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Should the U.S. legalize drugs for Mexico's benefit?

Should the U.S. legalize drugs for Mexico's benefit?

  • Yes

    Votes: 15 28.3%

  • No

    Votes: 24 45.3%

  • Maybe

    Votes: 1 1.9%

  • Other

    Votes: 13 24.5%
  • Total voters
    53
USA-1 said:
Just saying meth changes behavior and can lead to violence on its own. It ruins lives and kills people. It should never, ever be made legal.
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Just saying alcohol changes behavior and can lead to violence on its own. It ruins lives and kills people. It should never, ever be made legal.

and since we are just saying.. prohibition the policy is ruining far more lives and killing more people than meth the drug is. If you are concerned about the problem and want to reduce the harms, then we need to ditch the manufactured crime problem (which is the most destructive aspect surrounding drugs), and then focus in earnest on education, treatment and reduction of the now isolated drug problem.
 
samsmart said:
I don't think drug kingpins will say, "Oh gee, drugs are legal now, I guess we'll have to get legitimate jobs!"

Rather, I think they will say, "Oh gee, drugs are legal now, I guess we have legitimate jobs!"
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Right - like invest in Las Vegas casinos. :lol:

(Or Shanghai ones.)
 
samsmart said:
I don't think drug kingpins will say, "Oh gee, drugs are legal now, I guess we'll have to get legitimate jobs!"

Rather, I think they will say, "Oh gee, drugs are legal now, I guess we have legitimate jobs!"

They won't have to go get legitimate jobs because their current jobs are now legitimate.
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No, I don't think so.

Most of the Jobs/MONEY are Smuggling and illegal distribution which would be REPLACED by your local Pharmacist and others.
(to be supplied by legitimate and safely grown/manufactured products)
Drug Kingpins, Hoards of smugglers, Street sellers, and enforcers, would have NO jobs.
-
 
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Hayekian said:
Right - like invest in Las Vegas casinos. :lol:

(Or Shanghai ones.)
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Don't forget about the bootleggers who went legit and formed what would eventually be NASCAR ;)
 
samsmart said:
I don't think drug kingpins will say, "Oh gee, drugs are legal now, I guess we'll have to get legitimate jobs!"

Rather, I think they will say, "Oh gee, drugs are legal now, I guess we have legitimate jobs!"

They won't have to go get legitimate jobs because their current jobs are now legitimate.
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Actually those involved in the illegal drug business today should absolutely NOT be involved if it were to become a legal drug business. Look at what happened after alcohol prohibition, it was not the mobsters, and the bootleggers, and the rum runners who kept selling their goods, but rather it was companies and legitimate enterprises, your Jack Daniels', and your Budweisers that were now in charge.
 
No. (10 characters).
 
marduc said:
Don't forget about the bootleggers who went legit and formed what would eventually be NASCAR ;)
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That's what they did down south. Up north, the Kennedy's entered politics.
 
marduc said:
Just saying alcohol changes behavior and can lead to violence on its own. It ruins lives and kills people. It should never, ever be made legal.

and since we are just saying.. prohibition the policy is ruining far more lives and killing more people than meth the drug is. If you are concerned about the problem and want to reduce the harms, then we need to ditch the manufactured crime problem (which is the most destructive aspect surrounding drugs), and then focus in earnest on education, treatment and reduction of the now isolated drug problem.
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Meth and alcohol are not comparable.


Just say no?

I think we should use everything at our disposal to stop drug trafficking including the FBI, CIA and our military. Drugs smuggling is an attack on our nation and should be handled like it. Time to take the gloves off.
 
USA-1 said:
I think we should use everything at our disposal to stop drug trafficking including the FBI, CIA and our military. Drugs smuggling is an attack on our nation and should be handled like it. Time to take the gloves off.
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Riiiiiiiiiiiight, like that's been oh so terribly effective for the past 30 years since the government officially declared a War on Drugs and spent billions upon billions fighting it.
 
Hayekian said:
Yes, absolutely. Legalize heroin also to put Taliban right out of business.

Not to mention ending the war on civil liberties here, and the massive social destruction that comes with making private tragedies a social one.

