They do mingle at the same parties though. Lots of pot smokers and growers around where I live. They have managed to completely dissociate the brutalities of the drug trade from their interest in smoking a joint. Coke too, and some of the other hallucinogens etc. at the occasional party.
I know pot is slightly different (for one thing, most of it is local and organic where I live), but it is still built on association with organized crime and all that comes with it.
Why is it always one or the other. Did we stop having new ideas in 1875? Canât we get past the dichotomy of capitalism vs. communism and move on? They both suck. Letâs come up with something better.
True, I was just using it as an example.
Of course we can always do better, but I donât think we should start on the bases of âthe world of today sucksâ and âcapitalism is slaveryâ.
The world is doing better than we think, and I donât think capitalism is evil when I loan microcredits to entrepreneurs in the developing world.
Drug users may be donating to the Nazi party, but drug prohibitionists are the ones that wrote the Enabling Act that put 'em in power.
I am whole or part owner of a couple of corporations, I donât think capitalism is evil either. But I think it fails on many levels when it exists in an unregulated environment. Capitalism can be a very useful way to assign resources, if we allow a strong enough government to assure effective balancing against the potential negative effects. This includes environmental restraint, careful redistributon of wealth, and very strong measures to ensure that the apparent endpoint of unrestrained capitalism (oligarchy with a legally exempt power class and a massively disenfranchised underclass majority). Being born a Westinghouse or Rockefeller or Bush should not be sufficient justification for immunity to law and a life of endless privilege.
Also, this lovely report today from CNN:
These minor regional problems have nothing whatsoever to do with any of us at all. Itâs not like we buy our stuff in Africa is it? Besides, I hardly ever actually go in to a store. So how can I possibly bear any responsibility in the slightest for any difficulties that anyone anywhere may ever face?
See! Clean hands, me.
I suppose morals are just a foolish enterprise. See you in the thunderdome.
Uhhhhhhhhh
Sounds like a job for⌠cocaine!
Also itâs probably American companies profiting off the cruelty.
Arenât arms the USâs biggest export?
I agree, but itâs worth keeping in mind that if drugs were legalised then the cartels would turn to something else. They wouldnât all just go get jobs at McDonalds.
Ideally weâd be empowering the cartels to legitimise their business through incentives that keep the product price high (inflation hasnât touched most drugs in 20 years, theyâre not really expensive). I donât know how feasible that is (Iâm thinking out loud) but it has to be better than pushing them on to more nefarious substances, human trafficking etc.
Well looking to the past, we can see that after prohibition, organized crime didnât completely go away, but it was greatly reduced and the violence was greatly reduced. With out the need for a large distribution network, most of the foot soldiers (who were already working at McDonalds part time) would be forced to move onto something else. The incentive to be in a gang and promote violence goes right out the window. Who wants to risk their life when there is no chance of making it big?
If the illegal drug trade disappeared tomorrow, I think we would see a huge reduction of violent crime, and perhaps an uptick of petty crime (theft etc), which I could live with.
No, organized crime didnât go away. It just went to Vegas, which was once a cool town and has since turned all corporate. One thing the mob does really, really well is run businesses, be they governmental or private. And, it does give an example of what organized crime does when it canât make money on booze or drugs (illegally, that is).
Nothing is perfect. If we could stop all abuse of humans right now, this very minute? Itâd be back in play again before sunup. Because, evil greedy bastards and desperate people (neither position works without the other).
But, by the same token, one hopes that principled humans would be back on their game by sunup, too. You do what you canâŚbecause. And somewhere in between those two extremes are all the people who have other stuff to do (or claim that they do). You still do what you can. Because some of us choose who weâre gonna be. And nothingâs likely to change that, either. Not that complicated. You just pick one, or not.
I donât doubt that many organized criminals would be good at making money under a new system where drugs were legal. I just works better for everyone when the best way for them to deal with their problems is to call the police instead of to line people up and kill them with a hammer one by one.
At some point what you are left with is some rich guys who run powerful organizations who would absolutely kill you if it made economic sense for them to do so but who donât actually kill anyone any more. You can call them organized criminals if you like, but the ongoing misery they are creating has been lessened (and would be lessened further if we didnât make laws to prop up the rich at the expense of the poor).
Fully agreed! Targeting the problems is kinda different, though. Sure - if âweâ didnât make laws that prop up the rich. âWeâ only elect guys who do that in our names, though - based on what are often smear campaigns, and even if not, campaigns run by marketing people. And, reporters hang about waiting for the While House or some congressional office to tell us all whatever it wants us to think - certainly not your house or my house!
We had hoped that the wide-open abilities of the internet would change things - and it has, in some ways. I can reach thousands on the internet in less time than I could contact a dozen of my own neighbors. Or like this story. It just canât change the system it tells us about very well.
Believe it or not, there was a time when newspapers actually reported everything Congress did in the past week! All of it. Not press releases - the actual minutes. And then, people would head down to the taverns and it would be all the buzz - and fisticuffs over politics were a completely expected norm. (Not that the fist fights were a great way to handle it - but that people could be that involved and passionate about it all.) They took it very, very personally. That hasnât happened within living memory. No hundreds of pages for one stupid act, no dozens of tv breaks to tell you what it all means - just the weekly news itself.
So - who do we blame? The marketing people? The press as a whole? Growth? Progress? Thereâs an active movement now to deny opiates to anyone who hasnât got cancer- most fueled by families of addicts who died. No need to think theyâre gonna hop on board with legalizing anything! They donât even understand that the addicts did it themselves - not pharma, not doctors. (I know - grief and loss, but still.) If theyâre so wrapped up in thinking âdrugsâ are evil as theyâve been told for so long, how on earth can we expect them to think about ow business would change if they were legal? (And I do agree, they should be legalized.)
Man. The hard part is just figuring out how in the world to get there from here. Even CO and WA havenât one that farâŚyet.
Just like the Mafia worked so tirelessly in the '20s and early '30s to make sure Americans could legally buy a bottle of whiskey for a reasonable price from any legitimate corner market?
Again - not saying make it legal for the end user - just make it legal to make in Mexico. You know, cut overhead. (no pun intended) Assassination and mutilation fees add up before you know it.
Paging Godwin. Paging Mike Godwin.
Well ⌠the cartels would be stripped of a profitable source of revenue. I always figure theyâre smart enough to allocate resource to the activities that generate the most profit per unit (hour, individual, gram, whatever) - and by taking away drug cash (high margins in the overall system, to compensate for the risk load, which is not carried by the ultimate big money makers) weâd push them down the hierarchy of earnings.
So the criminal thing would all look a bit more workaday, a bit less flash beemer. Itâs gotta help.
Ha, WHUT?!
