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Comment by TheAmazingIdiot | Hacker News Reader

One has to remember that Portugal did not completely legalize drugs. Possession of small amounts and usage were legalized.

Dealing is still a big crime there, due to the citizens of Portugal not wanting to be akin the worlds drug den. The different viewpoint of legalizing usage was that it is a medical problem, and not a evil crime. Even that said, Portugal also made their problems less severe by bringing them out in the open instead of draconian punishments forcing users to hide.

The biggest hurdle for Portugal's idea to work in the USA is that we do not have any sort of socialized or national healthcare in which to attach a "fund substance abuse as medical problem" freely as Portugal does already. I can imagine that issue alone taking 10+ years in Congress, if any action is done at all.

Note: iPod farted earlier leading only posting the first character of this post: "O".

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Hey, sorry I downvoted you when the post was just "O".

The lack of a socialised healthcare system is actually a boon in this case, since the state is basically getting rid of a large cost (funding the police work on the war on drugs) without creating another cost (since patients then have to pay for themselves). Isn't it?

I'm not sure. What I do know is that from reading many stories about the "War on Drugs" that many dubious laws and judgments were made to separate people from their property and/or their livelihood.

We would also have a sizable chunk of the DEA disbanded (we wouldn't need them). We can add that to reduction of police forces around the US.

Where I am unsure is how the dependency of money works within the state system of the drug trade. I have a sinking feeling that there is probably the same amount or money moving around in the "War on Drugs" as there is in the drug trade in the US. My question then is, "What happens if we try to manipulate or disband this system?"

ObAside: I've seen this specific iPod bug before. When I click on an edit window, it will flash the keyboard up then down. And any sort of button click on the page submits the form. The only way I've seen to 'fix' it is to close and open the offending tab.

You'll probably only get half of the good effects that the Portuguese system will, you're only doing half the job.

No, it isn't. In Portugal, the healthcare system is free.

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

Medical care in the European Union (in general) is free. Money is recouped by higher taxation on all people, as if they bought into a country-wide policy.

I think we well understand what is meant by "free". It is usually contrasted by the US system in which emergency care is 'free' if you have no garnishable income or property to take.

By free I mean it's not a direct purchase. I'm perfectly aware that the healthcare system in my country is payed by my taxes.

To me (Brit) _free_ in this context is perfectly understood as _free at the point of use_

Unfortunately, that's not true. Not only you have to pay a fee for many basic services (called "Taxas moderadoras"), as they'll double in 2012.

As a grandson of a retired couple who had to pay 60 Euro for a public hospital bill just a couple months ago, I can tell you that not only are is it not free, as it can be too expensive already considering the low salaries and pensions.

There's public rehab in the US. There are also public mental health hospitals, and public hospital emergency rooms. There are also jails and prisons. Drug addicts end up in all these systems all the time, taking up space and resources.

Some addicts are somewhat functional, but not enough to hold down a job. They may steal things. So the cost is borne by the community, who have to deal with stolen car stereos and broken windows.

What seems to work out cheapest is community based group therapy like what you get with Alcoholics Anonymous. You meet a couple times a week, and talk out how shitty your life was, and how shitty you were to other people. Then promise to not be shitty, and not get down. Maybe you get in touch with the fact that you're kind of "off" and need to see a shrink. Yes, it's a little culty, but so is worshipping the bottle :)

AA and NA are dirt cheap.

AA and NA do not work. Failure rates are 95%, same as spontaneous remission. But there is an added increase in suicide of upwards of 28%.

As cliché as it seems, AA and NA are cults of indoctrination and trample our Bill of Rights as they can and often are court mandated.

The bureaucratic issues aside, it does seem, on the surface, absurd that we can't just view the money spent fighting the War on Drugs as part of a big bucket that we could instead just pour all over medical treatment.

Tossing the bureaucratic issues aside seems the larger problem.

