Malice Green

[Det_ard]

I'm totally OK with legalizing drugs as long as:

- their use is taxed with some portion of the tax revenues going to rehab programs, and

- employers and landlords are free to refuse to hire or house someone who is using now-legal drugs. I don't want to see ADA lawsuits because someone can't do their job due to their drug use.

[Wesley Mouch]

Just think what could have been achieved if all the money spent on the investigation, prosecution and incarceration of Nevers and Budzyn had been instead applied to treatment and rehabilitation. Think of all the damage that was done to the DPD reputation that wouldn't not have occurred.

What a waste. Adults should be allowed to put what ever they wish in their bodies whether it is sugar, fat, booze or dope. Save law enforcement for pursing the tens of thousands of outstanding warrants for murder, rape and theft. If those are broken, lock em up.

Drug possession laws are based on what one MIGHT do, not one what one does. Such laws are a threat to both our constitution and the rule of law. They open gateways to repression by those who control the government and police while wasting billions of dollars every year. And give us continual senseless incidents like the Malice Green event.

Lowell for President.

[noise]

FACTS??? where do you get this 50% figure????

http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/NEWS/...ds---_ST_U.htm

In any case, from that report, 34% of first children being born outside of marriage among white women is a significant number. 53% among Hispanic women.

[Melocoton]

I start this thread fully realizing that being labeled a racist in 21st century America is like being accused of being a witch in 17th century Massachusetts.

The only problem with this analogy is that while those women in 17th-century MA weren't actually witches, you actually are a racist.

[Django]

Back to my favorite soapbox, the drug war. What if Malice Greene had been put in prison. Thats roughly $60,000 a year for "storing" him as I like to call it. Todays drug war IMHO is modern day slavery. Privatized prisons has made billions through incarcerating mainly Latino and black men/women. When someone can make a buck off of owning someone I call that slavery. I remember back in about 1988 the US had about 500,000 ppl in prisons and now today we have over 2.5 million in the prison system, mainly because of the drug wars mandatory minimums. Dont quote me but Ive heard thats more than any three countries combined. The racist and skewed laws that put crack cocaine in a different category than powder cocaine [[the difference is only one has baking soda in it) with crack earning much longer prison sentences.
60,000 dead in Mexico alone in the past six years due to drug violence. Mexico is not even a large drug producing country but has various smuggling routes. And I will say it AGAIN, more people die over drugs than by drugs.
Six years ago I brought this same subject up here on Dyes and was usually put down for my radical ideas of legalizing drugs, Im happy to see some opinions have changed.
Malice Greene died because of the war on drugs as tens of thousands do every year around the world.
On a good note, Portugal has legalized all drugs for over 10 years now and has made huge improvements, but you wont be reading that in the papers. Big pharma simply doesnt want you using natures painkillers and stimulants, that would mean huge losses for them.
Im dyin to get in a debate with someone about this. Ill gladly start a new thread if someone wants to have a go. Ive got a boatload more to say on the issue. We have all lost friends to drugs. Maybe by prison, maybe through an overdose which most likely could have been prevented if the drug were regulated instead of cut with who knows what and dealt by some fool on the street, maybe it was just the addiction which is a health issue not a legal issue, and could have been helped by way of treatment instead of jail.
OK, Im taking a deep breath and now am going to let this go.

[gazhekwe]

Here's some ammo for you, Vicente Fox, former president of Mexico, speaking in Grand Rapids tonight:

... Fox blasted what he said was the failed war on drugs.

"We’re in a trap, and we’re paying a huge cost in that trap," Fox said, referencing Mexico's part to play in the ordeal.


"We just happen to be in between the huge consumption of drugs in this nation [[U.S.), a market worth $50 billion U.S. dollars, that are raised on supply of drugs to 4.5 million consumers."


The result of the failed war on drugs, Fox argued, is an increase in the number of weapons smuggled into Mexico from the U.S., and the violence that results.


Instead, Fox argued the U.S. should consider legalizing and regulating marijuana production, distribution and use in an effort to further crack down on violent drug cartels.

http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapi...r_mexican.html

[downtownguy]

^^Most interesting. As I recall, Fox's politics put him squarely on the right. And he says this in Grand Rapids? gazhekwe, do you know what group he was speaking to?

And to Django, I hope someone takes you up on your offer because I have yet to understand the opposition to your well articulated position.

