How many people here feel drug use should be de-criminalized.

[genius]

90% of the people in prison would be sent home. Imagine the savings in government spending.

This poll is serious as opposed to a debate-reframing poll.

[Extend a Hand]

1. legalize it n/t

and get rid of the prescription racket.

[genius]

2. I'll second that.

[deadparrot]

3. legalize, tax, and regulate it like tobacco, alcohol, etc. nt

[Why Syzygy]

4. I'm in favor of decriminlization

but not taxation. Grow yer own. They gonna come in and tax plants?

[AntiCoup2K4]

8. Sure they would.

They still bust moonshine stills, don't they?

[genius]

6. Think of all the revenue.

Good idea.

[firefox]

5. Prohibition supports the terrorists even outside the CIA n/t

[evlbstrd]

7. Legalize. And tax the churches.

[More Than A Feeling]

11. excellent non-sequitur.

sorry, its just funny that a question about taxes and drug use makes you think of taxes and church

[evlbstrd]

30. That's okay.

One ludricrous policy led to another.

[evlbstrd]

42. Combined, they'd be great debt busting proposals.

And I like non-sequitors.

[0007]

32. I'll second that!

[Catchawave]

51. At least tax televangelists !

I don't think God and Jesus had infotainment in mind when passing the good word.

Back to topic, decriminalizing recreational drugs would put the drug lords out of business and possibly lessen violent crimes in the inner cities.

The pharmaceutical lobby wants to control our addictions, and scare us with marijuana leads to harder drugs and abuse.

[evlbstrd]

58. Decrim would also serve to unjam the courts and prisons

and free up resources to pursue actual criminals.

[Catchawave]

60. I bet if you queried probation/parole officers....

...they would agree! My son was a PPO in Virginia for five years, and he would agree with you too!

[evlbstrd]

61. Every now and then I see studies/polls of law enforcement

and parole and probation officers that show exactly that. But what the hell do they know?
:shrug:

[Asgaya Dihi]

62. Law Enforcement Against Prohibition

There's a place where like minded law enforcement types can work together on exactly this subject. It's just two or three years old and has already gathered a lot of positive press with everything from narcotics cops to former governors and prison wardens as members. Anyone with a law enforcement background who agrees with them should probably drop by at least for a visit, better yet to join up.

The rest of us can join as supporters which also helps, but to actually be a member you have to have worked in some way connected with law enforcement.

http://leap.cc

[evlbstrd]

64. Thanks, that's great to know.

And welcome to DU!

[Psephos]

9. Which drugs?

Some feel that they shouldn't all be lumped together.

Peace.

[norml]

39. In answering this I assumed that it was mainly herb that was being talked

about.

For other illegal substances I'd have to go on a case by case basis, depending on their potential for harm and abuse.

For those substances with high potential for harm and abuse I'd like to see them treated more as a public health concern, and less as a criminal justice matter.

[Psephos]

40. I agree with you. :-)

[Psephos]

41. I agree with you. :-)

[More Than A Feeling]

10. Legalize and regulate marijuana. The rest can wait,

while we see how that goes.

[Katidid]

35. I'm with you ... n/t

[dback]

53. I agree, start small and get a track record of success

You might be able to pull of legalizing pot and getting a plurality of Americans to support you; you're going to have a much harder time convincing folks to legalize coke, meth, heroin, etc. (And I'm not sure I'd legalize the hard stuff myself.)

[butterfly77]

63. I agree

People have been and will be smoking weed for years. And they have been driving while and after using it. I saw a story a few years ago on 20/20 or one of those news shows and they show farmers who said they had been growing it for years and they said this is how they supplemented their income to survive.

[napi21]

12. I think it should be decriminalized, but I have a few questions.

I don't really want anybody who's high on anything "trying" to drive down the same road I'm on. Most of the drivers here are so bad, they sure don't need any impairment! There are several tests for % alsohol impairment, but the only ones I know of for other drug imparement are either positive or negative, and no graduation. Could there be tests for degrees of impairment?

What would be the source of the drugs? Are we talking about licensed MJ farms? US poppy fields?

Maybe all these things sound dumb to you, but if you are really serious about legalization, you need to think about them.

[Why Syzygy]

14. The stoners would be the ones

driving a little below the speed limit and giving you the peace sign. :hippie:

The pharmcos sell all kinds of crap that frick with people's minds. So. Natural selection would suggest, why limit it to their profits?

That's why "natural" drugs are "criminal". No patent right. Lost profits for the profiteers.

