Safe injection sites

[JagFarlane]

You were doing good until you got to that last sentence: "And, of course, add jobs to the country."

Just what jobs would legalizing drugs add to the country? Would they offset the LOSS of jobs in the drug enforcment and gang activity divisions of every law enforcement agency?

Just the elimination of the DEA would be a noticeable rise in the unemployment rate.

Well lets see...for one, if marijuana were legalized, I would imagine most likely the cigarette companies would pick it up. Considering the current demand for m.j. compounded by the fact that if it were legalized, former smokers of it may choose to pick it back up [my dad has admitted that if it were legal he would seriously consider it again]. So then, lets just start there:

Marijuana can be grown, and is legally grown within the borders of the United States. This would offer another crop to be grown within our borders. Now, most likely it would processed here, adding factory jobs in.

Law enforcement personnel, however, could be placed within other ranks. Last checked most law enforcement agencies are actively hiring [Norfolk, VA P.D. even advertises on tv] and reports have been made about the undermanning of sky marshals. Tie this in with the fact that drug enforcement is a job that has led to drug addictions as one former agent I knew said "You have to show dealers you're serious *sniffsniff*" But by legalizing it, we place talented agents in other needed fields [terrorist tracking anyone?]

 

[dr_mabeuse]

For the record-- Methedrine was first synthesized in 1893 in Japan. It's the N-methylated homologue of Benzedrine and was used extensively in WWII by both the allies and Germans. It's been available both legally and illegally since WWII. Its real name is N-methyl amphetamine. Methylating the nitrogen makes it more resistant to metabolic degradation so it lasts longer and is more intense than benzedrine, but the effect is the same. It's speed.

What's caused the recent boom in meth production was the development of a quick and easy one-step synthesis of methedrine from the legal, over-the-counter nasal decongestant pseudo-ephedrine in the '80's. Pseudo-ephedrine is dirt cheap and produced by the ton (or used to be. It's controlled now for just this reason.) Anyone with a can of paint thinner, a book of matches, some ammonia, hydrochloric acid and a couple of packs of Pseudophed could whip up some meth overnight, and that's what they started to do. First it was the biker gangs, then everyone got into the act as the recipe was distributed on the web.

Now it's the kitchen chemistry drug of choice and anyone buying Pseudophed in a drugstore has to sign and practically be fingerprinted. The danger in meth is that it leaves you sleepless for days and you deteriorate, mentally and physically. Massive doses also induce the well-known "amphetamine psychosis", but that's reversible as the drug clears the system. The actual toxicity of the drug (when pure) is small. Psychological addiction potential is high, though, especially if injected. (It can also be ingested or snorted.)

--Zoot

 

[dr_mabeuse]

At the same time, there is something called "tough love." When you make it easier and safer for people to continue using drugs, you give them less incentive to quit. Maybe it would be better to try to persuade the users to quit, rather than helping them continue their self destruction.

I think a lot of people -- maybe the majority -- who use drugs do so because they're in pain. They're medicating against very real psychic pain, from which they can get no other relief.

This is kind of hard for most of the straight world to accept. They see drug use as a moral failure, a weakness, and they can't understand how someone could let themselves sink so low. They can't understand that for these people, life without the comfort of drugs is something not worth living; that for them, the choice is pretty much either drugs or death, which is exactly why they hold their lives and freedom in such low regard. Their entire existence is a search for numbness.

Seen this way, the notion of having someone just "quit" like he or she might quit cigarettes or fatty foods kind of expects too much.

We're talking about people in existential pain like we can't imagine, who really have no good reason to get straight, who have nothing but pain and horror waiting for them, people who probably should be prescribed drugs like these in an ideal world. Certainly not all addicts are like this and there are some who no doubt are seeking to simply get straight, but by and large, I think people take drugs because they're in pain, whether that pain is nothing more serious than boredom, or something as devastating as suicidal guilt.

 

[Weird Harold]

Well lets see...for one, if marijuana were legalized, I would imagine most likely the cigarette companies would pick it up. Considering the current demand for m.j. compounded by the fact that if it were legalized, former smokers of it may choose to pick it back up [my dad has admitted that if it were legal he would seriously consider it again]. So then, lets just start there: ...

Law enforcement personnel, however, could be placed within other ranks. Last checked most law enforcement agencies are actively hiring [Norfolk, VA P.D. even advertises on tv] and reports have been made about the undermanning of sky marshals.

I think you're seriously over-estimating the potential for commercial farming and distribution opportunities for a plant that can provide enough drug for personal use in one (or two) flowerpot(s) -- as well as being decorative.

You're also seriously underestimiating the number of police officers without a mission if drugs are legalized. I've seen estimates as high as 80% of police officers' time is spent dealing with drugs and drug related crime. If you reduce the workload by even 50% departments would quit hiring (and might even start laying officers off.)

 

[Boxlicker101]

I think a lot of people -- maybe the majority -- who use drugs do so because they're in pain. They're medicating against very real psychic pain, from which they can get no other relief.

