging war, and calling it literally a war, on those who make, sell, and use recreational drugs. We don't have to do that, and I don't believe we should. And I'm done with repeating myself as to why I believe that.
"There's complete due process of law. Your item is arraigned, charged, and convicted before asset forfeiture kicks in.
Very processed."
"The widespread use of such proceedings, which usually involve assertion of in rem jurisdiction, has also brought many complaints about their misuse to deprive innocent persons of their lawful property. Without a requirement to prove that a crime had been committed, much less committed by the party in possession of the property, it has become too easy for law enforcement personnel to seize and prosecutors to forfeit properties worth as much as $20,000 because it will likely cost the person that much in legal fees to recover them. This is because in such cases the courts no longer abide by the old common law rule that the party in possession is to be presumed the lawful owner unless it is proved otherwise. Thus, a person carrying $6,000 in cash to a vehicle auction where the auctioneer will only take cash may be stopped and his cash seized because it is presumed only a drug dealer would have or carry that much cash.
"The problem is exacerbated by the laws and rules that allow the agencies seizing the assets to keep the money for their operations, including the funding of salaries and promotions, the purchase of vehicles and equipment, and other such things. In addition, there are often not strict controls on how the assets are liquidated, and law enforcement agents are discovered to have acquired forfeited assets, such as vehicles, boats, and other luxury items, without having paid full market value for them, or even anything at all. There have even been complaints about law enforcement officers seizing cash and other assets under the pretext of forfeiture and then just keeping them without reporting the seizure."
Read my earlier comment about it again. I didn't say that siezure without due process was legal. I said it happens, and it does.
You'll reduce costs, reduce risk, and you think that will reduce profit?
Well, yes. My wife is a pharmacist. She works at a hospital. The hospital price for a single tab of percocet is something on the order of two cents. (Yes, that's in tremendous bulk, I know.) The street price of a tab of percocet is roughly $10.
If the junkies could walk into Walgreens and buy the percs directly at even a dollar a pop, there's $9 worth of dealer profit that's going away.
Some of them will buy more, and OD and die, but lots of them already buy as much as they need, they just break into houses to get the money to pay for it at the inflated rate.
Yes, I understand your point about tort law, and don't know enough about law to have an opinion on it or contest it. But I really think that reducing the risks to the middlemen required will reduce the profits garnered from the end users.
You can stand by them, but the "target" part went off on a tangent. My point, to clarify, and I believe you understand (even if you disagree) is that those laws target the effect of the drug in question. They do so for reasons not having to do with the safety of the person taking them.
I believe we're in agreement with that - even if you and I disagree over the justness or rationale of the laws.
A law that is routinely ignored by huge numbers of otherwise good, law abiding people, of all demographics across the whole country, is likely an unjust law.
And if that is your metric, then you've self-refuted that Prohibition was a failure.
I've asked you to define your metric several times, and you've never explicitly done so, and your apparent metric isn't logical. But you've claimed that "Prohibition didn't work". But, DJ, this gets to the root of my point:
BY ANY UTILITARIAN MEASURE IT DID.
Crime. Health Care. Public Safety. All of these were areas where people not drinking were directly affected. In a "positive" manner. So the Prohibitionist pointed to those statistics approvingly.
So therefore using utilitarian metrics AND comparing drug laws to Prohibition is fundamentally unsound.
Yes, I agree with you about the federal money and federal power grab. I have said repeatedly that an argument on "Liberty" grounds works far better. That's a solid bulwark.
But blaming everything that happens anywhere for the US drug war is tiresome and stupid. The Mexican civil war is only tangentially about US guns and US drugs.
"Notable, they didn't vote the bastards out, however."
Yes, they did, and the law was repealed.
The 18th was amended out of existence by the 21st, that's true. ... And I can't find the study of how much turnover had occurred in Congress, and how it affected the votes. As I recall, and I can't cite you right now, the change in the votes came not from the new members (who voted pretty much how the older seat holders had), but in people who had been in the House and voted for it the first time. But there wasn't any sort of noticeable shift in electoral fortunes nationwide as a result of Prohibition.
"Which is why they were hidden. Behind locked doors. With guards. Open only at certain times. Only to vetted guests. Supplied by alcohol fermented in bathtubs.
"Right, those are all hallmarks of "open" and "public" establishments."
Of course they used guards and such. It was an illegal activity, remember?
"Nazzo fast." :)
DJ: They rebelled in public, quite visibly. "Speakeasies", which are illegal barrooms or saloons, i.e. places for the illegal sale and consumption of alcoholic drinks, were quite common. They were public places that people could walk into and drink alcohol.
They can't be "public" and secret and hidden at the same time. Speakeasies - again, a hallmark of the very big cities and Hollywood (portraying them in the big cities.)
That image has perpetuated, but when you get to smaller cities, how many speakeasies were in operation? Sure, a few. But they weren't easy to find, and they were something you didn't want to get caught going to or coming from, hence discretion was in order.
Speakeasies are estimated to have been between 200 and 500k, nationwide.
NYC has some better statistics, and they estimated that there were ~100k in NYC alone.
So, possibly 50%! of all the speakeasies were within 1 (very concentrated!) regional area. There are somewhere in the vicinity of 20k "incorporated" entities in the US. So, an average of 20 for EVERY (other) incorporated entity, presuming that the highest number is correct and they were all functioning at one time.
I'm in a small town with less than 12k full time residents. We've got more than 20 bars and liquor stores today. It doesn't take much to picture what would happen if that was cut to 2 or 3 and what that would mean for the drinking potential.
"Nothing says we have to do things the way we have been. You're making it an either/or proposition. It doesn't have to be one."
This country spends huge resources waging war, and calling it literally a war, on those who make, sell, and use recreational drugs. We don't have to do that, and I don't believe we should. And I'm done with repeating myself as to why I believe that.
But you've left untouched my point to you, that it is not a binary choice. I said that, and you continued to state that it is. You can be done all you want with "repeating" yourself, but you're being totally non-responsive to the subject at hand.
There is nothing that requires the current "War on Drugs" within a framework of prohibiting drugs. Your assertions that there's EITHER one OR the other don't stand alone.
You and I agree totally on ending the "War" on Drugs. We agree in part on the liberty and governmental perspective. Much of the rest of the disagreement is going to be based on a distinction of what metrics we find to be important, and how to measure them.
Not always. See here:
DJ, you did get that I was being sarcastic, right?
Seriously, Asset Forfeiture blows. But again, we've got to be correct in our criticism. As Oz above missed, you can be guilty without ever being convicted. Legally guilty and actually guilty aren't always related. By that same token, anything genuinely seized in asset forfeiture will receive it's day in court. It will get "due process". Yes, it's a laughable due process, and it's realistically a sham unless you're going to spend more to fight it. Yes, it's in reality, governmental theft in many cases.
But on paper, that car and that money got every bit of process due it. Again, if you make the argument about the supposed lack of due process, then you lose when "due process" is followed. Then all that happens is they show you exactly how they did things "by the book".
It's a bad metric to use against assets forfeiture. It's easily disproven/coped with. Don't use arguments that are easily sidestepped by Leviathan. Instead, go after the more substantiative ones. The lack of legal counsel for the "accused" would be far better.
"There have even been complaints about law enforcement officers seizing cash and other assets under the pretext of forfeiture and then just keeping them without reporting the seizure."
That's not Asset Forfeiture. That's just theft and corruption.
I didn't miss a thing. "Guilty" is a legal status that is assigned only by a conviction. It doesn't just mean "he did it." Note as well that "innocent" is not a legal status - those who are acquitted are merely "not guilty."
In the legal system, yes. It also has a meaning outside the strict legal one, ergo: "What you did."
What you're convicted of is not always what you did. And that was my point about the statistics that only measure "guilty" verdicts without context.
You apparently find it astonishing that prosecutors might be willing to take a sure conviction on drugs and trade off other not-so-sure convictions. But that doesn't mean that the people so sentenced weren't committing other crimes.
Right now, most of those drug convictions (some 80%+) are confessed to. No trial needed. If, as you seem to prefer, every single charge was tried... sure, we'd have a lot better data on crime. And a huge backlog in the courts. (Leading to more acquittals due to lack of witnesses, as well.) Not the way I think you might mean to empty the jails.
The upshot of this is if you legalized drugs, a very large fraction of those people would still living a life of crime. And will be sentenced for something - or will be acquitted (of the theft, burglary, assault, what have you) and freed.
That's not something I'd be looking forward to.
"But blaming everything that happens anywhere for the US drug war is tiresome and stupid."
This is indeed getting tiresome.
I don't blame "everything that happens anywhere for the US drug war" and you goddamned well know it. Now get off your goddamned soapbox and stop the hyperbole.
I'm gonna quote myself one more time and I'm gonna explain it in clear, simple English as I do. I wrote:
"Making it illegal doesn't stop the use ..."
Nope. It never has and it never will.
"... or the effects the user has on others, ..."
Which can be bad. No doubt about it, and I've said so several times.
"... but making it legal does stop the undesired, dangerous, and destructive activities that go on only because it is illegal. ..."
There are most certainly undesired, dangerous, and destructive activities that go on now and would continue to go on if drugs were made legal. I have never stated or implied otherwise. But some of those undesired, dangerous, and destructive activities go on only because drugs are illegal and so making it legal would end them.
You can disagree with that if you want, but I believe it is true.
"... On balance, I think that is a good tradeoff."
I still do.
"And if that is your metric, then you've self-refuted that Prohibition was a failure."
Horseshit. You are being incredibly obtuse.
It is my metric, although it astounds me that you needed me to state so explicitly to understand that.
Laws don't work if people don't obey them and don't believe they should. That accurately describes the response of great numbers of people to laws prohibiting alcohol.
It is not a binary matter, but you appear to think it is. A simple example suffices. If the metric were whether or not everyone obeyed the law, then only one violation would mean the law didn't work, and such is obviously not reasonable.
Your test of the success of prohibition is the effect the laws had on crime rates and such. My test is whether or not the people believed it was just and obeyed it. What is important to you is not the same as what is important to me. Thus, you get one result and I get another. Deal with it.
"But you've left untouched my point to you, that it is not a binary choice. I said that, and you continued to state that it is."
No, you are once again reading words that I haven't written. I have neither stated nor implied, ever, that I believe we are faced with a binary choice in the matter.
There are easily three choices: 1) leave the status quo, in which drugs are illegal and the gubmint makes war on those who make, sell, and use them; 2) leave the laws making drugs illegal but stop the war on those who make, sell, and use them; and, 3) make the drugs legal and stop the war on those who make, sell, and use them. There are many other possibilities, too, but this ought to make the picture clear enough for you to see it.
You would end the war on drugs, and so would I. I would go further and make their use legal, and I have stated why. Your complaint that I believe this to be a binary choice is a complete non sequitur.
"DJ, you did get that I was being sarcastic, right?"
No, I didn't.
Me:"There have even been complaints about law enforcement officers seizing cash and other assets under the pretext of forfeiture and then just keeping them without reporting the seizure."
You: "That's not Asset Forfeiture. That's just theft and corruption."
Call it by whatever pretty name you want. Naming it doesn't change what it is, and it wouldn't happen if we didn't wage a war on drugs.
For all your complaining about specificity of terms, U-J, you don't seem to be able to take some for yourself. I was only ever talking about the legal terms.
You seem to love the idea of having an easy-to-prove crime we can just include in a bundle of charges to make sure that at least one sticks on the wall. I find that to be destructive of liberty, especially when that crime is a victimless one. It's just like in the military; I can add "conduct unbecoming" into the list of charges and use that to hammer a guy even if the proof of the other ones isn't there. I've seen it happen before.
You say drugs make people more inclined to commit other crimes. I don't completely agree, but it's besides the point. All those other crimes are already illegal! If the police would, oh, I don't know, do some actual police work maybe they could prove more of them.
Asset forfeiture is inherently corrupt. Let's look at the chain of events:
1) Police accuse you of a drug crime and confiscate your property.
2) You are never indicted on any of the charges, but your property is "sued. Since you are unable to prove your own property is legitimate, your claim is denied.
3) The property is sold at auction and the proceeds go to fund law enforcement agencies nation-wide.
I'll quote Roger Q. Mills here again, because he was right:
Prohibition was introduced as a fraud; it has been nursed as a fraud.
It is wrapped in the livery of Heaven, but it comes to serve the devil.
It comes to regulate by law our appetites and our daily lives.
It comes to tear down liberty and build up fanaticism, hypocrisy, and intolerance. It comes to confiscate by legislative decree the property of many of our fellow citizens. It comes to send spies, detectives, and informers into our homes; to have us arrested and carried before courts and condemned to fines and imprisonments. It comes to dissipate the sunlight of happiness, peace, and prosperity in which we are now living and to fill our land with alienations, estrangements, and bitterness.
It comes to bring us evil-- only evil-- and that continually. Let us rise in our might as one and overwhelm it with such indignation that we shall never hear of it again as long as grass grows and water runs.
Now get off your goddamned soapbox and stop the hyperbole.
I'm not on the soapbox, DJ, but you are.
I'd tell you to go back, and look at what you don't address, and what I asked of you, but it's obvious that you've got a belief, and by god, facts are irrelevant to them.
It is not a binary matter, but you appear to think it is.
I specifically say that it's not. Repeatedly. And call upon you to stop saying that it is.
And you're calling me obtuse?
DJ, you've lost sight here of the entire issue and what I'm saying.
Me: But you've left untouched my point to you, that it is not a binary choice.
You: It is not a binary matter, but you appear to think it is.
You've let your emotion cloud your judgement, and you've totally lost sight of the issue at hand.
but this ought to make the picture clear enough for you to see it.
That was my point from the beginning. I've understood it clearly the entire time. I've pointed it out several times. I guess it's time to say "Thanks for seeing it my way."
You: "That's not Asset Forfeiture. That's just theft and corruption."
Call it by whatever pretty name you want. Naming it doesn't change what it is, and it wouldn't happen if we didn't wage a war on drugs.
It's not a "pretty name".
It's something totally different, and lumping them in together just proves that you're incapable of understanding the issue.
Theft under color of authority occurred before "asset forfeiture" was a legal gambit, and will occur if it's not allowed. It's something completely bloody different.
Have you allowed emotion to cloud your views so much that you can't see that arguing past a point, to something totally different, won't help you against what you're trying to get rid of?
I suppose it's going to be worthless to point out to you that the "War on Drugs" wasn't even where asset forfeiture started. It started with taxes.
It expanded into drugs. It's been misused horribly. It existed before the "War on Drugs".
A due process is followed during asset forfeiture. Which was what you claimed didn't occur. I agree with you, you dunderhead, that it's not fair, good, or anything I support. But there is a bloody "due process" that's followed.
Arguing against AF on the grounds that there is no due process is laughable, and not sustainable as a policy argument.
Kevin, some day I'm gonna sit down with a huge vat of hot tea and read your writings from start to finish. There is evidently too much good stuff to pass up, and this in one.
U-J, the crux of the difference between you and I on this matter can be found in your response to Oz:
"You apparently find it astonishing that prosecutors might be willing to take a sure conviction on drugs and trade off other not-so-sure convictions. But that doesn't mean that the people so sentenced weren't committing other crimes."
No, but it doesn't mean they were committing other crimes, either.
"The upshot of this is if you legalized drugs, a very large fraction of those people would still living a life of crime. And will be sentenced for something - or will be acquitted (of the theft, burglary, assault, what have you) and freed.
That's not something I'd be looking forward to."
The bottom line is, you would trade a bit of liberty for a bit of security. I wouldn't.
You would incarcerate people for doing things to themselves that ought not to be illegal just to get them off the streets. I wouldn't.
