Drug Legalization in North America

Thanks for accepting and presenting your first arguments!I guess I'll go over yours then bring up my own.-- Legalizing drugs will make nations more in debtI would like to understand how you come to this conclusion. According to Forbes, Colorado grabbed about $2 million in taxes in one month alone [1] in marijuana taxes. Imagine what can be generated in taxes if all drugs were legalized? About 9.2% of the American population uses illicit drugs [2], meaning that's almost 1/10th of the entire population of America that can be taxed even more, generating way more than the measly $2 million from Colorado in a month alone. There would be more deaths if drugs got legalized You need to prove that this is a bad thing. If someone is addicted to drugs, it's most likely because they already are a part of a criminal organization, and are a non-productive member of society. The ones that will overdose and possibly die from excessive drug use are most likely a non productive member of society and it may be better for them and humanity as a whole if they passed away. The current drug users out on the street do nothing more than harass innocent people and beg for money, as well as collect welfare; good, taxpayers' money. If drugs were legalized, and safe injection sites were initiated and implemented into society, less people would be on the street, as they now have somewhere to be to get their fix, and the spread of diseases would die down drastically, as sharing needles would not be a thing anymore. Police would be burdened by having to check on harder drug users and would have to be focused on them instead of other crimes that need attending. We need to understand that the police cannot be everywhere at once. A lot of the time the police are "on patrol," meaning just that - they are patrolling the area, checking for suspicious activity, making sure everyone is safe. If they are in the area of a known meth or cocaine abusers' residence, it would not be detrimental to quickly check in on them. Emphasis on quickly. Drugs are bad for youAnd people know this. If you chose to destroy your own body, that's your right. Go for it. So to sum it up; there is no reason to believe any nation would go more into debt by legalizing drugs. If anything, their debt would quickly decrease. The non-contributing members of society, or really just the people who are detrimental to society, would cease to exist after a while. The police would not have a hard time quickly checking in on the drug users if they had the opportunity, it would be more to see if they are still alive and well than anything. If they are, great. If not, call the coroner. Drugs being bad for you lies in that same category; the abusers know it's bad, yet they chose to anyway. They want to use drugs, they should (and probably do) know the consequences, and that isn't anyone's problem but their own.-- -Like I said before, it would decrease the debt of that nation [1] and actually increase jobs, as people need to work at the dispensaries.-The $100billion yearly war-on-drugs figure would disappear (for the most part) and America alone would save about $15billion yearly [3]. -About 100,000 people are sentenced to prison yearly for drug related charges [4], which is approximately half of all inmates [5].-The police forces would have much more time to focus on more important crimes than what someone is doing to their own body.-Drug smuggling would be practically non existent, judging from how Colorado is dealing with the legalization or marijuana. Border security for drugs would be less necessary, and once again would lead to more police and military forces able to assist in actual crimes and violence against other people.-The murder rate would lower substantially, considering at least 1,100 people are killed in the drug war yearly.-We could possibly cut down on taxes, considering a large amount of taxes go toward fighting the war on drugs [7].-Polititicians wouldn't run for office to extort people for currently-illegal drug related ideas.--These are just a few, I'd like to hear a rebuttal to these before I bring up more in-depth ideas. Glad you accepted, and I'm looking for a good debate! [1] http://www.forbes.com... [2] http://www.drugabuse.gov... [3] http://www.opensocietyfoundations.org... [4] http://www.huffingtonpost.com...[5] http://bjs.gov... [6] http://narcosphere.narconews.com... [7] http://www.drugpolicy.org...