How America can end its war on drugs
vox.com
vox.com
And don't get me started on the DA's who must always appear "tough on crime" to get re-elected by an ever-fearful populace that is convinced that various boogeymen are planning its demise 24/7/365.
But ultimately, it's about money. Always has been. And this country values profits above all else. And if a few more thousand innocent people need to get imprisoned and have their lives destroyed - well, that's a price that we, as a society, are willing to pay.
As long as WASP-y suburban white America doesn't feel the pinch. As soon as some unannounced no-knock raid by a SWAT team decked out like it's Fallujah circa '05 busts in and shoots up a bunch of 18-year-old "all-American" kids, prom queens and cheer-leaders and judges' daughters and sons and all. Then and only then will you see a real outcry.
> As long as WASP-y suburban white America doesn't feel the pinch. As soon as some unannounced no-knock raid by a SWAT team decked out like it's Fallujah circa '05 busts in and shoots up a bunch of 18-year-old "all-American" kids, prom queens and cheer-leaders and judges' daughters and sons and all. Then and only then will you see a real outcry.
In my area, an upper class and upper middle class region near a large city, a prescription opioid and heroin epidemic has been sweeping up affluent white children. There is a big difference in how drug related offenses are handled now, the consequences are much less severe and many go home uncharged.
Money didn't create the modern incarceration state. Corrections Corporation of America had about $55 million in revenue in 1990 and less than $200,000 in profits: http://www.referenceforbusiness.com/history2/76/Corrections-...: http://notunlikeresearch.typepad.com/.a/6a0133f1fb8812970b01.... The incarceration rate had been exploding for 10-15 years before that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_incarceration_ra.... The rise of CCA (which was a pioneer in the field), actually coincided with an inflection point where the growth in incarceration rate started slowing down.
The incarceration craze of the 1980's and 1990's was a response to a real spike in violent crime that started in the 1960's: http://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/wp-content/uploads/... (showing violent crime per capita increasing by more than 4x between 1963 and 1992). And it was fueled by a conservative backlash against the liberalism of the 1960's and 1970's.
We can argue about whether mass incarceration was the correct response to that increase in crime. But it's ridiculous to say it arose before of some sort of profit motive. That argument ignores the data right in front of your face.
http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2016/02/lead-exposure...
Do minorities not vote for the same politicians these "awful awful white people" vote for? Is Hillary Clinton (who will do less about the War on Drugs than Bernie Sanders) not getting a majority of the Dem. African American vote?
We need to get away from thinking this is some kind of conspiracy. The drug war exists because the public is unwilling to entertain alternatives, and to the extent it's misguided, it's a misguided attempt to deal with real problems.
Certainly there are companies and individuals making money by building and staffing prisons, but without public support the system would not exist as currently constituted.
In my state you don't go to jail for simple possession. People who end up in the slammer on drug charges are there either because they were dealing, or because the drug charges were coupled with other criminal behavior. To get locked up for possession of even "hard" drugs you have to be arrested multiple times and have a history of the sorts of crimes associated with junkies.
I'm curious what people who want to "end the drug war" are proposing we do with a meth head on serial burglary spree in an effort to support his habit. Because he's not going to stop breaking into houses no matter what you do with the drug laws.
I think it's sort of interesting that someone posted some Mother Jones apologia for criminality citing Swiss cheese hypotheses about lead and criminality ..... but wait we have to outlaw lead but any drugs people want to use must be made free ... what about ones including lead? I mean perhaps you aren't making this claim, I just think there are a lot of misconceptions about the utopia that follows from complete legalization and and I think the "we have laws against theft and murder already" are pretty weak for those interested in like having civil society.
(That, and because a significant portion of the population actually still genuinely believes in the need for it. The war on drugs is a complex phenomenon, like any long-ranging civil conflict, with multiple factors behind both its inception and its continuance).
As for why they want it, and the politicians who manipulate their fears... now that, I think, is real.
A look at parent's username makes it clear why the Kafkaesque reason takes precedence.
Other drugs are definitely more controversial.
When you use the type of polls that matter - actual voting, it's the elderly and conservative that vote, so it's the elderly and conservative who have a voice.
