I have been blogging about legalizing drugs for a very long time. It only makes sense to decriminalize drug use and therefore to put the whole illegal drug industry out of business.
Just recently, Vincente Fox, the past president of Mexico, spoke out against the horrific killings in Mexico due to wars between drug gangs; many innocent people have died and continue to die every day. The corruption is so bad that police work for drug lords and do some of the killing. Bringing in the Federales (army) has not curbed the slaughter.
The United States is to blame for most of the violence because it is Americans that buy the drugs from Mexico; without our demand for more and more drugs, the Mexican cartels would be out of business – no customers. Decriminalizing drugs on both sides of the border would bring an end to this mayhem. I do not vacation in Mexico any more because of the killings there.
President Fox pointed to the success Portugal has had when it decriminalized drugs. HIV is down 90% and drug addiction is down 50% where in the past, Portugal had the most addicts and the most HIV infected people in Europe.
How did they do it? First, you need balls to do what is right and what makes sense.
In this country, we started to make available marihuana for those in need to help control their pain because of a medical condition. A first step but even this small step is finding road blocks by local police who have nothing else to do but to patrol marihuana growers to make sure they haven’t crossed their allowed legal quota – bullshit. The cops need to get their priorities straight and make sure we are not murdered, raped, robbed, etc. – I don’t give a shit if someone is smoking dope; I’d rather feel physically safe in my own home and on the street.
Some are saying that the drug war is an industry keeping many agents employed. What would happen to those agents if the war ended? Would they go on unemployment?
Portugal offered drug treatment to those who requested it and they left those that didn’t alone. To their surprise many drug addicts asked for treatment even though using drugs was legal – see what can happen when you have the balls to try something different!
Legal drugs can be taxed so now you have a revenue source that you can use for helping addicts. Legal drugs can be regulated by the FDA to assure quality and purity. Since many crimes are committed because of drug addiction; legalizing drugs and making them relatively inexpensive and accessible would absolutely lower the crime rate as it has in Portugal.
Why are we as a society so determined to keep drugs illegal? We cannot win the war on drugs which by now should be quite apparent unless you can’t think or reason. Is it a religious issue – thou shalt not do drugs?
Why is alcohol legal? Look what damage alcohol does to our society but we keep it legal and we tax it and we regulate it and many people are employed in the alcohol industry but the same could be said of drugs. Is it because Jesus drank wine but did not do weed?
We, as a society just have to get smarter to move forward. I always thought that when the baby boomers got into power, things would change; well they did not change and now we are grandparents with white hair. Hopefully we still have some fight left in us.
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