In 1971 The Big Question Was "Should All Drugs Be Legalized?"
(It could happen . . .)
With the current movement afoot to legalize Marijuana in California (in an effort to raise revenues with a cigarette-style tax), I was reminded that in 1971 there was a movement afoot to legalize drugs completely, not just Marijuana but the whole recreational sub-genre. The idea that Heroin would suddenly become legal seemed remote, but the PBS program The Advocates devoted their hour on week to just that subject. And, as always with that program, the arguments were very interesting.
Joseph Oteri(arguing For legalization): “As extreme as our proposition may sound, we believe that we can show that by legalizing all drugs, you will have the following results: There will be less crime because drugs will be cheap enough so that addicts will not have to steal money in order to purchase them. The tax free criminal drug monopoly will be destroyed because of their inability to compete with cheap legal drugs. There will be fewer addicts because the forbidden fruit temptation of drug use will be diminished by its openness and the drug subculture, which makes drugs available will disappear. There will be fewer deaths from overdoses because the strength of drugs will be controlled by Federal standards. Hepatitis cases will be diminished because it will no longer be criminal to possess needles and syringes and users will have sterile equipment to use. But more importantly, an adult’s right to be let alone, his right to determine for himself what is good for him and not to be forced to accept the moral judgments of society as they relate to his private conduct demand that he have the right to use drugs if he chooses to do so.”
Needless to say it was a bold idea. The arguments on both sides had merits (although the "against" side went into overdrive when someone on the "for" side mentioned Heroin and Ice Cream in the same sentence).
It does beg the question why it can't happen now. I'm still not so sure we will ever see a full legalization of all drugs in our lifetimes, but legalizing Marijuana does seem possible at this point in time. Probably more so now than in 1971.
I still have their Licit and Illicit Drugs book from 1972, where they spend the last twenty pages arguing for the immediate legalization of marijuana.
US drug war has met none of its goals
'Nuff said?
The War on Drugs has kept the war on drugs going and that has made a lot of people a lot of money on both sides of the law. Although I guess that would be one of the more unstated goals.
It's all part of protecting everybody from everything and ignoring the consequences when that protection becomes more destructive than what they are trying to protect people from.
I was in law school when Nixon ripped apart the movement to legalize marijuana in the late 70's. The Alaska Supreme Court in the Raven case legalized the drug, saying their state's robust privacy clause so outweighed any harm that marijuana could cause that police couldn't justify invading people's home to stop it's use. (It was later recriminalized when their legislature acted in conjunction with Nixon's national anti-drug agenda). Switzerland legalized heroin years ago. They have found that fewer people use the drug and the number of property crimes dropped dramatically. Portugal recently decriminalized all drugs and, like Switzerland, treats drug use a a health issue. Look at Glen Greenwald's excellent discussion of Portugal's success. Today the AP had a story describing the 40th anniversary of our drug war and described the terrible waste. Will we learn and turn this around? I'm a Calif. criminal defense attorney and I don't think we as a nation are very close to recognizing the futility of this war. While I hope our state passes the legalization initiative in November, I'm afraid the money is just now beginning to pour in to scare people into voting against the initiative.
... former governor of New Mexico, Republican, was on the Colbert Report May 10th, saying that half our law enforcement costs ($70B) revolve around drug enforcement, and the related crime that finances the black market cash flow.
It seems to me to be complete stupidity to ignore the lessons of prohibition in the 1920s-30s, which is that black market cash flows energize organized crime rings.
I think there is way too much public acquiescence, if not support for marijuana to not legalize it.
In the case of heroin and cocaine, I would allow addicts to get maintanance prescriptions, or avail themselves of rehabilitation. What I would not do is continue the current policy, which is to have the addict feed a black market cash flow. If an addict can be off to the doctor for a prescription if addicted, then that would destroy the incentive for pushers to addict new users.
Right now, the current policy is to maximize black market cash flow. I'm not oblivious that this cash flow can be used to pay off politicians. I'm also not oblivious to private prisons lobbying Congress for more business. And, we're shipping billions to Mexico and Columbia to counteract the billions in the black market cash flow. Heroin cash flows feeds the Taliban military budget.
We simply cannot afford the current policy any longer. There might be some bellyaching about the new policy, but that would disappear after the crime rate dropped in half as addicts would no longer be robbing and stealing to support their habit.
Office of Orifices
Submit substances and objects for approval by "Authorities."
Legalize. Regulate. Tax.
These three simple words will save this nation and its states billions of wasted dollars every year. It will also start strangling the prison industry which has overly relied on drug offenses filling its public and for profit prisons.