Hence, marijuana prohibition continues. We're only seeing a lightening of this prohibition because our elderly are more and more from the baby boomer generation - the generation that made smoking pot cool.
I'm not sure what the majority opinion is on anything; from what I can tell if you asked a large number if Americans who Abraham Lincoln was with 3 choices, it would probably be all over the place.
http://blog.norml.org/2016/02/25/poll-60-percent-of-likely-c...
The public opinion on other drugs is not controversial. People broadly agree they should be illegal: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/04/17/drug-legalization-p....
There is pretty much nothing 75-85% of Americans agree on, other than that heroin, cocaine, LSD, etc, should be illegal. Well, that and that we should throw people in prison for life after three felonies: https://books.google.com/books?id=_wcyrot2kcUC&pg=PA234&lpg=...
It's pretty well proven that a survey can be crafted to guarantee the desired outcome for whom ever paid for it.
Those polls were from 1994 and 1995. The crime rate was way higher then: http://content.gallup.com/origin/gallupinc/GallupSpaces/Prod...
Much as is happening with marijuana when the States decriminalize/legalize it; the Fed can't do much without lower cooperation. Hell, they had a hard time 15 years ago using the Commerce Clause to convict people on an ounce of weed as "intent to distribute".
More to the point, is there a flaw in the reasoning that legalization would lead to a significant increase in addiction, or social dysfunction due to drug use? After all, alcohol is legal and readily available, but most alcohol users are not alcoholics.
This article offers solutions all based on the assumption that legalization and ready availability would drive up addiction to dangerous levels. I'm not at all convinced this is so. I wouldn't start shooting heroin even if it was socially acceptable and only cost as much as a coffee. Neither would most of the people I know.
maybe you meant something like "nobody _intends_ to get addicted". that's a very different sentence.
I never started because of the education/indoctrination by Nancy Reagan's "just say no." I just said no thanks when offered, and was only able to watch as these guy's lives spiralled out of control.
You cannot compare the "addictiveness" of alcohol and heroine, although there happen to be many addicted to alcohol and many alcohol related deaths.
I'm not sure why you are not convinced, is it because you don't want to be? There are already tremendous amounts of people addicted to legally obtained opiates, I think this is a terribly naive view.
If you believe the only thing that matters is for all drugs to be free then just say that but don't pretend the quantity of addicted decreases because the accessibility goes up. Imagine if you were a gambler, would you really make that bet?
Certainly, violence among dealers would disappear. Liquor stores don't have drive-by shootings to settle their turf. America's absurd incarceration rate would drop tremendously. Incarceration is a major contributor to child poverty. Moreover, a felony criminal record makes it extremely difficult for many adults to find productive work even after serving their time, which begets more crime and more cycling of the system.
The incredible militarization of our police forces, the costs of civil forfeiture (which doesn't require a conviction to take someone's property), the racism, the myriad other ways the "War on Drugs" damages our society and our souls - are you certain that an increase in addiction is so profoundly evil that it's worth this price?
When you're taking about poverty and getting rid of felonies you have to think is the fact the marijuana going to make the members of "Sex, Money, Murder" gang think "By George, I believe we will now have to earn our collective living by nursing the elderly and painting school gymnasium" .... I mean lets get real. Any time that proponents-of-drug legalization-that-also-believe-it-will-end-gang-violence are ready to come back to reality, I will be waiting for them. :)
As far as the other business, yes racist police actions should be universally reviled. But you have to think if unintendee consequences and the world is not one thing or the other.
I agree with you that there are violent criminals that are never caught committing violent crimes but only end up going to prison because they are caught with a kilo of cocaine; I guess you think that is tragedy that person is in jail and now cannot take care of his or her children. The child would probably also be in poverty if his parents were addicted to Krokodil.
I'm not sure "free heroine for everyone" is as much a panacea for the worlds problems as you suggest.
As I choose not to drink and not to smoke, I feel that others can similarly make /informed/ decisions as /adults/ about which recreational drugs they want to use; and I also very much agree with the approach of that third covered plan; drugs with worse consequences should be harder, but still fully legal (even /without/ a prescription but under supervision; possibly requiring a physical for health evaluation first) to gain access to.
