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[The Drug War] UN Declares drug war a failure, Obama rejects calls for change, hope
Robman
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
So there's this thing called "the drug war"
The UN apparently thinks it's a big waste of time and money, and that the criminalization of recreational drugs has been a long and expensive and failed social experiment. The United States has responded to this by saying LOL NOPE.
Just a reminder about the costs of the drug war
So guys I think I'm going to go enjoy my socially acceptable stimulant, later tonight I'll probably read some morose report and enjoy a glass of 12 year old socially and legally acceptable psychoactive drug.
The UN apparently thinks it's a big waste of time and money, and that the criminalization of recreational drugs has been a long and expensive and failed social experiment. The United States has responded to this by saying LOL NOPE.
Just a reminder about the costs of the drug war
- Paramilitary raids happen around the clock and kill many innocents, this list is NOT complete.
- Who the fuck knows how much money in military and armament assistance, prisons, lost productivity, lost taxation, and lost total lifetime earnings due to that cool FELON stamp
- A host of other shit that just depresses me so fuck it I'm not writing any more
- Except hippies, fuck those guys
So guys I think I'm going to go enjoy my socially acceptable stimulant, later tonight I'll probably read some morose report and enjoy a glass of 12 year old socially and legally acceptable psychoactive drug.
Robman on
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We can't abandon something so fundamental to our way of life.
Non-sarcasm: I think the people in charge of the whole law enforcement thing are required to say that they are going to continue enforcing the laws unless there's reason to think that they are invalid, not just dumb. I don't think there's much Obama can do about it without Congress jumping on board.
They tried to bury us. They didn't know that we were seeds. 2018 Midterms. Get your shit together.
Time Article
Salon Article
The policy has been around long enough for people to see the results.
I imagine that the health facilities necessary to do that could be paid for instead by the money that would have been spent locking people up in prison.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4JJHjoBw2c
The drug czar is required by law to oppose attempts to legalize Schedule I drugs.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Until someone can show me a way to regulate drugs in general - ie require any pharmaceutical substances be thoroughly studied before sale - without prohibiting the sale of drugs that don't meet the criteria of those requirements its a non-starter. Limited decriminalization is rational - its not that worthwhile to spend lots of time and money hunting down pot heads. But the idea that enforcing drug laws is so harmful that we should legalize narcotics in general is beyond foolish. Meth isn't harmful because its illegal, meth is harmful because its meth. Heroin addiction isn't something you can just wave a "better access to treatment" wand [strike]at to make better.[/strike] as a cure-all.
QEDMF xbl: PantsB G+
I'm not sure. I think all he has to do is the latter.
From http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/about/98reauthorization.html
IMO, the entire Controlled Substances Act needs to be reformed by Congress, but that is extremely ambitious and I don't think it's going to happen any time soon.
BTW, it looks like the current drug czar is interested in stepping down.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
This has always been my view too. I couldn't really care less about marijuana. I just don't understand the rationalization for decriminalizing the harder stuff. Meth especially is some scary stuff.
We don't prohibit the sale of chemicals that failed to meet the criteria for drug approval.
We prohibit the sale of chemicals that met a different, though related, set of criteria.
Failure to meet FDA approval does not mean that the chemical may not be sold. It merely means that it cannot be labeled as a drug or prescribed by physicians. You can still freely and legally buy it from a chemical supplier (assuming the manufacturer has chosen to continue making it).
The process for approving a drug for medical use and the process for prohibiting its sale are two separate processes and if you want to connect the two, you can (and we should), but you first need to acknowledge that they are separate and distinct.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Remind me who owns the copyrights/trademarks on Heroin.
Then tell me you don't think it has extensive study behind it.
There's an endemic assumption to this argument that people are somehow being kept from harm now.
The question isn't, 'Is Meth bad?', it is, 'Do more harms come from meth use when it is criminalised?', to which the answer is an unqualified 'yes'.
The CTP games weren't real Civ games. /nerd 8-)
About the topic - yeah it's a huge waste of time and money, but I don't expect it to go away any time soon.
I'd be fine with Portugal-style decriminalization of personal possession of meth, provided that manufacture and trafficking remain illegal. It's a little further than my ideal scenario, but I wouldn't complain too much.
I'm a fan of California's Prop 36 system (as far as meth goes). It's not decriminalization, but if you are arrested for possession, sale, or any other non-violent drug-related crime, you're given the opportunity to comply with a court-mandated treatment program. If you comply and complete the program, your conviction records are sealed.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
The conspiracy theorist in me says that the various state governments like this so they can make money from work-release programs.
Holder is pushing for the equalized crack sentencing to be made retroactive. Which isn't a huge step in ending the war on drugs but there is some trend at least towards softening it.