I agree wholeheartedly. Viewing drug usage as a medical problem and funding free treatment seems to be a no brainer. That pesky problem seems to go back to Congress.

I can just imagine the headlines: "Senator Blabla wants to release druggies who solicit behind YOUR KIDS ELEMENTARY SCHOOL!!!!" Citizens already appear to want harsher and harsher punishments for crimes.

And then is the open question about what we do with the whole lot of people who work on the governments side. It appears to me in the medium term a fat job loss across the US. Especially in this economy, that kind of job loss, even if countered by a hiring of social workers, still looks nasty.

Well, the simple response is to say that we don't want to get rid of the cops; we want them to focus on real crime. In these times of limited resources, we must focus on the kingpins and predators, etc, etc.

I think the more subtle and meaningful response (and one therefore unworkable in what passes for political dialog in the US) is to recognize that we're dealing with the broken window fallacy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window

If we criminalize something relatively harmless, then all the apparent economic activity related to enforcement is pure waste.

"I agree wholeheartedly. Viewing drug usage as a medical problem and funding free treatment seems to be a no brainer. That pesky problem seems to go back to Congress."

How is drug usage a "medical" problem? It's a personal choice. Most addicts aren't born addicted and they make the choice to pick up that first joint.

I don't want to make it easier to be a drug addict in this country. Especially at my expense.

I like to believe we're a culture that's willing to help people move past their mistakes to become productive members of society. I want to move the reality closer to that belief.

"I like to believe we're a culture that's willing to help people move past their mistakes to become productive members of society. I want to move the reality closer to that belief."

If you truly believe this, then you wouldn't want to have drug addicts in the first place. Making it easy to start very addicting drugs in the first place (like heroin) with little to no consequences means we will most likely have more addicts.

If you look at the stats on Portugal, lifetime addictions increased after drugs were de-criminalized. Legalizing it will make it even worse because it won't have any negative stigma.

It's very telling when a community that is supposed to be about honesty down votes me because they don't believe in my opinion. Without an honest discussion with all view points, your issues will never get solved.

I would rather deal with more addicts who aren't afraid to seek help, and who have help available, than read about another massacre. Or kids being branded as criminals because of a stupid mistake. The addicts would end up dead or in a bad place if the object of the addiction is criminalized. A thousand addicts who can seek help is better than ten addicts who are driven deeper into poverty and crime.

" A thousand addicts who can seek help is better than ten addicts who are driven deeper into poverty and crime."

a thousand people who wouldn't have tried drugs in the first place to get addicted is better than 10 addicts who wanted to use drugs because it feels good.

Just a technical point here. Most people who get addicted to opiates start with prescription drugs. Heroin is a lot harder to get than Tylenol with codeine or vicodin. Also, the typical opiate abuse is by non addicts who mix alcohol and the opiate.

Does the real data from Portugal mean nothing to you? Every drug stat is down after legalizing and treating.

I really don't understand why people are so willing to punish others (and pay dearly to do it), but not to help, even if it is cheaper and more efficacious.

Did you read what I said? The drug stats are not down. It's created more addicts.

Why? Because when drugs are legalized/decriminalized, more people are willing to try it (which makes sense).

"I really don't understand why people are so willing to punish others"

Sorry, but drugs are a personal choice. If you can't accept the consequences that come along with it, you shouldn't be ingesting mind-altering or addictive drugs.

It's just that simple. I'm not even taking about putting people in jail or having harsher drug laws, just not having my tax dollars pay for their medical expenses.

"It's made more addicts"

Or maybe existing addicts feel more comfortable being identified now that they aren't going to jail?

"drugs are a personal choice"

In the US, drugs are not a personal choice. I'm fine with you saying you don't want to pay for treatment of drug users, but why are so many of those same people (I don't know if you are in this category) so willing to pay to incarcerate them, which has been shown to have much, much higher costs, both in terms of actual dollars and in term of social costs?

The fact that I can go to jail for a small amount of weed says drugs are absolutely not a personal choice. But you are right, they should be.

