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| Gary Johnson: Face Reality, Legalize Pot |
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| Friday, 08 July 2011 13:29 | |||
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Forty years ago, when Pres. Richard Nixon publicly declared his intention to wage "a new, all-out offensive" against drugs, many Americans believed that tougher enforcement of drug laws would put an end to drug abuse in the United States once and for all. As governor, I was astonished to learn that half of what we were spending on law enforcement, courts and prisons was drug-related, and yet illegal drugs were cheaper, stronger and more available than ever. After further study, it became obvious to me that the drug war had created a lucrative black market and was enriching and empowering violent gangs and cartels. In many ways, it was like alcohol prohibition all over again, with similarly disastrous results. I decided I simply couldn't allow the status quo to continue unchallenged, so in 1999 I became an advocate for legalizing marijuana and adopting harm reduction strategies for dealing with abuse of harder drugs (including prescriptions). I've been making these arguments ever since, and in recent months they have been resonating more strongly than ever. The drug reform movement got a big boost last month when an international commission released a report criticizing the war on drugs. The Global Commission on Drug Policy was a 19-member commission that included Kofi Annan, a former U.N. secretary general; George Shultz, Pres. Ronald Reagan's secretary of state; and Paul Volcker, a former chairman of the Federal Reserve. The report's conclusions are clearly stated: "The global war on drugs has failed, with devastating consequences for individuals and societies around the world. Fifty years after the initiation of the U.N. Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, and 40 years after President Nixon launched the U.S. government's war on drugs, fundamental reforms in national and global drug control policies are urgently needed." Study these issues and I bet you'll agree that the Global Commission on Drug Policy is right. The Department of Justice reported that, in 2008, 2.3 million people were in our country's jails and prisons. Yet it is clearer than ever that the worldwide supply of drugs can never be wiped out - no matter how strongly prohibitions are enforced.
Comments (11)
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Potheads Directory
#1. Why do you rejoice at the fact that we have all been stripped of our 4th amendment rights and are now totally subordinate to a corporatized, despotic government with a heavily armed and corrupt, militarized police force whose often deadly intrusions into our homes and lives are condoned by an equally corrupt and spineless judiciary?
#2. Why do you wish to continue to spend $50 billion a year to prosecute and cage your fellow citizens for choosing drugs which are not more dangerous than those of which you yourself use and approve of such as alcohol and tobacco?
#3. Do you honestly expect the rest of us to look on passively while you waste another trillion dollars on this ruinously expensive policy?
#4. Why are your waging war on your own family, friends and neighbors?
#5. Why are you so complacent with the fact that our once "free and proud" nation now has the largest percentage of its citizenry incarcerated than any other on the entire planet?
#6. Why are you helping to fuel a budget crisis to the point of closing hospitals, schools and libraries?
#7. Why do you rejoice at wasting precious resources on prohibition-related undercover work while rapists and murderers walk free, and while additionally many cases involving murder and rape do not even get taken to trial because law enforcement priorities are subverted by your beloved failed and dangerous policy?
#8. Why are you such a supporter of the "prison industrial complex" to the extent of endangering our own children?
#9. Will you graciously applaud, when due to your own authoritarian approach, even your own child is caged and raped?*
* It is estimated that there are over 300,000 instances of prison rape a year. 196,000 are estimated to happen to men in prison. 123,000 are estimated to happen to men in county jail. 40,000 are estimated to be committed against boys in either adult prisons or while in juvenile facilities or lock ups. 5,000 women are estimated to be raped in prison.
#10. And will you also applaud when your own child, due to an unnecessary and counter-productive felony conviction, can no longer find employment?
I would like to know why the smart lawyers out there in byte land have not challenged the legality of the current law. How can a law based on lies be legal? The time has come to get over this!