If what you've been doing hasn't been working:
After 40 years, the United States' war on drugs has cost $1 trillion and hundreds of thousands of lives, and for what? Drug use is rampant and violence even more brutal and widespread.
Even U.S. drug czar Gil Kerlikowske concedes the strategy hasn't worked.
Then by all means find a way to do it even more:
It's beginning to show up in schools across the country as a new way for kids to get high. It's known as K2, Spice or Mr. Smiley, and it's a synthetic chemical that mimics the effects of marijuana.
But police say it can be much more dangerous, and it's already here.
The substance, billed as herbal incense, has already been outlawed in several countries and at least eight states, including Kansas, Kentucky, Illinois, Georgia, Missouri, Tennessee, Utah and North Dakota.
But in Indiana and Michigan, it remains legal, completely unregulated and widely available under a myriad of names.
Comments
Leo:
I remember doing a post on this back on 27 April.
I love the "NOT FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION" warning on it...
Now, what's the FIRST thing a moron would do if it said THAT?
Right...find some manner to CONSUME it.
Like I said in my post today (which deals with the same article) is that in ANY war...you CAN win, as long as you keep POLITICS the heck OUT of it.
If the current administration IS trying to transform America, then, by all means..let's legalize EVERY drug, get the populace stoned (AND broke), and then see how easy it will be to take over.
And by the way...crime is SURE to disappear because of LEGAL drugs, right?
Nice fantasy world they got goin' on.
(makes me wonder what THESE guys are smoking)
;)
The war on drugs is a massive failure, and trying to conquer it by targeting the supply only increases profits for those who sell. The only sensible thing to do is to treat addicts and continue to educate the young about the down side of drugs. Bob G says you can win ANY war, but that's not true. If economics teaches us anything, it's that where there's demand, someone will supply. It's the same reason that we will never see the end of prostitution, and the same reason that gun control laws will never work.
Lewis:
Gun control laws DO work.
Just ask HITLER...
or MUSSOLINI...
or POL POT...
or HUGO CHAVEZ...
or FIDEL CASTRO...
or MAO...
or KIM JONG IL...
(see any pattern here YET?)
At least you're not on the side of the fence for legalizing EVERY damn thing...that merely "reinforces and rewards bad behavior", and we've got PLENTY of that already to go around in OUR society.
(AND to keep "we, the people" of this country paying for)
Makes me wonder "IF" the supply (for illegal drugs) went away tomorrow...how long before the "demand" would dry up as well?
Just a thought...
Yeah Bob, that *totally* worked with alcohol prohibition.
But we've really got to stop calling it a war on drugs. Not only is it a war on everyone who's not a cop, but it makes the actual military look bad calling the SWAT fools playing soldier "militarized."
http://www.theagitator.com/2010/05/14/more-militarized-than-the-military/
Mike:
It's certainly not a "war" on ME (not a cop)...oh, but I'm not into the whole drug scene thing...OR am committing crime to feed my habit.
Maybe that makes a difference...'ya think?
Initially, prohibition WAS working...and working well.
http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/volstead-act/
But, if it will make you feel better, let's call it (the "war" on drugs) our:
"Continental Substance Abuse Contingency Operation" ...that sound OK?
And we'll just start issuing educational literature along with those sterm warnings and glaring stares (to those drug lords and distributors)...
Hell, that's sure to work.
OR...we "could" legalize it ALL...and then try to walk, bike, or drive around all the stoners lying or stumbling about the streets (when they're NOT behind the wheel of a vehicle, that is).
God, I feel SAFER already.
Don't you?
;)
No Bob, you're one of the entertaining ones, the ones an "isolated incident" could never happen to.
Unfortunately Bob, prohibition never /keeps on/ working.
But by all means, let's keep getting innocent people killed. It's only collateral damage and you can't avoid that in wars.
I'll sure feel safer when the police aren't training for a "war" when they should be peace officers. Soldiers, in a war, a trained to destroy the enemy. Unfortunately, in the drug war, everyone is a potential enemy.
Maybe you should go ask your pal Johnny Law about that... oh wait, didn't that narcissistic braggart quit the internet when enough of us wouldn't listen to his crap anymore? XD
Or hey Bob, instead of trying to predict the future (you have psychic powers of some sort?) and making idiotic statements about what terrible things will happen if we decriminalize drugs - you'll note you're the only person here using the term "legalize" - maybe you should do some research into what can actually happen. Like, say in Portugal where they did that very thing, in 2001:
"The question is, does the new policy work? At the time, critics in the poor, socially conservative and largely Catholic nation said decriminalizing drug possession would open the country to "drug tourists" and exacerbate Portugal's drug problem; the country had some of the highest levels of hard-drug use in Europe. But the recently released results of a report commissioned by the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, suggest otherwise.
"The paper, published by Cato in April, found that in the five years after personal possession was decriminalized, illegal drug use among teens in Portugal declined and rates of new HIV infections caused by sharing of dirty needles dropped, while the number of people seeking treatment for drug addiction more than doubled.
"Judging by every metric, decriminalization in Portugal has been a resounding success," says Glenn Greenwald, an attorney, author and fluent Portuguese speaker, who conducted the research. "It has enabled the Portuguese government to manage and control the drug problem far better than virtually every other Western country does."
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1893946,00.html
But hey, you wouldn't ever do drugs yourself, and therefore you know what's best for everyone else. How very liberal of you.
Mike:
Wow...never was called a LIBERAL before...I don't know if I should thank you or smack you...ROFLMAO!
I know some conservative friends that might "rethink" their friendship" with me after your comments...LOL.
(s'ok gang...Mike's mouth is writing checks his brain can't cash...that's all)
I guess the whole "If you want PEACE...prepare for WAR" thing goes right over your head (odd...you "seemed" TALLER than that)
Hey, drugs ARE legal in AMSTERDAM...and they've got the stoners lying all along their streets to PROVE it...nice, huh?
And I don't quite "get" your take that EVERYONE in the "drug war" is a potential ENEMY (deserving of destruction).
I wouldn't think that YOU are...or that I am, or even that Leo Morris or Tim Zank are. Not even Littlejohn.
We call those that ARE the enemy "the GUILTY" for a reason.
It makes me wonder how Portugal's drug problems compare to OURS, or how their economy compares to OURS...or even how thier "assistance programs" compare to ours.
Wonder if they're a democratic republic (like America is)?
BTW, if I were to play devil's advocate here, we "legalized" abortion...and uh...HOW MANY infants were MURDERED (killed) along the way THERE, hmm?
No "war" declared there.
I'm just sayin'...
THOSE are the "enemy" and must be destroyed?
Geez...sounds kinda genocidal, in a very specific way, don'cha think?
And Mike...for someone with (obviously) a LOT to say on the matter...you really haven't said all that much.
But thanks for playing...I found it enjoyable.
To each his own.
Do have a nice day.
:)
Actually Bob, that came from a libertarian vs. liberal discussion about which is the greater hubris - thinking you know what's best for yourself, or thinking you know what's best for everyone else. Maybe you really just cling to a more authoritarian/conservative outlook. I might have been mistaken in assuming you even /care/ what's good for anyone else.
Once again Bob, you don't know what you're talking about. And the really sad thing is it tells us you couldn't even bother to click the link:
"Pop quiz: Which European country has the most liberal drug laws? (Hint: It's not the Netherlands.)
"Although its capital is notorious among stoners and college kids for marijuana haze