> "The drug stats are not down. It's created more addicts."

This isn't really correct, certainly not the way you've stated it. The data you're probably thinking of point to a slight rise in "lifetime use". Almost all of that is cannabis use. The only significant effect shown by the data is that there has been a ~5% rise in the number of people who regularly use cannabis, and are expected to continue in the future.

Twisting this into "created more addicts" is a bit tabloid, don't you think?

The irony of the community down voting this is fantastic!

What's ironic about it? You posted incorrect information and were accordingly downvoted.

The irony of the community down voting this is fantastic!

These two comments don't contribute to the discussion, hence these two will get down voted. If you want to contribute, contribute, but posting comments like these don't further intelligent discussion.

> How is drug usage a "medical" problem?

Because it's the ingestion of mind-altering substances to achieve a certain goal. Most often this goal is inebriation for entertainment purposes, some times (especially in indigenous cultures) it's a spiritual goal.

> It's a personal choice.

Sure, many times it is. But I think more often than you'd realize it's less of a choice and more of a predisposition. I mean, if some people are born with allergies or giant feet or different colored eyes, would it be too crazy to assume that some people are more easily addicted to drugs?

> Most addicts aren't born addicted and they make the choice to pick up that first joint.

Just real quick, I think you mean joint as in marijuana joint. Marijuana is completely non-addictive physically, in any circumstance. Nor does it kill brain cells, etc. These are remnants of the hilarious Reefer Madness nonsense that the US unfortunately took part in.

> I don't want to make it easier to be a drug addict in this country. [...]

Then make drugs further decriminalized. Marijuana, for example, is not a gateway drug. Drug dealers are gateway drugs. Every drug dealer that I know, except one, doesn't just deal pot. They've got cocaine, saliva, mushrooms, ecstasy, et cetera et cetera. So instead of being able to just go to a safe environment and get some harmless little green stuff, many drug laws force benign drug-users to be around shady, scummy people with lots of other shady, scummy drugs on them.

> [...] Especially at my expense.

See the above comment, and recognize that your hard-earned tax dollars are being brilliantly spent on DEA sweeps of Marijuana dispensaries in California, for example; countless arrests are made and resources used over completely benign drugs. Massive, massive wars are being waged around the world that suck money into them faster than a black hole. I'm not a socialist myself and would agree that Person A having Person B take money from Person C to pay for his/her decisions is almost laughably dumb; but there are far, FAR more money-sucking endeavors in the US than drug addiction care/treatment. I'd take a socialistic addiction treatment plan over 3 million+ Dept. of Defense employees (that we know about), 216,000 "Department of Homeland Security" employees, massive military expenditures, and who-knows-how-many-millions of dollars spent annually "fighting" marijuana and other drugs.

Just my two cents. Sorry for the long post guys.

"Because it's the ingestion of mind-altering substances to achieve a certain goal. Most often this goal is inebriation for entertainment purposes, some times (especially in indigenous cultures) it's a spiritual goal."

A "medical" problem to me is having cancer or a disease. Something you can't stop. If you don't ever ingest illegal drugs, you will never becom an addict of them (funny how that works).

" I mean, if some people are born with allergies or giant feet or different colored eyes, would it be too crazy to assume that some people are more easily addicted to drugs?"

Some people have addictive personalities. But some drugs actually change brain chemistry and are physically addictive.

"Just real quick, I think you mean joint as in marijuana joint. Marijuana is completely non-addictive physically, in any circumstance. Nor does it kill brain cells, etc. These are remnants of the hilarious Reefer Madness nonsense that the US unfortunately took part in."

ugh. I never said it was physically addictive. However, I will just let you keep believing it doesn't kill brain cells . I know otherwise.

"Then make drugs further decriminalized. Marijuana, for example, is not a gateway drug. Drug dealers are gateway drugs."

