How do you feel about the currently illegal selling, possession, and usage of illicit drugs?

Feel free to add anecdotes and distinctions.

other people do. I can't see what good making drugs (or prostitution, for that matter) illegal has done. Especially marijuana.

Besides, I would like to be able to buy my goddam cold medicine without having to produce a picture ID.

beating that drum for 20 years.

Wasn't one of them goofy repug candidates making a big deal about marijuana being a gateway drug the other day? Hasn't that been refuted over and over and over? I wish MJ was legalized and taxed and the money earmarked for something good.
Our current drug policies are pretty bad. I always call them "Nixon's revenge". His way of fucking us for decades without even being here.

but I would rather have my kids smoke weed than drink alcohol. I mean, if they had to do something. My father was an alcoholic and I have a really big 'thing' about drinking.

I've tried alcohol, but it never really did it for me. My mom found out, and we had a talk. A couple months later, she picked me up from a friends house, and I was stoned out of my mind. She pretty much told me, "Well, I'd rather you be smoking pot than drinking. Just never do it in a car. You're way more likely to get caught, and driving while high isn't a good idea."

I whiteyed about 20 minutes later :)

:hi:

I am not sure about other drugs though because some of them are seriously unhealthy. On the otherhand, prohibition leads to more crime. There is also corruption in the system that causes some people to be arrested and do hard time while others don't.

instead of wasting our treasure arresting silly people who're having a good time, or lonely people trying to imagine themself someplace better, or bored people tasting what's available etc the industry could be regulated-why aren't thalidomide babies born every few months? the drug war is, in fact, cover for mr pig's war for control of the wildebeest called humanity, the public, the masses, the electorate, 'my feela ameerkans' and soon...mr pig is the biggest actor in our politics, in our social order, and the fact he HIDES HIS STINKING ARSE suggest mr pig....c'mon, there is not one person reading this who isn't aware of mr pig, and mr pig's hatred for us (he's terrified of us, thus he hates us and constantly works to neuter us)...after the revolution, the end of the 'drug war' should be first order o bizness, to prove that mr pig is up a tree, or hiding under a bed, or something....100 years ago, one could take public transit streetcars from new york to florida- it was mr pig who saw the mass transit destroyed and replaced by the car NOT the electric car, but the gas guzzler, so the piglets could get really really fat(?) from the windfall profiteering. The same idea saw pot made illegal. and today, the youngster bush is mr pig's man in Brainwashaton, DC, and mr pig is kinda embarassed- 'don't look ethel!'

If you mean an herbal substance, or a chemical substance, not inherently toxic or lethal used to enhance mood or trigger alternate states of mind that cause no harm, I think they should be legal and slightly regulated to prevent harm. Legal production and distribution would, I hope, take the crime, real and perceived, out of the process. Meanwhile, I hope we have better things to do than go to war with the producers, distributors, or users.

If you mean some toxic cocktail cooked up to enrich producers and distributors while it kills the users, or renders them unconscious and available for rape, I think the producers are criminal, the distributors need to be provided with a better way to make a living, and the users surviving need some intensive intervention, support, and therapy to activate whatever brain cells they've got left, in the first case, and need therapy, privacy, and prosecution of their rapists in the second.

but I think legalizing drugs would be a disaster too. There are an awful lot of people who don't have enough independent judgment to understand that just because something is legal doesn't make it a good idea. Those same people tend to be folks who have little ability to understand the need for limits and self control when indulging themselves. I think if drugs were legalized we would see a huge increase in addiction.

and they have devastated communities across the country.

outside liquor stores in the morning waiting for it to open? Or are you talking about those who buy their 40 ouncers at the local 7/11? Yeah, I agree some people have taken advantage of the 21st amendment that repealed prohibition.

. . . of any kind should be illegal. Chemical extracts though are bad news. Coca leaves are good medicine. Cocaine is horrible.

Maybe the only exception should be opium. Highly addictive and bad news even in it's crude form.

Opium is great! Of course it's addicting, but...big fucking deal. That's only a problem when you run out.

Everyone should just mind their own fucking business!

If the shit was legal, and you could grow it in your garden, it would eliminate the black market. No more junkies trying to steal your fucking tee-vee.

primary reason marijuana is not legal in the US. Unlike brewing your beer, which is a time consuming process any competent gardener can grow pot. Since almost anyone can grow it, corporations would find it difficult to control its distribution and thus difficult to make a profit.

Profit after all is what the US is about...SOMEONE MUST become obscenely rich.

but sheesh people, marijuana doesn't kill and the war on drugs is so freakin' corrupt. So start there, by legalizing pot and end the 'war'.

that's what annoys, the double standard.

and the people in jail now, for non-violent criminal offenses like possession of grass, should be released.

I'm not really in favor of people getting high off of gasoline, pesticides or strychnine, for example. Could you be more specific?

"I'd never recommend drugs or alcohol to anyone, but they always seemed to work for me".

