News On Drug Laws

[aresian]

In Chicago Illinois they have decriminalized the possession of marijuana. Under 15 grams on your person you only get a proportional fine. To put this in perspective 5 grams is enough to make something like five joints (depending on how you consume the plant). Three good sized buds from the plant weigh barely 1 gram and that's more than enough for some (who don't use it just to get super blitzed high). Just an FYI. It's still illegal but you just get fined when caught with it in Chicago. I had to laugh a little at peoples' reasoning against the measure. It wont condone use for long I mean when they made alcohol legal again did it surge the use? Maybe for a very short time people used it more often but then as it became part of the culture again it doesn't really stay the taboo it was and the use by youths didn't go up because it was legal to drink. I guess I wouldn't mind regulation on the quality of the plant sold, to somehow ensure no one laces the plant with bad stuff, and I feel that would be far more affective than this corrupted, waste of resources, policy currently in place. A small step in the correct direction and they have acceptable reasons for it that helped get it approved around those that have been brainwashed from Reganomics saying how evil all drugs are. Yes, I still say there are some terrible drugs out there that should be removed but Marijuana is not one of them. The government can tax it just like cigarettes if they were to legalize it because yes people can grow their own (they can grow their own tobacco too) but like tobacco better strands and knowledgeable herbalists will sell plants superior to the average dabbler and then those sources can work with the regulators to make ideally mutually beneficially policies that 1. give the government the money they lack but no more than they need to run what they are elected to run, 2. connect businesses and government in a way that isn't going to put them at odds with each other but actually promote working together. That would all lead down to the common consumer getting high quality products at decent prices. I don't oppose taxes as a whole I just oppose over-taxing the government should get enough to do what they need to do to run whatever we elected them to do, not buy fancy houses and cars. This isn't solely a Marijuana thing but the fight for and against Marijuana highlights these major flaws between business, government, consumer, and workers. It won't be "fixed" by more sensible laws on drugs but it will step the system towards a better path than the corrupt one they are currently enthralled with. I mean one of the major contributions to the downfall of Christianity as a governance was that super focus on trying to tell people how to live there lives "morally." When a governance tries to preach morals to the people it makes it look foolish because the people soon realize the governance is just as human as the people it claims superiority over and then they people refuse to follow hypocrisy. That's how it should be in an ideal world and it soon will be at the current rate. People get fed up with corruption eventually when they finally wake up and realize they aren't a part of anything good for them. Anyways, here is the article. So that you may formulate your own opinions.

www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/27/chicago-marijuana-ticketi_n_1631783.html

[Alice]

I am made happy by this. Another step in the right direction. Every little bit helps.

I feel that the two greatest flaws in this society as a whole are the prosecution of so-called victimless crime, and the high standards of living afforded to politicians.

Most our problems could genuinely be solved by decriminalizing all activities that don't involve non-consensual harm, and basing the salary of all political figures on the average American income.

How fast would the average quality of life in America improve if the law makers lived in the slums?

Huge volumes of money are spent by law enforcement stopping people from doing things that cannot cause harm to anyone by themselves, such as drug use and prostitution.

People are always going to do these things anyway, and the need to evade capture and prosecution creates a new market that generates huge amounts of revenue for criminal syndicates which then use that money to fund criminal enterprises which actually hurt people. Decriminalizing pot would be a crippling blow to organized crime.

The high prices created by the illegality of certain activity also drive those who indulge in them to commit their own crimes to fund the habit.

In effect, the war on drugs causes most of the nation's crime. Perhaps this is done intentionally.

May you find what you seek,
Alice