[napi21]

16. Didn't take my questions serious huh?

That's OK, I won't take your desire to decriminalize serious either.

[Why Syzygy]

23. Then you may not have read my post carefully.

"Decriminalization" means people can grow PLANTS and partake freely, as the christian god of the bible commanded (the herbs of the field).

"Legalization" indicates what you're talking about. GOVERNMENT CONTROL. Do we need MORE of THAT? I think not.

The driving comment was on spot. People drive all the time on the pharmco meds. They should NOT be driving (ever see the warning on a label, "do not drive or operate heavy machinery"? - those are put there by LAW).

I did not intend to make light of your concerns.

[TexasRob]

17. Re: The stoners would be the ones

Heroine, cocaine, crack, methamphetamine,lsd,pcp, and Ecstasy are not "natural" drugs. Many of these have had patents in the past and earned huge profits before they were made illegal. Marijuana falls into a different category but for the most part there are very good reasons that drugs are illegal and should remain so.

[Why Syzygy]

21. Okay. Maybe Op should have stated exactly

WHAT drugs are being polled. I notice it is 44 to 0 in favor though.

So. You make my point very well. Many "drugs" are considered "controlled substances". Ask your doctor to write a script sometime.

What "drugs" are you talking about?

[dkofos]

57. And they are??

[High Plains]

20. Thinking about decrim...

1. Impaired driving. That's a legitimate concern, although the science shows that pot doesn't impair nearly as badly as alcohol, and pot is by far the most widely used illicit drug. Some states have proposed "zero tolerance" drugged driving laws, where drivers are presumed impaired if any level of an illicit drug shows up. A better way is not to rely on drug tests but on testing what we are actually concerned about: impairment. Can he walk a straight line? Can he touch his finger to his nose? You get the idea. Drunk drivers can still be arrested even if they don't submit to alcohol blood level tests just because they seem impaired. The same would work for drugged drivers.

2. Licensed marijuana farms? Let me suggest a two-tiered system. A commercial tier, with farmers licensed to grow marijuana for the commercial market, ie cannabis cafes. All licensed and regulated. And a non-commercial tier, the "grow your own" tier, where anyone can grow and possess for his own consumption. Much like "home brew."

3. US poppy fields? Well, the UN conventions require that any country growing opium for the legitimate market must register with them, and several countries (France, Turkey, India, Australia--I believe) have done just that. The US could do that, or it could buy from one of those legit countries, or it could perhaps just buy up the Afghan opium crop--it would certainly cost less than we're spending to try to eradicate it.

Anyway, good questions. People have been thinking about these issues.

[norml]

22. There's so much to say about the lie of pot impaired driving.

However I'll try to keep it brief.

1st. Pot doesn't impair your reaction time, or your driving skills.

I'd like to see any valid studies that prove it does.

2nd. Just because you have traces of THC in your body, that doesn't mean you're high.

Everyone who's smoked pot knows these things, and yes, it's still the same pot as you smoked long ago.

To try to equate driving on pot to driving on alcohol or pills, is nonsense.

[napi21]

24. I'm asking the questions because I don't know the answers!

Although you may think EVERYONE smoked pot in the 60's, you're wrong. I graduated from HS in 1961, but never tried pot until I was once in the late 70's. I tried it once. It didn't do a damn thing for me, and I never tried it again!

Sooo, if we are talking about legalizing pot, we have to have responses to questions like:

If it doesn't impair driving, why do almost all employers test for it? They claim it's because people can get hurt on the job.

If it does not compare to an alcohol high which does affect most drivers abilities, what does it do, and why is it different?

[Why Syzygy]

31. I don't know

why employers test for it. I don't believe their claim.
It probably has something to do with the "war on drugs".
I don't know anyone who has ever been hurt or hurt anyone else while using mj. Your mileage may vary.

Alcohol has been shown to slow reaction times. It is a central nervous system depressant. Just like many prescription "medications".
mj is considered a "hallucinogen", although I've never heard of it actually producing hallucinations.
Alcohol makes some react violently. Some just stupid. As far as I know, mj does not. It is a "mellow".
In many people's opinion, alcohol is a far more dangerous drug than mj.

What is does depends on time, place, variety.
Mostly it just makes someone relax, "think about stuff", sometimes giggle and perhaps eat anything within arm's reach.

Some people with mental health issues have told me that mj is the best medication, but hard to come by. It IS used in some cases to relieve pain, reduce the side effects of chemotherapy and something about glaucoma (not sure about that one... there's always google).