Election 2012: Be Educated! Be Active! Vote!
www.PhoenixJustice.com
Absolutely agree. LRT. The Board of LRT. It would actually keep kids in school and out of prison.
cleaning up people who become hopelessly addicted. You give a little you get a little.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
YOUR tax dollars are spend on crack. Sad innit? You should stop paying taxes d00d!
Bite my shiny metal ass.
http://www.startalkradio.net/
And forget the taxes, well I think I could make a better return on crack than with a tax refund. Thanks for the idea.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
No, i say you use crack. I do not care what you do with your crack. Smoke it, snore it, push it in your eye socket for all i care.
Bite my shiny metal ass.
http://www.startalkradio.net/
that legalization would create more addiction. All the evidence points to it remaining about the same.
Its actually cheaper to provide people with drug treatment than it is to have them in jail or prison.
Here in Arizona, we are "selling" our prisons to private investors and then "leasing" them back costing taxpayers 50% more than what we got in cash for those prisons. Currently, our prisons take up 40% of the budget. Even if providing drug treatment were to cost 1/2 of that, we would be saving monies. Monies that could be put into public education.
Election 2012: Be Educated! Be Active! Vote!
www.PhoenixJustice.com
Screw that. What's the difference?
Illegal = Inhibited
Regulated = Inhibited
Taxed = Inhibited
But so many people would lose their jobs!
From:
(Jane Hamsher 04-28-10) FDL Late Nite: Vote For “Name Our Pot Campaign” Contest
When will government of the people, by the politicians, for the corporations perish from this Earth?
Not soon enough!
..the Powers that Be ( the Bush crime family comes to mind) will never legalize all these 'ilicit' substances because they would lose a lot of their ill-gotten money and a lot of their power/control.
Wars (the real ones and the fakes ones), prisons, police swat teams,
and the dough from drugs is what makes the economy purr....don't think that'll be ending any time soon. Hell, we have half of our military in Afghanistan protecting the heroin crop right now!
"Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of Stupidity" - Frank Leahy
As a long time pot head... (35) years now... all I can say...
Honestly, it's about fucking time!
Frank Zappa - Make A Jazz Noise Here
was the first device that substituted for cannabis legalization.
It's in black & white.......... somewhere under a pile of papers, cups and plates on the coffee table.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3FdhAAO6x0
And down [we] forgot as up [we] grew.
A Child's Garden of Grass
*Quote was cummings (sort of) not TCGOG
Drugs are bad mkay.
*takes another sip of whine, noice*
Bite my shiny metal ass.
http://www.startalkradio.net/
I would really like to know what the illicit drug use death rate is compared to alcohol and cigs.
We need a new drug policy-what we have now is not working at all.
no more Hummers until we finish our BP oil spill clean up and it's
off to bed we go.
Do people still drive that retarded thing that's supposed to be vehicle?
Bite my shiny metal ass.
http://www.startalkradio.net/
So those big he-men can project their insecurities in public by driving a bus like behemoth and also indulge those who want to play Army.
"We will find fulfillment not in the goods that we have, but in the good we can do for each other."
Robert F. Kennedy
I've only seen a Hummer one time. A black one with all kind of chrome shit on it. I wanted to ram it of the road, but i was driving a Renault Twingo so i didn't. The next time when i drive a Leopard 2A4 he's going down.
Bite my shiny metal ass.
http://www.startalkradio.net/
Two years ago I drove an H3 from Phoenix to Palm Springs. I about my broke my back it was so uncomfortable, not to mention the shitty gas mileage. I drove over to John Wayne Airport and traded it in for a much more comfortable and fuel sipping Mercury Mariner.
Election 2012: Be Educated! Be Active! Vote!
www.PhoenixJustice.com
Just our luck they'd outlaw Twinkies...
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
What teh bloody hell is a twinkie?
Bite my shiny metal ass.
http://www.startalkradio.net/
That's the thing...
...nobody knows...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-b5aW08ivHU
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
Ooh, the twilight zone. One of my most favourite pinball machines.
BTW: winners use drugs :p
Bite my shiny metal ass.
http://www.startalkradio.net/
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/natio...
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
http://jackherer.com/comparison.html
The longer answer is that Prohibition 1.0 (alcohol) didn't work, the illegal was made legal, regulated, controlled, and taxed. Prohibition 2.0 (cocaine, heroin, marijuana, opium) hasn't worked either. (There was a brief respite for marijuana and opium poppies for the World War II war effort.) The War OF Drugs, waged against the American people didn't begin in ernest until Nixon initiated the Shafer Commission Report, then buried it because its conclusions were unpalatable to Nixon's police state.
Today, the police state is in full force. The negative influence of the War OF Drugs upon society is far more destructive than the effects of any of these drugs themselves. At the beginning of Prohibition 2.0 less than 6% of the population were engaged in steady regular drug use. Nearly $1 Trillion USD over 70 years, several million citizens imprisoned, and it is reasonably estimated that less than 6% of the population is engaged in steady regular drug use. What a waste of time, money, and lives ruined. If the government truly wants to control drugs, then they need to be legal, regulated, and taxed.
