Crack & Heroin & All Drugs must be legalized, and with no tax either.

[paradise!]

legalize weed~~~~~

Else Rape All Aliens in Their Fukin Earholes When They Come.~*~*~ #TickleMyPerineum #IAmTheUnofficialHomeDepotMascot

[Supreme]

[Manco]

Prohibitive drug laws are effective. Prohibitive drug laws have a successful track record suppressing illicit drug use since they were first introduced. The licit drug alcohol has current user rates as high as 80% in populations over 14 years of age, and tobacco has historically had current use rates up to 60% of adult populations, yet the percentages currently using illicit drugs in OECD countries are generally below 1% of the population excepting cannabis where most are between 3% and 10%, with six countries between 11% and 17%. In the 50 year period following the first 1912 international convention restricting use of opium, heroin and cocaine, the United States’ use of illicit drugs other than cannabis was consistently below 0.5% of the population, with cannabis rising to 1-2% of the population between 1955 and 1965. With the advent of the counter-culture movement from the late 1950s, where illicit drug use was promoted as mind-expanding and relatively harmless, illicit drug use rose sharply. With illicit drug use peaking in the 1970s in the United States, the "Just Say No" campaign, coincided with drug use decreases from 14.1% in 1979 to 5.8% in 1992, a drop of 60%.

Prohibition discourages drug use. After so many years of drug control experience, we now know that a coherent, long-term strategy can reduce drug supply, demand and trafficking. If this does not happen, it will be because some nations fail to take the drug issue sufficiently seriously and pursue inadequate policies. Many countries have the drug problem they deserve.

Controls and prohibitions help to keep prices higher, and higher prices help keep use rates relatively low, since drug use, especially among young people, is known to be sensitive to price. The relationship between pricing and rates of youth substance use is well-established with respect to alcohol and cigarette taxes. There is literature showing that increases in the price of cigarettes triggers declines in use.

Regarding the freedom of choice of those addicted to a drug, it is important to recognize that addiction is defined as compulsive by its very nature and that addictions curb individual freedom. As is the case with alcohol addiction, illicit drug addictions likewise serve to keep many such users functionally in poverty and often as a continued burden on friends, family and society. Where it is argued that all disabilities are a burden on society it must be recognized that most disabilities are not the result of a choice, whereas the decision to recreationally use illicit drugs is most commonly free, and with the knowledge that they may lead to an addiction.

Due to a placebo effect, a patient may erroneously believe a drug is helpful when it is not. This is especially true of addictive, mind-altering drugs like marijuana. A marijuana withdrawal syndrome occurs, consisting of anxiety, depression, sleep and appetite disturbances, irritability, tremors, diaphoresis, nausea, muscle convulsions, and restlessness. Often, persons using marijuana erroneously believe that the drug is helping them combat these symptoms without realizing that actually marijuana is the cause of these effects. Therefore, when a patient anecdotally reports a drug to have medicinal value, this must be followed by objective scientific studies.

There is a growing misconception that some illegal drugs can be taken safely. For example, savvy drug dealers have learned how to market drugs like Ecstasy to youth. Some in the legalization lobby even claim such drugs have medical value, despite the lack of conclusive scientific evidence.

Compared to the social costs of drug abuse and addiction-whether in taxpayer dollars or in pain and suffering-government spending on drug control is minimal.

The economic argument for drug legalization says: legalize drugs, and generate tax income. This argument is gaining favor, as national administrations seek new sources of revenue during the current economic crisis. This legalize and tax argument is unethical and uneconomical. It proposes a perverse tax, generation upon generation, on marginalized cohorts (lost to addiction) to stimulate economic recovery. Are the partisans of this cause also in favor of legalizing and taxing other seemingly intractable crimes like human trafficking? Modern-day slaves (and there are millions of them) would surely generate good tax revenue to rescue failed banks. The economic argument is also based on poor fiscal logic: any reduction in the cost of drug control (due to lower law enforcement expenditure) will be offset by much higher expenditure on public health (due to the surge of drug consumption). The moral of the story: don’t make wicked transactions.

The tax revenue collected from alcohol pales in comparison to the costs associated with it. Federal excise taxes collected on alcohol in 2007 totaled around $9 billion; states collected around $5.5 billion. Taken together, this is less than 10 percent of the over $185 billion in alcohol-related costs from health care, lost productivity, and criminal justice. Tobacco also does not carry its economic weight when we tax it; each year we spend more than $200 billion on its social costs and collect only about $25 billion in taxes.

Billionaires George Soros, Peter Lewis and John Sperling have bankrolled the pro-pot or drug legalization movement. These people use ignorance and their overwhelming amount of money to influence the electorate. The drug legalization lobby’s vigorous and well funded promotion in media and schools of a ‘safe use of illegal drugs’ message indicates that drug prohibition is in the midst of a pitched battle waged by those who are accepting not only of the drug user but who also strongly promote an acceptance of drug use itself.

Crime, violence and drug use go hand in hand. Six times as many homicides are committed by people under the influence of drugs, as by those who are looking for money to buy drugs. Most drug crimes aren’t committed by people trying to pay for drugs; they’re committed by people on drugs.