And no, I'm not high.

[Bridget Burke]

72. Maybe it's "Drug Free America" that encourages drug testing...

At the work place. The company gets a plaque & is considered a good member of The Community.

I'm not sure of the details. But a friend got hit with an random test the day after his band practiced. They found evidence of pot smoking, so his company had to fire him; they were sorry to do it. (Some companies at least offer counseling, probation, etc.) He is a graphic artist, not a surgeon or fork lift driver!

Marijuana tests can turn up positive a couple of weeks after smoking. Or even being in the room while people smoked. Testing for competence would make more sense. Of course, some people would fail that test, no matter what.

Very strong pot or hash can have effects beyond mellow. But don't believe people who say all pot is stronger now. There was always Big Taste & there still is. Mexican El Cheapo is still around to do the job. (Still wishing the Afghans would go back to producing hashish instead of heroin.)

[RedstDem]

68. You Make A Great Point

If when you tried pot in the 70's & it didn't do a damn thing for you,
i think your saying it did not make you feel any different. if thats the case, how would it effect your driving skills ? actually, i think it would make you & alot of people drive differently, mostly slower. i've been driving high for 30 years, no one ever has a problem with me on the roads, and the only wreck i've had was hitting a tree while DRUNK. i don't drive drunk anymore...that was 25 years ago so i didn't get a ticket.

[firefox]

27. Driving while enhanced

I happen to be the person that first wrote "driving while enhanced" because cannabis users are safer drivers. Dana Larsen has written several good articles on this at CannabisCulture.com- http://www.cannabisculture.com/articles/4131.html and http://www.cannabisculture.com/articles/4187.html

[firefox]

26. Drugs do not cause driving

There are already laws against impaired driving. Field sobriety tests are well established.

The reason the Feds fight the legalization of laughing grass so hard is they realize their drug war will not collapse at once and it will be more of peeling the layers, like an onion approach, that does in their drug war, police state, and seizure laws. That is why the government spends billions to demonize the greatest medicinal plant in history, so that it all does not unravel.

The legalization of laughing grass is the biggest step that can be made for advancing harm reduction under a health care model and move things away from the criminal justice model desired by the police state. The laws themselves inflict the largest harm to society as laughing grass itself is rather benign and in fact is beneficial.

Prohibition is what forces the popular method of ingestion which would be smoking. Legal laughing grass would bring us vaporizers that in turn could be used by cigarette smokers to reduce the harm that comes from smoking while also breaking the habit of lighting up. Vaporizers are a gift from the cannabis community that drug warriors do not want to be well known.

But besides keeping 2000 people a day out of the criminal justice system, Free Cannabis is the superior alternative to alcohol. Alcohol was the substance worthy of a Constitutional Amendment and it still inflicts great harm even though the official party line is to ignore it and to let the ads flow during every televised sporting event while having taxpayers demonize laughing grass in the next commercial.

Harm reduction is such a hard thing to push because of all the resistance from the drug warriors, with the US being the great Satan that led the world to a global prohibition. In this country the first step is to legalize laughing grass so that people might grasp the alternatives on other substances.

I will say that I am for the personal liberty of growing coca plants. You should read NarcoNews.com to see what the natives of South America think of this miraculous plant and see how it is so demonized. The natives would chew the leaves or make a paste, with the paste being something that was denied children according to Dr. Andrew Weill. It took a pharmaceutical company to isolate cocaine.

I really hate the tax the hell out of it argument because it really is about freedom. To say we should legalize it so we can tax it is like saying Bu$h's War would be okay if we actually got oil of it.

The movement to Free Cannabis is a world wide thing. In most of Europe and places like Brazil, Colombia, and Venezuela it is no big deal. I read at HempCity.com that you can buy homegrown in south France now with France being the most hard core of prohibitionist countries in Europe. Spain is the most friendly of all places in Europe and it is grown openly everywhere.

I for one think the prohibition laws in Canada are dead as cultivation and possession laws were clearly struck down by the courts. That leaves open Section 5 laws against trafficking, but if possession and cultivation laws are struck down why would trafficking be allowed to remain illegal? I only mention that as tomorrow there is a trial that will ask the court to recognize that the laws are dead and that the courts cannot legislate once struck down laws back into existence by changing a few sections of marijuana access regulations made by Health Canada.