End Prohibition 2.0 now.
"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."
-- John F. Kennedy
If there's a buck to made by it and if they can get the masses to do anything to get it, you can bet your biffy the corporations will be twisting the government's arm to allow them full control and rights of distribution and obscene profits.
From one cartel to another that's all. Anyone thinking that legalization will reduce crime by throwing addictive drugs into the open market, is probably smoking too much and should cut down a little.
They're called BigPharma. Speed is illegal...unless you have a scrip for Adderall. Cocaine is illegal...unless you get it from the hospital as a topical anesthetic(Its intended use). Heroin is illegal...unless you have a scrip for morphine, Fentanyl, Oxycontin, etc. BigPharma's motive to keep Marijuana illegal is the fact that it works too well in comparison to their patented poisons and we don't need them to provide it through their ill-received THC pills. All we'd need is a flower pot.
I agree with you completely .
"The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all."
After 40 years, the United States' war on drugs has cost $1 trillion and hundreds of thousands of lives and has met none of its goals, and for what?
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/A...
"Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people." ~ Eleanor Roosevelt
the national security state has too much at stake -- all those billions in taxpayer dollars; all the toys and the unchecked police powers -- those bully boyz will never give that up.
and bigpharma will take care of congress.
The hemp industry is suffering too because it looks "too similar" to marijuana. That stuff can be used for everything, the oil could even be used in place of diesel in the same sort of way that cooking oil can be used.
but they can legalize anything they want, but if you do buy and use, even something like pot, there will still be 'tinkle test's' that your employer of the police will have you take.
If we legalize, there ought to be minimum blood/urine-levels set for each drug, because yes, if you smoke a doobie and try to go for drive right now, you are DUI. But, if you smoke a joint on Friday or Saturday night watching a movie, you shouldn't be able to be arrested for DUI on Monday morning, or 3 weeks later for that matter, when you're fine to drive, but the pot is still in your system.
I'm all for legalization and have been since I was a kid in the '70's. And I don't mean to rain on anyones legalization parade, I'm just sayin...
The problem with current drug testing is that it is not based upon the detection of active THC in the blood or urine sample -- it is based upon the detection of decomposed analog compounds of THC that have no psychotropic characteristics.
De-criminalization or re-legalization of marijuana should simultaneously exclude any /all drug testing methods that rely on anything other than psychotropically active THC. Otherwise, the vestiges of our fascistic police state will remain no matter what other changes occur. I am sure that there will be some billionaire drug test moguls that would wince over that dramatic change.
On a side note: Obama et. al. laughed off the number one net-roots question regarding the re-legalization of marijuana. This hypocrite is a self-confessed former (?) illicit drug abuser, who, if he had been caught and prosecuted as a young adult, would never have gone to college, or to law school, or become President. He has essentially endorsed and adopted the very tactics used by the Reich-wingers for 70+ years to oppress minority rights (now everybodys' rights) in this country.
I am sick of hypocritical and / or cowardly politicians that continue to espouse this War OF Drugs perpetrated on the American people. While I am not a single-issue voter normally, I will make an exception regarding marijuana. If a weaselly politician cannot publicly favor decriminalization or re-legalization of marijuana, then he / she will not get my vote or my money. I suggest you readers follow this high road as well. Enough is quite enough!
"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."
-- John F. Kennedy
described it when speaking for LEAP in Feb.: the rate of Americans addicted to heroin before prohibition - 3%; after over 70 years of prohibition and hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars - 3%.
At one time, tinctures of cannabis and laudanum (opium) resided in America's medicine chest, alongside aspirin, iodine, and mustard plasters. All of these were available without prescription and over-the-counter. Mustard plasters have largely faded from popularity. Tincture of iodine is effectively illegal. Prohibition 2.0 has done the same to tinctures of cannabis and laudanum.
And now aspirin, yes aspirin, is under fire from BigPharma and their legally sanctioned drug pushers (AKA primary care physicians) through the Healthcare Reform that recently passed. Yep, if you use a Medical Savings Account to deal with medical expenses, you will be forced to obtain a doctor's prescription to buy Over The Counter products like aspirin with MSA funds. Aspirin was / is a miracle drug with many applications, albeit somewhat more dangerous than that medical marijuana (today) or tincture of cannabis (of yesteryear).
Our politicians, including within the White House, are all bought-and-paid-for shills of the crony capitalist oligarchy, including BigPharma. Everyone please remember this and give some pay-back to "your" politicians this November at the ballot box.
"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."
-- John F. Kennedy
Comments are closed on this entry