If we read the Declaration of Independence, we find that this country was formed, at least in part, to guard against such:
"[King George] has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
[...]
"For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences"
Well, you wouldn't actually deport drug users, would you? But I think "pretended offences" is accurate, even if Ol' Tom spelled it wrong.
the crux of the difference between you and I on this matter can be found in your response to Oz:
I think I should back up and restate what my "view" is.
* The "War on Drugs" is bad.
* Asset Forfeiture is ghastly. but
* Drug Legalization will not be a panacea.
and
* Drug Prohibition in the US is not responsible for all the world's ills.
(And as a practical matter:
* Any realistic drug legalization will not be understricted. Any restrictions will still lead to lawbreaking and criminal activity.)
Yup. People will continue to use them and such use will continue to cause serious problems. I have stated so repeatedly.
"Drug Prohibition in the US is not responsible for all the world's ills."
Yup. I have never stated or implied otherwise.
"Any realistic drug legalization will not be understricted. Any restrictions will still lead to lawbreaking and criminal activity."
Yup. I think you meant "unrestricted". I would expect any restrictions to be largely ignored, just as they are now with alcohol.
I agree with all that.
What I would do comes from this simple principle, which I stated in my first comment of this post:
"I have no quibble about a druggie doing to himself whatever he wants to, provided when he does it to himself he does it to only himself."
So, I would not ban the use of recreational drugs. As with alcohol, and so to help prevent harm to others, I would place restrictions such as when and where they can be used, and such as what can be done when under their influence. In all cases, I would hold people responsible for the consequences of their actions when they use them.
I believe in freedom and liberty. I do not believe in trying to save people from their own stupidity.
"Asset Forfeiture is ghastly."
Yup. It is a consequence of the war on drugs.
No, it is not.
Asset Forfeiture in this country predates the Constitution! It was used under the Articles of Confederation! It's been used throughout the years by taxing authorities. The IRS has been using it since the IRS's inception. The IRS was making so much money via it in the 70s, that AF was brought to bear in the new "War on Drugs." Because it was a successful (again, with the metrics, they're important, from a governmental perspective) tactic.
Let me repeat this for you:
IT PREDATES THE CONSTITUTION IT WAS NOT A RESULT OF THE 1970s "WAR ON DRUGS".
Continuing to insist that it is is wrong.
Wrong.
Factually incorrect.
Unsupportable.
I've been trying to get across to you that a Utilitarian argument against Prohibition fail miserably.. I came by this belief by getting my ass kicked years ago on this topic when I tried to argue i.e.!
You've been frothing at these points - such that you can't even track the damn argument and were lecturing me that "maybe you can make me see" what was the point I started out with. You're swinging wildly, incorrectly, and non-factually.
Liberty is a usable argument against prohibition. As I have repeated multiple times.
All your other arguments fail.
But you won't stay on the liberty argument that we can agree with.
You'll instead keep using arguments that are false..
"Drug Prohibition in the US is not responsible for all the world's ills."
Yup. I have never stated or implied otherwise.
Bullshit.
Not even slightly defendable. Just now! You've blamed the "War on Drugs" for. Asset Forfeiture which predates the War on Drugs by almost 200 years. You've said the "War on Drugs" is responsible for corruption under power of authority, ("Call it by whatever pretty name you want. ") and utterly refused to consider that they're not at all related. While you may not, others in here have repeatedly made claims, such as the one starting out, that the civil war in Mexico is because of the War on Drugs.
You've insisted on shifting the goalposts around to defend a utilitarian arguments. Yes, you have.
That's exactly what you've done, DJ.
The bottom line is, you would trade a bit of liberty for a bit of security. I wouldn't.
It's a great line, sure, shows me.
Except it's not true. You, and I, make that tradeoff daily. There's no way not to make it. You even, later, admit to it, per restrictions on a theoretical non-prohibition: "Yup. ... I would expect any restrictions to be largely ignored"
But you'd expect them. And you'd probably expect them to be enforced. Like when someone drives drunk - you don't have to wait until they hit and injure someone.
I'm good with that, are you?
If you are, then ... you're trading "liberty" for "security".
I would hold people responsible for the consequences of their actions when they use them.
DJ:
Quite simply, this is impossible with intoxicants.
The law recognizes differences in behaviors while intoxicated now. We make allowances for that. Only in a very few cases and states - and as a result of high-profile and well-publicized tragedies, is causing injury or fatality by drunk driving treated anywhere near as harshly as sheer recklessness or intentional harm.
Because of the effect of the intoxicant.
A couple of years ago, My toolbox in the back of my truck was stolen. I was away on vacation, and reported it when I got back.
About a week later, I got a call from the police to see if I could ID some evidence.
Yup, was some of the things that had been in my toolbox. Only thing of worth was a hydraulic floor jack. A Tarp (still in the wrapper) and a couple of small tools.
They'd found the guy who stole it. At the time they arrested him, he'd broken into a stretch Hummer Limo and was carving the seats up. 6 cops, 3 taser shots later, they have him in custody. They have to strap him into a restraint chair where he eventually passes out. Waking up many hours later, he's panicked until he sees a policeman. "Oh. What did I do this time?" He reportedly asked. They searched where he was staying, found a little of what was left of my stuff and some other things that had obviously been stolen.
He claimed, via the detective, and I believe both of them, not to remember anything of the previous week and a half. He liked to get high. He didn't care what with. Or how. He went to a dealer he knew, who had some special concoction and mix. (I was told what he called it and I've forgotten.)
The Detective told me that the blood test for drug residue came back "Yes". (To everything, in case you're not getting the "humor" there.) He'd been taking this concoction which was a mix of damn near everything, and he wanted more more more. So he went around stealing - well, even stuff like my tool box that was "tied down".
They didn't charge him with the theft of my belongings. I got a groveling letter from the DA to explain it. yes, they were where he was staying. With a lot of other people. Yes, they're sure he's who took them, yadda yadda. But he was willing to take a 10 year-before-parole plea bargain, and the DA was good with that. (DJ, since they caught him red handed and on dash-cam with the destruction of property, he's also charged and plead guilty to felony destruction of property, so he's not one of your '1 in 3' stat.)
He doesn't remember doing anything in the spree that got him 10 years. The detective told me that he's very remorseful, and asked for an apology to be extended to everybody he stole from and who he injured. The detective said he said "I just don't know what I'm doing when I'm high." He asked him if he was going to be straight now. He said "Man, I'll be honest with you, I don't know how I ever will." He had a record, he's been in jail a fair bit, rehabbed several times. But he can't resist the call of getting high.
How do you hold him "accountable" for his actions once he's rendered himself unaccountable mentally?
(Putting him in prison for ten years isn't "holding him accountable"? - Ed.)
Once he had his drugs, once he took them, reason and logic as you and I see them weren't available. He could reason and use logic "I need more of this!" to some degree, but in reality, he was impaired and any and all laws didn't matter at that point. Add to that that he was addicted to several drugs...
This is getting long enough, and there are a whole lot of bigger issues that play into it. The fact he's never held a job, yet was able to afford food and housing, and spend all of his time (since it all was "spare" intoxicating himself...
But I have to say that when it comes to deliberately losing your faculties, especially to something addictive, reality intrudes into the nice hypotheticals.
No, I didn't.
If you'll go back, I said that the Drug War was not the root cause of many ills - specifically being blamed.
I said that arguing for liberty was the best case against Prohibition, be it drugs or alcohol.
I said - and demonstrated repeatedly - that the utilitarian claims against Prohibition are usually directly wrong, and at least are arguable.
Stick to Liberty.
I will say that our current renaissance in crime is largely due to the facts that we're using drug laws to lock up minor offenders and those criminally-minded for longer times.
I'll also not that "vagrancy" laws were used long before any "War on Drugs" to separate those addicted to drugs, and aren't any sort of new discovery. (i.e., locking up the potential troublemakers isn't new, revolutionary, and at the time wasn't seen as the infringement on liberty we'd now dismiss it as.)
We're talking here about the consequences of laws regarding the use of recreational drugs, aren't we? What I meant was that, if recreational drugs were legal and the gubmint didn't make war on those who use them, then the gubmint wouldn't go about confiscating the property of people because the property might (read "may or may not") have some association with those drugs. I meant nothing more than that. If you weren't clear on it, if you wondered if I meant anything further, what you should have done (as I have told Markadelphia many times) is ask me what I meant, instead of telling me what I meant.
Do you have to have every thought someone writes spelled out for you so explicitly?
You:"Drug Prohibition in the US is not responsible for all the world's ills."
Me:"Yup. I have never stated or implied otherwise."
ENOUGH.
Read your own words: "... all the world's ills." That's "ALL" the world's ills. This is HYPERBOLE and a straw man to boot, and you goddamned well know it.
You will not find anything in what I wrote that states, or implies, in any way, shape, or form, that I believe ALL THE WORLD'S ILLs (your words, not mine) are caused by drug prohibition in this country.
I've told Markadelphia many times in the past, and now I'll tell you: If you have a point to make, you don't need to submerge it in bullshit. If you're right, you don't need it. If you're wrong, it won't make you right.
Now, kindly STOP THE GODDAMNED HYPERBOLE.
Me:"The bottom line is, you would trade a bit of liberty for a bit of security."
I'll quote your own words, which are what led me to make that statement:
"But when you arrest the BG, and he's got dope in his pocket... There's your conviction. No matter you can't find out whose 20 stereos are in the back of his car, or that the car he was in was stolen from some illegal immigrants (Who aren't going to report it, and won't testify.) You can probably drop all of those charges that will cost a bunch to try him and might get him acquitted, if he'll plead out on the drug charges."
"A sure conviction with a guilty plea, or try for a jury trial with the costs and uncertainty?"
"You can go to trial and try and convict, or you can plead it out. The system rewards you for pleading it out, and most defendants are happy with it. But it means that all the other charges aren't prosecuted. It doesn't mean that you aren't guilty of beating your wife. Or stealing the car stereos. Or the car. Because the DA was happy to get you in jail for the drug charge."
"The upshot of this is if you legalized drugs, a very large fraction of those people would still living a life of crime. And will be sentenced for something - or will be acquitted (of the theft, burglary, assault, what have you) and freed.
That's not something I'd be looking forward to."
That'll do. Your own words tell me that you apparently are content (perhaps not the right word, but it'll do) with trading a bit of liberty (the right to use recreational drugs, i.e. the right to do to yourself whatever you want to) for a bit of security (the ability to incarcerate people more easily, particularly when you wouldn't otherwise be able to). I think my statement is thus fully justified and is accurate.
I don't accept that the utilitarian value, as a law enforcement tool, of making recreational drugs illegal justifies the abrogation of rights it requires. That's my opinion.
"But you'd expect them. And you'd probably expect them to be enforced. Like when someone drives drunk - you don't have to wait until they hit and injure someone.
I'm good with that, are you?
If you are, then ... you're trading "liberty" for "security"."
I don't know that I fully understand what you're asking, bit I'll respond anyway.
Putting something into your own body is something I view as a right, but driving on the public roadways is a privilege, not a right. So, I have no problem with allowing someone to consume alcohol, and I have no problem with pulling them off the road if they drive while under its influence. The former is upholding a right in the interest of liberty, and the latter is denying a privilege in the interest of public safety.
I'm good with that. Are you?
FINALLY, go back to this recent post of mine, and note that my response to your statement as to what your "view" is, is that I agree with it, except that I would not make recreational drugs illegal. I stated why, on the grounds of freedom and liberty, I would do so.
In particular, note that this is not a court room, I am not being cross-examined aa a hostile witness, and no judge is ordering me to answer your questions. It is nothing more than cheap theatrics for you to assume that any question that is not answered explicitly and in gruesome detail implies that the unwritten answer is favorable to you. What you should assume is that what appears in writing to be a screaming rant by you is often not worth responding to.
That's my opinion, and I don't really care what you think about it. Stop the strawmen and stop the hyperbole and I might think otherwise.
I was kind enough, as you quoted utilitarian argument after argument, based on emotion, and counterfactual not to bring up Mark and his habit of doing exactly that.
Now if you want to bring him up, raise your eyes to the top of the screen, and see who moved goalposts, cited non-sequitur, and ended up demanding that I accept what had been my point from the beginning - thus proving you'd lost track of WHAT you were arguing... You know. Like we point out Mark does.
If you want to evade all of that and try and pull a bullshit Markadelphia "SEE SEE SEE!!!" scoring a point, yeah, OK, fine.
I was wrong.
"All the world's ills"was hyperbolic.
Yep, you win! You get your point! Nevermind what you said before that was factually wrong.
Because that doesn't matter, right?
(Wait, isn't that what you and I together tried to pound into Mark's head, that you've got to be factual in your assessments in order to understand? That we're engineers, and demand hard facts and the context within which they matter?)
Oh, well, my bad.
You're right, I overstated the case, you didn't blame all the ills (just a lot of them that are obviously and easily proven to be unrelated) of the world on The Drug War.
How do you hold him "accountable" for his actions once he's rendered himself unaccountable mentally? (Putting him in prison for ten years isn't "holding him accountable"? - Ed.)
1) It was for drug possession, not really his actions under the drugs. (Yes, in this case, they were able to cite him for what they caught him red handed doing. But that conviction is being served concurrently with the drug charge. Without that, I think they're pretty sure who he was, and they'd have busted him shortly. As they say in England, he was "Known to the Authorities.")
2) Not really. At best it approximates it. It's retribution. It's for actions he (apparently) took with no knowledge of them. This is the crux of the entire problem - how can you hold someone accountable when by black-letter-law, they're not accountable?
It's the closest thing we've got to "accountability", and it's as close as we can come, but no, it's not what I would call really holding him accountable for his actions. We're holding him accountable for taking the drugs and intoxicating himself.
It's not really "holding him to account" for those things - hell, we - and he - have no idea what all he did.
It isn't a "point", and it isn't about "points". I don't keep a goddamned score.
I have stated several times that I agree with your "view" of the matter of recreational drug laws except that I would make them legal and you would keep them illegal. We have different opinions on the matter. I've stated mine and I've stated the reasons for it. At this point, I couldn't care less what yours is or why it is.
Enough.
I'm done with you.
I'm done with your jumping to conclusions, your attributing to me words that I didn't write and thoughts that I don't have and didn't express. It is not possible to clarify any such matters with you because you continually diverge onto endless ranting tangents when I try.
Think what you wish. I can't for the life of me care one whit.
Actually, DJ, I had intended that to be my final say on the matter, but as you very well know, I've got a personal failing when someone isn't honest about me, my positions and statements.
I've stated mine and I've stated the reasons for it.
I pointed out that many of those "reasons" were totally counterfactual - the exact same thing that you and I have lambasted Mark in the past about his views. Instead, you just repeated them then ignored the problems with them, rather than admit anything.
endless ranting tangents
I addressed the points you brought up. The rationales that you were using. You can be as irrational and dishonest as you please.
But it's not my problem.
I started off countering an incredibly stupid comment. You came in and have refused to admit any of your blatant errors, your own hyperbole, your own hypocrisy.
Whether you're keeping points or not, there's one of us, and it's not me, who's twisted around to the point where they lost track of their own argument. Who has made ludicrous statements unbacked by facts. refused to admit when he was trivially wrong.
Flail and raise your tone all you want, it doesn't change when Asset Forfeiture was first used by the pre-US Government. It doesn't change the crime stats. Or the election results. Or the facts. Remember the good old days (of last week) when facts were what we insisted on?
Metrics matter, DJ. They matter when Markadelphia is being stupid. They matter when I'm being stupid. They matter when you're being stupid.
Thus my initial attempts to define which metrics you were using. "Failure" is a description that's widely differing in meaning. (Again, this sounds like something familiar...)
You preferred to raise the ire rather than substance.