There never was a valid reason for Cannabis Prohibition. There still is no valid reason. But go ahead and defend it. Even the prohibitionist do not mention prohibition or how alcohol prohibition required a Constitutional amendment, yet the drug laws did not. Even then the Marijuana Tax Act was declared unconstitutional in 1969, which meant it convicted people with unconstitutional laws since its inception on October 1, 1937.

The Schedule 1 classification of cannabis is an absolute lie. A flat out bald faced lie. For it to be schedule 1 it is supposed to meet three criteria. One implies harm even under a doctor's care. It does not meet that because hundreds of millions of people use it world wide without a doctor's care and they do not end up at the hospital or in the morgue. They might get a cough because prohibition keeps quality stuff, hash, vaporizers, and happy food off the market. Another criteria would be addictiveness. You do not see people rushing out at 3 in the morning like they do for cigarettes and anyone that uses laughing grass is used to the dry spells. The third criteria is that it has no medical value. What a frigging joke that is. The list is too long to list, but if it only gave you a good night of sleep that would be one reason and that defeats no medical value alone.

Do you ever wonder why the discussion does not take place on television? It is because Cannabis Prohibition is indefensible. There was no justification given when Congress prohibited it in the first place and there is no justification now. It is this simple. With all the billions of pages on the Internet, produce one link that even pretends to justify prohibition.

To all DUers- can you furnish any link that takes on the justification of Cannabis Prohibition. This does not include demonization which is mostly lies anyway. I mean a pro and a con argument. Something that says the price of prohibition and what good we get from that prohibition. We don't get shit out of prohibition, but we have paid one hell of a price.

The goddamned drug warriors even outlawed hemp as if something that provides food, clothing, and shelter (and was the most used lighting fuel until the 1800s)is some kind of drug worth throwing your ass in jail for and taking your house.

Free Cannabis For Everyone.

[johnnypneumatic]

13. make all legal

There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power government has is the power to crack down on criminals. When there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws. – Ayn Rand

[TexasRob]

19. make all legal

Lets go all the way and make everything legal.

[Asgaya Dihi]

37. Define "legal"

Yes, make it all legal. But, legal doesn't mean anyone and everyone can get anything they want any time they want. Morphine is legal today on the drug front, and explosives and fully automatic weapons are available to construction companies and movie studios among others who can show a valid use for it.

Legal doesn't mean free use, it means WE get to regulate the drugs instead of the street dealers, we deprive organized crime and terrorism of massive amounts of income and can better protect our kids and regulate doses to prevent "hot shots".

Here's an example that's been tried in Switzerland, and do note that though the police were skeptical at first they are some of the biggest supporters now and when the locals were offered a vote to either shut down or to expand it they voted by about 70% to EXPAND it. We'll hear lots of horror stories from the prohibitionists about the failures of free use, but intelligent regulation they don't want to talk about. We don't need prisons, we need brains.

http://www.dpft.org/heroin.htm

[omega minimo]

15. Or is that

jackoff?

[sam sarrha]

18. Lets put the F'n CIA out of buisness...decriminalize weed,

[Freedomfried]

25. Marijuana is a part of my spiritual program

It makes me introspective and meditative.

[firefox]

28. THC Ministries

http://www.thc-ministry.net/forum/index.php You might be interested in this. There will be a big Supreme Court case on religious use of substances in the near future. THC Ministries takes a religious view of cannabis and in fact says that cannabis was used in the annoiting oil in the Bible and claim freedom of religion guarantees the legal use of cannabis under certain circumstances.

[Freedomfried]

36. Thank you very much

Its nice to know that I'm not alone on this

[Humor_In_Cuneiform]

29. I wouldn't support decriminalizing all drugs

But for some I would.

[SHRED]

33. The Black Market creates...

Cartels, gangs, and death.

The Gov has no business telling me what "drug" I can or cannot ingest.
Especially herb.

[sendero]

34. It's probably ..

... the most obvious no-brainer in US society today.

The "War on Drugs" is ten times worse than drugs themselves in terms of outcomes.

BTW - "decriminalize" doesn't mean that there is no government involvement. It means that prison sentences are a thing of the past. Mandatory treatments, even the possiblity of losing one's drivers license are possible under my version of "decriminalization".

[_Loki_]

38. A willing buyer.......

.......and a willing seller. That's what it comes down to. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. It violates no one's rights, it victimizes on one (other than that the junkie probably victimizes himself, but that's his own fault).

As a side note, the USSC was spectacularly idiotic in its ruling that marijuana being grown in Oregon for medicinal use by the grower was illegal under Federal Law, due to Powers granted under the Interstate Commerce clause of the Constitution. Ludicrous.

