Last edited by Vuk; 04-15-2011 at 00:21.
Hammer, anvil, forge and fire, chase away The Hoofed Liar. Roof and doorway, block and beam, chase The Trickster from our dreams.Vigilance is our shield, that protects us from our squalid past. Knowledge is our weapon, with which we carve a path to an enlightened future.
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"I do not yet know how chivalry will fare in these calamitous times of ours." --- Don Quixote
"I have no words, my voice is in my sword." --- Shakespeare
"I can picture in my mind a world without war, a world without hate. And I can picture us attacking that world, because they'd never expect it." --- Jack Handey
I am sorry, but that is about the most laughable comparison I have ever heard. Do you know what the wholesale price for corn is? The only way to make money on corn is with massive factory farms and economies of scale.
As Ajax, pointed out there is not a huge "blackmarket" trade in corn (though there is some small-time underground/roadside selling) and no criminal trade in corn.
Legalization & regulation of pot removes the criminal element from it's ditribution. It does not stop abuse, that is why you also need to fund treatment. Compare to alcohol, again since legalization, it is controlled and taxed, and the criminal element in alcohol distribution (which thrived during prohibition) has mostly been eliminated. The best part is that taxes on the controlled substance can fund the treatment programs.
So, if you legalize or at least de-criminalize these things, removing the profit for criminals, you also solve the problems of drug wars in Mexico and Colombia. If there is no longer the promise of ultra-profits, then you remove the incentive. They can either grow for legit distribution at a tiny fraction of previous profits, or plantations go back to producing coffee. There certainly is nothing to shoot each other over.
The other aspect that you are ignoring, while harping about drug crime deaths, are the deaths and lives destroyed due to the war on drugs itself. Until you get that far there is no point in trying to go into more difficult concepts such as "Is the war on Drugs intended to fail, and so to be a perpetual war never making gains". Ignore as well the corruption in institutions of Colombia & Mexico (?and even the US?) where they are tied into that same drug trade. In Mexico a General will raid one cartel, because he gets pay offs from their competitors. As long as there are ultra-profits in drugs, corruption will go hand-in-hand.
The only way to eliminate the criminal elements of drug production & distribution is to remove the ability to profit, or reduce the profit margins to the point where they are not worthwhile.
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