Should all drugs be legalized?

[sear]

Thanks for the BBC link Dave.



I'd like to see the list, based on pharmacological harm alone.
But the -social harm- approach is interesting, and potentially useful.

[Dave Toast]

It's hard to come up with a comprehensive criterion for deciding harm but they decided to try to keep it as scientific as possible. Where they departed from that, they tried to keep it as simple and objective as possible. Pharmacological harm obviously had by far the highest weighting in the harm quotient, as I understand it.

Incidentally, they reckoned that if we were to stick with the classes A, B and C, Heroin down to alcohol should be class A, Ketamine to Buprenorphine (including tobacco, the most addictive substance known to science) should be class B and cannabis downwards should be class C.

[sear]

I'm skeptical about the criteria.
I'm not sure pharmacology was as primary a consideration.
Pharmacologically, I believe tobacco is worse than alcohol.
But they have it the other way around.

I'm guessing the reason for that is, so many police incidents, incidents to which police are dispatched, often include alcohol involvement among the subjects / suspects.
As far as police are concerned, where there's alcohol, there's often trouble.

Yet a glass of red wine a day may actually be healthful.

How many cigarettes per day is pharmacologically therapeutic?

[Dave Toast]

Yep, tobacco is by far the biggest killer. It kills more than all the others put together and road accidents and all sorts of other stuff combined. It's also by far the biggest cost to the NHS. However, it's effects reach beyond that in no way whatsoever. The same cannot be said for alcohol, to say the very least. By a very long shot indeed, it has the most wide-ranging effects on individuals and societies.

Pharmacologically though, it's not as cut and dried as you might think as it's not just a case of whether it kills you or not. You've got to weigh smoking and it's average decrease of 10 years on life expectancy against the fact that alcohol consumed faster than the liver can deal with it (read virtually all alcohol consumption) gets to the brain and makes with destroying brain cells. You won't find a smoker staggering and slurring incoherently around the street as though they'd taken a bunch of barbs or smack (unless they're a drunk smoker). This is an aspect of drinking that we treat as completely normal and acceptable but, seen objectively, such effects are amongst the most debilitating available to the user of any drug. You won't find a smoker puking up in a natural reaction to rid the body of the poison it has ingested. You won't find a smoker wearing dark glasses the day after smoking a pack of 20 while their brain tries to recover from the onslaught of the night before, driving to work (or the kids to school, etc) whilst intoxicated and being a hinderance when they get there. This is to say nothing of its effects on the liver and the rest of the body.

The scientists and doctors reckoned it is by far the biggest health problem facing society today.

[DHodges]

Incidentally, they reckoned that if we were to stick with the classes A, B and C, Heroin down to alcohol should be class A, Ketamine to Buprenorphine (including tobacco, the most addictive substance known to science) should be class B and cannabis downwards should be class C.

In the United states, the drug laws are not particularly rational. Marijuana is a Schedule I substance, the same as heroin. Khat, shown in the BBC chart above as not very harmful, is also Schedule I.

Tobacco is legal because of historical reasons and because of a powerful lobby. There does seem to be a growing trend to limit its use - especially indoors, in public places - and to tax it heavily.

Alcohol is legal at the federal level because Prohibition did not work. However, there is still a wide variety of laws by state, and there are still dry counties. The fact that a Constitutional amendment was needed to outlaw alcohol might be used to argue that a similar ban on marijuana is also unconstitutional.

Legalizing *all* drugs is politically a non-starter in the US. However, there have been ongoing efforts by various groups (such as NORML) to get marijuana decriminalized/legalized. That is probably a necessary first step before decriminalization/legalization of other drugs. Marijuana has the advantage of having medical uses which are being increasingly recognized by the medical community (which means it should not be Schedule I, at the least).

[brokenhead]

Did the marijuana promote the psychosis?
Or are those already predisposed to psychosis more likely to attempt to self-medicate with marijuana, or other drugs, legal or not?

This simple point is almost universally glossed over by those who clain they are "educating" youth on the effects of drug use.

And I suspect NFL players suffer more harm from their football activity than dopers do from smoking themselves into oblivion.
If the government nanny-State is going to protect us from ourselves; why is it allowing the apparently substantially more serious harm of NFL conduct?

Or boxing? Or NASCAR? Where are the life-sentences for steroid use?

The most persuasive reason not to drink too much Saturday night, is the headache you'll have Sunday morning.
Statutory augmentation of the negative affects of drug abuse ought not be necessary.