I've always thought the concept a joke and I'm disappointed Obama / the Government reacted stubbornly.
This is not really true.
The FDA determines if a drug has an accepted medical use and whether it can be safely administered under medical supervision. Part of that process is an examination of the potential for abuse.
The results of these findings are forwarded to the DEA, which takes the recommendations and Schedules the drug (there is very little wiggle room) based on potential for abuse, accepted medical use and safety of administration. Each of those criteria is determined by the FDA and the DEA must publish the findings before scheduling which allows for a period of public review. Any drug "with abuse potential"* approved by the FDA is Scheduled, at least until it is approved as OTC by the FDA.
(Abuse potential is a broad category
& Dependence
• Muscle Relaxants
• Analgesics
• Anticonvulsants
• Antiemetics
• Antidepressants
• Narcolepsy
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Alzheimer’s Disease
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& Cold
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If a substance is suspected of abuse, a request for scheduling can be made to the DEA. If accepted is elicits an evaluation of abuse from the FDA and hearings are held. The results of these findings are forwarded to the DEA, which takes the recommendations and Schedules the drug (there is very little wiggle room) based on potential for abuse, accepted medical use and safety of administration. Each of those criteria is determined by the FDA and the DEA must publish the findings before scheduling which allows for a period of public review.
The process for determining the potential for abuse is identical whether initiated by a New Drug Application or from a Scheduling Request from the DEA
You can't separate the two.
QEDMF xbl: PantsB G+
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/meth/
So, keep this in mind:
1. The severity of the meth epidemic is directly proportional to the purity of it on the streets.
2. It can only be made using chemicals that are so sophisticated that they must be manufactured in a lab. (epinephrine or pseudo-epinephrine)
3. There has been an ongoing back and forth between regulations to prevent meth manufacturers from getting those chemicals and getting around those regulations.
4. Oregon has seen significant drop in meth addition by making epinephrine and pseudo-epinephrine require a prescription.
5. Pharmaceutical companies don't want regulation because they'd rather have their meth money.
Meth is pretty interesting in that aspect of it. I realize that someone is about to bust up all in here and go hurp derp free market, but it's not a question about free market or not. Regulating drugs is done already. There isn't a free market that's being lost because one isn't there to begin with. The question is 'should the ingredients for this drug also be regulated in the same way other drugs already are?'
One more thing, you can't just legalize everything and go problem solved. The appropriate health and treatment facilities need to be in place to help the addicts, and you still have to prosecute the manufacturers and dealers.
We don't prohibit the sale of drugs that don't meet approval criteria right now.
Failing the approval process is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for a drug to be controlled.
A drug is going to be controlled if it has abuse potential. Abuse potential is neither necessary nor sufficient to fail FDA approval.
Yes, the FDA has to share its findings with the DEA and the DEA has to take those into account for scheduling. But that does not imply that the FDA's approval process and the DEA's scheduling process are inseparable - as your bolded text mentioned, scheduling a substance is often, but not always, done in conjunction with the approval process. (I also noticed you conveniently left out the next part of the document, which discusses what the DEA should do if the drug in question is not currently being evaluated by the FDA.)
Since the purpose of the Controlled Substance Act is not, as you imply, to control the sale of drugs that failed FDA approval, would you consider the Controlled Substances Act in its current form a "non-starter?"
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
The controlled substances act, and the DEA, are not necessarily concerned with whether a drug poses a public health issue. The dangerousness or lack thereof of a drug does not determine it's placement on the schedule of controlled substances. A particularly dangerous drug may invite DEA attention, but there is nothing formally in the law that says that a drug has to be dangerous to be illegal.
The only positive criterion necessary for a drug to be controlled is abuse potential. "Abuse," as far as I know, is not a legally-defined term. There's no legal standard determining what uses of a drug do, and do not, qualify as "abuse." The de facto standard, though, is that any non-medical use of a drug is "abuse." Consequently, any drug that invites non-medical use - ie, any drug that is fun - may be controlled.
We have literally outlawed fun.
I think that is completely ludicrous. PantsB, I suspect you don't understand or respect the desire to take drugs for fun. That's fine, you don't have to. But neither should I have to justify it, any more than I would try to justify the enjoyment I get from music to somebody who is amusical, or the joy of non-procreative sex to somebody who is asexual. It should be enough to say that there are many, many people who find not only enjoyment but significant personal fulfillment and even spiritual meaning in non-medical drug use. Therefore, a basic classical liberal philosophy compels us to allow such people to continue doing the things that make them happy in the absence of compelling positive evidence that doing so results in a major public safety issue.
