You are not logged in. Please register or login.
- Topics: Active | Unanswered
- Randall Flagg
- Rep: 139
Re: US Politics Thread
Our prison system is fucked. Judges taking kick backs to convict longer sentences should be drawn and quartered. But again, it's not like people are being dragged off the streets for smoking a joint.
They hold up a liquor store with a gun and after they're arrested, maybe some cocaine is found on them. So that charge gets added. When you parse the convictions, this falls under the "drug related" and someone sees the 20 year sentence. He didn't get 20 years for snorting coke, he got 20 for armed robbery, was probably a felon already, so the gun charge makes it worse.
Should someone get 20 years for armed robbery? I don't know, but that's where the discussion should be. Not trying to argue all these people are in prison for minor drug infractions.
But sign me up if you want to alter federal drug laws. I can't do anything if Mississippi wants to have laws that simple possession of pot carries 3 years no more than I can do anything if California wants to issue a 5 year sentence for owning an AR-15.
In my opinion the biggest contributor to sentencing is your lawyer. If you can afford a lawyer, you're going to have a better chance at a reduced sentence or dropped charges. But if you get a public defender, you're fucked. I don't know the answer to this. Everyone wants Johnnie Cochran, but he's incredibly expensive and there are only so many hours in the day.
My brother got sentenced yesterday for felony firearm theft. He had a public defender and I've spent a lot of time in court the past few months. It amazed me how people were filed in like cattle with one defender who had a 2 foot stack of casework on his desk, often going off the cuff. But I don't know the answer to this problem.
Re: US Politics Thread
misterID wrote:I'm not against guns, you just want to rant about blacks. I'm not getting into it.
Props to Bernie for the Price questions!!
You can't link someone's post claiming racism and then say "you're addressing the claims of race, so I'm not going to respond."
No, you are over generalizing. I've heard your song and dance before, it always goes back to blacks, Chicago and murder rates.
I agree with Flagg. You guys act like the people in jail did nothing to be sent there. There are some folks in jail that don't deserve to be there. But most do.
Bullshit, overdramatic lie. No one said that. Communities that were devised to be a no mans land for undesirables left to rot to protect the "good" communities has about a hundred years of socio/economic webs to untangle. Treat people like animals for so long, the devolped ways of survival and even to prosper, has to be understood. We grew up seeing affluence in doctors and business men, and equating it with such, not to mention we had a leg up on education, is much different than growing up and equating wealth in your communities with crime. That has a psychological effect. Denying they do have it rougher and have more to overcome simply because of where they were born makes you an uninformed liar. Or worse.
Re: US Politics Thread
I agree with Flagg. You guys act like the people in jail did nothing to be sent there. There are some folks in jail that don't deserve to be there. But most do.
I think there in lies the problem...why do so many people commit crimes in this country? Or are we locking people up for things in this country that no other country does?
Re: US Politics Thread
The war on drugs was a terrible thing to undertake. That's all on Reagan.
All drugs, and I mean all, should be legalized, taxed and regulated. I imagine that would solve a lot of very bad problems, create some other minor problems of its own, but in the end not only SAVE money but generate a shit ton of money for all levels of government.
Yeah, that's a weird stance to have, but I've thought this for a long time now.
- Randall Flagg
- Rep: 139
Re: US Politics Thread
The war on drugs was a terrible thing to undertake. That's all on Reagan.
All drugs, and I mean all, should be legalized, taxed and regulated. I imagine that would solve a lot of very bad problems, create some other minor problems of its own, but in the end not only SAVE money but generate a shit ton of money for all levels of government.
Yeah, that's a weird stance to have, but I've thought this for a long time now.
We have a major opioid epidemic. And that's due to a completely legal system. How are drugs like meth and angel dust remotely helpful? Who pays for their medical treatment? Who pays for their unemployment and welfare benefits when they can't obtain a job because they're addicted to heroin or meth?
This is more of the "I'm not responsible for anything, give me my freedom and bail me out when the debt comes due."
You want to legalize weed and shrooms, fine. But to say all drugs should be legal not only would cause a catastrophic increase in medical and public assistance costs, it might destroy our society. I have nothing against weed, but look at how the usage rates have increased since legalization in Colorado. Now imagine if people could just walk into CVS and get their Heisenberg Blue.
Re: US Politics Thread
The war on drugs was a terrible thing to undertake. That's all on Reagan.
All drugs, and I mean all, should be legalized, taxed and regulated. I imagine that would solve a lot of very bad problems, create some other minor problems of its own, but in the end not only SAVE money but generate a shit ton of money for all levels of government.
Yeah, that's a weird stance to have, but I've thought this for a long time now.
I think that's an oversimplification.
The war on drugs stew has long been simmering in America. The Nixon administration coined the term, founded the DEA, and passed the Control Substances Act. Reagan was the simply the Huckleberry the Republicans were looking for, someone who'd happily bang the "anti-drug / get tough on crime" drum that he'd been pounding on since his days as Governor in California. He no doubt escalated Nixon's policies but I'm like to blame the former for much of this idiocy, even if it's roots go much deeper.