Yeah, well, sear - I have to disagree with you there. You make rational points - your are clearly a sensible person. I would argue that many, if not most, people are not sensible. Not only is alcohol a potentially addictive substance, but people that use it in a normal fashion are not dissuaded from their Saturday nights by their Sunday mornings. I'm sure many people who have been behind the wheel while intoxicated and caused a fatal accident were not alcoholics, but were Weekend Warriors who have bragged to their buddies, "Rough night last night..."

You won't find a smoker puking up in a natural reaction to rid the body of the poison it has ingested.

Yes you will. Not as often, I grant you. But even a slight overdose of nicotine - along with the 1000 other additives in cigarette smoke, including gunpowder - makes you violently ill. I remember having quit smoking for over a year. Then, the night my brother got married, I had a couple drinks and my will power went out the window, and I got cigarettes. I spent most of the night calling God on the Big White Phone.

Thanks for the chart above, sear. I'm not clear on the "harm" rating, though. Do we mean harmful to the individual? Do we mean harmful to society because of the pharmalogical effects (ie, impaired motor-coordination leads to dangerous driving)? Do we mean harmful to society because of prevalence (alcohol consumption is far greater than heroin consumption)?

If we're talking just harm to the individual, as I take it we are, it's hard to see how alcohol can be worse than "solvents." And can pot be worse than cleaning products?

I once read a study that rated drugs as to their lethal dose - to - average dose ratios. The study included more than just drugs. For instance, the lethal/average ratio for water was 100 to 1. For THC, it was 10,000 to 1. I'll try to dig up the study from the net.

[brokenhead]

Marijuana has the advantage of having medical uses which are being increasingly recognized by the medical community (which means it should not be Schedule I, at the least).

It also has the advantage of being an enormous cash crop and the potential tax revenues speak quite loudly.

[sear]

"I have to disagree with you there. ... I would argue that many, if not most, people are not sensible. Not only is alcohol a potentially addictive substance, but people that use it in a normal fashion are not dissuaded from their Saturday nights by their Sunday mornings. I'm sure many people who have been behind the wheel while intoxicated and caused a fatal accident were not alcoholics, but were Weekend Warriors who have bragged to their buddies, "Rough night last night..."" broke

You may have missed my poorly sharpened point here broke.

I was attempting to call attention to the irony that the advocates of Drug War presumably believe recreational drug use is bad.
If they're right, then what sense does it make to augment the harm?
Is it as bad as their draconian penalties indicate? The simple crime of felonious agriculture can be punished more severely than homicide.
Merciful Heavens! Washington, we have a problem.

If the U.S. Founders had wanted agriculture to be a felony, don't you think they would have punished it in the 18th Century?
They didn't.
Why should we?

The paradox is, those favoring Drug War think there should be penalties to augment the harm of recreational drug usage.
I'm opposed to Drug War. I think the penalties of drug abuse are plenty bad enough on their own.
I don't mainline heroin.
The reason I don't mainline heroin has nothing to do with whether or not it's illegal.
The reason I don't mainline heroin is because it's a foolish thing to do.
I wouldn't do it even if it were legal.

Regarding the efficacy of Drug War:
Is there really anyone in the U.S. that wants heroin, that can't get it? Anyone that wants crack that can't get it? LSD? Mushrooms? Ecstasy?

I doubt it.
And if not, then we're basically spending the U.S. Drug War budget for worse than nothing, for counterproductive purpose.
Al Capone was a wealthy entrepreneur not because his Harvard MBA really paid off.
I don't believe Capone had an MBA.
Instead, Capone, and Escobar, and Felix, were made wealthy because the commodities they traded in were increased in value many times; by United States tax payers.
It's the simplest, most fundamental economics. The government drives the price up, and the crooks get rich, and powerful.
If there was no Drug War, crack would probably cost about as much as beer, maybe less.

And I find our government hypocrites so offensive. They talk eloquently about free trade. Yet they approve prohibiting these commodities, to the substantial detriment of societies around the world.

"It's insanity!" Andre Marrou

[Dave Toast]

If there was no Drug War, crack would probably cost about as much as beer, maybe less.

Ironically the scientists behind the Lancet publication thought that alcohol is vastly underpriced.

[sear]

"Ironically the scientists behind the Lancet publication thought that alcohol is vastly underpriced." Dave

Interesting / amusing point Dave. Thanks for the comic relief.

They may indeed have said so.
It's a silly position for them to take.
Supply and demand sets such prices.
What do they think the price should be?

Should hops farmers simply double their prices, to make beer cost more?

Should the machine shops that produce the fittings for distilling equipment triple their price so booze will cost more?

The price of beverage ethanol, distilled or not, is a relatively simple production cost (through the production, wholesale, retail cycle) plus profit. It's price is based upon production costs, etc. Not what scientists think.