[Pushed To The Left]

43. Definitely yes!

Drug use should be treated as a health problem, not a legal one.

www.aclu.org
www.mpp.org
www.drcnet.org
www.drugpolicyalliance.com

[laugle]

44. You don't list the drugs so I assume you are

including heroin, meth, X, etc.

Get real!!!

[Spiffarino]

45. Utterly and without reservation.

The so-called "War on Drugs" is just another war on the underclass. Rich, white blow-monkeys rarely go to jail, but poor crack addicts do.

What you do to your own body is your business. As long as you aren't fucking up somebody else, do what you will.

[Leftest]

46. The War On Drugs

IMO is nothing less than a violation of Constitutional -and- Human Rights.

However, it is because of my knowledge of how much wallstreet relies upon the mass influx of illegal drug money laundered by our corporations --Yes! OUR corporations-- it will never be legalized.

No amount of taxation will ever offset the need our grotesquely bloated economy receives from laundering illegal drug money. This axiom is much more pervasive than many might suspect -and- much more vitally critical to keep our massively bloated economy from going bust and driving us into a recession - to say the least.

It is for THIS reason and this reason only, that our sorry excuse of a government will never discuss legalizing drugs and taxing & regulating them the way alcohol and tobacco is. Illegal drugs generate mass amounts of cold hard cash, cash that flows right into wall street and plays a large role in keeping our overly inflated money from looking like the Mexico Peso, and the War On Drugs and the CIA are there to facilitate this. Interestingly enough, that is, mentioning the CIA. Do a history search on top CIA officials and see how ALL of 'em are bigwigs on wallstreet.

You can get a lot of good and sourced information on this subject from Michael Ruppert, a former LAPD Narcotics detective. For anyone not already familiar with him. He is the author of "Crossing The Rubicon: The Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil", and he is the publisher/editor of the paper "From The Wilderness". Here's a short read about him >> http://www.fromthewilderness.com/about.shtml

[Donald Ian Rankin]

47. I voted no.

If the question had been "do you support the leglisation of marijuana" I'd have been a yes, with some reservations, but as it is I think it's an open and shut no - heroin and cocaine are far too dangerous and addictive, and the distribution networks too unpleasant, to just ify legalising them.

[Leftest]

48. The history of Man is a history of drugs

"heroin and cocaine are far too dangerous and addictive, and the distribution networks too unpleasant, to just ify legalizing them."

Although I agree with you on the fact that heroin and cocaine are extremely dangerous. I would however like to ask you a question. Its an argumentative question, but please believe me, I mean no disrespect.

What I would like to ask is this: What would you rather have? Heroin and cocaine being distributed by unregulated and unscrupulous criminals who use our streets as battlegrounds in turf wars? Or would you rather have heroin and cocaine being distributed by government regulated businesses where they could require a license showing the person has undergone instruction on the dangers of heroin and cocaine?

Would you rather heroin and cocaine being manufactured by the criminal element? Or would you rather heroin and cocaine being manufactured by government regulated industry?

It is for these two reasons as well as a few others why I agree that even hard dangerous drugs should be legalized. Once you come to the realization that you cannot stop people from using drugs, then you can move on to a more constructive and responsible way of dealing with them.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

50. I'm afraid I don't think the latter is an option.

The drug gangs have a massive head start on both producing and distributing drugs. I don't think legalisation would put them out of business, although it would make them somewhat less profitable, and their turf wars might well become even more vicious as the turf started to shrink.

The fact that a dealer's clients would still be able to get a supply even if they sold them out would undeniably be a help in stopping that particular facet of drug related crime, but I think it's outweighed by the fact that legalisation would make it harder to prosecute people who bought drugs from illegal dealers, and that legalisation would probably mean more drug addicts. That's a bad thing in itself for the poor saps who get hooked, but (in some ways more importantly) it means more drug-related crime to finance those habits.

There are certainly some good arguments for legalisation, and there would *definately* be strong arguments against criminalising drugs if they'd never been illegal (although there'd be strong arguments for it, too - you'd still have drugs => addicts => drug-related crime), but I think the arguments against it except are stronger, except arguably in the case of marijuana.

[Asgaya Dihi]

52. Head start?

The worst players in the drug trade aren't farmers, they are little more than glorified middlemen with fat paychecks. The farmers are generally the poor who are just trying to find a way to survive, and I've known casual users to come out of prison hard core but they generally weren't before they went in. Prison often creates the criminal, not the drugs.