As a side note, American didn't deserve Jimmy Carter. Too ahead of his time.
We have a major opioid epidemic. And that's due to a completely legal system. How are drugs like meth and angel dust remotely helpful? Who pays for their medical treatment? Who pays for their unemployment and welfare benefits when they can't obtain a job because they're addicted to heroin or meth?
A completely legal system is a bit of a stretch. I think many Americans have an issue with the role of corporate lobbying in American politics. A smaller subset of that group sees the pharmaceutical industry as very problematic.
As far as who sells the opioids, that's a bunch of makeshift clinics with doctors of dubious merit prescribing the drugs to dealers thinly veiled as patients, exploiting every possible loophole in the process. Some operate illegally, some are perfectly satisfied doing so until they're raided. So you basically have a semi-legal black market.
We don't have a completely legal system that Brian was arguing for and we certainly don't have any compelling education on the issue. It's like any other issue in America with the national discourse is so muddled, it's impossible to have a rational conversation.
Re: US Politics Thread
bigbri wrote:The war on drugs was a terrible thing to undertake. That's all on Reagan.
All drugs, and I mean all, should be legalized, taxed and regulated. I imagine that would solve a lot of very bad problems, create some other minor problems of its own, but in the end not only SAVE money but generate a shit ton of money for all levels of government.
Yeah, that's a weird stance to have, but I've thought this for a long time now.
We have a major opioid epidemic. And that's due to a completely legal system. How are drugs like meth and angel dust remotely helpful? Who pays for their medical treatment? Who pays for their unemployment and welfare benefits when they can't obtain a job because they're addicted to heroin or meth?
This is more of the "I'm not responsible for anything, give me my freedom and bail me out when the debt comes due."
You want to legalize weed and shrooms, fine. But to say all drugs should be legal not only would cause a catastrophic increase in medical and public assistance costs, it might destroy our society. I have nothing against weed, but look at how the usage rates have increased since legalization in Colorado. Now imagine if people could just walk into CVS and get their Heisenberg Blue.
That all may entirely happen. It's certainly not out of the realm of possibility. But the current war on drugs, many would argue, has already destroyed a major part of our society.
Drugs wouldn't be available in your local chain drugstore, that would be quite dumb, but licensed, regulated shops.
The usage of pot in Colorado is up for debate. Some say unchanged. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/won … 8e731fada8
Some say use is down. https://www.scientificamerican.com/arti … alization/
Possibly the worst abused substances in this country are tobacco and alcohol. They are perfectly legal. Either make them illegal, too, or legalize all recreational mind-altering substances.
Like I said, legalization would create problems, no doubt. I'm not naive about it. But it would solve a bunch as well.
Why not try it? Prohibition was tried. It failed. It was remedied.
- Smoking Guns
- Rep: 330
Re: US Politics Thread
Drug demand in the US gave power to the cartels in mexico and a lot of the crime in South America. I like freedom of choice, but we have too many children and idiots that can harm others to make some drugs, "legal"...
Re: US Politics Thread
bigbri wrote:The war on drugs was a terrible thing to undertake. That's all on Reagan.
All drugs, and I mean all, should be legalized, taxed and regulated. I imagine that would solve a lot of very bad problems, create some other minor problems of its own, but in the end not only SAVE money but generate a shit ton of money for all levels of government.
Yeah, that's a weird stance to have, but I've thought this for a long time now.
We have a major opioid epidemic. And that's due to a completely legal system. How are drugs like meth and angel dust remotely helpful? Who pays for their medical treatment? Who pays for their unemployment and welfare benefits when they can't obtain a job because they're addicted to heroin or meth?
This is more of the "I'm not responsible for anything, give me my freedom and bail me out when the debt comes due."
You want to legalize weed and shrooms, fine. But to say all drugs should be legal not only would cause a catastrophic increase in medical and public assistance costs, it might destroy our society. I have nothing against weed, but look at how the usage rates have increased since legalization in Colorado. Now imagine if people could just walk into CVS and get their Heisenberg Blue.
Not a dime for planned parenthood and fuck accessible healthcare but we can spend billions on the drug war and continue to lose?
Making drugs illegal hasn't stopped anything...it's slightly slowed the pace. This isn't a morality argument anymore...it costs society greatly to fight itself.
You ain't stopping anyone who wants drugs from getting them...
Re: US Politics Thread
There is a book named "Chasing the Scream" that studies drug use and it's impact on culture. It also is about legalization vs. our war on drugs. They found that countries with more lax laws on drugs (or no laws at all) had lower rates of addiction, and less crimes overall (related to drug use and sales.)
Criminalizing something with such high demand makes zero sense, unless you are a for profit prison system or a drug runner I suppose. I think the argument that more people will try drugs because they are legal is bunk. If heroin became legal in Nevada, I wouldn't then be more inclined to use it.
