The War on Drugs is unconstitutional, immoral, and a complete failure

Excellent introduction. I am honored that you are going to use my definition of morality to forward your case. Yes, this is in part a spin-off of our last debate, because you made some points that I want to isolate and address here. But, on the other hand, I have before and will in the future pose this argument to anyone who doesn't agree with my thesis.... unless of course you show me that my argument is flawed... 1) Your rebuttal depends on the fact that WoD CAN reduce your risk. I agree that you should not have to deal with the junkie in the semi truck that's high on methamphetamines, but that doesn't mean that outlawing drugs will actually quell that concern. If you can't show that it does, then your points are invalid. My point here, specifically, was that the government should not control what a person can and cannot do in the name of "health". Any argument that supports the WoD because drugs are unhealthy is simply wrong. If you don't see the slippery slope here I will outline it for you. I will grant, that if you can show that the WoD is a success, it will necessarily weaken this argument of mine, and we will have to revisit this point again. 2) I will not split hairs, I will defend all common drugs, unless my argument gets stretched ridiculously to include anthrax (viruses) or some kind of drug used as a weapon, but since bleach is more dangerous than any common drug, I should be fine. I think you have a mistaken idea of our justice system. A lot of people think that police officers are here to "serve and protect" among other things, but police officers have a very specific role in this society of ours. They arrest people who have broken the law. They don't, ..... I feel kind of stupid calling you Tarzan, like I have a joke being played on me... They don't arrest people who are LIKELY to be breaking the law soon. Let me provide an example. I say, hey Tarzan! You are pissing me off with your anti-drug sentiments online and I am going to kill you!! Now let's assume I actually know where you live. You can call the police, and possibly get me for a threat, maybe get me locked up for a night if you are lucky. But Officers are really not going to be able to stop me, in the end, because until I've perpetrated the crime, I'm untouchable. If you had an officer at your side 24/7 you could stop me on assault charges or something to that effect, but that is not feasable. My point here, is that our government has very specific functions, dictated by the constitution, and that although "crime prevention" and "serve and protect" get thrown around a lot, it is not TECHNICALLY what they do. Crime prevention is an indirect result of the very specific tasks that officers have the authority to do - mainly arresting people who break the law. Consider that in my example, you actually had the officer there. If I saw him, and ran away, I would not get charged with murder. You could get me at a lesser charge, at most attempted murder, but you could probably not even get me for that unless I swung a weapon at you or something to that effect. You would be completely unable to stop me, through use of the police department. The "crime prevention" would only take the form of my own conscience, reminding me of what could happen AFTER the fact. This lengthy explanation is what I would use to show you that the government does not have the authority to make drugs illegal simply based on the fact that someone could possibly use it to commit an injustice. I could commit plenty of injustices with any object in my room, but that doesn't make them cause for concern. Your examples: The man with the bomb has ALREADY broken the law, as is with the rifleman in the mall. And no, the rifleman can clean his gun in the privacy of his own house for as long as he wants, because of the second ammendment. You must not take that right away from him, without commiting a grave injustice. If gun owners want to kill people with guns, THERE IS NOTHING WE CAN DO. Nothing at all, until they have perpetrated the crime. Of course, gun rights is another issue, but I could simply use an axe as an example instead, and get the same effect. And yes, my argument of the ends justifying the means stands, because as with any family values argument, that is what is happening: we would like no one to abuse drugs, so we make them illegal. The ends, utopia, justify the means, prohibition. This logic, which has been tested endlessly through the millenia, can lead to much evil (much more than drugs ;) ) 3) I use a proxy for my first round argument, and I keep forgetting to delete the parts out of it that have been successfully refuted, which is mainly the homosexuals and religion paragraph. I'm sorry for missing that, I will concede that my homosexuals argument is tangented and my connection of family values to religion is flawed. As far as my family values argument in general goes, I would say that we don't agree, because you still percieve family values to be a good reason to pass laws. I argue that family values cannot be dictated. You say that drug use degrades the family structure. What's your definition of "degrading the family structure"? What if your politicians think that debate.org degrades the family structure? Should it be illegal? I bet there are some people that think a lot of things degrade the family structure, that only degrade what they *think* the family should be like. Therefore, family values, which are not absolute, are not grounds for laws, because family values are drastically different from place to place, in different times, to different peoples. Morality is absolute. Justice is absolute. Family values to me and you are completely different, and if you could pass a law to perpetuate your family values, mine would be affected adversely. If you could prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that family values were absolute AND that drugs necessarily destroyed them, you would still need to show that the WoD is effective at controlling them, before you refute it. WoD not successful, not a failure? I don't support that reasoning, because it simply is. First off, you need to show that this war can help reduce drug use to support most of your arguments, in my opinion, because there is no point in the waste of resources if it is not. Waste of resources includes: 1) Billions spent on the WoD in the last two decades 2) fines, jail and prison sentences to non-violent, drug possession convictions (I won't include distribution) 3) suppression of rights of marijuana users 4) Job histories ruined due to past drug possession convictions And to say it's not a failure, when the average tenth grader has NO problem procuring drugs, and there are distributors everywhere, users everywhere, is simply a gross understatement. The possibilites of drug control, while legal, have not even been explored yet because we haven't had the faith in our citizenry to try. I bet we could put drug dealers out of business overnight by legalizing drugs and putting strict controls on them instead, and when junkies hit rock bottom we can set up places where they can use in the presence of professionals who can detain them temporarily until they sober up, so they don't hurt anyone else. Violence is violence anyway you slice it, and should be dealt with accordingly. I only defend people's freedoms of choice; they have the right to choose, but choices have consequences. I say we should let the people make their own choices, but punish them if their actions have immoral consequences. Being high, in and of itself, is not immoral at all. I won't defend an overnight strategy, I suppose a slow but sure process would be acceptable. But that's not what we are doing now... I won't defend adult-age-requirements for drug consumption. We can stick to adults. Your quote is tactful and witty (taking it from Abe) but I don't see how you can use it against me...