Metrics matter. Because your claim that "Prohibition was a failure" is a very arguable concept, depending on what statistics you claim as your basis. Property crime, assaults, murders don't support that thesis. (Per capita, of course.)
I argue that point, using statistics.. You instead invented a whole NEW "type" of statistic ([insert chorus here]), the "otherwise law abiding citizen" stat... Which I didn't even bother detailing delegitimizes parking laws, speed limits, zoning....
No, DJ, you can't take your reputation as a fact-minded arbiter out of this. I'm sorry that you'd rather scream to the hills rather than admit to cold hard facts, but again, that's not my problem. You foamed and flamed over "all the world's ills" like a true victim. But you know that it was a minor bit of hyperbole, and you never addressed the substantiative issues behind it. Nitpick it if you insist, and I apologized for, but you didn't address the issues. Just the form.
I'm sorry if this makes you feel angry with me, or less of me.
But as I've said to Mark, who's probably a fine fellow in person, many times: Is what I'm saying backed by the facts is what I strive to ensure in my own thinking. That's why I have to raise a nit about Asset Forfeiture, where a very explicit process is detailed for any and all. That doesn't mean I agree with it, but it means that my argument against AF is factually based and upon the failure in the "due process". You can just scream that there is no due process!!!elvenety!11!! One argument is factual. One's emotional. One gets totally owned when a book, detailing the "process" is used to rebut the accusation in totality. (No, you didn't say "elvenety". Thats hyperbole. Apologies in Advance. You did, however, say that police corruptly pocketing items was the same thing "Call it by whatever pretty name you want. Naming it doesn't change what it is". See, isn't the hyperbole better?
I've argued your side on Prohibition, and I had my ass handed to me on a damn platter of FAIL.
Using utilitarian metrics isn't the way to argue against Prohibition. I've said that, I stand by it, and if this thread alone doesn't prove why, well, you'll never understand.
I shall have a nice day, thank you. I'm sorry that you're going to break from your oft-stated principals over something so (realistically) trivial and meaningless.
We're all due our foibles, and we're all human. I certainly have my own set of failings - notably the inability to let insults and smears to my rationality, logic, and intelligence go unanswered by someone who's confused, evasive, and allowing emotion to swamp their reason.
You used to like that. Ah, well. People change. Que Sera, Sera...
How do you hold him "accountable" for his actions once he's rendered himself unaccountable mentally?
Stop buying the bullshit excuse. He is ALWAYS accountable. Whether there are mitigating circumstances does not change that. [Speaking as a matter of ethics, not as a matter of law - the law on this is wrong.]
A lot of people have been killed by drunk drivers because we for too long bought the bullshit excuse.
I'm willing to bet you there are more people out there getting as high as this guy but not doing what this guy does. So does EVERYONE get a free pass? Have we not discussed moral hazard before? This is another wonderful instance of it.
"It's for actions he (apparently) took with no knowledge of them. This is the crux of the entire problem - how can you hold someone accountable when by black-letter-law, they're not accountable?"
How is this any different from charging someone with murder if he holds up a liquor store and the cops shoot his partner in the holdup? Once you choose to ignore the danger your actions place your neighbors in, you are responsible for all crimes that follow from that choice. Current law, at least in some states, recognizes this concept, does it not?
Yes, the guy was completely unaware of what he was doing, or wasn't thinking straight, or whatever. He was "impaired". He chose to put himself into that state, regardless of potential danger to those around him. Just the same as if he chose to hold up a liquor store, and didn't think things through enough to realize or care that people might die because of that choice. The cop pulled the trigger, but his and his partner's choices are the actions that led to the death, not the actions of the cop. Or am I misunderstanding how the law addresses such things?
The point I made originally is still the one I stand by. You know, the one you haven't even mentioned. No, far better to froth and flail, call me names, and ignore the gist.
As I've said repeatedly: Using utilitarian arguments is not the way to argue against Prohibition. Those arguments do not succeed using historical examples. Use Liberty as your metric.
(I feel like someone begging the British not to charge Over the Top in WWI. Or telling Custer to wait for the reinforcements and take artillery and automatic weapons.)
On the basis of consumption per capita of liquor, Prohibition was one gigantic, screaming, fucking SUCCESS.
EXACTLY!. Thank you! By That Metric. If you make the quite-often-heard argument that liquor consumption went UP during Prohibition, (and thus it would be assumed that drug use would go DOWN if they were legalized) then you're wrong. (That's also about the only really-wrong, oft-heard argument that didn't surface previously.)
You don't get to pick and choose what facts you like, Juris. (Again, this sounds really familiar.) Frothing and flailing around irrationally doesn't work well for Mark, it doesn't work well for anybody else.
That was the biggest load of pedantic bullshit I've read in a while.
Wait, I thought it was a strawman. Now it's pedantic bullshit?
It can't be both. A strawman is something misstated and blown out of proportion, pedantic bullshit is nitpicking the smallest things. (Now, if you're talking about the screaming crying fit over "all the world's ills", you'll have a point.)
My points might well be pedantic. But you now will be hypocritical if you insist that Mark, or anyone else, be factually correct in their arguments. After all, what you feel is more important than facts.
I sure have enjoyed being a bystander in this conversation.
I think, Unix-Jedi, that folks don't always get what you mean when you say "stick to the liberty argument." I've said something similar to that, whenever there is this type of conversation... and the general response to me is something along the lines of "FASCIST!" It just means that the only argument that cannot be shot full of holes is the liberty one... and it's a good one, but it isn't powerful enough to get people to change their mind on the topic. They can easily "agree to disagree" and no one likes that outcome.
As you've done an excellent job of detailing, prohibition is "bad" only as a subjective statement. "Bad" how? In reducing deaths of cirrhosis?
A nuance of the discussion (that is seldom mentioned) is that Prohibition only federalized a criminalization of liquor. Many states had it on the books. Some areas still have those laws. Many wanted Prohibition overturned because they didn't believe it was a matter that should be decided at the Federal level. That is a lesson on how to frame the liberty argument: leave it to each state to decide. A similar liberty argument is to find out where in Article 1, Section 8 we gave Congress permission to legislate anything in this arena (although it appears more and more each day that Congress doesn't refer to the Constitution for anything anymore).
If we were arguing this the way that many do, we'd respond with wild-ass claims such as, "Don't you care about people dying from cirrhosis?" "You can save lives!"
I think the problem occurs (and it isn't exclusive to this subject) is that people don't like facts that don't support their theories. They'll go emotional, rather than rational, when they don't have them.
When my husband made the statement on his blog once that if the data didn't support that gun ownership was a net benefit to society, that he have a hard time supporting the 2A. You'd have thought he'd murdered a million kittens! If the stats were reversed, say that 90% of gun owners used guns to commit crimes (instead of using them to STOP crimes), then we wouldn't have an argument. But we DO, because the facts don't support that conclusion.
I also noted that it was dern-near impossible for folks to separate out the abuses of government as causal. There may be correlation, but not cause. We could keep drugs criminalized and remove no-knock warrants, seizure of property without hearing, etc. We could stand united against the abuses of government, but we don't want to be united. Our "side" can't win that way.
In that regard, this topic is very similar to the abortion one, where middle ground is impossible to find. Because of that, we have the status quo, where no one does much to reduce the numbers (both in terms of those who have/use or work to fix the abuses of government), because they like the noise. It supports their argument that whatever-it-is is bad/evil and should be absolutely reversed.
Perhaps, given that you are in Texas, you were aware of this remarkable event when it happened. Note the date of the article, "September 18, 1984", and the source, "New York Times". Point is, the repeal by the voters of laws prohibiting "liquor by the drink" in Oklahoma was about to happen and it was news on a national level.
Well, it did happen, but all it did was remove the state prohibition, leaving the question up to the voters of individual counties. See this article, and the date, "Jan 5, 2004", which states:
"In September 1985, the state passed the liquor by the drink law and most counties followed suit within the next few years. Forty counties have voted yes, while 37 do not allow the sale of liquor by the drink. Twenty-five of those 37 have never voted, ..."
... which means twelve did vote, and the vote was "no". That was current as of five years ago.
"Nothing so needs reforming as other people's habits." -- Mark Twain
I think the problem occurs (and it isn't exclusive to this subject) is that people don't like facts that don't support their theories.
Speaking of which, one is people trying to duck the uber [Progressive] moralism that underlay Prohibition.
I offered the example to U-J that if ALL that were prohibited was being stoned in public, or driving while stoned, I would agree with the "public safety" argument. But he insisted that that position ALSO covers what someone does in the privacy of their home (because they MIGHT do something due to not being in their right mind). Now, what does THAT argument sound like - something about those "extra dangerous" AWs?
I don't know how you can claim to argue liberty, let alone utility for that. It is nothing but pure public moralizing.
"Immigrants are going back to Mexico because of a bad U.S. economy."
Anytime I'm reading something and come across a completely silly assertion, I pretty much quit.
2. In the thick end of twenty years as a prosecutor, I have never- not once- seen anyone given a custodial sentence for ONLY drug possession.
3. Remember, once upon a time all drugs WERE legal. History tells us that the social problems that appeared to result from that state is what convinced our ancestors to make them illegal.
4. Unix is right, by any sensible utilitarian measure prohibition succeeded. Yes, X more gangsters were murdered. But X x Y fewer people were killed on the roads. I'd trade fifty dead criminals for a hundred dead citizens any day. And the consumption of alcohol DID go way down.
5. This is just w*nking- drugs are not going to be made legal anytime soon. You need a prescription for penicillin!
No way the doctors and the ETOH business will let that happen.
Yes, X more gangsters were murdered. But X x Y fewer people were killed on the roads. I'd trade fifty dead criminals for a hundred dead citizens any day. And the consumption of alcohol DID go way down.
Yet today 2.9% of the population represents almost half of the victims of homicide - almost all of said homicides being related to the drug trade. And that's just on this side of the border.
There's something very not right about that.
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Tentative mapping of comments to original article, corrections solicited.
Mr. Navarrette has, as his side so often does, personified inanimate objects.
Yep. Like I said, the way he talks you'd think there were herds of feral weaponry roaming the countryside and terrorizing the Mexican people all by themselves.
Just once I'd like to come across a herd of feral free-range N-frame Smith & Wessons trying to cross my street. (They are always "on the streets" aren't they? Carolyn McCarthy wouldn't lie to me!)
I stand by what I said in the other thread: As long as the people calling for bans on guns are the same people encouraging illegal immigrants to come and stay, I call bullshit. Mr. Holder, you don't give a rat's ass about gun smuggling, if you did you'd be raising cain about actually attempting to secure the border.
You are right, but you don't focus on the main issue here. You focus on the fact that our libtard politicians are idiots. That's true, but the fact remains that it's the war on drugs that makes drug running profitable.
Take away the profit motive and you take away the problem. The USA needs to decriminalize drugs now. The government should be the sole supplier for "hard" drugs, and people should be allowed to grow their own for limited consumption. If you can't afford your drugs you can pick them up for free. They cost very little to produce, and you've taken out virtually all of the profit motive and excitement about producing/selling/using them. Seems to be working in Switzerland.
Sounds just wonderful.... right up until you mentioned putting the .gov in control.
Think about that for just a second...
The government should be the sole supplier for "hard" drugs
Good thing that's essentially never been tried before.
people should be allowed to grow their own for limited consumption.
Really. And you don't see an obvious problem there with those two emphasis-added areas?
If you can't afford your drugs you can pick them up for free.
*sigh*
And this is why I have to almost always respond to the druggies.
Why would anybody bother to make their own if you can get it for free?
They cost very little to produce, and you've taken out virtually all of the profit motive and excitement about producing/selling/using them.
People aren't using drugs for the excitement of them. So the government hands out drugs for free, you know, just to destroy the profit motive.
... Hopping bloody crimony, do you druggies have the capability to even pay attention what happened when we did that to money with welfare's various forms?
And you think that somehow, addictive and easily-overdosed DRUGS will work out BETTER?
Look at the metrics in his language, "...as many as...most of...many purchased...many...come in as..." A long time ago, from a single course in statistics I recall the trinity of the mean, the medium and the mode. The number I want to know is the medium, that number of which half of the "as many as 2000!!!!!!" are above and half are below. I also want to know how many days, that is, what is the unit of time being measured? One day? One week? Here it sounds like a unit of time called "as many as 2000 a day". (I am tempted to say what's the problem/ At this rate all the guns in American should be south of the border at the end of the Age Of Obama, some 2800 years from now.) Nevertheless, over the course of a year, if the medium of "illegal alien guns sneaking south" per day was say, 1877, half the daily quantities/occurances would be above this number and half below. This is quite different if the medium number 11 quantities/occurances per day. It's easier to understand using grades and percentages. In a class of 100, if the medium grade was 97%, half the class scored above 97% and half scored below. A very different result if the medium was 33%. Just saying as many as 11 in some cases got as high as 100% on the test tells us nothing. What's the mean, the average number of "sneaking south killers" per day Ruben? Anyone, anyone, Bueller? How about the mode, that number which is the most frequent score? Was it a B+ or a D+? You are quite right about cognitive dissonance Kevin, but you shouldn't use such scary words to describe 'journalists'. It's just not fair that as many as 2000 journalists a day don't know what the facts are.
I want to find some FALs or G3s foraging for 7.62 NATO (or .308 Winchester). After all, for as much carnage they're leaving across Mexico, there must be A LOT of it down there.
Thanks for the heads-up. I posted the first two comments on the article. :-)
All the folks who posted here - please go and post on that article as well. We absolutely must own the comments. We have no choice but to expose and debunk the lies every single time that they happen. You have to register for the site - please go and do it.
Broadsword,
You're actually referring to the "median". Also, knowing either the mean (average) or median (mid-point) would be infinitely more informative than knowing only the peak (an estimated one at that).
But giving us either would probably not be feasible, because all of the numbers regarding this are estimates at best, and more likely just completely fabricated bullshit.
What's your suggestion, Unix-Jedi? The war on drugs has given us this. As more and more of our money goes to the cartels, we'll just get more and more of the same in return.
Fine, take the government out of it. But drug use/production must be decriminalized. This is the only way to take the profit motive out of criminal equation.
"And you think that somehow, addictive and easily-overdosed DRUGS will work out BETTER?"
Well, U-J, I'm not a druggie. I've never smoked anything in my entire life, and I mean never, not a cigarette, not anything.
But I do like the idea of exchanging one deadly problem for another, if it changes who the problem is deadly to and how deadly it is, and does so in an advantageous way. I have no quibble about a druggie doing to himself whatever he wants to, provided when he does it to himself he does it to only himself. Legalizing drugs changes the dynamic from the producers, distributors, and dealers killing competitors, police, and bystanders so the druggie customers can kill themselves to only the druggies killing themselves. Given that the druggies will do so either way, I can live with that.
Good fisk. I'm finally getting traction with the editor on Wikipedia's page called Mexican Drug War regarding the weapons used.
It's a long fight, but one worth fighting.
DJ:
if it changes who the problem is deadly to and how deadly it is, and does so in an advantageous way.
Right.
But there are some severe issues with that.
I have no quibble about a druggie doing to himself whatever he wants to, provided when he does it to himself he does it to only himself.
But that's the problem. Most of the current drug laws aren't because of what the drugs to do a person, but those around them.
Additionally, the action of taking almost all of the drugs in question impairs judgement. Meaning once the drug's taken, you cannot expect to reason logically, or use conventional means to punish/reward. Hell, look at drunk driving alone. Now imagine how hazardous it would be to be anywhere near any road when meth is legal to buy and even more widespread.