Legalizing or regulating drugs in no way empowers the middlemen who hold power today, we can cut them out completely. Our drug companies are set up perfectly well to process anything we'd want to, and if we didn't even want to deal with foreign farmers we could grow anything we needed to right here in the US as well. The gangs and problems are mostly distribution related and that simply because it's illegal, without the laws that distribution network collapses and legitimate enterprise takes over.

Legit companies brewed beer and bourbon before prohibition, and they did so after. It was only while it was illegal that the main profits went to criminals. We don't even have to allow it to be advertised or marketed, restrict it to special interest publications, regulate access based on risk for those who are already interested and do away with the prisons.

[Leftest]

54. I think I disagree

Because when a substance is made illegal it drives its price up substantially. Therefore when you legalize it, the profit margin drops to a point where the risks are no longer worth it.

Secondly, most people would rather buy their drugs from a legitimate business who manufactured them following safety guidelines, as opposed to buying them from a criminal element where one has to put their faith in these criminals, that these criminals didn't use unsafe and dangerous chemicals and processes to manufacture their product.

Thirdly, most people would rather walk into a legitimate place of business and be able to buy their drugs, as opposed to going into crime riddled areas to seek out someone who's a criminal, and give this guy money for a product you can't be sure of how safe it is.

I see that you mentioned that if drugs were legalized, that it would probably mean more drug addicts. Often when I debate this issue I come across this point. And I usually respond by asking this: If drugs were made legal tomorrow, and you could on your next stop at a convenient store buy whatever you wanted, would you buy some crack cocaine because you could? -AND- Lets just say all things being the same as they are today. If you decided one day that you wanted to experiment with heroin, is the mere fact that it is illegal going to prevent you? Statistics say NO it wouldn't.

That brings me to another critical point pertaining to this subject. That is: We've had a War on drugs now for sixty years. And not only has it not substantially reduced drugs, it hasn't reduced drug use at all. And in most cases it hasn't done anything except cause more damage to people than the drugs themselves. It doesn't stop drug use because drug use in-of-itself is not a crime.

It may be a social and spiritual problem, but it is not a criminal problem. And you are not going to solve a problem by making a crime out of something which is not a crime. Drug use (altering one's conscious) is as old as human history and only until very recently has it been criminalized the way it has. I do not have a right to throw someone into jail and ruin their lives that way just because they decided they wanted to use this intoxicant instead of that one.

Lastly I would like to point out; that if you re-legalized drugs, the resulting drop in prices and the availability from legitimate businesses would reduce what you referred to as "drug related crimes" the same way it was done when alcohol was re-legalized.

[No DUplicitous DUpe]

66. Great Post! Well Said. I agree...

completely

[Selatius]

49. Tax and regulate it all to death

It'll put the gangsters and mobsters out of business, and you would be taking a serious problem and putting it out in the open rather than denying it by trying to imprison or deny the problem behind steel reinforced concrete and steel bars.

[MN ChimpH8R]

55. Decriminalize, regulate and tax at a reasonable level -

same for prostitution. Decrim eliminates dealers, pimps, and profiteers and stops intrusion into personal decisions. I would support making being zonked an aggravating factor in an unrelated criminal offense, though. Stupidity should have consequences.

[FormerDittoHead]

56. Should be like gambling. Let States decide. Get the Fed out of it. n/t

[Puglover]

59. y'all have it exactly right...

legalize it, tax the living crap out of it.

[randr]

65. Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness

A central part of our constitution addresses the freedom to get high.

[Zynx]

71. Do not confuse the Declaration of Independence with the Constitution.

The Declaration of Independence is not a legal document. It establishes no laws at all. To make this mistake is to make the same mistake the right-wingers make in saying the founding fathers wanted this to be a Christian nation.

Also, I would very much dispute that drugs are a true exercise in liberty or cause happiness. Drugs enslave people with addiction and cause them to be miserable in the long run. I for one have sworn off alcohol and never have and neer will touch any currently illegal drug.

[progressoid]

67. .

[harlinchi]

69. I voted yeas but where will we get all of the Blacks needed to keep...

... our PIC (Prison Industrial Complex) humming along? If we're not gonna arrest Blacks at the rates we currently do, who will fill all of those recently constructed prisons (built so far from cities so the jobs go to local residents)?

[Puglover]

70. De-criminalize it and

tax the living shit out of it.


on edit

and while they're at it tax the churches too.