Frequent use of hard drugs is one of the strongest indicators of a criminal career. Offenders who use drugs are among the most serious and active criminals, engaging in both property and violent crime. Early and persistent use of cocaine or heroin in the juvenile years is an indicator of serious, persistent criminal behavior in adulthood. Those arrested who are drug users are more likely than those not using drugs to be rearrested on pretrial release or fail to appear at trial.

The idea that our nation's prisons are overflowing with otherwise law abiding people convicted for nothing more than simple possession of marijuana is a myth, an illusion conjured and aggressively perpetuated by drug advocacy groups seeking to relax or abolish America's marijuana laws. The vast majority of inmates in state and federal prison for marijuana have been found guilty of much more than simple possession. Some were convicted for drug trafficking, some for marijuana possession along with one or more other offenses. And many of those serving time for marijuana pleaded down to possession in order to avoid prosecution on much more serious charges. In the US, just 1.6 percent of the state inmate population were held for offenses involving only marijuana, and less than one percent of all state prisoners (0.7 percent) were incarcerated with marijuana possession as the only charge. An even smaller fraction of state prisoners were first time offenders (0.3 percent).

The argument that drug addicts are forced into crime by prohibition should first and foremost highlight the fact that this argument presupposes and underlines the addictive nature of illicit drugs, addictive enough to create a viable criminal supply industry. Secondly, the harms of increased drug use, which as previously outlined would be a consequence of legalization and its cheaper prices, far outweigh the current crime harms of prohibition.

The notion that illicit drug use is a victimless crime and that everyone should be free to do what they want with their body disregards the web of social interactions that constitute human existence. Affected by an individual’s illicit drug use are children, parents, grandparents, friends, colleagues, work, victims of drugged drivers, crime victims, elder abuse, sexual victims, patients made sicker by medical marijuana etc. Illicit drug use is no less victimless than alcoholism.

Few things restrict people’s freedom as much as the consequences of violence, drugs and criminality in society.

Many people argue that only drug dealers should be fought and not the drug users themselves. But this rests on the fundamental error that big-time drugs smugglers and dealers hawk illicit drugs to new consumers. This is most often not the case. Rather it is the users themselves that are mostly responsible for recruiting new users through networks of friends or relatives demonstrating that users need to be targeted as the recruiters of new drug use, and that an emphasis on early rehabilitation for young users is the best answer to curbing widespread dealing.

[Supreme]

Alright, barely read cause of TLR but:

1) How did the ban of alcohol work out for you last time?
2) Dutch legalizes cannabis yet addiction rates are lower
3) Last but not least you completely lack any sort of argument on individual freedom. I think this goes beyond anything else. Educate but not limit so to say.

[Pearl Jam]

THE TRUTH: Everybody is actually a giant turtle, but we're plugged into a giant "Matrix"-esque environment where we live out our lives as humanoid beings. Turtles, man. Turtles.

You're welcome.

[Kahlan]

THE TRUTH: Everybody is actually a giant turtle, but we're plugged into a giant "Matrix"-esque environment where we live out our lives as humanoid beings. Turtles, man. Turtles.

You're welcome.

No, you got that wrong. The EARTH is on the back of a giant turtle but in the shape of a disc being held up by giant elephants. Close, though.

[Xog]

No, you got that wrong. The EARTH is on the back of a giant turtle but in the shape of a disc being held up by giant elephants. Close, though.

I totally watched that series before. Can't for the life of me remember what it was!

[Manco]

Bump

[Tone]

Bump

You want me to reply?

everything you said in your long post is wrong + you disbelieve that elements of the government traffic drugs on purpose, and think that its a false conspiracy theory because you didnt research it and look at the witnesses and how many times theyve been caught.

If you think these things are untrue instead of true, then nothing can be said to you. That means there is no possible reply for you. You are programmed with untruths. Most of the time, theres no such thing as debates and varying viewpoints, but rather truth and untruth. People like to disguise truth & untruth as debates & opinions so that the untruth can be mixed with the truth making it look valid to even state or post, instead of BS that should be thousands of years behind us.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_syndrome

I would not be surprised if less than 10% of all debates were actually real debates of viewpoints, instead of simple truth & untruth disguised as a "debate". Please, debating this would be like debating weather or not serial killers are good or bad.

[paradise!]

eat a fruit-by-the-foot

problem solved

[Tone]

You have blacks proportionately imprisoned for drugs, enduring incredible torture and being broken, and this guy wants to still write his invalid reply based on the disbelief that elements of intelligence traffic the drugs for money funneled through the world bank and that the illegality is what causes violence, injury and death of the ones involved plus innocent bystanders. Only the sickest satanic mind or the most ignorant would have Stockholm syndrome and agree with whats going on, then pretend theres a debate instead of the truth & right position being super obvious

[soup]

is this the spongebob squarepants thread?

[kthx]

Black people being tortured is not putting them in jail.

[roxxkatt]

tl;dr

this post has clearly proven the existence of alien squidward-based lifeforms