As I said to perlhaqr, I'm sympathetic to the "liberty" argument. But from any sort of a utilitarian argument, drug legalization fails horribly. Not only are the people usually advocating it also demanding free-to-the-patient health care with no restrictions, they're usually also the ones who are least likely to demand personal responsibility. But even those who would like to demand it (like you, for example) understand how unlikely it is we'll actually be able to force that massive culture shift as a precondition.
Ben:
What's your suggestion
Stop the invasive war and militarizing the police. Arrest people when their other contact brings them into drug discovery with the police. (Which is the vast majority of drug-related arrests anyway.)
The war on drugs has given us
Many things. Sure. Bad. Many of them, don't get me wrong.
But what you're advocating is policy for sheer damn folly.
As more and more of our money goes to the cartels
Well, then you should be reassured. That problem is mostly solved, they're getting as much money as they can.
Really. The serious crimp on drug smuggling these days is getting the money BACK home. I've seen a stat that for every pound of concentrated cocaine that goes north generates 2 pounds of dollar bills that have to go south.
Fine, take the government out of it. But drug use/production must be decriminalized.
To any and all extend, beyond what we criminalize now for say, alcohol or prescription meds?
This is the only way to take the profit motive out of criminal equation.
No, it makes it far more lucrative.
(Perlhaqr, do you see now why I kind of jumped down your throat this weekend? :) )
If you remove risk then the profit motive goes up. Removing criminal sanctions means that it's more profitable to produce and sell drugs. Ever taken econ? If you did, wasn't one of the textbook cases drug criminalization?
You'll reduce costs, reduce risk, and you think that will reduce profit?
Damn, but this "New Math" is counterintuitive.
That is why decriminalization is simply not enough. The only way to live with this thing is to fully legalize to the extent that alcohol and tobacco have been legalized. You take the profit away from the criminals by taking the business itself away from criminals, or simply allowing/forcing them to function as a real business.
Will this make drug abuse more manageable in this country? Duurrrr, of course not. But this is the only way to end the cycle of drug gangs and cartels shooting it out with each other. Instead, they will have the same protections as any other legal manufacturer of deadly intoxicants, such as booze. Coors and Budweiser distributors don't kill each other.
Recreational drugs, vetted by the FDA, will still be cheaper and safer than illegal drugs sold by criminals. And "gun crime" will be reduced enough to lessen the pressure on our freedoms.
Where am I getting all this? Simple. It's exactly what happened when they repealed alcohol prohibition. Alas, the NFA passed right at about the same time, both as reactions to prohibition's rampant criminality.
Scott:
Wow, long time no see. Congrats on the kid! Sorry to see you guys drop off the 'net, though.
There was an interesting article posted recently by an American who worked in Mexico for about 5 years. The title says it all: You and I Can't Buy the Guns Mexican Cartels Own:
The Administration is Not Dealing Straight With Us on Mexico's Gun Problem. It's worth the read: http://www.gunnewsdaily.com/rw807.html
Full auto weapons, completely unmarked weapons, grenades, RPGs and the like do NOT come through US "gun show loopholes." Such weapons as DO move from the US, such as semi-auto rifles and handguns, tend to go to middle class Mexicans for personal protection FROM the cartels (and frequently purchased, BTW, from corrupt Mexican police departments, as gun ownership is generally highly restricted down there.) The heavy stuff, the things the cartels use against each other and the police, comes from elsewhere, since you just can't get it in the US.
Me: "I have no quibble about a druggie doing to himself whatever he wants to, provided when he does it to himself he does it to only himself."
U-J: "But that's the problem. Most of the current drug laws aren't because of what the drugs to do a person, but those around them."
I'm quibbling about how you worded that, and I think it is a significant quibble. The drugs don't effect those who do not use them, but the people who use the drugs do. So, I think it's more accurate to say: "Most of the current drug laws exist because of what drug users do to the persons around them." Legislation doesn't prevent the undesired behavior, does it? Don't we make precisely the same argument about gun control?
"But from any sort of a utilitarian argument, drug legalization fails horribly."
I disagree.
I do subscribe to the Libertarian argument about it. Consider what percentage of prison inmates are incarcerated only because they did something only to themselves that the law prohibits, being careful to consider the cost to society at large in terms of the costs of prosecution and incarceration, as well as the cost of keeping out of prison people who prey on others because there is no room in prison for them. What is that current percentage, something like one in three?
Prohibition of alcohol didn't work, prohibition of recreational drugs doesn't work, and prohibition of tobacco wouldn't work, all because people quite willingly do stupid things to themselves and will do so even if it is illegal. Making it illegal doesn't stop the use or the effects the user has on others, but making it legal does stop the undesired, dangerous, and destructive activities that go on only because it is illegal. On balance, I think that is a good tradeoff.
Why do I get the feeling that since the advent of Obama that America is a sinking ship, and Obama's trying to save it by drilling holes to let the water out?
I'm quibbling about how you worded that, and I think it is a significant quibble.
I'll grant you the degree of the quibble matters. But the point is, look at a law concerning drugs, or even alcohol, and in almost every case, it's not written and targeted at the person taking the drugs, but the effect once they take effect.
The drugs don't effect those who do not use them, but the people who use the drugs do. So, I think it's more accurate to say: "Most of the current drug laws exist because of what drug users do to the persons around them."
Or are thought to have done, or might do, or the like.
Yes. Right.
Legislation doesn't prevent the undesired behavior, does it?
In totality, no. But there is a deterrent effect that illegality has. As Chris Rock says, "If you jump a [subway] turnstile, you might get a warning. But if you jump a turnstile smoking a blunt with a gun in your waistband [carrying illegally] maybe you need your ass kicked."
Don't we make precisely the same argument about gun control?
If we do, we shouldn't. The problem with these drugs under consideration is that they affect the mind. Otherwise, who'd bother with 'em?
Guns don't. (Yes, they're claimed to by some, but it's hyperbole and easily and often fisked and laughed at.)
That takes your previous quibble and blows it out of the water in terms of quibbling. :)
Guns aren't addictive. (Really, I can quit any time I want!) You can't accidentally pick a gun up, or be snuck one on the sly.
But drugs are addictive. Some people, once they've had a hit of cocaine, heroin, meth, will be immediately hooked. Look at the entire product line of tobacco, which is our closest analog. But tobacco for all it's other vices, doesn't cause reality and perception changes in the mind.
The legality or -il of those drugs, as a result, affects where and how they're taken, pushing them away from the outside world where they might be arrested for mere possession. Remove that, and it's kitty bar the door. The risk-taking you see with drunk driving ("I'sh ko to drivsh, wally. Ish onwy shrresh blocks.") is now available to any of the now-legal substances.
Consider what percentage of prison inmates are incarcerated only because they did something only to themselves that the law prohibits, being careful to consider the cost to society at large in terms of the costs of prosecution and incarceration, as well as the cost of keeping out of prison people who prey on others because there is no room in prison for them. What is that current percentage, something like one in three?
I've seen those stats, they don't jibe with my experiences [people I've known] and those reported through those that I know in Law enforcement. There's a difference there in the numbers of whom are solely convicted for drug possession, versus those who's only crime was drug possession. It's a substantial difference.
The cops I know have a lot to say on that. I don't know one who says they've ever made an arrest solely on drug charges, other than dealers. IOW: No just users.
What they will tell you is how often they arrest someone for some hard-to-prove something. Domestic violence. Suspicion of stolen property. All sorts of things that are actually hard to prove, require testimony from people that in their experience either will change their story or not testify.
But when you arrest the BG, and he's got dope in his pocket... There's your conviction. No matter you can't find out whose 20 stereos are in the back of his car, or that the car he was in was stolen from some illegal immigrants (Who aren't going to report it, and won't testify.)
You can probably drop all of those charges that will cost a bunch to try him and might get him acquitted, if he'll plead out on the drug charges.
When I've discussed this with the cops I know, they tell an almost identical story. They have a lot of people they've arrested and have plead guilty solely to drug charges aren't in prison just because of the drugs.
When you look at those 1 in 3 that have been cited... Look at the original charges against them. It's a game, the police and prosecutors play. A sure conviction with a guilty plea, or try for a jury trial with the costs and uncertainty? (And even then, you might want to check on the prior records of those in jail. In order to get more than a 60 or 90 day stint, they've pretty much had to have a long and distinguished record.)
The few people I've known personally were in that range. They did something illegal, the cops found them, and they ended up writing off the other charges for a guilty plea on the narcotics. In one case, he did this several times before he spent more than a month in jail.
Prohibition of alcohol didn't work
Per what measurements? Alcohol consumption dropped to under 10% of what it had been in some areas, 20% nationally. Crimes involving alcohol, even with the organized crime stepping in dropped dramatically.
The Prohibitionists declared victory early on, due to the changes that were occurring (before the Chicago Mob made it big, press-wise.).
Prohibition - depending on your metrics - can be seen as a success or failure.
prohibition of tobacco wouldn't work
(Actually, it would probably be easier on that than the others - just due to the volume needed for curing and treating and smoking the tobacco prior to sale)
Making it illegal doesn't stop the use or the effects the user has on others, but making it legal does stop the undesired, dangerous, and destructive activities that go on only because it is illegal. On balance, I think that is a good tradeoff.
But it can cut down severely on the use, as Prohibition demonstrated. It can push the use "underground", and hidden, not out in the open.
And I agree with you about the tradeoffs. But they're tradeoffs. Not magic. And looking at other cultures who've either not illegalized mind altering drugs, or allowed their use either legally or via turning a blind eye, I can't see any long term success stories.
And that's where I really don't like trying to conflate gun ownership - where we accept as reasonable all sorts of restrictions and requirements, and insist on responsible gun handling, especially when using them as designed - and mind-altering drugs, which by definition you can't hold people responsible for their actions while under the influence and for whom many are not able to resist the addictive influence.
Oh, DJ, ben, perlhaqr and others?
I'm very upset that you're not following the closed mindset that was VERY EXPLICITLY DETAILED in the memo and AGREEMENT YOU SIGNED to join the VRWC.
Dammit, men, this is no way to run a failed ideology! LOCK STEP, dammit!
I've been checking in on the original article and it has been stuck on 2 comments all day. Do you think they are not allowing any more through? Maybe getting ripped a new one?
As for the drug legalization discussion, I'm in favor of ending the war. As it is currently being waged we have the worst of both approaches at the same time. We have millions of people using with all the destruction of lives that creates (the laws aren't doing squat to stop that, sorry Unix-Jedi), while the costs to the leagal system keep going up with no reduction in either the number of users or the amount of drugs available. How that can be considered anything other than a failure I have a hard time understanding.
The number of users would probably increase with some form of legalization, but the number is not an increase from 0 as the drug warriors try to frame it, but the difference between what we have now and the potential increase.
For that increase we gain the billions spent on interdiction, the assault on individual freedoms, less money available for corrupting politicians in all countries, less danger of getting caught in a shoot-out. I'd consider that a good tradeoff.
"There's a difference there in the numbers of whom are solely convicted for drug possession, versus those who's only crime was drug possession."
Not in the legal system I grew up with...
Oz:
"There's a difference there in the numbers of whom are solely convicted for drug possession, versus those who's only crime was drug possession."
Not in the legal system I grew up with...
Which legal system was that?
Every crime was prosecuted?
The one where you aren't guilty unless you're convicted? Or have we changed to a system where the government can claim you committed crimes and that claim stands absent any evidence to support it?
I'm not so naive to suggest that people never get away with crimes. I do question, however, the crude implication that the numbers are ridiculously skewed. I mean, if it's so obvious that there are other crimes going on why aren't they prosecuted? Don't infer more than the data provide.
"I'll grant you the degree of the quibble matters. But the point is, look at a law concerning drugs, or even alcohol, and in almost every case, it's not written and targeted at the person taking the drugs, but the effect once they take effect."
Horse hockey. It's targeted at the ones who make, sell, and use them; they are the ones who spend time in jail if they are caught.
I have known three people who have served time in jail on charges of possession of marijuana. No other charges or suspicions were involved. Two were simply seen purchasing a small amount, and one was stopped and frisked because he smelled of weed. All three are, and always have been, fine, upstanding people, all gainfully employed professionals, all taxpayers, and all with Ph.D's. They have not been deterred from using marijuana since then. For the life of me, I can't see anything positive resulting from these three people being in jail, or from such an approach to drug use.
A small sample, you say? Yup, it is. But read on.
Me: "Prohibition of alcohol didn't work."
You: "Per what measurements?"
It didn't work because it didn't stop people from making, selling, or drinking it. Recreational drug prohibition doesn't stop people from making, selling, or using it. Tobacco prohibition wouldn't stop people from making, selling, or using it. Prohibition doesn't work.
"And that's where I really don't like trying to conflate gun ownership ..."
I prefer to be consistent. The same argument applies to each.
We both make the argument that gun control doesn't work, and that the the primary effect of such prohibition puts law-abiding people at risk and denies them their best opportunity to defend themselves. It's about rights, and the lack of results mitigages against denying those rights.
I also make the argument that drug prohibition doesn't work, and that the primary effect of such prohibition puts law-abiding people at risk from which they have little ability to defend themselves, even if they are armed. Again, it's about rights, and the lack of results mitigages against denying those rights.
Let's do a bit of comparison, shall we?
Begin with tobacco, which is used by somewhere between 20 and 25 percent of adults in this country. One in three who use it as intended by the manufacturers will die from it. Likely my father did, as he died at age 45 from a heart attack that dropped him in his tracks, as it were. Likely my mother did, as she died at age 84 from lung cancer. Both were lifetime smokers, beginning in the 1930's with unfiltered cigarettes.
There's more. About half of all fires (house, grass, and the like) are caused by careless smokers. Lots of traffic accidents are caused by drivers who cannot muster the attention or coordination to keep control of their vehicle while fumbling with a goddamned cigarette. Even worse, tens of thousands of people die every year simply because they breathe the same air as smokers.
It is addictive and it is expensive. It's easy to start, if you can get past the goddamned stink, but after it's been used for a while, it's goddamned nearly impossible to stop using it.
It's a product that kills people and breaks up families. I was made a victim of it at age nine. It wasn't nice.
Continue with alcohol. I don't know the percentage of adults who use it, but I know very few adults who don't. Even my cardiologist (a Muslim from Pakistan) suggests strongly that I drink red wine every day, citing his own confidence in the studies which show the benefits to the heart thereof.
But it kills an awful lot of people who use it, and it kills many others who don't. The effects range from the destructive effects of the lessening of inhibitions in assholes, to the lessening of judgment and coordination in drivers, and ends with the rotting of livers and whole bodies in habitual users.
It, too, is a product that kills people and breaks up families. I wasn't a victim of it, by my cousins were. It wasn't nice.
I have no personal experience with recreational drugs. I just ain't interested. But many such drugs are quite similar to tobacco and alcohol in that they are addictive, destructive to the user directly, and destructive to others because of the effects they have on the user.
They, too, are products that kill people and break up familes.
But there is one great distinction between recreational drugs and both tobacco and alcohol. The former is illegal, while the latter are not only legal, they are condoned and used in public by ordinary people, including those who make and/or enforce the relevant laws. I think the law ought to be consistent. I cannot see why tobacco and alcohol are legal, while recreational drugs are not.
My focus is on the wholesale destruction that comes about as a result of making such things illegal. My concern is with the wars that the producers, distributors, and sellers of illegal drugs wage against, not just law enforcement, but everything from individual neighborhoods to whole countries. We don't find that with legal products, now do we?
"But it can cut down severely on the use, as Prohibition demonstrated. It can push the use "underground", and hidden, not out in the open."
Sounds Puritannical to me. Are you afraid people might be having fun?
"I'm very upset that you're not following the closed mindset that was VERY EXPLICITLY DETAILED in the memo and AGREEMENT YOU SIGNED to join the VRWC."
Karl Rove gave me the day off.