[DHodges]

And I find our government hypocrites so offensive. They talk eloquently about free trade. Yet they approve prohibiting these commodities, to the substantial detriment of societies around the world.

I think you will find that politicians are very supportive of free trade when it will aid their interests, otherwise, not so much.

If you follow the dollars, who benefits from, say, cocaine being illegal? Who would lose if it were made legal? The profit is (mostly) not made by the farmers in Columbia. It's made by the importers and sellers, who don't follow DEA restrictions (e.g., quality control and proper labeling) and don't pay taxes.

It's actually another way to exploit third world workers. It's the US that forces the rest of the world to play along with the unwinnable War on Drugs.

[Carl G]

Yet a glass of red wine a day may actually be healthful.

How many cigarettes per day is pharmacologically therapeutic?

I'd say one or two pipefuls per day, if accompanied by prayer. To the native americans tobacco was often used as a sacrament, its smoke lifted in prayer, thanksgiving, contemplation, or during council, through the ceremonial pipe. The Europeans bastardized the use of it for recreational and then addictive purposes.

[sear]

" ... who benefits ..." DH

Bingo.
Drug War is a ~$10 $Billion $Dollar industry in the U.S.
Last time I checked, we've got hundreds of thousands of non-violent prisoners of Drug War, either behind bars, or under criminal justice supervision.

It's absurd!
They mess up, and I get punished?
They get caught with a baggie of powder, and the government takes them off the tax payer roles; and I have to pay their food, clothing, shelter, medical, dental, and perhaps even education benefits?
Why am I penalized for their shortcomings?

If they want to punish somebody, punish THEM! Not me.

" ... who benefits ..." DH

The Drug Warriors benefit, because it's a huge industry, and CO's (jailers) prefer non-violent prisoners of Drug War to mentally imperfect violent felons.

The criminals benefit because such prohibitions create the profit margins that made the afore mentioned kingpins so wealthy.

"... It's the US that forces the rest of the world to play along with the unwinnable War on Drugs." DH

I get that impression as well.

It seems other nations are slowly coming to their senses.
But it's an anachronistic Twilight Zone.
My calendar says this is the third millennium.
But some of these Drug War policies are medieval.

The real tragedy of all this is, for $100 $Million $U.S. $Dollars, we could snuff out this U.S. Drug War in 18 months.
The $money is out there.
But to get to a guy like George Soros about a project like that, you first have to go through Ethan Nadelman PhD.
And Dr. Nadelman has no interest in ending the Drug War. He's in the Drug War ending bidness.
He knows damned well, if he actually did his job, he'd put himself out of a job.
And he'd rather keep his job than bind the War wounds of his nation and People.

Traitor.

[Dave Toast]

"Ironically the scientists behind the Lancet publication thought that alcohol is vastly underpriced." Dave

Interesting / amusing point Dave. Thanks for the comic relief.

They may indeed have said so.
It's a silly position for them to take.
Supply and demand sets such prices.
What do they think the price should be?

Should hops farmers simply double their prices, to make beer cost more?

Should the machine shops that produce the fittings for distilling equipment triple their price so booze will cost more?

The price of beverage ethanol, distilled or not, is a relatively simple production cost (through the production, wholesale, retail cycle) plus profit. It's price is based upon production costs, etc. Not what scientists think.

Well, to further relay the opinions of the people who carried out the study, as opposed to mine, they thought that people's altering their consciousness has always gone on and will carry on going on and that it is therefore a matter of getting the best grasp we can of the relative harms of these drugs and then to educate as opposed to forbid.

To play devil's advocate for them, they'd probably say that we don't live in a world where production cost + reasonable profit = price. Rather we live in a world where production cost + whatever mark up people are willing to pay = price. In a world as such, where governments have to legislate in order to educate, higher taxes on commodities more harmful to the individual would make perfect sense. Further, in a world where governments tax on the basis of mitigating harm done to society, higher taxes on commodities more harmful to society would make even more sense.

That's what I reckon they'd say, or something along those lines.

[Tomas]

.

-Dave-
Well, to further relay the opinions of the people who carried out the study, as opposed to mine, they thought that people's altering their consciousness has always gone on and will carry on going on and that it is therefore a matter of getting the best grasp we can of the relative harms of these drugs and then to educate as opposed to forbid.

-tomas-
Yes, sir. Same as it ever was.




-Dave-
To play devil's advocate for them, they'd probably say that we don't live in a world where production cost + reasonable profit = price. Rather we live in a world where production cost + whatever mark up people are willing to pay = price. In a world as such, where governments have to legislate in order to educate, higher taxes on commodities more harmful to the individual would make perfect sense. Further, in a world where governments tax on the basis of mitigating harm done to society, higher taxes on commodities more harmful to society would make even more sense.

