From: "Paul Hager" <hagerp@moose.cs.indiana.edu>
Subject: Re: spelling this stuff out clearly
Organization: Computer Science, Indiana University
Date: Sat, 3 Oct 1992 23:15:28 -0500

dolan@nrlmry.navy.mil (Kent Paul Dolan) writes:


>> I assume that once we start with the illegal substances, it's logical  
>> to progress to the legal stuff... like tobacco, and then alcohol.   

>You have that handle by the wrong end, a frequent problem in this
>discussion. We aren't "starting" with the illegal substances. We're
>"starting" with the base of knowledge of what affects the currently
>_legal_ recreational drugs have had on our society and the health and
>well being of its citizens, and preventing the _addition_ of _more_,
>potentially similarly harmful substances, to those currently causing us
>grief. Had we known at the beginning what we know now, alcohol,
>tobacco, and caffeine would never have been legalized in the first
>place.

As I said during an interview for Channel 18 in Lafayette, Indiana,
if one were committed to prohibition, a rational policy might be
to legalize cocaine and marijuana and prohibit the much more
dangerous (and addictive) tobacco and alcohol, respectively.  I
pointed out that government-approved sources and pro-drug war
organizations give mortality rates for the health effects of
tobacco as 640:100000, of alcohol as ~100:100000, of cocaine as
25:100000, and of MJ as too low to figure.  And, the Surgeon general
rates tobacco smoking as several times more addictive than crack
smoking.

In the same interview, I believe that I also mentioned that the
courts have found that the Federal Narcotics Act isn't invalidated
by its scientifically misclassifying cocaine as a narcotic because
"rational basis rather than actual rationality" is an acceptable
standard.  I added that there is a section in the act that specifically
states that "relative harmfulness" of a drug is irrelevant -- in other
words, the scientific facts about the comparative dangers of illegal
vs legal drugs can't be advanced to invalidate the law.  (By the way,
the cases were US v Castro (DC ND Ill) 401 F Supp 120 and US v Coletta
1982, CA9 Cal 682 F2d 820.  And see sec 844 of the Federal Narcotics
Act on the relative harmfulness issue.)

As to the statement about "knowing what we know now", it is clear
that we would never have prohibited alcohol, which gave us organized
crime, an increase in deaths from alcohol abuse, and widespread
comtempt for the rule of law.

Incidentally, some of the same folks who gave us alcohol and drug
prohibition DID argue for tobacco and caffeine prohibition.  However,
wiser heads realized that the political fallout from such a broad
stroke would doom prohibition of any substance.

>> Perhaps this should also apply to eggs, since cholesterol causes lots  
>> of heart problems, and we shouldn't have to pay for the damage that  
>> someone does to their own body by ingesting a substance that is known  
>> to be bad for them.  The same logic then applies to red meat, and a  
>> host of other foods.

>Proving only that any argument can be taken to extremes to ridicule it.
>"Drinking enough water will kill you" is not a valid argument to avoid
>drinking water, nor is "every substance taken into the body is capable
>of causing damage" a valid argument against avoiding those which have
>no offsetting benefits to make that damage one we should be willing to
>suffer.

Your argument was merely being applied to a category of personal
behavior that is demonstrably more dangerous than use of illegal drugs.
As I said in a previous post -- to which you did not respond -- the
game is very simple: all I have to do is point to activities that are
more dangerous than illegal drug taking and you have to provide a rational
justification for their not being prohibited too.

And, as I stated before, there is no obvious benefit other than 
social control for the existence of organized religion.  Arguably
it promotes superstition, irrationality, magical thinking, and
prejudice.  If you are going to claim that the state can decree
acceptible brain states by banning people from having analogues to
endogenous chemicals crossing their blood-brain barrier, it is a 
very small step to banning the state that results from the endogenous
chemical itself.  If a peak experience from LSD is prohibited, why
is a peak experience from a Pentecostal service permitted?  If a 
hallucination from a psychoactive is prohibited, why is a hallucination
about Jesus or the Virgin Mary permitted.  One obvious advantage of a 
psychoactive is that when one comes down, one knows that the experiences 
were hallucinatory -- this just ain't so for the religious variety.
And, there is the final matter that if the state can say certain
brain states are impermissible, it can also dictate that certain
brain states are manditory.