The one where you aren't guilty unless you're convicted?
Which is.. Where?
That's not what it means, and I described what I meant. You would have had to read past it, and deliberately misunderstood my point to say that.
Or have we changed to a system where the government can claim you committed crimes and that claim stands absent any evidence to support it?
Doesn't matter.
You can be guilty with no conviction.
(You can be convicted and be innocent.)
I do question, however, the crude implication that the numbers are ridiculously skewed.
It's hardly crude, and it reflects on your ability to read far more than my descriptive ability.
I mean, if it's so obvious that there are other crimes going on why aren't they prosecuted?
You've got a choice. 3 doors. One door has $0 behind it. the one you picked has $100 behind it. The last door might have $400 or $0.
Do you take the $100? That's the example and the situation. You can go to trial and try and convict, or you can plead it out. The system rewards you for pleading it out, and most defendants are happy with it. But it means that all the other charges aren't prosecuted. It doesn't mean that you aren't guilty of beating your wife. Or stealing the car stereos. Or the car. Because the DA was happy to get you in jail for the drug charge.
Don't infer more than the data provide.
Data, absent any context is worthless. The "1 in 3" statistic deliberately omits relevant data to analyze it, and I think on purpose, to distort the debate.
Laughing Dog. Oops! Thanks, you are correct, the median. (It has been 40 years.) Ruben Navarette was using a medium, or maybe thrown bones. Heh.
It's targeted at the ones who make, sell, and use them; they are the ones who spend time in jail if they are caught.
Sorry, DJ, but that's wrong. Drunk Driving laws aren't targeted at drunk drivers. They're targeted at those of us they're going to drive their cars into. Same for the vast majority of drug laws. They're justified because of the actions of the drug-affected towards others. Either directly, or in criminal activities to gain the money. **
For the life of me, I can't see anything positive resulting from these three people being in jail, or from such an approach to drug use.
On that, we can agree. Plus, of all the illegal drugs under discussion, pot's gonna be the "safest" to legalize.
It didn't work because it didn't stop people from making, selling, or drinking it. Recreational drug prohibition doesn't stop people from making, selling, or using it. Tobacco prohibition wouldn't stop people from making, selling, or using it. Prohibition doesn't work.
You didn't tell me your metrics, your measurements. So I'll have to assume you mean that it's an absolute. Without absolute cessation of drugs, alcohol, tobacco use, it's a failure.
But, DJ, dammit, that's not a fair metric. NOTHING is that absolute. But it doesn't mean we shouldn't make murder illegal. Or parking in handicapped spaces. Or .. ANY CRIME. The fact that every law, no matter HOW liberty-preserving will be violated does not mean it doesn't work. Using that metric, what are you left with?
People murder, murder should be legal. People pimp other people, that should be legal. People abuse their kids, so....
No, DJ, that's just past the pale.
During alcohol Prohibition, people drank. But they didn't do it in public. They did it discreetly, and in many cases, people stopped. Crimes dropped.
I once saw a map of DC overlaid with a small dot where there had been a violent crime. There were areas that were near-circles. In the middle of those circles was a green dot. Where a liquor store was.
From a metric of crime reduction, Prohibition worked. It made a huge difference! Alcoholism rates dropped dramatically. Inner-cities saw jails running at a fraction of capacity because of the lack of drunken fights breaking out on the weekend.
You may not like that metric. But you can't just ignore it.
I prefer to be consistent. The same argument applies to each.
I disagree, and stated why. Gun ownership doesn't intentionally disrupt the mind. It's almost opposite of the same argument.
But there is one great distinction between recreational drugs and both tobacco and alcohol.
What's the difference between tobacco and alcohol?
They're treated radically differently. Go out, have a smoke. Have 3! Go back to work.
Go out, have a martini at lunch. Have 3! Go back to work.
Will the two outcomes be identical?
Probably not. Because in one case, you're altering your mind and consciousness. With something that isn't physically addictive. Tobacco is. Yes. Incredibly. Alcohol isn't. (To most people. Until you reach a VERY saturated level that usually takes months/years of constant drinking.)
I think the law ought to be consistent. I cannot see why tobacco and alcohol are legal, while recreational drugs are not.
The law's not consistent between alcohol and tobacco (for some obvious reasons.) And what drugs are you calling "recreational"?
My focus is on the wholesale destruction that comes about as a result of making such things illegal.
Who can be against that? But it's not a either-or proposition. And it ignores the wholesale destruction that would follow with making them legal.
Sounds Puritannical to me. Are you afraid people might be having fun?
In a way, I suppose you could say that. I've seen people fall down that rabbit hole of drugs, "having fun". Having so much fun they'd do anything to continue.
** As a side note, the "failure' of the "war on drugs" is usually cited by the plummeting prices of drugs over the last 30 years.
Yet crime to obtain these drugs is still as rampant. Despite the fact that cocaine and meth are incredibly "cheap" by comparison. Property and personal crime has gone UP as prices have done DOWN.
How would legalizing (other than pot) these other drugs change that?
I was mostly trying to be funny, but there's a kernel of truth in there. In our legal system, you aren't guilty until you're convicted. I don't give a damn what they were arrested for. Drug possession in the context you described is a catch-all bludgeon that the police can use to put people in jail because collecting evidence for real crimes was too hard. It's a bullshit victimless crime, just like having an unregistered .50 BMG rifle sitting in a hypothetical California closet.
UJ, you're attempting to conflate an action that directly harms others(murder, pimping, drunk driving etc) with actions that harm no one but the person doing them.
Oh, and in answer to your last question, the change would occur in that the cops could be called if someone tried to nab your stash, and guards could be legally hired to ensure it's integrity. Gangbangers aren't that likely to try their luck against professionals, not after the first couple times. Not to mention there's not nearly as much of a percentage in it for them since the original sellers will no longer have to use the gangs as channels.
They're justified because of the actions of the drug-affected towards others.
Bullshit. Driving while intoxicated on anything and that would be true. But there sure as hell is no law against being blind drunk in your own home.
Drunk in public? I don't think anyone questioned that law. So, stoned in public could be treated the same. But that should not lead anyone to the conclusion that you are saving that person from himself, which is ultimately the moral crusade that underlies all prohibition.
I've seen people fall down that rabbit hole of drugs, "having fun".
You don't even want to discuss my family history of alcoholism. That doesn't mean I'm going to argue in favor of prohibiting alcohol. Largely because the vast majority of people are not and will not become alcoholics.
UJ, you're attempting to conflate an action that directly harms others(murder, pimping, drunk driving etc) with actions that harm no one but the person doing them.
Nope. I asked a question, and by the metric that I was answered, evaluated the other laws. DJ (apparently) put a pass/fail on it that if it's not totally stopped, it's a failure. I'll say that's not a sensible metric at all.
Where is a reasonable metric for intoxicants?
Oh, and in answer to your last question, the change would occur in that the cops could be called if someone tried to nab your stash, and guards could be legally hired to ensure it's integrity.
Which doesn't have anything to do with my last question. (You can call the cops NOW if someone steals your stash. And they'll go looking for it. Not to give back to you, but they will go looking. In terms of effectiveness, I'll take the "illegal" guards over Brinks Rent-a-cop in mindset and equipment.)
You not only didn't answer my question (referring to drug users committing property and personal crime), your reply was a non sequitur and not even that sensible. If drugs were legalized, why would there be a "stash" needing guarding?
What does that have to do with the fact that the dropping prices haven't resulted in dropped crime by those using the drugs? The argument is that by legalizing them (according to the argument dropping the price), that there would be "no need" for crime to pay for them. But we've never seen crime drop even with cost drops.
juris:
They're justified because of the actions of the drug-affected towards others.
Sorry, editing error on my part.
"Justified." I meant to put in quotes. Because that's the rationale used for them.
But that should not lead anyone to the conclusion that you are saving that person from himself, which is ultimately the moral crusade that underlies all prohibition.
I understand that prohibition will always have crusaders. But in my particular case, I'm actually not against saving anybody.
I'll let them rot - but only if I can be assured that their rot won't slop on me, mine, or anybody else who doesn't want to be around them.
I'd be OK to have a "Escape from New York" setup where you go in and do whatever drugs you want.
But I'm not going to be oblivious to the obvious problems that are going to pop up, and especially when I'm going to be buying the damn drugs AND paying for medical treatment for the drug users, as well as dealing with crime as a result of drug use.
Merely "legalizing" drugs (or alcohol) doesn't deal with any of those issues.
Nope. I asked a question, and by the metric that I was answered, evaluated the other laws.
The proper metric is does the prohibition cause more harm then good. Well, let's look at the Constitutional law effects - very bad on the 4th, bad on the 5th and not looking very good for the 2nd. Not to mention that the whole goddam apparatus is hinged on a such a hideous deceit about "regulating commerce" that it would make even Markadelphia cringe.
The worst part of Prohibition was not the violence of rum runners - it was the expansion of federal power and the general corruption it engendered; crooked cops & judges and citizens who knew it was a farce. Any law that does that should be highly suspect to any thinking person.
The proper metric is does the prohibition cause more harm then good.
I'll disagree on "proper" but it *is* a metric. :)
But that's a very hard one to measure. If you only limit to to the Constitution, probably.
However, the damage to the case of the (especially) 4th is due to our own failures to force government and it's operatives to adhere to the law. Not the law itself. The use of Prohibition as a rationale doesn't mean that the prohibition itself is the reason - it's the rationale. Nor does Prohibition require the damage to the Constitution that we have seen.
It's laziness and the usual greed for power.
I'll let them rot - but only if I can be assured that their rot won't slop on me, mine, or anybody else who doesn't want to be around them.
Well you don't have that guarantee with alcohol now. How far are you willing to cast liberty aside for a little safety?
I disagree with the proposal to entangle the govt further as 'supplier'. Just get the govt out of people's lives, period.
Otherwise, once we end up with national healthcare, we will get national health control. No more fatty fried foods for YOU!
Me: "It's targeted at the ones who make, sell, and use them; they are the ones who spend time in jail if they are caught."
You: "Sorry, DJ, but that's wrong. Drunk Driving laws aren't targeted at drunk drivers. They're targeted at those of us they're going to drive their cars into. Same for the vast majority of drug laws. They're justified because of the actions of the drug-affected towards others. Either directly, or in criminal activities to gain the money."
You are using a really bizarre definition of "targeted". To me, the "target" of a law is the person whose behavior is intended to be influenced and/or deterred by the law. Thus, to use your example, drunk driving laws are "targeted" at those people who drive while intoxicated or drive while under the influence.
To say that said laws are "targeted" at "those of us they're going to drive their cars into" makes no sense to me. What behavior of ours would the laws have us change?
You are confusing the notion of whom the law targets with the notion of what justfies the law. The demonstrable risk the drunk driver poses to others is what justifies the law, but the law is targeted at the drunk driver whom the law attempts to deter.
"You didn't tell me your metrics, your measurements. So I'll have to assume you mean that it's an absolute. Without absolute cessation of drugs, alcohol, tobacco use, it's a failure."
I do not argue, and never have, that prohibition laws had no effect or didn't serve as a deterrent. But I note that said laws were widely ignored, all across the country, by people of all demographic groups you care to name. The point is that these laws were ignored by otherwise law-abiding people who believed that they were unjustified. They rebelled, in effect, against those who passed such laws on the grounds that, as Mark Twain noted, there's nothing that needs reforming so much as other peoples' habits.
Now, hold that thought for a bit.
They rebelled in public, quite visibly. "Speakeasies", which are illegal barrooms or saloons, i.e. places for the illegal sale and consumption of alcoholic drinks, were quite common. They were public places that people could walk into and drink alcohol.
You seem to be deliberately missing the point I try to make. I treat the notion of someone trying to do something to himself, i.e. to inflict something only on his own body, as his own business and no one else's. I do so as a matter of right, not of effect. I do not ignore the effects, either on him or others, but I do not think harmful effects to himself overrides the right. That being the case, I see no distinguishing difference between tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, and many other drugs.
Now don't jump to conclusions. Read on.
I try to be consistent in this. I do not support prohibition of alcohol, but I do support severe restrictions on what can be done while under its influence. I do not support prohibition of tobacco, but I do support severe restrictions on where and when it can be used, because using it is one of the very few things you cannot do to yourself without simultaneously doing it to all those around you. I do not support the prohibition of recreational drugs, but, as with alcohol, I would support restrictions on what can be done while under its influence.
You apparently would treat alcohol, tobacco, and various recreational drugs each differently because of their different effects. I, on the other hand, am much more concerned with people's rights, the point being that I would not make self-inflicted harm a crime. The core of this is that I do not supoort restricting self-destructive stupidity, but I do support holding people responsible for the consequences of their actions, including the effects their use of these products has on others.
Now where have I heard this notion before: In this country, we do not restrain people because they might do something wrong, but we hold them responsible for their actions when they do.
Me: "My focus is on the wholesale destruction that comes about as a result of making such things illegal."
You: "Who can be against that? But it's not a either-or proposition. And it ignores the wholesale destruction that would follow with making them legal."
No, it doesn't ignore it, and I haven't ignored it. I'll repeat myself:
"My focus is on the wholesale destruction that comes about as a result of making such things illegal. My concern is with the wars that the producers, distributors, and sellers of illegal drugs wage against, not just law enforcement, but everything from individual neighborhoods to whole countries. We don't find that with legal products, now do we?"
No, we don't find that with legal products. I pointed out in detail the harm that comes from legal use of these legal products. I would expect much the same thing from legal use of legal recreational drugs. Indeed, I pointed that out. I'll repeat myself again:
"Making it illegal doesn't stop the use or the effects the user has on others, but making it legal does stop the undesired, dangerous, and destructive activities that go on only because it is illegal. On balance, I think that is a good tradeoff."
Now, recall that thought I asked you to hold onto. I do not think other people's habits need reforming so much. I prefer to hold them responsible for the consequences thereof, and that could use a great deal of reformation. I think effort would be better spent there than making war on people doing stupid things to themselves.
"Drug possession in the context you described is a catch-all bludgeon that the police can use to put people in jail because collecting evidence for real crimes was too hard. It's a bullshit victimless crime, just like having an unregistered .50 BMG rifle sitting in a hypothetical California closet."
It goes further than that, Oz.
In some states (or perhaps it's a federal law, I don't really know), a law enforcement agency can simply sieze your property, your vehicle, cash, and what-have-you, claiming that it is the result of illegal drug activity, all without arresting you, charging you, arraigning you, indicting you, trying you, or sentencing you. The gubmint can simply steal from you without the slightest pretext of due process of law.
It's a really sad state of affairs when you can be the victim of your own gubmint and be called the victim of a victimless crime, even when there was no crime at all.
I had been hoping you'd bring that up, DJ. I believe it's a federal measure.
Lest I go OT again, let me just say well done, as usual, to Kevin on the OP.
DJ:
Let's go back just a bit:
DJ: You are using a really bizarre definition of "targeted". To me, the "target" of a law is the person
What I said was: in almost every case, it's not written and targeted at the person taking the drugs, but the effect once they take effect.
The effect. Not the person.
This matters. A lot. We treat alcohol and tobacco - both "legal" (For some value of legal) radically differently.
Because of their effect. Tobacco is horribly addictive, but it's not mind-altering in the manner that alcohol is.
There's a reason that doing jobs drunk (Train engineer, airplane pilot, etc.) are federal felonies. Chewing tobacco? Nope.
The point is that these laws were ignored by otherwise law-abiding people who believed that they were unjustified.
Sure. So's every other law. The justness of the law cannot be measured by the brutality of the scofflaws.
They rebelled, in effect, against those who passed such laws on the grounds that, as Mark Twain noted, there's nothing that needs reforming so much as other peoples' habits.
