Michael, I'll go along with you and concede that selective enforcement of laws is a part of any legal system, especially South Carolina's environmental regulations. And we Americans do a lot of questioning of what our taxes get for us. The blatant waste, fraud, and abuse is widely tolerated by those with the power to stop it.
Drug laws are an entirely different subject though. This is completely off the topic of our GRNO problems, but I want to make one point in reference to legalization of drugs, and it isn't because I am an old geezer who never heard of marijuana when I was a kid, much less cocaine.
Right now about one in four Americans are addicted to nicotine even though they are aware of the risks of using tobacco. But using tobacco doesn't make anybody crazy. Sure, they set things on fire occasionally, or harm their childrens' health, but mostly all they do is tend to kill themselves earlier. Since many of them die of old peoples' diseases when they are still in their productive years, tobacco use robs society of their contributions that they could still have made had they lived. And since they fought the cancer, emphysema, or heart disease while they were younger and stronger, they used up more health insurance benefits than they would have if they died of the same diseases as elderly seniors.
And I am not one who insists that marijuana use makes anybody crazy. It might make them a little goofy, but liquor probably is more addictive.
My point is I don't want to live in a country where one in four Americans is addicted to crack. If no restrictions are put on the marketing of drugs, the stuff will be given away to elementary school children, I guarantee it. Further, I doubt that the number hooked would be limited to only 25%. When it is time for you to begin collecting Social Security, try collecting any of it from a nation of crack heads.
Holland has lax or no drug laws, but Holland is a different country with different cultural attributes than ours. They are able to get away with what they do because they set cultural limits if not legal ones. Even so, I had a friend whose family still lived in Holland and he said he would never want to live there. He said the country barely is able to function. That Dutch descendant was a go getter, not laid back. He couldn't stand it in the Netherlands.
Sure, enforcement of drug laws is problematic and leads to widespread corruption among law enforcement officers. Still, I am willing to state that the vast majority of those who enforce drug laws are not corrupt, with the possible exception of border guards, or the situation would be much worse than it is. And I doubt drugs are a problem in areas where the inhabitants actively fight back and have them removed. Again, a cultural difference. But if selling crack wasn't against the law, it would be hard for locals to get the cops to roust the thugs and crazies.
Charles |