[gazhekwe]

Fox was in Grand Rapids as keynote speaker for the World Affairs Council of Western Michigan's 63rd Anniversary Dinner, a gathering that attracted some 500 attendees who paid as much as $200 a plate.

http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapi..._handle_i.html

[SWMAP]

Portugal didn't legalize drug use. Portugal de-criminalizes possession of small amounts of drugs. Drug-running is still illegal in Portugal and Portugal's ecomomy and population still aren't dynamic stand-outs on the world stage. Possibly Portugal's culture is happy to look the other way as young people squander themselves to a drug haze. Possibly that's not the American way yet.
Django, do you think that if marijuana had been legal when you were young that you would not now be using heroin and dreaming of wintering in some far east country where heroin is legal and cheap?

[Wesley Mouch]

Back to my favorite soapbox, the drug war. What if Malice Greene had been put in prison. Thats roughly $60,000 a year for "storing" him as I like to call it. Todays drug war IMHO is modern day slavery. Privatized prisons has made billions through incarcerating mainly Latino and black men/women. When someone can make a buck off of owning someone I call that slavery. I remember back in about 1988 the US had about 500,000 ppl in prisons and now today we have over 2.5 million in the prison system, mainly because of the drug wars mandatory minimums. Dont quote me but Ive heard thats more than any three countries combined. The racist and skewed laws that put crack cocaine in a different category than powder cocaine [[the difference is only one has baking soda in it) with crack earning much longer prison sentences.
60,000 dead in Mexico alone in the past six years due to drug violence. Mexico is not even a large drug producing country but has various smuggling routes. And I will say it AGAIN, more people die over drugs than by drugs.
Six years ago I brought this same subject up here on Dyes and was usually put down for my radical ideas of legalizing drugs, Im happy to see some opinions have changed.
Malice Greene died because of the war on drugs as tens of thousands do every year around the world.
On a good note, Portugal has legalized all drugs for over 10 years now and has made huge improvements, but you wont be reading that in the papers. Big pharma simply doesnt want you using natures painkillers and stimulants, that would mean huge losses for them.
Im dyin to get in a debate with someone about this. Ill gladly start a new thread if someone wants to have a go. Ive got a boatload more to say on the issue. We have all lost friends to drugs. Maybe by prison, maybe through an overdose which most likely could have been prevented if the drug were regulated instead of cut with who knows what and dealt by some fool on the street, maybe it was just the addiction which is a health issue not a legal issue, and could have been helped by way of treatment instead of jail.
OK, Im taking a deep breath and now am going to let this go.

Very well said -- and very true.

[[Could've lost the part about privatization, though. Isn't needed to make this point.)

[detroitsgwenivere]

Django, do you think that if marijuana had been legal when you were young that you would not now be using heroin and dreaming of wintering in some far east country where heroin is legal and cheap?

Are you being serious or sarcastic...?

[SWMAP]

Well, serious. Django had a blog last year in which he lamented that the angel who was supplying the airplane ticket backed out and that he couldn't get a visa.The blog is hauntingly beautiful about life as an addict.on the east side.

[Django]

SWAMP. I think that if marijuana had been legal when I was growing up and I was told the truth about "illegal" drugs, that pot is a far less dangerous and far less addictive than any other drug such as heroin or alcohol then I might have understood things better as a kid. Instead I found out the hard way, that pot really wasnt that big of a deal and therefore I took the assumption that all other drugs must not be that big of a deal. I thought to myself "hey this pot ain't so bad as Nancy said it was" my brain didnt fry in a pan after I used it and hell, everybody around me drank booze so how could that be bad. I now believe our best bet is to teach the truth to our kids. Just saying no and putting ppl in prison if they dont say no does not work and creates more problems than if some of these drugs were legal

Django, do you think that if marijuana had been legal when you were young that you would not now be using heroin and dreaming of wintering in some far east country where heroin is legal and cheap?

I think that if I were told the truth about what some drugs do and some drugs dont I might have made different decisions.

Ill get back to the legality of drugs in Portugal later after I do some Wikisearch. I believe they went further than just decrim in Portugal though. I could be wrong.

To Wesley, I believe private prisons are a huge gateway to a much worse war on drugs. I strongly believe that these prisons should be brought into the argument. Locking ppl up for possession of drugs and someone making money off locking those ppl up is like I said, modern day slavery. I stand hard that thats a very valid point.