Excellent article done in South Carolina's paper

http://www.thestate.com/crime/story/182719.html
SAVAGE METH | Day 3: Hidden time bombs
Poisons lurk as state does little to notify public,
make toxic sites clean
By JOHN MONK and ADAM BEAM - jmonk@thestate.com
abeam@thestate.com


http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/government/article/0,2777,DRMN_23906_4481405,00.html
Family's world shaken by former meth lab
Maria J. ÁVila © News

Joyce Townsend, of Broomfield, stands outside what was
once her rental property on Evergreen Street in
Broomfield. The house had been used as a meth lab.
Townsend could not afford to pay $30,000 in cleanup
cost and now finds her rental in foreclosure.
By Felix Doligosa Jr., Rocky Mountain News
February 20, 2006



Chico couple that got AB 1078 passed (unfortuneatly
meth labs busted prior to 2006 were not always
red-tagged, nor was there a lien put on them so that
their former meth lab status and possible hazmat
condition is not readily available to a homebuyer)

http://abclocal.go.com/kfsn/story?section=local&id=3625011




article below is incorrect-note that DEA's list of
meth lab busts is NOT inclusive, my home is NOT on
their list
http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/seizures/california.html
it is here, but this database was not viewable with my
mac computer, nor is is pulled up if I do a google
search for my address (which I did before I purchased
my home)
http://2stopmeth.org/dbase/view.php


http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/06/03/BUGT2Q5R431.DTL

Meth homes can leave neighborhood in a mess
Carol Lloyd
Sunday, June 3, 2007


great (NOT) dump "cleaned up" former meth lab homes
that may have lingering soil toxicity issues on low
income buyers and renters
http://www.topix.com/forum/state/co/TGU0JTDMOT750J97M

Foundation looking to buy former meth labs
With potential contamination from carcinogens and
explosive chemicals, to most people, a former
methamphetamine lab would sound like a less than
desirable real estate venture.



great investigative journalism!!
http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=1206717
Former Meth Houses Declared "Safe" May Not Be
May 10th, 2007 @ 10:17pm
Debbie Dujanovic Reporting


http://www.accesskansas.org/kcaa/reports/meth.htm

Costly and Hazardous – Meth Labs

By Rick Stuart, CAE



http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_5139261
Meth-lab disclosure hits homes
Sellers of a house, condo, hotel or apartment building
must now certify that their properties were never used
to make the drug.
By Chuck Plunkett and David Olinger
Denver Post Staff Writers
Article Launched: 02/02/2007 01:00:00 AM M



this one seems more like an advertisement for their
product-remember unless one tests directly where the
contamination is, a "dirty" house may pass the test,
but still has good info
http://kutv.com/seenon/local_story_310234701.html
Get Gephardt: Home Meth Contamination



www.methlabhomes.wordpress.com
because my son unknowingly bought one in TN in 2004.
However, his story is the story of thousands of people
across the U.S. And I truly feel that it is a problem
that needs to be addressed at a federal level.

http://www.siouxcityjournal.com/blogs/crime_watch/?cat=41
Archive for the 'Is your home a former meth lab?'
Category
Is MY house a former meth lab?
Monday, June 11th, 2007





note-I will give this compilation it's own thread on Monday-am running out the door now

Having said that, the country needs to treat drug use as more of a medical and social problem than a legal one. Some of the incarcerations for drug posession are creating as many problems as the harsh sentences fix.

For marijuana- I've never smoked dope and probably wouldn't even if it were legal. I think it could be legalized as long as it is kept out of the hands of kids and there is some way to prohibit and enforce a ban on driving while stoned/intoxicated.

i say the same about prostitution, sex clubs, smoking, drinking, game-shooting, gambling, sports, religious worship, and pretty much the entire panalopy of vices, pleasures, and activities. i find inclusion and ritualized context a far more productive method of management than banishment and punishment.

Fuck meth.

And I haven't toked in months.

It's simple, I won't budge on this one I know too many useless users that are using drugs and living off my tax dollar. Well if they want to live off me it should be in jail. Most are Rx or meth heads...

Tax the sales, set a legal age and stop treating drug use like a criminal problem instead of the health problem it is, usually mental health - people turn to self-medication for their depression, anxiety and worse which often goes undiagnosed in our society, which treats mental illness as a stigma, much like old age. All of the excuses for the criminalization of drugs, such as increased criminal activity (criminals would get out of the drug trade if it weren't profitable for them and DUI, theft, even public indecency are all already on the books, should users break them) or the imagined plague of irresponsible drug use (legalizing abortion didn't cause all pregnant women to run out and get one, and legalizing drugs allows us to honestly educate the public about drugs rather than to merely spread anti-drug propaganda). The problem is that too many people in positions of power stand to profit from the proliferation of the "drug war," not the least of which are crime syndicates and law enforcement, so it will take quite an effort to see it end, despite the number of people who want it to.

if its pot you're alluding to I love it, if its pain medication I love it too as it is a big part of my day today as I go into the tomorrows. :-) lying about it so as to make young ones curious is wrong though. I graduated from high school back in '66 having never heard the word marijuana or if I did not in the context of it being bad or good. when I arrived at camp nimitz in San Diego for navy boot camp I was assaulted by the anti-crowd and that is what got my attention as to what it was, been smoking that ole devil weed for all these years now though and don't plan on ever stopping. its a very good pain reliever and I wished I could be legally using it for that purpose.
comments are welcome