Drug Legalization in North America

Thanks for explaining in greater detail!You'll have to provide some sources that say the money drug users take up or waste is greater than the taxes and revenue the government makes. Because that isn't the case in the states that have legalized Marijuana. However Marijuana isn't a horrible life threatening drug, it still is a drug and has not had affects that you have mentioned, regarding money.The "what if" is practically irrelevant - you can say the same thing about abortion or even masturbation... "what if one of those sperm cells grew up to be the person who cured Cancer?" Draining money from society and destroying the economy is not beneficial, and the chance that those people who abuse drugs and abuse the welfare system and government and middle to upper class becoming something successful is quite low. $4.5billion (with a B) is contributed to the homeless population [1], so if they all (I don't know how to say this in a kind way...) went extinct... we're saving billions of dollars. Am I saying money is more important than people? It depends what kind of people those are. The people who leech billions of dollars from society, who harass and intimidate innocent citizens; yes. I've really got nothing against those people, but if they chose to destroy their body, it not only gets rid of someone who harasses innocent people, it saves the government a lot of money.Like I said, it would be illegal in public - the same laws alcohol has. However this is a good point - something being illegal won't stop everyone from doing it, but considering how easy it is to get your hands on hard drugs now, and the low amount of car accidents caused from being high off it, it's safe to assume that if all drugs were legal, it wouldn't make a very big difference in the amount of car accidents caused by it. However one innocent death is bad, you're right, lots more are saved (gang wars over drugs go way down, less innocents die that way, smuggling goes down, less police and innocents are killed, less sharing needles, less shooting up in public places, etc.) There will always be exceptions. There will always be people who break the rules. Legalizing marijuana or illegalizing it will not do much to the sickos who need to get some. However, crime in Colorado has gone down 10% since the legalization, assaults making up 3.7% of those crimes. This is taken from your first source, something you conveniently didn't mention.If the war on drugs drops by, say, 80% because all drugs are now legal, less deaths (1,100 a year) will happen. Let's say it drops down to 100 a year in regards to drug activities. And maybe 50 or even 100 people die (innocent and non-innocent) because it's legalized. Mind you, this is the first death in five months of Colorado legalizing marijuana. That equals 200 people dead. Instead of 1,100. Is that a bad thing?I agree, innocent people don't deserve to die. But so many innocent people are killed in gang wars over drugs currently. "In 2012, 63 people died in the course of US domestic drug law enforcement operations, or one about every six days. Eight of the dead were law enforcement officers; 55 were civilians." [2]If cops had the option to just "stop a robbery," they would be doing so now. Cops can't just appear at a crime as soon as it happens. Would it be better not to check up on them and just let them do whatever? I didn't really know how to make this point, but I said to check up on them because that seems logical, to just see if they're still alive or not.You act like if meth was legal, Tim and his son next door would be shooting up every day for breakfast. This is the same argument I get against gay marriage; I don't want to marry another man! Don't legalize it! - If someone is a drug addict, the chance that you would be hanging out and socializing with them is probably low to begin with. If someone wants to shoot up now, they can. Of course a few more people would if it was legal, but if it's the healthy people you're friends with you're worried about - don't be.The drugs will be produced by governments in government labs, not Joe down the block.Regulate the elections then. If someone is a known user, disregard their vote. Or don't worry about it; the Flying Spaghetti Monster isn't going to become president; reasonable candidates will.Thanks again for expanding on your explanations.--Drug possession charges would drop drastically. That's enough to say that the prison population would drop a lot, even if occasional people were arrested for driving under the influence etc.It's hard to speculate actual numbers, but I highly doubt more people would be killed if there weren't any more wars over drugs. There would be deaths, yes, but not as many as if people killed each other over drugs.You're just saying "who knows what will happen" - this isn't a great argument. $2million a month in one state from one drug can take care of a lot. What happens when every state in America and Canada, or every country, legalizes every drug? A LOT.Once again - "who knows what will happen" - if a politician is elected, that means the general public likes him and what he will do. Most people are not (and most likely will not) be into hardcore drugs, and won't mindlessly elect some coked-out addict.-- I can see the main concern is "they could screw up the economy, and possibly hurt innocent people." - If anything, the taxes generated from drug sales would do anything but screw up the economy; it would greatly benefit it. And innocent people are killed by drug wars now anyway. If drugs are legal, there's no more drug wars, and no more innocent deaths because of it. There could be innocent deaths from drug use, but the laws would stay the same on the streets and in public as it is today - because someone does drugs in their homes doesn't mean they would run out into the street and kill someone - they have the option to do that already, cops don't go knocking on everyone's door to see if they're using drugs.Don't worry about italics or anything, I get what you mean! Good job for a second debate, I'm glad you brought up such good points and actually had a good argument. Looking forward to hear what you have to say next![1] http://homelesshub.ca... [2] http://stopthedrugwar.org...