That's what I reckon they'd say, or something along those lines.

-tomas-
Well said.




Tomas


.

[sear]

"tax on the basis of mitigating harm done to society" Dave

Who makes that judgment?
I have a modest bar in my home.
It's hardly lavish. But beverage alcohol is present in my home (I'm drinking water right now).
The only bar fights I've been in were those I was dispatched to. And by the time I got there, it was mostly just disordered furniture and broken glass, and sometimes some bleeding people.

We could quibble about the precise numbers, but as a general principle I suspect ~90% of the trouble is caused by ~10% of the drinkers.

And if so, I'm not sure taxing 100% of drinkers, for 10% of the evil-doers is the best feedback loop.
I'd rather see persons arrested for bar brawling pay full compensation for damage, injuries, police, courtroom, & etc. time; plus fine (govt. profit).

Here's a novel idea: punish the guilty. Stop sending the bill for the martial oppression to those of us that don't have anything to do with it.

[daybrown]

Lawyers make laws.
Lawyers also make billions off defending drug dealers.
All this is pissing in the wind. The lawyers are never gonna kill that cash cow with legalization.

[sear]

"All this is pissing in the wind. The lawyers are never gonna kill that cash cow with legalization." day

Not any time soon, it appears.

Indentured servants, many of them Negroes used to be recognized in U.S. law as "three fifths" of a person.
We have now found more subtle ways to discriminate against these Americans (see Section #2 of the 14th Amendment).

In the previous Drug War, beverage alcohol was prohibited.

Amendment #21 - SECTION 1.
The eighteenth article of amendment [Prohibition] to the Constitution of the Unites States is hereby repealed.

It doesn't happen often.
It doesn't happen easily.
But it has happened.
This nightmare of a War against the People, this binge of martial oppression, this excursion from sanity will end, out of necessity.
It may not end in our lifetimes. But it will end.

[brokenhead]

Here's a novel idea: punish the guilty. Stop sending the bill for the martial oppression to those of us that don't have anything to do with it.

We get the bill because opression is expensive. In addition, billing (bilking?) the public is form of hand-washing. The police, the DAs and ADAs - why, they are just public servants. Need proof? The public pays them to do what they do. And just to show they are the good guys, they let you know that in the private sector, they'd be making twice as much.

But in reality, when was the last time you made a decision about any of this that mattered? You are not there when the deals get made behind closed doors. You get one vote. That's it. Your pay check is garnished. Your purchases are levied upon. You have to pay to live in the house that you own on the land that you own. When you father dies, you have to pay to inherit what he left you in his will. Two or three times a year, the PBA calls you for a donation, which you are worried not to give, because they know who pays them and who doesn't. You wonder why shakedowns like this are legal.

Yet you have broken no laws. Your block is the last to get plowed - if it ever does - when it snows. You would install a security system if you could afford one, because you know the police would not prevent a break in at your home, and if there ever was one, they could never get back what was stolen. That's up to you - you have to pay homeowners insurance to make sure you get to keep owning the things you already own. And this invisible other world, the one that keeps collecting and collecting your money, has mandated that you have to pay for the right to drive the car you bought, and also pay a third party insurance premiums on top of that. If you don't pay the premiums, then all those people whose salary you pay will fine you more money and tell you that you cannot drive to the job you need to keep paying them, which in any case, you are still required to do.

Then you read about some guy in Texas who is spending his 40th year in prison on a life sentence for possession of an ounce of pot in the late 60's. The article is right next to one about OJ playing golf somewhere while the PTB get ready to waste another few million trying to slap him on the wrist. Just below the story continued from page one about the 3000th young US serviceman to die in an undeclared war waged against a sovereign state with not one defensible reason, designed to make Cheyney and the Bush family even wealthier and that will cost hundreds of billions of dollars before it is over, if it is in our lifetimes. You wonder, could they not just have pocketed the money and saved those lives?

But no, you don't get to say. You had your vote.

And don't take too long to eat that taco you bought inside the convenience store. Because a blue-and-white just rolled into the parking lot, and if the thick-necked officer whose shirt doesn't quite fit decides he doesn't like the way you look, he has the right to detain you you and demand to see any form of ID he wishes to see and ask you any questions he feels like asking. And if he does that, you have to keep in mind not that you have been forced to pay him to be able to do this, but that if you don't bend over and spread your butt cheeks for him, he has the authority to make you pay more and/or lose time at work to make arrangements to pay it.

But you get your vote.

[sear]

broke,
Thanks for the rant.
Not bad.
Ever think of running for mayor?
If you give a stump speech like that, I might vote for you.