The very principles of a liberal democracy guide us to structure our drug law so that dangerousness, not abuse potential, is the primary positive criterion for banning the sale of a drug.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
I do think the Controlled Substances Act, because it is incompatible with basic philosophical notions of liberty, is a non-starter. Or, at least, it should have been. It should have been abandoned to die on the Senate floor.
Prohibition didn't work in the 20s and it's not working now. Despite the risks of getting arrested, sent to prison, overdosing, or even shot, people still get high. Maybe that's a sign that getting high is more important to the human condition than our law currently recognizes.
I do see laws against drug abuse as similar in color as anti-sodomy laws, or Islamic laws against music. People do them anyway, and for no reason that can be rationally explained to somebody without the analogous urges. I don't believe that it's coincidental that from Dionysus to Xochipilli, the mythological figures representing intoxication were also closely associated with music and sex. When people keep seeking out a particular subjective experience despite significant social risk, that shows us that we're fighting a really primal appetite.
Instead of suppressing it (with limited exceptions), we should be finding ways of channeling it into safe, enjoyable contexts. Nicotine and alcohol clearly aren't good enough.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
I'm certainly happy to see more and more of the world's political establishment realizing that, but the US is going to be very slow to change, as there is just so much money and political power wrapped up in all this stuff these days.
I really liked this bit right here.
My personal view is that drugs are one of several avenues that people are searching for meaning/pleasure when traditional avenues of society fail.
What do we do, and why do we do it? I would posit, that the vast majority of all human behavior is based off of seeking a reward. We work jobs for money, we work on our looks to impress others or for our own personal admiration (vanity). We take drugs because they make us feel good.
When we do the things our culture is telling us to do, but don't meet with success, we feel cheated. People can't get jobs, make too little money, and are unable to through their own efforts achieve any kind of what society (or themselves) would consider success. They need something to cope with this.
I'm of the opinion that you could lower drug usage quite a bit (and deal a large blow to the drug trade as a whole) by providing more job opportunities for low skill workers. We have this idea that there are all of these people collecting welfare so that they can use the money to buy drugs. I think that for the most part it's the other way around. If you honestly couldn't find a job after being on unemployment for awhile, even at Wal Mart, could you handle that sober?
All of the people I know who have or had serious drug problems also had seriously fucked up family lives or emotional issues. Losing a job can cause depression, but the average drug addict has more going on alongside the addiction.
Thread title aside, Obama is kind of held captive to the Congress and Supremes here.
There's also something smart and adult about him refusing to unilaterally fix shit in America by dictat - forcing legislative action will stop a future president reversing his policies with a simple decree.
That's what you get from being the leader of the world. Can't really say that U.S. hasn't been asking for the position either.
Only if you assume that future presidents will display the same degree of self-control.
It's about introducing external chemicals that by accident resemble internal chemicals, causing them to do things with our biochemistry. This is what substance use does, some medicine gets more complex, but a lot of it - including the recreational ones - work by approximating things that should be in the system in relevant places. The problem with the heavier stuff, legal or illegal, is that it takes the biochemistry that is the human condition, and it fucks. It. Up.
I'm all for classifying shit based on dangerous to the individual and society it is, and treatment is definitely way, way more important than punishment. But let's not kid ourselves; Drug addiction is not a choice made by the enlightened citizen of a liberal society, nor is it part of the operating parameters of the human conditions. It's a chemical subversion of the decision making processes of the human mind.
(In fact, the reason that treatment is more important than punishment [of use] is because it's not a choice)
It's a method of dehumanizing The Other. Since nobody like us would do drugs, so everyone who does is The Other, and deserves imprisonment if not death.
It's a sickening thought process.
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That's one of those pieces of conventional wisdom that really isn't true any more.
California almost legalized (not decriminalized) pot, and several other states are on the cusp as well. Taxes on weed are a juicy, lucrative and steady revenue source that many states would love to get their hands on.
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The DEA is under executive control, but it and the Drug Czar's office (Office of National Drug Control Policy) were created by acts of congress. (True, one of them was an act of congress written by President Nixon, but it was submitted to congress for a vote and passed nonetheless.)
Constitutional law is definitely not my forte, but I suspect that the executive branch can't substantially change the responsibilities of the DEA without it coming up to Congress for a vote.
Obviously, nowhere in the law does it say 'the DEA must fund foreign warlords.'
BTW, the drug czar did state back in 2009 that his intent was to stop using the phrase "war on drugs" and treat it more like a public health problem, but I don't know if that resulted in any substantial change in policy.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Not, unless the California situation is being allowed by virtue of the drug czar looking the other way?
I don't know exactly how it works, but very early in Obama's tenure, he declared that the DEA (ATF?) would no longer be conducting raids on medicinal marijuana growers/distributers in California.
Then the head of the DEA said "Haha, nope. Raiding all day and night."