Camille Paglia excoriated the baby boom generation one time for their craven cowardice in not just maintaining the war on drugs but escalating it. Here here.
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If Paglia had Palin's body she would be dangerous.:roll:
 
USA-1 said:
Meth and alcohol are not comparable.
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in the context of your argument they are 100% comparable, which is why I was able to simply switch one term out and still retain the the exact same meaning and truth value.

Just say no?
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failed miserably

I think we should use everything at our disposal to stop drug trafficking including the FBI, CIA and our military. Drugs smuggling is an attack on our nation and should be handled like it. Time to take the gloves off.
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We are ~$1 trillion and almost 40 years into this now, and the "hmm we still have not made a dent lets get tougher and throw more resources at the problem" mindset has not made a difference. -well I will take that back, we have a hell of a lot more violence and a hell of a lot more people in our jails now.
And unfortunately drugs have became cheaper, purer, and more prevalent right alongside this continuous escalation. We have been trying to enforce this problem away for 40 years and things just get more and more ugly, at what point do people wake up and realize that prohibition does not work.
 
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With the money we have already spent on the war on drugs we could have purchased mexico, instead.

I don't believe we should legalize it for mexico's benefit. I believe we should legalize it for our benefit. It would help cut our trade balance because once california starts producing it legally no one will be able to provide a greater quality than made in the USA.:ind:
 
marduc said:
i
failed miserably



We are ~$1 trillion and almost 40 years into this now, and the "hmm we still have not made a dent lets get tougher and throw more resources at the problem" mindset has not made a difference. -well I will take that back, we have a hell of a lot more violence and a hell of a lot more people in our jails now.
And unfortunately drugs have became cheaper, purer, and more prevalent right alongside this continuous escalation. We have been trying to enforce this problem away for 40 years and things just get more and more ugly, at what point do people wake up and realize that our drug policy is a failure.
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That's because we have used the same old failed tactics. It's time to use our technology, the CIA, FBI and put our military on the border. If we had the resolve to stop drug trafficking we could do it. And we could secure our borders.

You do know that many more lives were lost and ruined and the cost to society was far greater after alcohol was legalized, don't you?
 
samsmart said:
I don't think drug kingpins will say, "Oh gee, drugs are legal now, I guess we'll have to get legitimate jobs!"

Rather, I think they will say, "Oh gee, drugs are legal now, I guess we have legitimate jobs!"

They won't have to go get legitimate jobs because their current jobs are now legitimate.
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But they don't. They want high income. Legalize drugs and you have competition, you have price controls, you have government fingers in your business. They don't want that. They want to be completely in control and making obscene amounts of money.

They'll just move on to other criminal exercises where they maintain the control and the profit.
 
LiberalAvenger said:
With the money we have already spent on the war on drugs we could have purchased mexico, instead.

I don't believe we should legalize it for mexico's benefit. I believe we should legalize it for our benefit. It would help cut our trade balance because once california starts producing it legally no one will be able to provide a greater quality than made in the USA.:ind:
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Could someone sue the legal meth manufacturers if their product caused death or harm?
 
TacticalEvilDan said:
Riiiiiiiiiiiight, like that's been oh so terribly effective for the past 30 years since the government officially declared a War on Drugs and spent billions upon billions fighting it.
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We haven't even tried. We don't have a War on Drugs, we have a Public Talking Point on Drugs. If you think we've done anything to actually fight drugs, you're wrong.
 
I have long been of the opinion that if you make something illegal that something will always be available at a price somewhere.
Whereas if it were made to be legal and readily available at least the criminal element would be removed.
If you remove the criminal element you reduce society's costs.
However it may be that these costs would then have to be made towards healing those that become addicted.
I would prefer to do as the Government of Portugal does. Make it legal for a person to hold a certain amount of a drug for their own usage.
Where I would differ from Portugal is that should any person be found to have an illegal amount of drug in their possession, that person receives an automatic Death Sentence.
 
Cephus said:
But they don't. They want high income. Legalize drugs and you have competition, you have price controls, you have government fingers in your business. They don't want that. They want to be completely in control and making obscene amounts of money.