"... opression is expensive." broke

And counterproductive.
It's not merely that the money is wasted.
The expenditure actually makes matters worse.

"... on the land that you own." broke

I'm not trying to pick a squabble with you here broke; only trying to make a point about real estate "ownership" in the U.S.

It has been said that you don't "own" real estate in the U.S.; you only rent it from the government. Sure, my name is on the deed. But that doesn't matter much.

I own my Grandfather's pocket watch.
The government doesn't lurk about in the shrubs checking to see about the watch.
It's mine. I own it. Period.

But the house and acreage I "own" is quite a different matter.

If I don't pay my real estate taxes twice a year, they'll send me a threatening notice, demanding payment, and penalty.
If I still don't pay, the letters will get more threatening, etc.

If I simply never pay, eventually they'll send the thugs, the government enforcers. They'll do whatever it takes to get me out of the house. Then they'll sell it for whatever is owed on it; just to get it back on the tax roles again; a cash cow for them.

But I'll still have the pocket watch; because I own it.

========================================

The Mafia used to (and still may) run "protection rackets".
Pay up, or they'll come by and break your legs.

Government is simply a protection racket. They're a tad subtler about it. But fundamentally there's very little difference between Mafia protection money, and paying taxes.

Ironically, in Drug War, the government actually presumes to protect us from ourselves.

How transparently absurd!

[Tomas]

.

Country music lyrics high on substance abuse

There's more drinkin', dopin' and smokin' in country-music lyrics than you think, according to researchers from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbc ... /584219238

.

[Carl G]

Who cares? Posting on this board is substance abuse. Breathing air is substance abuse.

[sear]

caveat:
This post does not express or imply any threat of bodily harm or malicious ill-will.
It is protected speech, within the rubric of the 1st Amendment.

"Breathing air is substance abuse." Carl

It is if U.S. President Bush (younger) does it.
It's substance use for most of the rest of us.

abuse (e-by¡z´) verb, transitive
abused, abusing, abuses
1. To use wrongly or improperly; misuse.

Excerpted from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Third Edition © 1996 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Electronic version licensed from INSO Corporation; further reproduction and distribution in accordance with the Copyright Law of the United States. All rights reserved.

[guest_of_logic]

If this Catalyst show (which aired last night in Australia) is anything to go by, then the jury is finally out on the link between cannabis and psychosis. Here are the "money" extracts from the transcript:

Narration: And the critics had a good point. If cannabis caused psychosis, how come as consumption increased over the years, schizophrenia rates hadn’t? But it turned out no one had really checked. In 2004, a London study found the truth – schizophrenia rates have been rising in parallel with cannabis use.

Jonica: So this killed one of the main criticisms?

Dr Cohen: It did, it did. And a second study coming out of Zurich actually showed the same thing.

Narration: Still – that was just two studies - the clincher came last year. Scientists decided to run what’s known as a meta-analysis – that’s where they take all the research from all over the world and combine the data.

Jonica: The conclusion – published in the world’s most prestigious medical journal, The Lancet, couldn’t be more clear. Smoking pot at any stage increased your risk of developing a psychotic illness by 40%.

Narration: What’s more, the heavier you used, the higher the risk. And while the risk to an individual is still low, with so many people using cannabis, the impact overall is substantial.

Dr Cohen: Yeah the meta-analysis showed that if you removed cannabis from the schizophrenia equation, so if people didn't use cannabis, then about one in ten people who developed a psychotic disorder like schizophrenia, wouldn't develop the disorder.

[...]

Narrator: [...] Dunedin is home to one of the world’s best longitudinal studies. Since 1972, they’ve been subjecting a group of 1000 people to a barrage of tests and questions. In 2005, they announced an astonishing discovery – a gene for vulnerability to cannabis.

Professor Richie Poulton: The gene we looked at is called the catechol-O-methyltransferase – or COMT for short. And we looked at it because it’s a gene that stands out in families that have schizophrenia.

Narration: And what does this COMT gene do? Well, as it happens, it regulates our old friend, dopamine.

Jonica: Let’s say these are the COMT genes – this is the good gene – this is the bad gene. Now, everyone gets two of them, so you can get two good genes or one each. But, if you get two of the bad genes, well it seems your ability to regulate dopamine is impaired.

Narration: Which might not matter, unless you smoke cannabis.

Professor Poulton: We found that among adolescents who had used cannabis on a monthly basis or more, who had the bad version of the gene, their chances of developing psychosis by their mid 20’s were increased 11 fold.

It looks like daybrown's test for susceptibililty to pot-induced psychosis is not far off...