This is ultimately a philosophical matter, of course.  One could
argue that human beings are important only insofar as they serve
a greater institutional good.  All bureaucracies, no matter how
benign, operate in this fashion to some degree.

It was an interesting experience for me to try and read Bellamy's
"Looking Backward."  Bellamy was a socialist/progressive whose
answer to the abuses of the corporate world was to propose such
alternatives as the Industrial Army.  I couldn't get very far in
the book because Bellamy had no conception that replacing corporate
bureaucracies -- which were bad enough -- with a huge government
bureaucracy would lead to even worse abuses.

>> Personally, I prefer a state that doesn't need to be your parent  
>> because it's not in the business of taking care of you.

>You must hate college.

Non sequitor.

>I prefer a state with a manageable tax burden for the citizens. I have
>an income that the IRS considers "high", in perhaps the upper 3% of
>incomes in the country, but by the time over 50% of it is taken by
>various income based taxes, I have no discretionary income and struggle
>to make ends meet, with no money left for savings at the end of the
>month, because I have to pay to live in the high cost of living area
>where incomes of that level are justifiably paid to people with my
>modest skills.

You must love prohibition.  It is a monumental price support for
illegal drugs.  Illegal drug revenue is estimated to run anywhere from
$50 to $100 billion, depending upon whose figures one uses.  This
revenue is -- surprise -- not taxed.  Then there is the $25 billion
or more in direct taxes that is paid to fight the drug war.  There
are additional billions required to build prisons to house drug
users -- who could have otherwise been out earing a living and paying
taxes.  The fact is that most people incarcerated for "drug crime"
are in for non-violent use or possession.

>Propose to me a likely 50% increase in my taxes to provide lifetime
>support to the drug impaired, or the more likely eventuality that my
>job will disappear in the wash of lost productivity after drugs are
>legalized, so that a bunch of self indulgent brats can toke up on nose
>candy, and I prefer a government that looks out for the best interests
>of its _productive_, social contract participative citizens, however
>much that displeases those contemptable fools who can't cope with
>reality without recreational drug support, thank you very much anyway.

Kent, I propose to you a TAX CUT.  Let me repeat, a TAX CUT.  You
do not use currently illegal drugs, yet you pay a percentage to
fight the drug war.  In a legal environment, a suitable excise tax
places the burden directly on users -- not you.  The people in prison
for possession and use crime get amnesty, and can return to the
workforce and PAY TAXES, both income taxes and excise taxes if they
choose to use drugs.  For people who abuse drugs, a portion of the 
tax revenue can be set aside to deal with their problems by 
providing treatment as required.

Now, if you want to argue about the details of this approach, by
all means do so.  But statements about 50% tax increases have 
nothing to do with reality.

As a final comment, even if illegal drugs were as dangerous as you
seem to think they are, it still doesn't justify the destruction of
basic rights that is going on as a result of the drug war.  As I
asked you in a previous post, why was it necessary to declare war
on drugs several years into a historic decline in drug use?  (Source:
the NIDA -- a US governmental entity -- Household surveys of drug use)
Why do you prefer a "war" to education as a way of cutting consumption 
and abuse?  The Bush administration has spent $40-odd billion fighting
this war and there is no evidence that things have improved.  In fact,
the evidence is that the 10-year decline in drug use that began in '79
started to go up during Bush's war.

Kent, it is legitimate to ask why we should continue and on-again
off-again drug war that has been going on for nearly 80 years particularly
if it is NOT WORKING, is VERY EXPENSIVE, and is gutting the Bill of
Rights.

>Kent, the man from xanth.
>"The Birthright of humankind is the stars!"
>--
>Ignore the header, and don't expect me to see a news reply.  We don't get news.
>Use email to: <dolan@nrlmry.navy.mil> or <dolan@192.138.87.240>
-- 
paul hager		hagerp@moose.cs.indiana.edu
"Run 'em down, Fred!  They don't belong here!  Run 'em down!"
-- Bobby Fischer to Fred Cramer, who was driving him through a
a crowd of spectators after Fischer adjourned game 1 in his
1972 match with Spassky.
Newsgroups: talk.politics.drugs