Notable, they didn't vote the bastards out, however.
They rebelled in public, quite visibly. "Speakeasies", which are illegal barrooms or saloons, i.e. places for the illegal sale and consumption of alcoholic drinks, were quite common. They were public places that people could walk into and drink alcohol.
Which is why they were hidden. Behind locked doors. With guards. Open only at certain times. Only to vetted guests. Supplied by alcohol fermented in bathtubs.
Right, those are all hallmarks of "open" and "public" establishments.
I do support holding people responsible for the consequences of their actions, including the effects their use of these products has on others.
And I'm right there with you.
But that's where the analogy with gun rights falls apart - once you start to intoxicate yourself, you're no longer able to be responsible for your actions.
What some of the illegal intoxicants can do make alcohol (which is a depressant) look insignificant.
And are as, or more addictive than tobacco. So you've got the combination of upper, addictive, and mind altering.
Either regulations will limit the effects and dosage (Meaning that the illegal side might still be in big business), or you'll be selling one-shot-death. As I've pointed out, given the current litigation culture, that won't happen.
Unless it's still by the same guys. So if your goal was to defund the vile drug kingpins, you've failed there. (That might not be yours, but it's one that is often cited.)
No, it doesn't ignore it, and I haven't ignored it.
Actually, it does ignore it. We can stop the destruction via government, without legalizing the hardcore drugs.
We don't find that with legal products, now do we?
There's plenty of illegal products we don't see that with, either.
Nothing says we have to do things the way we have been. You're making it an either/or proposition. It doesn't have to be one.
The gubmint can simply steal from you without the slightest pretext of due process of law.
*sigh*
DJ, I like you, but as much as stickler for detail as you, you're shockingly wrong there.
There's complete due process of law. Your item is arraigned, charged, and convicted before asset forfeiture kicks in.
Very processed.
(Nitpicks aside, Asset Forfeiture was a bad idea gone very wrong. The "Due Process" that is conducted is so slanted that Kangaroos are known to complain about the courts. )
There's complete due process of law. Your item is arraigned, charged, and convicted before asset forfeiture kicks in.
Very processed.
Yes, and we're just regulating the commerce in scheduled substances. Oh, what's that? We prohibit that commerce? Well, that's just a form of regulation isn't it? And stop looking at me with that pathetic 'police power' look on your face.
Feh. We've given the bastards the inch and we've taken a mile up the...
Are assets competent to defend themselves now? You don't defend them yourself, you make a claim to them. In other words, you are required to prove that your property is legitimately yours.
Hell, the government can even start the process on hearsay. I have a special place in my heart for those sorts of trials, since I'm from Danvers, MA.
"What I said was: in almost every case, it's not written and targeted at the person taking the drugs, but the effect once they take effect."
Nazzo fast. You also wrote:
"Drunk Driving laws aren't targeted at drunk drivers. They're targeted at those of us they're going to drive their cars into."
I stand by my comments about it.
"We treat alcohol and tobacco ... radically differently. Because of their effect."
Yes, we do. Your concern is more with those effects than with people's rights, and mine is the opposite.
"The justness of the law cannot be measured by the brutality of the scofflaws."
No, but it can be gauged by the gentility of the scofflaws. A law that is routinely ignored by huge numbers of otherwise good, law abiding people, of all demographics across the whole country, is likely an unjust law.
"Notable, they didn't vote the bastards out, however."
Yes, they did, and the law was repealed.
"Which is why they were hidden. Behind locked doors. With guards. Open only at certain times. Only to vetted guests. Supplied by alcohol fermented in bathtubs.
"Right, those are all hallmarks of "open" and "public" establishments."
Of course they used guards and such. It was an illegal activity, remember? But they drank in a place where there were other people whom they didn't know, and anyone who wanted to could do so. They didn't ALL drink only at home in the closet with the light off.
"There's plenty of illegal products we don't see that with, either.
"Nothing says we have to do things the way we have been. You're making it an either/or proposition. It doesn't have to be one."
This country spends huge resources waging war, and calling it literally a war, on those who make, sell, and use recreational drugs. We don't have to do that, and I don't believe we should. And I'm done with repeating myself as to why I believe that.
"There's complete due process of law. Your item is arraigned, charged, and convicted before asset forfeiture kicks in.
Very processed."
Not always. See here:
"The widespread use of such proceedings, which usually involve assertion of in rem jurisdiction, has also brought many complaints about their misuse to deprive innocent persons of their lawful property. Without a requirement to prove that a crime had been committed, much less committed by the party in possession of the property, it has become too easy for law enforcement personnel to seize and prosecutors to forfeit properties worth as much as $20,000 because it will likely cost the person that much in legal fees to recover them. This is because in such cases the courts no longer abide by the old common law rule that the party in possession is to be presumed the lawful owner unless it is proved otherwise. Thus, a person carrying $6,000 in cash to a vehicle auction where the auctioneer will only take cash may be stopped and his cash seized because it is presumed only a drug dealer would have or carry that much cash.
"The problem is exacerbated by the laws and rules that allow the agencies seizing the assets to keep the money for their operations, including the funding of salaries and promotions, the purchase of vehicles and equipment, and other such things. In addition, there are often not strict controls on how the assets are liquidated, and law enforcement agents are discovered to have acquired forfeited assets, such as vehicles, boats, and other luxury items, without having paid full market value for them, or even anything at all. There have even been complaints about law enforcement officers seizing cash and other assets under the pretext of forfeiture and then just keeping them without reporting the seizure."
Read my earlier comment about it again. I didn't say that siezure without due process was legal. I said it happens, and it does.
You'll reduce costs, reduce risk, and you think that will reduce profit?
Well, yes. My wife is a pharmacist. She works at a hospital. The hospital price for a single tab of percocet is something on the order of two cents. (Yes, that's in tremendous bulk, I know.) The street price of a tab of percocet is roughly $10.
If the junkies could walk into Walgreens and buy the percs directly at even a dollar a pop, there's $9 worth of dealer profit that's going away.
Some of them will buy more, and OD and die, but lots of them already buy as much as they need, they just break into houses to get the money to pay for it at the inflated rate.
Yes, I understand your point about tort law, and don't know enough about law to have an opinion on it or contest it. But I really think that reducing the risks to the middlemen required will reduce the profits garnered from the end users.
I stand by my comments about it.
You can stand by them, but the "target" part went off on a tangent. My point, to clarify, and I believe you understand (even if you disagree) is that those laws target the effect of the drug in question. They do so for reasons not having to do with the safety of the person taking them.
I believe we're in agreement with that - even if you and I disagree over the justness or rationale of the laws.
A law that is routinely ignored by huge numbers of otherwise good, law abiding people, of all demographics across the whole country, is likely an unjust law.
And if that is your metric, then you've self-refuted that Prohibition was a failure.
I've asked you to define your metric several times, and you've never explicitly done so, and your apparent metric isn't logical. But you've claimed that "Prohibition didn't work". But, DJ, this gets to the root of my point:
BY ANY UTILITARIAN MEASURE IT DID.
Crime. Health Care. Public Safety. All of these were areas where people not drinking were directly affected. In a "positive" manner. So the Prohibitionist pointed to those statistics approvingly.
So therefore using utilitarian metrics AND comparing drug laws to Prohibition is fundamentally unsound.
Yes, I agree with you about the federal money and federal power grab. I have said repeatedly that an argument on "Liberty" grounds works far better. That's a solid bulwark.
But blaming everything that happens anywhere for the US drug war is tiresome and stupid. The Mexican civil war is only tangentially about US guns and US drugs.
"Notable, they didn't vote the bastards out, however."
Yes, they did, and the law was repealed.
The 18th was amended out of existence by the 21st, that's true. ... And I can't find the study of how much turnover had occurred in Congress, and how it affected the votes. As I recall, and I can't cite you right now, the change in the votes came not from the new members (who voted pretty much how the older seat holders had), but in people who had been in the House and voted for it the first time. But there wasn't any sort of noticeable shift in electoral fortunes nationwide as a result of Prohibition.
"Which is why they were hidden. Behind locked doors. With guards. Open only at certain times. Only to vetted guests. Supplied by alcohol fermented in bathtubs.
"Right, those are all hallmarks of "open" and "public" establishments."
Of course they used guards and such. It was an illegal activity, remember?
"Nazzo fast." :)
DJ: They rebelled in public, quite visibly. "Speakeasies", which are illegal barrooms or saloons, i.e. places for the illegal sale and consumption of alcoholic drinks, were quite common. They were public places that people could walk into and drink alcohol.
They can't be "public" and secret and hidden at the same time. Speakeasies - again, a hallmark of the very big cities and Hollywood (portraying them in the big cities.)
That image has perpetuated, but when you get to smaller cities, how many speakeasies were in operation? Sure, a few. But they weren't easy to find, and they were something you didn't want to get caught going to or coming from, hence discretion was in order.
Speakeasies are estimated to have been between 200 and 500k, nationwide.
NYC has some better statistics, and they estimated that there were ~100k in NYC alone.
So, possibly 50%! of all the speakeasies were within 1 (very concentrated!) regional area. There are somewhere in the vicinity of 20k "incorporated" entities in the US. So, an average of 20 for EVERY (other) incorporated entity, presuming that the highest number is correct and they were all functioning at one time.
I'm in a small town with less than 12k full time residents. We've got more than 20 bars and liquor stores today. It doesn't take much to picture what would happen if that was cut to 2 or 3 and what that would mean for the drinking potential.
"Nothing says we have to do things the way we have been. You're making it an either/or proposition. It doesn't have to be one."
This country spends huge resources waging war, and calling it literally a war, on those who make, sell, and use recreational drugs. We don't have to do that, and I don't believe we should. And I'm done with repeating myself as to why I believe that.
But you've left untouched my point to you, that it is not a binary choice. I said that, and you continued to state that it is. You can be done all you want with "repeating" yourself, but you're being totally non-responsive to the subject at hand.
There is nothing that requires the current "War on Drugs" within a framework of prohibiting drugs. Your assertions that there's EITHER one OR the other don't stand alone.
You and I agree totally on ending the "War" on Drugs. We agree in part on the liberty and governmental perspective. Much of the rest of the disagreement is going to be based on a distinction of what metrics we find to be important, and how to measure them.
Not always. See here:
DJ, you did get that I was being sarcastic, right?
Seriously, Asset Forfeiture blows. But again, we've got to be correct in our criticism. As Oz above missed, you can be guilty without ever being convicted. Legally guilty and actually guilty aren't always related. By that same token, anything genuinely seized in asset forfeiture will receive it's day in court. It will get "due process". Yes, it's a laughable due process, and it's realistically a sham unless you're going to spend more to fight it. Yes, it's in reality, governmental theft in many cases.
But on paper, that car and that money got every bit of process due it. Again, if you make the argument about the supposed lack of due process, then you lose when "due process" is followed. Then all that happens is they show you exactly how they did things "by the book".
It's a bad metric to use against assets forfeiture. It's easily disproven/coped with. Don't use arguments that are easily sidestepped by Leviathan. Instead, go after the more substantiative ones. The lack of legal counsel for the "accused" would be far better.
"There have even been complaints about law enforcement officers seizing cash and other assets under the pretext of forfeiture and then just keeping them without reporting the seizure."
That's not Asset Forfeiture. That's just theft and corruption.
I didn't miss a thing. "Guilty" is a legal status that is assigned only by a conviction. It doesn't just mean "he did it." Note as well that "innocent" is not a legal status - those who are acquitted are merely "not guilty."
Oz:
Yep, you missed it. Totally.
"Guilty" is a legal status
In the legal system, yes. It also has a meaning outside the strict legal one, ergo: "What you did."
What you're convicted of is not always what you did. And that was my point about the statistics that only measure "guilty" verdicts without context.
You apparently find it astonishing that prosecutors might be willing to take a sure conviction on drugs and trade off other not-so-sure convictions. But that doesn't mean that the people so sentenced weren't committing other crimes.
Right now, most of those drug convictions (some 80%+) are confessed to. No trial needed. If, as you seem to prefer, every single charge was tried... sure, we'd have a lot better data on crime. And a huge backlog in the courts. (Leading to more acquittals due to lack of witnesses, as well.) Not the way I think you might mean to empty the jails.
The upshot of this is if you legalized drugs, a very large fraction of those people would still living a life of crime. And will be sentenced for something - or will be acquitted (of the theft, burglary, assault, what have you) and freed.
That's not something I'd be looking forward to.
"But blaming everything that happens anywhere for the US drug war is tiresome and stupid."
This is indeed getting tiresome.
I don't blame "everything that happens anywhere for the US drug war" and you goddamned well know it. Now get off your goddamned soapbox and stop the hyperbole.
I'm gonna quote myself one more time and I'm gonna explain it in clear, simple English as I do. I wrote:
"Making it illegal doesn't stop the use ..."
Nope. It never has and it never will.
"... or the effects the user has on others, ..."
Which can be bad. No doubt about it, and I've said so several times.
"... but making it legal does stop the undesired, dangerous, and destructive activities that go on only because it is illegal. ..."
There are most certainly undesired, dangerous, and destructive activities that go on now and would continue to go on if drugs were made legal. I have never stated or implied otherwise. But some of those undesired, dangerous, and destructive activities go on only because drugs are illegal and so making it legal would end them.
You can disagree with that if you want, but I believe it is true.
"... On balance, I think that is a good tradeoff."
I still do.
"And if that is your metric, then you've self-refuted that Prohibition was a failure."
Horseshit. You are being incredibly obtuse.
It is my metric, although it astounds me that you needed me to state so explicitly to understand that.
Laws don't work if people don't obey them and don't believe they should. That accurately describes the response of great numbers of people to laws prohibiting alcohol.
It is not a binary matter, but you appear to think it is. A simple example suffices. If the metric were whether or not everyone obeyed the law, then only one violation would mean the law didn't work, and such is obviously not reasonable.
Your test of the success of prohibition is the effect the laws had on crime rates and such. My test is whether or not the people believed it was just and obeyed it. What is important to you is not the same as what is important to me. Thus, you get one result and I get another. Deal with it.
"But you've left untouched my point to you, that it is not a binary choice. I said that, and you continued to state that it is."
No, you are once again reading words that I haven't written. I have neither stated nor implied, ever, that I believe we are faced with a binary choice in the matter.
There are easily three choices: 1) leave the status quo, in which drugs are illegal and the gubmint makes war on those who make, sell, and use them; 2) leave the laws making drugs illegal but stop the war on those who make, sell, and use them; and, 3) make the drugs legal and stop the war on those who make, sell, and use them. There are many other possibilities, too, but this ought to make the picture clear enough for you to see it.
You would end the war on drugs, and so would I. I would go further and make their use legal, and I have stated why. Your complaint that I believe this to be a binary choice is a complete non sequitur.
"DJ, you did get that I was being sarcastic, right?"
No, I didn't.
Me: "There have even been complaints about law enforcement officers seizing cash and other assets under the pretext of forfeiture and then just keeping them without reporting the seizure."
You: "That's not Asset Forfeiture. That's just theft and corruption."
Call it by whatever pretty name you want. Naming it doesn't change what it is, and it wouldn't happen if we didn't wage a war on drugs.
For all your complaining about specificity of terms, U-J, you don't seem to be able to take some for yourself. I was only ever talking about the legal terms.
You seem to love the idea of having an easy-to-prove crime we can just include in a bundle of charges to make sure that at least one sticks on the wall. I find that to be destructive of liberty, especially when that crime is a victimless one. It's just like in the military; I can add "conduct unbecoming" into the list of charges and use that to hammer a guy even if the proof of the other ones isn't there. I've seen it happen before.
You say drugs make people more inclined to commit other crimes. I don't completely agree, but it's besides the point. All those other crimes are already illegal! If the police would, oh, I don't know, do some actual police work maybe they could prove more of them.