As long as we never have universal health care or addicts never get free treatment. This is my problem: you not only want drugs legalized, but you want me to pay for your medical expenses in taxes (but first deny that it causes any health problems).

"Every drug dealer that I know, except one, doesn't just deal pot."

You sure seem to know a lot of drug dealers. It's interesting to me because almost everyone I know that smokes pot falls in love with it. It becomes almost like their girlfriend. They talk about it all the time and defend it to the death.

You can't tell me that this doesn't have some effect on the brain.

"They've got cocaine, saliva, mushrooms, ecstasy, et cetera et cetera. So instead of being able to just go to a safe environment and get some harmless little green stuff, many drug laws force benign drug-users to be around shady, scummy people with lots of other shady, scummy drugs on them."

I wish the people on the left were as interested in less control control and less taxes as they are about drug usage.

Our current drug policy is already a large tax burden. The budget for the DEA alone is $2 billion. I imagine the imprisonment, local law enforcement, and court costs associated with our drug policy dwarf that number. If you are interested in less government control and less taxes, reexamining our drug policy is a place to look.

We all agree that drug abuse can have a detrimental effect on individuals and society. The question is whether our current policy is the most cost effective.

The DEA as is a government organization. And like all other organizations, it acts to grow its influence and power. If you are looking to limit government, all government organizations should be looked at not just those that give away your tax money to others.

Many of the most addictive drugs are legal. Good luck avoiding the narcotics if you ever need back surgery.

You assert that marijuana "kills brain cells". I would LOVE to know where you got that from. Keep in mind that the bar is pretty high here. Brain cells are slaughtered in mass by drugs which are now perfectly legal -- one in particular, I'll let you guess which one.

Your last sentence is telling I think. Why would you assume that arguments against you are coming from "the left"?

> They've got cocaine, saliva

I'm not sure drug dealers are really getting a lot of demand for saliva. At least, I hope not. I mean, gross, right.

The idea of "drug tourists" is absurd. The worst of the illicit drug addicts can barely take care of themselves. They choose drugs over food and showers. They can't hold jobs and resort to crime to feed their habits. Access to drugs isn't their problem else they wouldn't have become addicts in the first place. They aren't going to spend their money to travel to Portugal even if they can afford it.

Have you been to Amsterdam? It's not the poor addicts who travel, it's the rowdy 16-25 crowd. It must bring in a ton of tourism revenue, but I know the Dutch aren't thrilled about a ton of Brits, Aussies, and Americans wandering about their city stoned out of their minds all the time.

That's a plausible concern to me, but I wonder if it's practically any worse than other party destinations. E.g., New Orleans during Mardi Gras or parts of Florida during spring break.

Here in San Francisco marijuana is effectively legal; friends tell of walking past cops smoking joints. I'd much rather deal with a thoroughly stoned stranger than a thoroughly drunk one.

I think the weed vs booze distinction is really a distraction. There are plenty of cities that sell alcohol that don't end up party destinations. It seems like the right solution to public nuisances is enforcing laws against being a public nuisance.

That's the biggest difference between cali and most other medicinal states at this point. Most have semi-legal dispensaries and collective-scale grows, but public smoking is usually prohibited. It's one of those unnecessary clauses put in the laws because the writers think it won't pass without it. I will say that I enjoy Michigan's new no-smoking law, which makes it far less conspicuous to smoke weed outside. I can, however, use my vaporizer legally anywhere except schools and public parks.

I haven't been there because there's no point; I can literally do the same things here with no consequences. Stoners are far less annoying than drunks. There's a good chance they won't even make it out of the house, but many people smoke daily and go about their business no matter where you live. No one notices or cares. And if there are people stoned every day then there are people people driving around you are stoned every day. These people are a threat to no one because they are practically unimpaired. It's not even comparable to driving drunk unless you're on edibles or are very unexperienced, so they go unnoticed as well. It's just not a big deal anymore.

That comment was directed to the person who said the idea of drug tourism was "absurd."

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