From: GA.JRG@forsythe.stanford.edu (June Genis)
Subject: Re: Drug Legalization. Was: College Was: Perot
Organization: Stanford University, California, USA
Distribution: usa
Date: Wed, 8 Apr 1992 21:42:29 GMT

In article <1992Apr8.171329.10239@oakhill.sps.mot.com>,
dong@oakhill.sps.mot.com (Don M. Gibson) writes:
>Tangent on the issue.  Increased usage effects of legalization for
>alcohol and drugs will not be similar at all.  Drugs (except pot)
>are *extremely* addictive.  So addictive, in fact, that a
>one-time experiment can lead to a life-time addiction.  That cannot
>be said for alcohol and that is why they are different.

This is utter nonsense.  Just where are you getting this drivel
from, Bob Martinez?  The only drug I'm aware of that even has the
potential for doing this is coke, and that only in a small
percentage of individuals with particularly sensitive personal
chemistry.  Coke was also a drug which was developed totally as a
response to the illegality of cocaine; if cocaine had never been
illegal there is a good chance we might never have developed a coke
market.

>Further, if legalized, the big pharmaceutical companies would take
>over.  They would develop drugs, which are 90%-95% addicting
>on the first try.  Picture samples being mailed to every home
>in the country.  I think this would be a problem.  Remember,
>these are the same people that are busy mapping all your
>genes.  (please don't think i am a conspiracy nut.)

We do not allow free samples of cigarettes or alcohol to be sent
thru the mails because there is too much chance they could fall
into the hands of unsupervised minors.  There is no reason to assume
that drugs would be treated any differently.  There is almost as
little reason to believe the drug companies would find it worth
their while to develop such a marketing strategy even if it were
technically feasible.

Recreational drugs will be cheap under a legalized system and are
never likely to amount for that large a percentage of corporate
profits.  Bayer is hardly likely to risk their reputation in the
aspirin business by getting a reputation as an outfit out to hook
innocent consumers on powerful addictive drugs.

>I believe that there is hope for winning the "war on drugs".
>But the current plan won't work.  The guys at the top are
>not touchable.  The guys at the bottom have nothing to loose.
>The guys in the middle are vulnerable, but there are lots of
>dealers waiting to take their place.  I think with a super
>effort to stop money laundering, the middle guys can be
>squeezed out.  Stop the ability to spend the profit and
>you stop the drug sales.  This is sort of the way they got
>Capone.

They got Capone on income tax evasion not bootlegging charges.  Do
you really increase the police state atmosphere we are already
living in, and to spend billions to prevent someone from buying t
the corner store something that they can make in their basement with
a little more effort?

May I generally suggest that you suppliment some of the drug war
propaganda that you have obviously been consuming in large doses
with some of the excellent material available from the Drug Policy
Foundation in Washington D.C.

>---dmg

/June
Newsgroups: alt.individualism