Asset forfeiture is inherently corrupt. Let's look at the chain of events:
1) Police accuse you of a drug crime and confiscate your property.
2) You are never indicted on any of the charges, but your property is "sued. Since you are unable to prove your own property is legitimate, your claim is denied.
3) The property is sold at auction and the proceeds go to fund law enforcement agencies nation-wide.
Nothing wrong with that system, not a bit...
I'll quote Roger Q. Mills here again, because he was right:
Prohibition was introduced as a fraud; it has been nursed as a fraud.
It is wrapped in the livery of Heaven, but it comes to serve the devil.
It comes to regulate by law our appetites and our daily lives.
It comes to tear down liberty and build up fanaticism, hypocrisy, and intolerance. It comes to confiscate by legislative decree the property of many of our fellow citizens. It comes to send spies, detectives, and informers into our homes; to have us arrested and carried before courts and condemned to fines and imprisonments. It comes to dissipate the sunlight of happiness, peace, and prosperity in which we are now living and to fill our land with alienations, estrangements, and bitterness.
It comes to bring us evil-- only evil-- and that continually. Let us rise in our might as one and overwhelm it with such indignation that we shall never hear of it again as long as grass grows and water runs.
I said what I had to say on this topic quite a while back.
Nothing I've seen more recently has changed my mind.
Now get off your goddamned soapbox and stop the hyperbole.
I'm not on the soapbox, DJ, but you are.
I'd tell you to go back, and look at what you don't address, and what I asked of you, but it's obvious that you've got a belief, and by god, facts are irrelevant to them.
It is not a binary matter, but you appear to think it is.
I specifically say that it's not. Repeatedly. And call upon you to stop saying that it is.
And you're calling me obtuse?
DJ, you've lost sight here of the entire issue and what I'm saying.
Me: But you've left untouched my point to you, that it is not a binary choice.
You: It is not a binary matter, but you appear to think it is.
You've let your emotion cloud your judgement, and you've totally lost sight of the issue at hand.
but this ought to make the picture clear enough for you to see it.
That was my point from the beginning. I've understood it clearly the entire time. I've pointed it out several times. I guess it's time to say "Thanks for seeing it my way."
You: "That's not Asset Forfeiture. That's just theft and corruption."
Call it by whatever pretty name you want. Naming it doesn't change what it is, and it wouldn't happen if we didn't wage a war on drugs.
It's not a "pretty name".
It's something totally different, and lumping them in together just proves that you're incapable of understanding the issue.
Theft under color of authority occurred before "asset forfeiture" was a legal gambit, and will occur if it's not allowed. It's something completely bloody different.
Have you allowed emotion to cloud your views so much that you can't see that arguing past a point, to something totally different, won't help you against what you're trying to get rid of?
I suppose it's going to be worthless to point out to you that the "War on Drugs" wasn't even where asset forfeiture started. It started with taxes.
It expanded into drugs. It's been misused horribly. It existed before the "War on Drugs".
A due process is followed during asset forfeiture. Which was what you claimed didn't occur. I agree with you, you dunderhead, that it's not fair, good, or anything I support. But there is a bloody "due process" that's followed.
Arguing against AF on the grounds that there is no due process is laughable, and not sustainable as a policy argument.
Even though I AGREE WITH YOU AND WANT TO END IT.
Kevin, some day I'm gonna sit down with a huge vat of hot tea and read your writings from start to finish. There is evidently too much good stuff to pass up, and this in one.
U-J, the crux of the difference between you and I on this matter can be found in your response to Oz:
"You apparently find it astonishing that prosecutors might be willing to take a sure conviction on drugs and trade off other not-so-sure convictions. But that doesn't mean that the people so sentenced weren't committing other crimes."
No, but it doesn't mean they were committing other crimes, either.
"The upshot of this is if you legalized drugs, a very large fraction of those people would still living a life of crime. And will be sentenced for something - or will be acquitted (of the theft, burglary, assault, what have you) and freed.
That's not something I'd be looking forward to."
The bottom line is, you would trade a bit of liberty for a bit of security. I wouldn't.
You would incarcerate people for doing things to themselves that ought not to be illegal just to get them off the streets. I wouldn't.
If we read the Declaration of Independence, we find that this country was formed, at least in part, to guard against such:
"[King George] has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
[...]
"For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences"
Well, you wouldn't actually deport drug users, would you? But I think "pretended offences" is accurate, even if Ol' Tom spelled it wrong.
Kevin:
A very good post.
Except for where you say that Asset Forfeiture doesn't have a due process. :)
There may be a process. But (taking off fake amateur lawyer hat) I wouldn't call it anything close to what we are due as citizens.
DJ:
the crux of the difference between you and I on this matter can be found in your response to Oz:
I think I should back up and restate what my "view" is.
* The "War on Drugs" is bad.
* Asset Forfeiture is ghastly.
but
* Drug Legalization will not be a panacea.
and
* Drug Prohibition in the US is not responsible for all the world's ills.
(And as a practical matter:
* Any realistic drug legalization will not be understricted. Any restrictions will still lead to lawbreaking and criminal activity.)
"The "War on Drugs" is bad."
Yup. We should end it.
"Asset Forfeiture is ghastly."
Yup. It is a consequence of the war on drugs.
"Drug Legalization will not be a panacea."
Yup. People will continue to use them and such use will continue to cause serious problems. I have stated so repeatedly.
"Drug Prohibition in the US is not responsible for all the world's ills."
Yup. I have never stated or implied otherwise.
"Any realistic drug legalization will not be understricted. Any restrictions will still lead to lawbreaking and criminal activity."
Yup. I think you meant "unrestricted". I would expect any restrictions to be largely ignored, just as they are now with alcohol.
I agree with all that.
What I would do comes from this simple principle, which I stated in my first comment of this post:
"I have no quibble about a druggie doing to himself whatever he wants to, provided when he does it to himself he does it to only himself."
So, I would not ban the use of recreational drugs. As with alcohol, and so to help prevent harm to others, I would place restrictions such as when and where they can be used, and such as what can be done when under their influence. In all cases, I would hold people responsible for the consequences of their actions when they use them.
I believe in freedom and liberty. I do not believe in trying to save people from their own stupidity.
They do so for reasons not having to do with the safety of the person taking them.
No. That would be true if the law only prevented operating a motor vehicle, or just being in public, under the influence.
The law does not just prohibit that, it prohibits all possession (and consumption).
Drug Legalization will not be a panacea.
A straw man that you created and tore into with all the vigor and relish of Markadelphia.
No one said it is a panacea.
I see this all the time with people arguing against libertarian positions, such as
x is bad, but prohibiting x results in these problems a, b and c
oh, you libertarians just think the world will be perfect if you can do x.
sigh
"Asset Forfeiture is ghastly."
Yup. It is a consequence of the war on drugs.
No, it is not.
Asset Forfeiture in this country predates the Constitution! It was used under the Articles of Confederation! It's been used throughout the years by taxing authorities. The IRS has been using it since the IRS's inception. The IRS was making so much money via it in the 70s, that AF was brought to bear in the new "War on Drugs." Because it was a successful (again, with the metrics, they're important, from a governmental perspective) tactic.
Let me repeat this for you:
IT PREDATES THE CONSTITUTION IT WAS NOT A RESULT OF THE 1970s "WAR ON DRUGS".
Continuing to insist that it is is wrong.
Wrong.
Factually incorrect.
Unsupportable.
I've been trying to get across to you that a Utilitarian argument against Prohibition fail miserably.. I came by this belief by getting my ass kicked years ago on this topic when I tried to argue i.e.!
You've been frothing at these points - such that you can't even track the damn argument and were lecturing me that "maybe you can make me see" what was the point I started out with. You're swinging wildly, incorrectly, and non-factually.
Liberty is a usable argument against prohibition. As I have repeated multiple times.
All your other arguments fail.
But you won't stay on the liberty argument that we can agree with.
You'll instead keep using arguments that are false..
"Drug Prohibition in the US is not responsible for all the world's ills."
Yup. I have never stated or implied otherwise.
Bullshit.
Not even slightly defendable. Just now! You've blamed the "War on Drugs" for. Asset Forfeiture which predates the War on Drugs by almost 200 years. You've said the "War on Drugs" is responsible for corruption under power of authority, ("Call it by whatever pretty name you want. ") and utterly refused to consider that they're not at all related. While you may not, others in here have repeatedly made claims, such as the one starting out, that the civil war in Mexico is because of the War on Drugs.
You've insisted on shifting the goalposts around to defend a utilitarian arguments. Yes, you have.
That's exactly what you've done, DJ.
The bottom line is, you would trade a bit of liberty for a bit of security. I wouldn't.
It's a great line, sure, shows me.
Except it's not true. You, and I, make that tradeoff daily. There's no way not to make it. You even, later, admit to it, per restrictions on a theoretical non-prohibition: "Yup. ... I would expect any restrictions to be largely ignored"
But you'd expect them. And you'd probably expect them to be enforced. Like when someone drives drunk - you don't have to wait until they hit and injure someone.
I'm good with that, are you?
If you are, then ... you're trading "liberty" for "security".
I would hold people responsible for the consequences of their actions when they use them.
DJ:
Quite simply, this is impossible with intoxicants.
The law recognizes differences in behaviors while intoxicated now. We make allowances for that. Only in a very few cases and states - and as a result of high-profile and well-publicized tragedies, is causing injury or fatality by drunk driving treated anywhere near as harshly as sheer recklessness or intentional harm.
Because of the effect of the intoxicant.
A couple of years ago, My toolbox in the back of my truck was stolen. I was away on vacation, and reported it when I got back.
About a week later, I got a call from the police to see if I could ID some evidence.
Yup, was some of the things that had been in my toolbox. Only thing of worth was a hydraulic floor jack. A Tarp (still in the wrapper) and a couple of small tools.
They'd found the guy who stole it. At the time they arrested him, he'd broken into a stretch Hummer Limo and was carving the seats up. 6 cops, 3 taser shots later, they have him in custody. They have to strap him into a restraint chair where he eventually passes out. Waking up many hours later, he's panicked until he sees a policeman. "Oh. What did I do this time?" He reportedly asked. They searched where he was staying, found a little of what was left of my stuff and some other things that had obviously been stolen.
He claimed, via the detective, and I believe both of them, not to remember anything of the previous week and a half. He liked to get high. He didn't care what with. Or how. He went to a dealer he knew, who had some special concoction and mix. (I was told what he called it and I've forgotten.)
The Detective told me that the blood test for drug residue came back "Yes". (To everything, in case you're not getting the "humor" there.) He'd been taking this concoction which was a mix of damn near everything, and he wanted more more more. So he went around stealing - well, even stuff like my tool box that was "tied down".
They didn't charge him with the theft of my belongings. I got a groveling letter from the DA to explain it. yes, they were where he was staying. With a lot of other people. Yes, they're sure he's who took them, yadda yadda. But he was willing to take a 10 year-before-parole plea bargain, and the DA was good with that. (DJ, since they caught him red handed and on dash-cam with the destruction of property, he's also charged and plead guilty to felony destruction of property, so he's not one of your '1 in 3' stat.)
He doesn't remember doing anything in the spree that got him 10 years. The detective told me that he's very remorseful, and asked for an apology to be extended to everybody he stole from and who he injured. The detective said he said "I just don't know what I'm doing when I'm high." He asked him if he was going to be straight now. He said "Man, I'll be honest with you, I don't know how I ever will." He had a record, he's been in jail a fair bit, rehabbed several times. But he can't resist the call of getting high.
How do you hold him "accountable" for his actions once he's rendered himself unaccountable mentally?
(Putting him in prison for ten years isn't "holding him accountable"? - Ed.)
Once he had his drugs, once he took them, reason and logic as you and I see them weren't available. He could reason and use logic "I need more of this!" to some degree, but in reality, he was impaired and any and all laws didn't matter at that point. Add to that that he was addicted to several drugs...
This is getting long enough, and there are a whole lot of bigger issues that play into it. The fact he's never held a job, yet was able to afford food and housing, and spend all of his time (since it all was "spare" intoxicating himself...
But I have to say that when it comes to deliberately losing your faculties, especially to something addictive, reality intrudes into the nice hypotheticals.
Juris:
A straw man that you created
No, I didn't.
If you'll go back, I said that the Drug War was not the root cause of many ills - specifically being blamed.
I said that arguing for liberty was the best case against Prohibition, be it drugs or alcohol.
I said - and demonstrated repeatedly - that the utilitarian claims against Prohibition are usually directly wrong, and at least are arguable.
Stick to Liberty.
I will say that our current renaissance in crime is largely due to the facts that we're using drug laws to lock up minor offenders and those criminally-minded for longer times.
I'll also not that "vagrancy" laws were used long before any "War on Drugs" to separate those addicted to drugs, and aren't any sort of new discovery. (i.e., locking up the potential troublemakers isn't new, revolutionary, and at the time wasn't seen as the infringement on liberty we'd now dismiss it as.)
"... Unsupportable."
Dude, lighten up on the caffeine, willya?
We're talking here about the consequences of laws regarding the use of recreational drugs, aren't we? What I meant was that, if recreational drugs were legal and the gubmint didn't make war on those who use them, then the gubmint wouldn't go about confiscating the property of people because the property might (read "may or may not") have some association with those drugs. I meant nothing more than that. If you weren't clear on it, if you wondered if I meant anything further, what you should have done (as I have told Markadelphia many times) is ask me what I meant, instead of telling me what I meant.
Do you have to have every thought someone writes spelled out for you so explicitly?
You: "Drug Prohibition in the US is not responsible for all the world's ills."
Me: "Yup. I have never stated or implied otherwise."
ENOUGH.
Read your own words: "... all the world's ills." That's "ALL" the world's ills. This is HYPERBOLE and a straw man to boot, and you goddamned well know it.
You will not find anything in what I wrote that states, or implies, in any way, shape, or form, that I believe ALL THE WORLD'S ILLs (your words, not mine) are caused by drug prohibition in this country.
I've told Markadelphia many times in the past, and now I'll tell you: If you have a point to make, you don't need to submerge it in bullshit. If you're right, you don't need it. If you're wrong, it won't make you right.
Now, kindly STOP THE GODDAMNED HYPERBOLE.
Me: "The bottom line is, you would trade a bit of liberty for a bit of security."
I'll quote your own words, which are what led me to make that statement:
"But when you arrest the BG, and he's got dope in his pocket... There's your conviction. No matter you can't find out whose 20 stereos are in the back of his car, or that the car he was in was stolen from some illegal immigrants (Who aren't going to report it, and won't testify.)
You can probably drop all of those charges that will cost a bunch to try him and might get him acquitted, if he'll plead out on the drug charges."
"A sure conviction with a guilty plea, or try for a jury trial with the costs and uncertainty?"
"You can go to trial and try and convict, or you can plead it out. The system rewards you for pleading it out, and most defendants are happy with it. But it means that all the other charges aren't prosecuted. It doesn't mean that you aren't guilty of beating your wife. Or stealing the car stereos. Or the car. Because the DA was happy to get you in jail for the drug charge."
"The upshot of this is if you legalized drugs, a very large fraction of those people would still living a life of crime. And will be sentenced for something - or will be acquitted (of the theft, burglary, assault, what have you) and freed.
That's not something I'd be looking forward to."
That'll do. Your own words tell me that you apparently are content (perhaps not the right word, but it'll do) with trading a bit of liberty (the right to use recreational drugs, i.e. the right to do to yourself whatever you want to) for a bit of security (the ability to incarcerate people more easily, particularly when you wouldn't otherwise be able to). I think my statement is thus fully justified and is accurate.