This is kind of hard for most of the straight world to accept. They see drug use as a moral failure, a weakness, and they can't understand how someone could let themselves sink so low. They can't understand that for these people, life without the comfort of drugs is something not worth living; that for them, the choice is pretty much either drugs or death, which is exactly why they hold their lives and freedom in such low regard. Their entire existence is a search for numbness.

Seen this way, the notion of having someone just "quit" like he or she might quit cigarettes or fatty foods kind of expects too much.

We're talking about people in existential pain like we can't imagine, who really have no good reason to get straight, who have nothing but pain and horror waiting for them, people who probably should be prescribed drugs like these in an ideal world. Certainly not all addicts are like this and there are some who no doubt are seeking to simply get straight, but by and large, I think people take drugs because they're in pain, whether that pain is nothing more serious than boredom, or something as devastating as suicidal guilt.

I have never been a drug addict, due more to good luck than good sense. However, I am a recovering alcoholic. This is not the same thing, but there are similarities. Just as there are some alcoholics who will never get straight, there are some addicts who won't either, but there are many of both groups, maybe even most of them, who might. I won't say those people need help, because all the help in the world is a waste of time when offered to somebody who isn't ready, or doesn't want to get straight.

Making it easier for somebody to continue the self-destruction may be a bad thing in the long run. In the short run, it might be a good thing, because it will help keep those people alive until they are ready to quit, if they ever are.

 

[Weird Harold]

Making it easier for somebody to continue the self-destruction may be a bad thing in the long run.

The problem is that there is NO "good thing" when it comes to addiction, just "bad," "very bad," and "extremely bad."

Legalization and regulation is the least bad option. Prohibition of drugs, like Prohibition of Alcohol is proving to be in the "Extremely Bad" category because it involves innocents who get caught in the crossfire of gang warfare over drug profits while doing virtually nothing to help the addicts.

 

[where]

But that's just the point about legalization: When Marijuana, Cocaine, Opium, Heroin and Morphine were legal and ingredients in everything from patent medicines to soft drinks they were NOT huge social problems -- or at least no more of a social problem that public drunkenness is now.
sweetness... you should have a look at some uk inner cities (actually and some of the more rural areas as well), to see the huge social problem drunkeness causes. In the UK it causes more violent crime and costs more in resources to health and social care services than drug addiction


Nearly all of the "social problems" caused by recreational drugs is the direct result of them being banned rather than the effect of the drugs themselves.
[COLORdepends on how you define social problems[/COLOR]

Drugs like PCP, Meth, Crack only became "recreational drugs" because Marijuana, Opium, Heroin and Morhpine were banned and they weren't (at the time they entered the market.)

Every drug that gets banned starts the search by casual thrill seekers for something new that hasn't been banned yet and the unscrupulous criminals who provide illegal drugs dig up some new poison or animal tranquilizer -- and eventually add one more drug to the list to start the cycle over.

It's no accident that all of the really dangerous drugs -- as far as making the user a danger to others, like PCP -- have appeared since we began making drugs illegal in batches and bunches.

Fair point, but do you really think drug companies are going to be 'responsible' in their marketing of stuff like PCP?

I think we basically agree on the main issues but whereas you seem to be coming from a libertarian free market perspective, I go down the state control route, because a free market would undermine free health and social care.

Problem is, if you control a lucrative market too much, a black market is likely to emerge.

This is true, but then tobacco is legal and a huge percentage of tobacco sold in the uk is sold via the black market so even if recreational drugs were in the hands of responsible drug companies and subject to huge taxes to help alleviate the increase in social problems, people would still be getting them via the black market to avoid the tax

 

[Boxlicker101]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Boxlicker101
Making it easier for somebody to continue the self-destruction may be a bad thing in the long run.

The problem is that there is NO "good thing" when it comes to addiction, just "bad," "very bad," and "extremely bad."

Legalization and regulation is the least bad option. Prohibition of drugs, like Prohibition of Alcohol is proving to be in the "Extremely Bad" category because it involves innocents who get caught in the crossfire of gang warfare over drug profits while doing virtually nothing to help the addicts.

Well, I don't think anybody questions that. Maybe the real problem is that politicians go to college and study Law and Poli Sci. They should spend more time studying History, such as the history of the Prohibition era in the US, so they would know what can happen to good intentions.

 

[Weird Harold]

Fair point, but do you really think drug companies are going to be 'responsible' in their marketing of stuff like PCP?

Perhaps not, but the corner pharmacy/liquor store/quicky-mart is going to card buyers and make it harder for children and teens to buy -- it won't stop children from using drugs any more than it stops them from drinking or smoking, but it will stop people from handing out free samples through playground fences to hook new customers.

Drugs like PCP should have tighter controls than drugs like marijuana but at the very least PCP users will be using pure PCP and not PCP laced with strychnine or other poison.

I'm not particularly Libertarian/Free Market on this subject -- I don't think the FDA should be completely disbanded, for example -- but I do think that the lessons of Prohibiton have been learned for alcohol, but aren't being applied to drugs or tobacco; punitive taxation levels generate a black market and organized crime involvement just as surely as outright banning does.

Bottom line is that I want real control over who buys and uses drugs out of the hands of criminals and back in the hands of the governement where it belongs.