They'll just move on to other criminal exercises where they maintain the control and the profit.
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That may be the case. But even if it is, we could 1) use the money we currently spend on drug enforcement and 2) use the money we could get from tax revenue from selling drugs to instead spend it to enforce the laws on those criminal exercises.
 
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USA-1 said:
That's because we have used the same old failed tactics. It's time to use our technology, the CIA, FBI and put our military on the border. If we had the resolve to stop drug trafficking we could do it. And we could secure our borders.
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We've been trying, off and on for the last 100 years, to figure out how to efficiently ban intoxicants. It hasn't worked. The problem isn't the lack of technology or resolve. The problem is human nature.

USA-1 said:
You do know that many more lives were lost and ruined and the cost to society was far greater after alcohol was legalized, don't you?
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You do know that prohibition lasted all of 13 years in the United States, which means that legal alcohol has had a lot more time to work its magic than prohibition? Right?
 
TacticalEvilDan said:
We've been trying, off and on for the last 100 years, to figure out how to efficiently ban intoxicants. It hasn't worked. The problem isn't the lack of technology or resolve. The problem is human nature.



You do know that prohibition lasted all of 13 years in the United States, which means that legal alcohol has had a lot more time to work its magic than prohibition? Right?
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We could stop smugglers and we could secure the borders. We just don't have the resolve. We *****foot around, throwing money at the problem but we don't do what is needed.

I do believe pot should be legalized but not heroin, meth, or crack. No good would come from that.
 
USA-1 said:
We could stop smugglers and we could secure the borders. We just don't have the resolve. We *****foot around, throwing money at the problem but we don't do what is needed.
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OK, how do we secure the 2000 miles of the Mexican border, 5,500 Canadian border, and all of our coasts? How much will this cost?

USA-1 said:
I do believe pot should be legalized but not heroin, meth, or crack. No good would come from that.
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I haven't seen much if any real good come from ciggarettes or alcohol that isn't outweighted by the bad. If some idiot wants to kill himself with meth, why not let him? You can help him if you want, but ostracizing him as a criminal will drive him away from real help.
 
samsmart said:
I'm watching "Fareed Zakaria GPS" on CNN and Mexico's President Felipe Calderon is calling for the U.S. to start legalizing drugs to stop the drug violence in Mexico. He says that the U.S. is the highest consumer in the world of illegal drugs, so U.S. demand dictates the prices for Mexican drug suppliers. So if the U.S. started legalizing drugs, Mexican drug violence would decrease and help bring back order.

So my question is this: if U.S. consumption of illegal drugs is causing problems in Mexico, does the United States have the responsibility to legalize or decriminalize drugs so that Mexico loses it's black market as a drug supplier which will reduce drug violence in Mexico?
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We should legalize drugs for the benefit of Mexico and the US. The war on drugs is fomenting violence not just in Mexico, but in the US and other nations as well.

We have a serious problem with drug addiction in this country, and outlawing them is not solving the problem. Any addict should be able to have access to drugs without criminal prosecution and without having to resort to illegal activity to get them. Things like heroin and cocaine need to be dispensed under medical supervision, while pot should be legal for any adult.

Addicts need to be encouraged to enter a rehab program, but if they're not willing to try to kick the habit, it is unlikely that they can be rehabilitated successfully anyway.

Perhaps if the absurd practice of locking people up for being addicted to drugs were to end, we'd decrease our prison population and make room for the violent offenders that have to be kept locked up for the safety of the rest of us.
 
DrunkenAsparagus said:
OK, how do we secure the 2000 miles of the Mexican border, 5,500 Canadian border, and all of our coasts? How much will this cost?



I haven't seen much if any real good come from ciggarettes or alcohol that isn't outweighted by the bad. If some idiot wants to kill himself with meth, why not let him? You can help him if you want, but ostracizing him as a criminal will drive him away from real help.
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We already spend hundreds of billions on our military. We have the greatest military in the world. Use it and technology to secure the borders. Other countries do it.
We are wasting our military resources. We are being invaded and it's time for the military to defend our borders.

There is no good that comes from alcohol, tobacco or illegal drugs except for the therapeudic qualities of cannabis. Pot should be legalized. I see no ill effects to society from it.
 
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