My complete goal with this policy is fighting CRIME, not /drug use/.
Then, DEA help comes with infiltrators. Among people sent to combat drugs, there are spies that carry out a large deal of espionage.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_history_of_cannabis_in...
“There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos, and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz, and swing, result from marijuana use. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers, and any others.”
I've heard the idea of anti-drug laws as dog-whistle politics (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog-whistle_politics) from a few people.
As far as "evidence" here, I don't know what kind is suitable.
The 1875 San Francisco Opium Den ordinance law is widely seen as anti-chinese[1]. There's certainly historical people, like Harry J Anslinger (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_J._Anslinger#The_campaig...) who justified drug prohibition through racist prejudice.
The world isn't black and white of course, and how much race played in this can't be quantified reasonably. However, it's safe to say that it's non-zero.
IMHO, all the war on drugs is doing is inflaming a constant Streisand Effect for drug use. Also, I think that notionally, all drugs would be illegal under the current mindset. The reason that some are not has less to do with race I believe than it has to do with the billions of dollars alcohol and tobacco has to carve legislation in their favor.[2]
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1. California is the starting point for quite a bit of anti-drug legislation. Although now, in 2016, we ostensibly live in relative racial harmony, the state has a notoriously terrible history of regrettable regressive racialized politics. This completely factual history runs up against most people's current perception of the politics of the state.
2. It's worth noting that when you ban the sale of something, in ways you are creating a more "free" (nominally in the pejorative sense) market then if you sunlight it. If you search "marijuana easier than alcohol" you'll see many saying that, for children, pot is easier to buy than beer. Basically by the state not acknowledging the market, they lose out on the opportunity to influence it. Prostitution-based STD transmission being much higher in places of illegal prostitution is another supporting argument for this.
And finally, in markets such as liquor and tobacco, competing firms don't resolve dispute through violent armed gangs of militias cartelling territories like is done through gangs and illicit drugs. Can you imagine someone working for PBR murdering someone in the competition to gain market penetration?
In 1973 President Richard Nixon's "Reorganization Plan Number Two" proposed the creation of a single federal agency to enforce federal drug laws and Congress accepted the proposal, as there was concern regarding the growing availability of drugs. As a result, on July 1, 1973, the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs (BNDD) and the Office of Drug Abuse Law Enforcement (ODALE) merged to create the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). On December 1, 1975, the Supreme Court ruled that it was "not cruel or unusual for Ohio to sentence someone to 20 years for having or selling cannabis."
It always blows my mind that literally right after the end of alcohol prohibition (1933), marijuana prohibition began (1937 though lighter than the '70s kind of illegal). Basically historical mistakes repeated within literally years of one another. That second error is still not corrected 40+ years later. Criminalizing drug use is absolutely barbaric and has wreaked more havoc than any drug could on society.
The parent commenter is overly mood-affiliated, but Eric Schlosser's book Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs, and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market is good on this topic (http://www.amazon.com/Reefer-Madness-Drugs-American-Market/d...). I don't have a copy of it at hand, but making weed and other drugs illegal was wrapped up in racial fear and fears of what become known as counterculture.
Wade Davis's One River is about many things, including the ways hallucinogens came to the U.S., how they fit many indigenous religions, and why they're far more legitimate than the US makes them out to be. It's also an adventure story about the exploration of the deep Amazon and other South American rivers.
It's sometimes useful to think in terms of a total broad policy, but we also need ideas for smaller steps to take that we can actually get through various congresses. It seems like the political environment might become more amenable to broader change after considerable small-scale changes and clear changes in public opinion.
- How else can you confiscate private property without charges or conviction and just share the money among yourself ?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/04/25/how-o...
- How else can you run a multi-billion dollar prison industrial complex ?
- How else can you run a surveillance state where state actively encourages to snitch on fellow citizens ?
- How else can you create vote banks of Blacks, Latinos and other who need to feel marginalized and victims ?
Markets can only work when the agents (roughly) act in accordance with their interests. I don't want to pedal the fallacy that all drug consumers are addicts, but heavy consumers make up a very large and disproportionate portion of the alcohol (let alone tobacco) industry's sales.