More victims in Mexican massacre found across border (Page 3)

Wild__: If drugs were legalized the taxes would be generated through corporate tax and income tax, as well as sales tax. No different than alcohol or tobacco.

StuckInTheSixties:

I'd prefer to stick to the topic, but it's your thread.

How about the Interstate Highway System? Seems to work pretty well. You wanna get rid of that?

GI Bill?

Center For Disease Control?

N.O.A.H?

Library of Congress?

How about the Armed Services?

Etc. etc. etc.

It's easy to just simplistically complain that the government can't run ANYTHING successfully. You wanna be a fundamentalist Libertarian, where NOTHING is run by the government?

OCD_OCD: In order to gain control of the cartels in Mexico, we would have to have military action coordinated with the Mexican Military against the cartels....much like Afghanistan.

The drug lords and cartels are terrorists without a nation, just as Al Quaeda and the Taliban. They will have to be rooted out by the same means. Do we have the stomach for that?

the cartels are murdering, tormenting and enslaving the Mexican people. if we don't have the fortitude to fight terrorism in the rest of the world, what makes our backyard any different?

StuckInTheSixties:

Wrong. If the cartels had no one to buy their product, they would simply die.

StuckInTheSixties:

If the poppy growers in Afghanistan had no one buying their opium, they'd have to start growing turnips or something.

OCD_OCD: I'm a constitutionalist and I do not believe that the government should take powers that are not given to them under the constitution.

StuckInTheSixties:

Then why complain when you get this sort of result?

OCD_OCD: You have already stated that there will be a market for drugs, Sixties. someone is going to supply those drugs. does the government hire them as GSA's? give them small business loans?

StuckInTheSixties:



I can't figure this out ...

On one hand, you don't want government bureaucracies because they're not capable of tying their own shoelaces. But on the other hand, you don't want to remove those bureaucracies that sustain the war on drugs, creating the mess we have.

OCD_OCD: Are you talking about the DEA, Coast Guard, etc? The Federal government is there to protect the US and it's citizens and to enforce federal laws and regulations.

which bureaucracies are you saying "create" our drug problems?

davidk14: .

I realize this may be out of place...but should we just give up and not fight terrorism either? We'll never win. How about drink drivers, we'll never get rid of them.

Should we just stop trying? Drugs, alcohol, drunk drivers...lost wars.

.

OCD_OCD: If we all agree to convert to Islam maybe there would be peace, too, but I seriously doubt it.

StuckInTheSixties:

OCD, I didn't say those bureaucracies "create" the drug problems. It's the laws, and individual citizens that do that. The bureaucracies SUSTAIN the problems.

As I see it, you're preferences leave only one alternative:

Ultra-repressive laws, and draconian penalties on the slightest violation of those ultra-repressive laws ... but that sort of goes contrary to the idea of freedom for the individual that we value so much ...

southern77: ok lets try this....

crack open a bottle of tequila ... after getting stinkin drunk we smoke some pot and then throw darts at sits belly and that stupid rabbit guy...

then we can all pass out... after we get over the hangover the next morning... we can all move the hell on to something more important like figuring out quantum physics

OCD_OCD: and therein lies the rub. In order to protect the citizenry, do we choose to dance with the devil and accept the potential loss of life? If we do choose to dance wi the devil, then each person will have to take responsibility for their own bad choices and this means they have to figure out how to feed themselves and their children and pay for their vices and addictions without burdening those who have made the right choices.

It would be tough, but I would only be OK with the legalization of all drugs IF those that were addicted we're left to stew in the hell of their own making.

StuckInTheSixties:

The DEA and Coast Guard drug intervention "protect" us by SUSTAINING the legal framework that, along with the behavior of the individual, CAUSES the problems.

I think that's a little clearer way to express my thought.

The DEA and CG, ironically, function to feed their own bureaucracies by helping to keep the black market in place that allows them to have the budgets to do what they do ... It's an endless circle.

RE: Dancing with the devil:

Right. Either way, it's a dance with the devil. We totally agree on that.

I say do the dance that causes the least overall harm to society, and protects individual liberties the most.

southern77: has anyone thought to look what portugal has done??????????????????????????

OCD_OCD: If we did that, it would mean no governmental assistance for crack babies, no welfare for addicts, no medical care for addiction or addiction related diseases. would you be willing to do that, Sixties?

OCD_OCD: Portugal? In what way, Southern?

southern77: http://www.alternet.org/drugs/151635/ten_years_ago_portugal_legalized_all_drugs_--_what_happened_next

Wild__:

David says,

I realize this may be out of place...but should we just give up and not fight terrorism either? We'll never win. How about drink drivers, we'll never get rid of them.

Should we just stop trying? Drugs, alcohol, drunk drivers...lost wars.

And I respond,

I both expect and insist that the government protect its citizens from terrorists and drunk drivers. Drunk driving is a public safety issue and requires vigilance. People use illegal drugs and drive as well. When they are caught and convicted they pay the price.

A government, ANY government cannot protect individual citizens from them selves.

If someone wants to be a drug addict, let them. Take away their drivers license until which time as they have demonstrated that they are fit to be a productive member of society.

Through regulation, the harmful effects drug users pose to society can be mitigated, but never eliminated.

davidk14: .

Southern,

Who would have thunk. Now, it seems to be working with a population of 10 million. The stats were good but should they have been better? To take the same program and use it in a population of 310 million? I have seen small countries do well because it worked for them. However, there was improvement. Could it work in a country with a population of 100 million?.

Why not test it.

.

OCD_OCD: OK. I read it, Southern. It seems that Portugal still criminalizes trafficking and dealing, just not using. the drug dealers are still there and making money, though.

OCD_OCD: another article said the government used money they saved not jailing users rather than the government assuming the mantle of legalizing the sale of drugs and it becoming a profit center.

southern77: what about the tequila, the pot and the darts?