XShipRider said:
Check out the productivity of the Netherlands, land of legal drugs. I
believe you'll find they have lost a lot of productivity due to their
embracement of legalizing marijuana and hash. I could be wrong.
Maybe they just didn't institute it correctly.
Yes, alcohol is a major player in all of the things you mentioned. As you
pointed out, it didn't go away when it was outlawed. Marijuana is the
only drug I will be in agreement with you. If properly regulated, no
additives (unlike cigarettes) and taxed ~ it could be a major cash crop
in many respects.
Ever notice how the countries that hate us export their drugs to this
country. Economics would explain much but it is also they know they
can put a crimp in the US economy by doing so. Think Afghani poppys.
Columbian weed and coke.
There is no way I'll change your mind. You've convinced yourself, as I've
convinced myself, on the drug question.
Yes, you were wrong on that. There is no evidence showing that legal marijuana has hurt the productivity or the economy of Holland. This is a myth put out by prohibitionists in America. Their economy has done much better as a result of the coffeeshops. They have less drug abuse overall, they have plenty of tourism that boosts their economy, and contrary to popular belief, most marijuana smokers are not lazy. Couch potatoes in America are considered cute until you find a roach in the ashtray and then its labeled and stereotyped into some crisis, give me a break. Lazy people will always exist in any society and you can blame it on whatever you want. There are plenty of responsible doctors, lawyers, professors, cops, and other contributing members of society that use marijuana on ocassion as a recreational drug like a beer. A small part of society already abuses marijuana like they abuse other drugs, and making it legal will not change this. Most people smoking weed in excess are already doing so, and if a few more people do this, they'll hand over their role in the economy to someone else who is looking for a job. Politicians use these fear tactics to say we would make society into drug addicts. No ,we would make fewer people use drugs if didnt advertise them, so boring and legal marijuana unadvertised would lower its use rates. Knowing how we promote drug abuse by advertising alcohol, its time to end all of that hypocrisy, the government doesnt care about your personal life. Make drugs legal and boring, and they seek their low natural levels of abuse.
I like how you mentioned other countries that hate us sell the illegal drugs we demand to our markets.
Al-Qaeda boats have been caught post 9/11 with opium and hash. Afghanistan produces 87-90% of the world opium supply according to the government estimates and they say themselves that it funds terrorism. Osama Bin Laden is officially labeled as a narco-terrorist in U.S. government files. They are using our own bad laws against us. We can never eradicate all the billions of fields of weeds growing in mountainous regions of the earth. I saw a 60 minutes special on it and the corruption is rampant in the Karzai government because the drug trade produces so much money to corrupt.
We cant stop it in the thousands of mountainous square miles of weed fields where terrorists hide. And why would we try to eradicate the drug when that would only increase the price of the drug and make it more desirable for terrorists to sell?
We make these drugs so expensive because we keep them illegal. We need to regulate these drugs that terrorists sell because its a national security issue. But that would make the government lose profits to pharmaceutical industries and make them retract their lies on the drug war.
If people could grow poppy flowers legally they wouldnt have to pay corrupt pharmaceutical giants $250 per month for overpriced pain medications which are all opiates! All synthetic opiate drugs convert to morphine in the brain, it is the same drug we are using that is found for free in a natural flower pod!
Dont bother to compare this idea to the 19th century chinese with the opium problem. That is such a poor comparison. That was a peasant society ruled by a harsh dictatorship, so that society was susceptible to drug abuse because they had no reason to work. Opium had existed in China for thousands of years, but took off when the population was being brutalized. They were farm laborers with no hope of a better life. Only downtrodden populations that are under harsh oppression seek drug abuse on a wide scale. Free countries do not. This is why the addict populations through history were being oppressed and massacred like Native Americans (alcohol), ancient Chinese under a brutal dicatorship (opium), and Irish in a long civil war (alcohol).
Normal life does not create populations who struggle with widespread addiction, a small percentage of society will always abuse drugs that make them unproductive citizens, but this will never change and these people will use alcohol, or anything else to escape. This is understood and it will always happen. Making drugs illegal does not change this number because they will always exist regardless of any law, making drugs legal does not facilitate this because these reckless people in society already abuse illegal drugs and legal drugs.
Americans in the 21st century are caffeine junkie capitalists all about GO, GO, GO.... We have goals to achieve, lives to live, things to do, hobbies to consume our time, we want more money, more electronics, nicer cars, better televisions and sound systems, more achievement, more material goods every day. Our society has reasons to stay sober, ancient peasent villages had no reason not to become addicts. Only a small amount of society becomes addicted to alcohol today, which is a drug we advertise so people will consume it! We shouldnt advertise opium poppy, but it will be legal if you want to grow it or buy it in a licensed store. Society today is not nearly as prone to drug abuse as ancient societies who had no material goals and therefore no reason to stay sober! If you are destitute you seek to mope around and let time pass, but if you have a life you will seek to stay away from drug addiction, nobody wants to zone out like a caterpillar on a leaf today. Opiate drugs are not much of a threat to society, and surely not worth risking death on a massive scale from well funded terrorism.
I would rather have people growing their own opium than what we do today, letting terrorists sell poppy to fund our future deaths. If a few people want to risk addiction, they should have that choice in a free society, but there is nothing sane or logical about allowing terrorists to profit from these horrible laws.