I don't accept that the utilitarian value, as a law enforcement tool, of making recreational drugs illegal justifies the abrogation of rights it requires. That's my opinion.
"But you'd expect them. And you'd probably expect them to be enforced. Like when someone drives drunk - you don't have to wait until they hit and injure someone.
I'm good with that, are you?
If you are, then ... you're trading "liberty" for "security"."
I don't know that I fully understand what you're asking, bit I'll respond anyway.
Putting something into your own body is something I view as a right, but driving on the public roadways is a privilege, not a right. So, I have no problem with allowing someone to consume alcohol, and I have no problem with pulling them off the road if they drive while under its influence. The former is upholding a right in the interest of liberty, and the latter is denying a privilege in the interest of public safety.
I'm good with that. Are you?
FINALLY, go back to this recent post of mine, and note that my response to your statement as to what your "view" is, is that I agree with it, except that I would not make recreational drugs illegal. I stated why, on the grounds of freedom and liberty, I would do so.
In particular, note that this is not a court room, I am not being cross-examined aa a hostile witness, and no judge is ordering me to answer your questions. It is nothing more than cheap theatrics for you to assume that any question that is not answered explicitly and in gruesome detail implies that the unwritten answer is favorable to you. What you should assume is that what appears in writing to be a screaming rant by you is often not worth responding to.
That's my opinion, and I don't really care what you think about it. Stop the strawmen and stop the hyperbole and I might think otherwise.
DJ:
I was kind enough, as you quoted utilitarian argument after argument, based on emotion, and counterfactual not to bring up Mark and his habit of doing exactly that.
Now if you want to bring him up, raise your eyes to the top of the screen, and see who moved goalposts, cited non-sequitur, and ended up demanding that I accept what had been my point from the beginning - thus proving you'd lost track of WHAT you were arguing... You know. Like we point out Mark does.
If you want to evade all of that and try and pull a bullshit Markadelphia "SEE SEE SEE!!!" scoring a point, yeah, OK, fine.
I was wrong.
"All the world's ills" was hyperbolic.
Yep, you win! You get your point! Nevermind what you said before that was factually wrong.
Because that doesn't matter, right?
(Wait, isn't that what you and I together tried to pound into Mark's head, that you've got to be factual in your assessments in order to understand? That we're engineers, and demand hard facts and the context within which they matter?)
Oh, well, my bad.
You're right, I overstated the case, you didn't blame all the ills (just a lot of them that are obviously and easily proven to be unrelated) of the world on The Drug War.
Mea Culpa.
Kevin:
How do you hold him "accountable" for his actions once he's rendered himself unaccountable mentally?
(Putting him in prison for ten years isn't "holding him accountable"? - Ed.)
1) It was for drug possession, not really his actions under the drugs. (Yes, in this case, they were able to cite him for what they caught him red handed doing. But that conviction is being served concurrently with the drug charge. Without that, I think they're pretty sure who he was, and they'd have busted him shortly. As they say in England, he was "Known to the Authorities.")
2) Not really. At best it approximates it. It's retribution. It's for actions he (apparently) took with no knowledge of them. This is the crux of the entire problem - how can you hold someone accountable when by black-letter-law, they're not accountable?
It's the closest thing we've got to "accountability", and it's as close as we can come, but no, it's not what I would call really holding him accountable for his actions. We're holding him accountable for taking the drugs and intoxicating himself.
It's not really "holding him to account" for those things - hell, we - and he - have no idea what all he did.
"Yep, you win! You get your point!"
Sigh.
It isn't a "point", and it isn't about "points". I don't keep a goddamned score.
I have stated several times that I agree with your "view" of the matter of recreational drug laws except that I would make them legal and you would keep them illegal. We have different opinions on the matter. I've stated mine and I've stated the reasons for it. At this point, I couldn't care less what yours is or why it is.
Enough.
I'm done with you.
I'm done with your jumping to conclusions, your attributing to me words that I didn't write and thoughts that I don't have and didn't express. It is not possible to clarify any such matters with you because you continually diverge onto endless ranting tangents when I try.
Think what you wish. I can't for the life of me care one whit.
Have a nice day.
Actually, DJ, I had intended that to be my final say on the matter, but as you very well know, I've got a personal failing when someone isn't honest about me, my positions and statements.
I've stated mine and I've stated the reasons for it.
I pointed out that many of those "reasons" were totally counterfactual - the exact same thing that you and I have lambasted Mark in the past about his views. Instead, you just repeated them then ignored the problems with them, rather than admit anything.
endless ranting tangents
I addressed the points you brought up. The rationales that you were using. You can be as irrational and dishonest as you please.
But it's not my problem.
I started off countering an incredibly stupid comment. You came in and have refused to admit any of your blatant errors, your own hyperbole, your own hypocrisy.
Whether you're keeping points or not, there's one of us, and it's not me, who's twisted around to the point where they lost track of their own argument. Who has made ludicrous statements unbacked by facts. refused to admit when he was trivially wrong.
Flail and raise your tone all you want, it doesn't change when Asset Forfeiture was first used by the pre-US Government. It doesn't change the crime stats. Or the election results. Or the facts. Remember the good old days (of last week) when facts were what we insisted on?
Metrics matter, DJ. They matter when Markadelphia is being stupid. They matter when I'm being stupid. They matter when you're being stupid.
Thus my initial attempts to define which metrics you were using. "Failure" is a description that's widely differing in meaning. (Again, this sounds like something familiar...)
You preferred to raise the ire rather than substance.
Metrics matter. Because your claim that "Prohibition was a failure" is a very arguable concept, depending on what statistics you claim as your basis. Property crime, assaults, murders don't support that thesis. (Per capita, of course.)
I argue that point, using statistics.. You instead invented a whole NEW "type" of statistic ([insert chorus here]), the "otherwise law abiding citizen" stat... Which I didn't even bother detailing delegitimizes parking laws, speed limits, zoning....
No, DJ, you can't take your reputation as a fact-minded arbiter out of this. I'm sorry that you'd rather scream to the hills rather than admit to cold hard facts, but again, that's not my problem. You foamed and flamed over "all the world's ills" like a true victim. But you know that it was a minor bit of hyperbole, and you never addressed the substantiative issues behind it. Nitpick it if you insist, and I apologized for, but you didn't address the issues. Just the form.
I'm sorry if this makes you feel angry with me, or less of me.
But as I've said to Mark, who's probably a fine fellow in person, many times: Is what I'm saying backed by the facts is what I strive to ensure in my own thinking. That's why I have to raise a nit about Asset Forfeiture, where a very explicit process is detailed for any and all. That doesn't mean I agree with it, but it means that my argument against AF is factually based and upon the failure in the "due process". You can just scream that there is no due process!!!elvenety!11!! One argument is factual. One's emotional. One gets totally owned when a book, detailing the "process" is used to rebut the accusation in totality. (No, you didn't say "elvenety". Thats hyperbole. Apologies in Advance. You did, however, say that police corruptly pocketing items was the same thing "Call it by whatever pretty name you want. Naming it doesn't change what it is". See, isn't the hyperbole better?
I've argued your side on Prohibition, and I had my ass handed to me on a damn platter of FAIL.
Using utilitarian metrics isn't the way to argue against Prohibition. I've said that, I stand by it, and if this thread alone doesn't prove why, well, you'll never understand.
I shall have a nice day, thank you. I'm sorry that you're going to break from your oft-stated principals over something so (realistically) trivial and meaningless.
We're all due our foibles, and we're all human. I certainly have my own set of failings - notably the inability to let insults and smears to my rationality, logic, and intelligence go unanswered by someone who's confused, evasive, and allowing emotion to swamp their reason.
You used to like that. Ah, well. People change. Que Sera, Sera...
How do you hold him "accountable" for his actions once he's rendered himself unaccountable mentally?
Stop buying the bullshit excuse. He is ALWAYS accountable. Whether there are mitigating circumstances does not change that. [Speaking as a matter of ethics, not as a matter of law - the law on this is wrong.]
A lot of people have been killed by drunk drivers because we for too long bought the bullshit excuse.
I'm willing to bet you there are more people out there getting as high as this guy but not doing what this guy does. So does EVERYONE get a free pass? Have we not discussed moral hazard before? This is another wonderful instance of it.
"It's for actions he (apparently) took with no knowledge of them. This is the crux of the entire problem - how can you hold someone accountable when by black-letter-law, they're not accountable?"
How is this any different from charging someone with murder if he holds up a liquor store and the cops shoot his partner in the holdup? Once you choose to ignore the danger your actions place your neighbors in, you are responsible for all crimes that follow from that choice. Current law, at least in some states, recognizes this concept, does it not?
Yes, the guy was completely unaware of what he was doing, or wasn't thinking straight, or whatever. He was "impaired". He chose to put himself into that state, regardless of potential danger to those around him. Just the same as if he chose to hold up a liquor store, and didn't think things through enough to realize or care that people might die because of that choice. The cop pulled the trigger, but his and his partner's choices are the actions that led to the death, not the actions of the cop. Or am I misunderstanding how the law addresses such things?
what statistics you claim as your basis
Wonderful. On the basis of consumption per capita of liquor, Prohibition was one gigantic, screaming, fucking SUCCESS.
Which is obviously why it was repealed.
That was the biggest load of pedantic bullshit I've read in a while.
Well, it is nice to know that Markadelphia isn't the only one treated the way he is treated!
I go to Burning Man and watch the biggest damn 'straw man' on the planet go up in flames.
Every year.
juris:
The point I made originally is still the one I stand by. You know, the one you haven't even mentioned. No, far better to froth and flail, call me names, and ignore the gist.
As I've said repeatedly:
Using utilitarian arguments is not the way to argue against Prohibition. Those arguments do not succeed using historical examples.
Use Liberty as your metric.
(I feel like someone begging the British not to charge Over the Top in WWI. Or telling Custer to wait for the reinforcements and take artillery and automatic weapons.)
On the basis of consumption per capita of liquor, Prohibition was one gigantic, screaming, fucking SUCCESS.
EXACTLY!. Thank you! By That Metric. If you make the quite-often-heard argument that liquor consumption went UP during Prohibition, (and thus it would be assumed that drug use would go DOWN if they were legalized) then you're wrong. (That's also about the only really-wrong, oft-heard argument that didn't surface previously.)
You don't get to pick and choose what facts you like, Juris. (Again, this sounds really familiar.) Frothing and flailing around irrationally doesn't work well for Mark, it doesn't work well for anybody else.
That was the biggest load of pedantic bullshit I've read in a while.
Wait, I thought it was a strawman. Now it's pedantic bullshit?
It can't be both. A strawman is something misstated and blown out of proportion, pedantic bullshit is nitpicking the smallest things. (Now, if you're talking about the screaming crying fit over "all the world's ills", you'll have a point.)
My points might well be pedantic. But you now will be hypocritical if you insist that Mark, or anyone else, be factually correct in their arguments. After all, what you feel is more important than facts.
Personally, I would rather be called a pendant.
I sure have enjoyed being a bystander in this conversation.
I think, Unix-Jedi, that folks don't always get what you mean when you say "stick to the liberty argument." I've said something similar to that, whenever there is this type of conversation... and the general response to me is something along the lines of "FASCIST!" It just means that the only argument that cannot be shot full of holes is the liberty one... and it's a good one, but it isn't powerful enough to get people to change their mind on the topic. They can easily "agree to disagree" and no one likes that outcome.
As you've done an excellent job of detailing, prohibition is "bad" only as a subjective statement. "Bad" how? In reducing deaths of cirrhosis?
A nuance of the discussion (that is seldom mentioned) is that Prohibition only federalized a criminalization of liquor. Many states had it on the books. Some areas still have those laws. Many wanted Prohibition overturned because they didn't believe it was a matter that should be decided at the Federal level. That is a lesson on how to frame the liberty argument: leave it to each state to decide. A similar liberty argument is to find out where in Article 1, Section 8 we gave Congress permission to legislate anything in this arena (although it appears more and more each day that Congress doesn't refer to the Constitution for anything anymore).
If we were arguing this the way that many do, we'd respond with wild-ass claims such as, "Don't you care about people dying from cirrhosis?" "You can save lives!"
I think the problem occurs (and it isn't exclusive to this subject) is that people don't like facts that don't support their theories. They'll go emotional, rather than rational, when they don't have them.
When my husband made the statement on his blog once that if the data didn't support that gun ownership was a net benefit to society, that he have a hard time supporting the 2A. You'd have thought he'd murdered a million kittens! If the stats were reversed, say that 90% of gun owners used guns to commit crimes (instead of using them to STOP crimes), then we wouldn't have an argument. But we DO, because the facts don't support that conclusion.
I also noted that it was dern-near impossible for folks to separate out the abuses of government as causal. There may be correlation, but not cause. We could keep drugs criminalized and remove no-knock warrants, seizure of property without hearing, etc. We could stand united against the abuses of government, but we don't want to be united. Our "side" can't win that way.
In that regard, this topic is very similar to the abortion one, where middle ground is impossible to find. Because of that, we have the status quo, where no one does much to reduce the numbers (both in terms of those who have/use or work to fix the abuses of government), because they like the noise. It supports their argument that whatever-it-is is bad/evil and should be absolutely reversed.
"Many states had it on the books."
Perhaps, given that you are in Texas, you were aware of this remarkable event when it happened. Note the date of the article, "September 18, 1984", and the source, "New York Times". Point is, the repeal by the voters of laws prohibiting "liquor by the drink" in Oklahoma was about to happen and it was news on a national level.
Well, it did happen, but all it did was remove the state prohibition, leaving the question up to the voters of individual counties. See this article, and the date, "Jan 5, 2004", which states:
"In September 1985, the state passed the liquor by the drink law and most counties followed suit within the next few years. Forty counties have voted yes, while 37 do not allow the sale of liquor by the drink. Twenty-five of those 37 have never voted, ..."
... which means twelve did vote, and the vote was "no". That was current as of five years ago.
"Nothing so needs reforming as other people's habits." -- Mark Twain
I think the problem occurs (and it isn't exclusive to this subject) is that people don't like facts that don't support their theories.
Speaking of which, one is people trying to duck the uber [Progressive] moralism that underlay Prohibition.
I offered the example to U-J that if ALL that were prohibited was being stoned in public, or driving while stoned, I would agree with the "public safety" argument. But he insisted that that position ALSO covers what someone does in the privacy of their home (because they MIGHT do something due to not being in their right mind). Now, what does THAT argument sound like - something about those "extra dangerous" AWs?
I don't know how you can claim to argue liberty, let alone utility for that. It is nothing but pure public moralizing.
1. Back to the original topic-
"Immigrants are going back to Mexico because of a bad U.S. economy."
Anytime I'm reading something and come across a completely silly assertion, I pretty much quit.
2. In the thick end of twenty years as a prosecutor, I have never- not once- seen anyone given a custodial sentence for ONLY drug possession.
3. Remember, once upon a time all drugs WERE legal. History tells us that the social problems that appeared to result from that state is what convinced our ancestors to make them illegal.
4. Unix is right, by any sensible utilitarian measure prohibition succeeded. Yes, X more gangsters were murdered. But X x Y fewer people were killed on the roads. I'd trade fifty dead criminals for a hundred dead citizens any day. And the consumption of alcohol DID go way down.
5. This is just w*nking- drugs are not going to be made legal anytime soon. You need a prescription for penicillin!
No way the doctors and the ETOH business will let that happen.
Yes, X more gangsters were murdered. But X x Y fewer people were killed on the roads. I'd trade fifty dead criminals for a hundred dead citizens any day. And the consumption of alcohol DID go way down.
Yet today 2.9% of the population represents almost half of the victims of homicide - almost all of said homicides being related to the drug trade. And that's just on this side of the border.
There's something very not right about that.
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