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Comment by tedks | Hacker News Reader

Is nobody else on hacker news scared shitless of the convergence of militarized police forces, pervasive surveillance, and now legalized drugs?

Why is drug policy "liberalizing" now? There's no new information. We've known about the risks involved in marijuana and other drugs since it was first scheduled. Harm reduction is not a novel concept.

It seems suspicious to me that drugs are being released into the population, under the watchful eye of regulators of course, now that we're in a permanent recession/permanent war rather than, say, during the Clinton years when the economy was great and we were temporarily not locked in conflict.

Optimists say that ending the "war on drugs" will stop surveillance and overpolicing, but that doesn't seem like such a sure bet to me.

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Why is drug policy "liberalizing" now? There's no new information.

There is. And because of it doctors really want to use marijuana derivatives. I know some of the folk running the NHS studies and doing some of the PHD work on endocrine effects.

Here's a couple of recent studies on Sativex.

http://www.gwpharm.com/oncology.aspx

http://www.gwpharm.com/GW%20Pharmaceuticals%20Announces%20Ne...

Also, you have organisations like Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, who have been working heavily behind the scenes for the past decade. http://www.leap.cc/

This is new to me, thanks for pointing it out.

That said, this doesn't mean marijuana needs to be recreationally legalized; in the US it would only need to be made a Schedule II drug rather than a Schedule I drug. Cocaine is a Schedule II drug IIRC, and it's routinely used medically, so it doesn't make sense to have recreational legality, or tolerance of widespread use, just to get medical benefits.

For virtually every cause, there are groups "working heavily behind the scenes for decades" -- the existence of activist pressure doesn't seem to correlate with policy change. I'd love to see hard data disagreeing with me, but this is my impression from being an activist for some time, and knowing the histories of social change for various struggles.

Yet it does make sense to stop arresting people for recreational use of one of the most benign drugs we know of. Marijuana does not wreck homes, it does not kill people, and it does not cause societal problems. It is easy to use responsibly and does little more than make you feel a bit giddy. If you disagree with that then I daresay you haven't ever tried it.

I don't disagree with it; I just think it's suspicious that people are publicly acknowledging that now rather than at any other time.

That said, marijuana is certainly less benign than you're making it out to be. I know several people who started using marijuana in high school and became interested in basically nothing else. Anything can become addictive, but biological components that have tolerance factors are especially effective because they cause you to increase your dosage over time.

It's not like doctors in the 60's thought that marijuana was actually lethal, though. The propaganda about marijuana has been divorced from truth basically the whole time, but it's been scheduled anyway.

I find it hard to believe that this is simply a miracle story of the long work of activists finally paying off. There are no free lunches. If we're getting legal marijuana, we're losing something else. So what is that?

Well, what else are we losing?

> If we're getting legal marijuana, we're losing something else.

This doesn't follow at all. The downside to legalization of all recreational drugs is minuscule compared to the societal benefit.

I knew more than a few people like that myself. Now, I'm about to stray into the realm of anecdote, so take this with a grain of salt, but I knew these people well (I was one of them) and, honestly, if they didn't have weed to smoke they would have found something else to waste their time with. I'm not trying to say that this is true across the board, but i do find it hard to believe that people who are inherently driven and intelligent can be radically changed by something like pot.

Besides, the current laws are not stopping people from doing it. Most know that weed is something which can be enjoyed recreationaly without risking their health or lifestyle. It doesn't hurt anyone around them, so current law is viewed as arcane and unjust. What benefit are these laws providing to society?

Removing the war on drugs is taking away one of the many legs that state surveillance and military police force rely on. Eventually they won't be able to stand up(or pay for fancy weapons).

Most police departments don't pay for their weapons systems, they're gifts from the DoD.

State surveillance is officially motivated by terrorism, with the drug war only an ancillary motivation. The war on terrorism can never be won and can never even be stopped, because terrorism can only be suppressed, not eliminated. So I don't think there's a compelling argument to be made that the end of the drug war will cause an end to surveillance.

Militarized police are currently primarily justified because of the drug war, but there's always terrorism to fall back on in the even that the drug war liberalizes.

And if the populace is on drugs, who's going to speak out against militarized police? Or against anything else for that matter?

> Most police departments don't pay for their weapons systems, they're gifts from the DoD.

Needs some evidence for a claim this strong. Yes, the DoD sold excess hardcore equipment to police forces. This still required money to buy them, in my understanding, even at reduced prices.

