WSJ: "Drug War" has cost taxpayers $1 trillion

Who's condemning a country here? Nobody I see. I was merely mocking the fairy tale notion that this can be resolved by eliminating demand.

 

Well, lmao, cutting off the supply has worked so well....

 

Nancy Reagan says Just Say No!!!11!!

 

Yeah, and that worked too.
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It taught grade-schoolers to memorize a phrase.

 

Can't eliminate supply or demand. But you can regulate supply. In the case of marijuana, just fricking legalize, regulate and tax the shit out of it. A net gain for everybody except for those in the private prison and illegal sales and distiribution businesses.

Dealing with harder drugs is tougher nut to crack. But with weed, the answer's easy.

 

Honestly, I don't know what the answer is. Beating the shit out of Mexico would just move the market elsewhere if there's a demand (and obviously the Middle East is a market). Hell, America itself is coming on as a market. It's just a cleaner market.

 

Tax the shit out of it and you have the same social problems you have now. People will buy it to support their habits at the expense of their families and children.

 

So fucking what? They are anyways, at least we'll no longer be enriching violent criminals, we'll have more space in our jails, our police resources can be directed in a more productive directions, users who want help can actively seek help instead of feeling like they must be in hiding, and perhaps best of all, it would bring in a shitload of tax revenue to apply against our obscene deficit. Net pluses all around.

And marijuana is not the drug causing the "social problems" and "habits", at least not in comparison to our favored legal drug, alcohol. I didn't say to legalize heroin or crack, I said to legalize weed. A huge difference there.

 

Is there anyone, anyone at all, who grew up during the 1980s that didn't turn "Just say No" into a fucking punchline?

 

Actually, screw alcohol. It's Meth. Meth that has eliminated the accessibility of many over the counter drugs that used to work for well-meaning people with issues like allergies, colds, and the like.

I don't argue with your point about prisons. On the other end, people like the dude who took down Giffords and other sociopaths need to be vaporized to make more room.

 

You rang? I have an Illudium Q-36 Space Modulator and am not afraid to use it.

 

It's funny in a way, because people are already (rather easily) finding their way to get "legalized" marijuana, aka medicinal marijuana. All the sudden by 20-something aged friends all have bad backs or unstable knees and need a medicinal card, and you know what? Doctors don't give a shit and just write it off because they get their own percentage from it.

Demand for drugs will never, never ever die down. Alcohol has been a part of society for how long now? Both are drugs and both are looked at differently (and quite wrongly, I might add). The government is even more laughable in this regard because these huge pharmaceutical companies are getting people addicted to painkillers and the like, but it's "medicine" so it's legal -- and it makes a profit for all involved (except the user, of course).

Everything is backwards in this country. I should go into politics at this rate. Too bad I can't lie as well as the rest of 'em.