Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!lll-crg!nike!ucbcad!ucbvax!mc.lcs.mit.edu!kfl%mx.lcs.mit.edu From: kfl%mx.lcs.mit.edu@mc.lcs.mit.edu Newsgroups: mod.politics Subject: Drugs Message-ID: <12234058764.49.MCGREW@RED.RUTGERS.EDU> Date: Wed, 27-Aug-86 01:31:56 EDT Article-I.D.: RED.12234058764.49.MCGREW Posted: Wed Aug 27 01:31:56 1986 Date-Received: Wed, 27-Aug-86 21:15:15 EDT Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Reply-To: kfl%mx.lcs.mit.edu@mc.lcs.mit.edu Organization: The ARPA Internet Lines: 129 Approved: poli-sci@red.rutgers.edu [ Who pays for the cops who keep drugs out of the hands of kids? Do these laws that keep drugs out of kids hands include their parents? If a parent chooses to give drugs to his child, is it legal? Well, this all seems to work pretty well for alcohol and tobacco. I never said ALL of the world's problems will go away if we adopt a libertarian system. Kids will still get drunk. Teenagers will still try marijuana and cocaine. At least the marijuana won't contain paraquat, and the cocaine won't contain strychnine. I read a few weeks ago that a 4 year old kid playing on the front steps of his apartment downtown pricked himself on a discarded needle. He got AIDS apparently from that needle. If drugs and drug paraphernalia had been widely available this would not have happened. It is also true that if illegal drugs weren't used this would not have happened. But do you have any ideas how to deter drug use? The current methods aren't working. Do you think spending billions more on narcotics police will change anything? The drug laws aren't working. The tons of marijuana and kilos of cocaine that the Coast Guard keep intercepting are only a small percentage of the amount that is not intercepted. The smugglers treat it as a business expense. And it probably costs them less than taxes would if they paid taxes. People's attitudes aren't very anti-drug use. Very very few people would turn in an acquantance for drug use. ... Your statistics on weed usage in the 1960's is incorrect: a much larger number of people smoke mj now than did then. The drug laws aren't working. Would you call the cops if you saw someone smoking marijuana? Would anyone? Would the cops even bother to arrest him? What use are laws which everyone ignores? Don't they simply breed disrespect for the law? Your argument of "employers and schools will still test for it": I can see a lawsuit coming - how could an employer fire an employee for using a drug that is legal and stigma-free ... The same way they can fire people for excessive alcohol use now. As you know, I support an employers right to set any conditions for employment. Many employers still have dress codes. So why not drug codes? - perhaps there will be 'snorting' and 'no-snorting' zones in office buildings and cafeterias? Perhaps. But the reason for non-smoking areas is because the smoke enters the air and affects non-smokers in the vicinity. Except for drugs that are smoked, this won't be a problem. If you think people quit a drug (including tobacco, which you have reviled as the lowest of the low) because its "dangerous", why don't all the smokers in the world quit? Because they like it! No. Because they are addicted. But government has not seen fit to forbid this extremely addictive and deadly substance. Few people would support an attempt to ban tobacco. ... The 'enjoy' factor of heroin, or cocaine is tremendously higher than for cigarettes - Enjoyment and addiction don't have much to do with eachother. Anyway, I have been told by people who have quit both tobacco and heroin that quitting heroin was much easier. The extreme addiction of heroin is largely a myth. Most users go several months each year without using any, and continue this pattern for years. Most users who are forced to go through withdrawal (for instance who spend time in a prison or a hospital) resume using heroin as soon as possible even though they are not physically addicted anymore. if its legal, there's going to be a dramatic rise in addicts. Since steadily harsher penalties don't seem to result in any fewer users, how can you conclude that more lenient (or nonexistant) penalties will result in more users? Remember that we are discussing policies for the real world, not for some ideal world. In an ideal world nobody would use the drugs and so it wouldn't matter whether usage was legal or carried the death penalty or anything in between. Here in the real world we can take it as given that people will continue to use the stuff, and the only question is should they pay a lot for cruddy stuff or should they pay much less and get much better quality stuff? Should needles be widely available, or should drug users share needles and catch AIDS and Herpes? And give AIDS to innocent children playing with their drug debris? If you think that legalized gambling will make the mob go away, go look at who OWNS the casinos in Atlantic City. ... Have you any evidence for this? A friend of mine owns a lot of stock in an Atlantic City casino, and he is no mobster. They won't go away; they're making too damn much money to stop. You underestimate the mob: they're smart and mean. - CWM] I'll bet they can't outcompete honest businessmen in a free market economy. And if they can, without breaking any laws, more power to them! ...Keith [ ... I'll bet you they can because they don't let little things like laws stop them from making a buck. Legitimate businessmen don't rob competitors or burn down their warehouses. Does you friend think that organized crime does NOT own a substantial part of his casino? Last time I was in Atlantic City, it was not an idyllic libertarian community. On drug laws: no, they don't work well, mostly because enough people are willing to pay very high prices for the stuff (the free market at work, eh?) The original point was, and still is, that I don't think it will be such a good and valuable thing to have it all cheaper, more plentiful, and easier to get. I don't think that getting the paraquat out of mj and the milksugar out of heroin is that all-fired important. AIDS won't go away, and getting it from a discarded needle won't go away either (needles aren't the only way AIDS gets spread, you know) from your plan - so your child would still get it, unfortunately. But I digress (we digress? Use digress toothpaste for a whiter, more libertarian smile? :-) How can YOU say that we'll have fewer addicts? I think my arguments are stronger on that point than yours (but then, I would!) I guess I don't have your ability to be quite so sure about such things as you. I have a natural suspision of anyone who says, "The answer is simple. Just trust me and it will all be alll right..." Because usually it isn't, and it won't be. - CWM] -------