And police departments are responsible for the costs of most of their equipment. Think hand guns, batons, etc.

I'm willing to listen to your perspective if you can put together a cogent, evidence-supported argument. As it stands, you're alluding to things that may or may not be the case, with little evidence, and hinting at some sort of a conspiracy without actual logic, other than some predilections for suspicion of authority.

Under the 1033 program, it's given to police forces free of charge:

"By providing law enforcement agencies with surplus military equipment free of charge, the NDAA encourages police to employ military weapons and military tactics." -- http://www.newsweek.com/how-americas-police-became-army-1033...

'[The 1033 Program] "permits the Secretary of Defense to transfer, without charge, excess U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) personal property (supplies and equipment) to state and local law enforcement agencies (LEAs),"' -- http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/08/14/t...

Caveat: "given" may be the wrong term: 'Estevez said that such equipment is "conditionally loaned" to the local police departments and is returned to the Department of Defense for "demilitarization at the end of its useful life."' -- http://www.military.com/daily-news/2014/09/10/official-most-...

It's also definitely worth noting that the majority of items aren't tanks, though: "Requisitions cover the gamut of items used by America’s military -- clothing and office supplies, tools and rescue equipment, vehicles, rifles and others small arms. Of all the excess equipment provided through the 1033 program, only five percent are weapons and less than one percent are tactical vehicles." -- http://www.dispositionservices.dla.mil/leso/Pages/default.as... (Though if that <1% is in terms of number of items rather percent of total value, that may still be a misleadingly small percentage.)

Nationwide, how big was this program compared to the size of a police force's asset budget?

If you demand any information that opposes your existing opinions to be spoon-fed to you, but blindly accept things that you agree with, you're just covering your ears in a different sort of way rather than being truly open-minded.

I've found this information in two google searches and integrating information from three results available on the first page of results. Google filter-bubbles, so your results might be different. But probably not impossible.

Notice also that you were factually wrong about whether or not this equipment was free. Are you going to go through your mind, search for all the conclusions you made based on that incorrect assumption, and propagate that belief? Or are you going to squelch it with an excuse?

Don't hide behind the rhetoric of rational thought by requesting "strong evidence for strong claims" when you're disagreed with. It outs you as a hypocrite.

> And if the populace is on drugs, who's going to speak out against militarized police? Or against anything else for that matter?

Living with a bunch of college students, I can promise you that activism and drug use are far from mutually exclusive.

Not to mention the fact that the populace has been ingesting intoxicants pretty steadily up until now as well. The only difference is that it's mostly been alcohol.

The idea that you can be jailed for unhealthy behavior (when it doesn't affect other people) is relatively new I think. If anything, I feel like liberalizing drug policy would be more of a correction than a radical departure from history.

For as long as I'm aware, some portion of the population will desire recreational drugs, whether that's alcohol, caffeine, nicotine, cannabis, or whatever. A smaller subset will run into issues with their use (whether that's for physiological reasons like genetic disposition or because of life circumstances that make intoxication seem like a more appealing escape).

That won't really change if you can no longer be put in jail for ingesting something. I'd imagine it would be a lot like it is now. A good chunk of the population would continue to chemically alter their moods and mental processes on occasion and a smaller subset of them would run into dependence or other health issues.

The difference would be that people wouldn't be at risk of prison or permanent financial ruin because they did something that is (at worst) unhealthy or unwise. Intoxication would and should remain no excuse for otherwise criminal acts committed while under the influence. You're still responsible for your actions, you just wouldn't automatically become a criminal because you adjusted the way your brain works for a few hours one afternoon.

I used to be very involved in a number of activist groups, and I think the drug culture was significantly harmful to their effectiveness.

Activism itself is not a threat to the status quo. Successful activism is.

>risks involved in 'marijuana'

Getting the munchies and getting fat? Falling asleep? Even driving while high is still less dangerous than driving drunk.

Cannabis is less dangerous than alcohol. The medical benefits are amazingly well documented, but recreational use is being legalised because:

1. It's a massive drain on police budgets to enforce laws against soft drugs.

2. It's a law that's often applied selectively to penalise people the police don't like.

3. Legalising and taxing it will raise huge amounts of money.

4. Legalisation stops money flowing to criminals.

5. Both Washington and Colorado have had crime rates significantly decrease post-legalisation.

Besides #5, all of the above was public knowledge basically from the time marijuana was scheduled.

Why is it being unscheduled now?

Because all the old people are dying.

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