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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Whitebeard who wrote (224148)	10/14/2007 7:10:31 PM
From: Sea Otter	Respond to of 793886

Stillholding, widespread drug use long predates Hollywood. Muslims and Indians have smoke pot for millenia (alcohol being prohibited in Islam, but not pot). South Americans used coca leaf. Native Americans smoke psychedelic tobacco. Romans used opiums during parties. Blacks and hispanics smoked pot in the USA for a long time before the Beatniks even got groovy with it. And so on. In the USA, alcohol use and addiction has been rampant for centuries. Check out early Colonial anti-alchohol tracts. It's like there was a drunk on every corner. In short, humans have been doing drugs a lot, and long before Hollywood. But I agree with you about the breakdown of the famly and social structure, especially in black communities. But is this caused by the drug itself, or by the fact that 50% of all black males do prison time? If half the white male population were put in prison (say for transporting or drinking beer), what do you think would happen to the white family structure? I think it would fall apart. The drugs laws are frankly racist in their bias. A black smokes some crack, or lights a joint and he goes to prison. A white snorts some cocaine or Oxycotin ("hillbilly heroin") and he gets off. And beer drinking is perfectly legal. What's wrong with that picture? Fact is the Drug War has failed. We've locked millions and drugs are still everywhere. All we've done is repeat Prohibition and created a criminal underclass too. So if a war isn't succeeding, maybe one should reconsider tactics? Let me be clear: I don't advocate drugs. Many times I've seen alcohol destroy lives, and one case of cocaine abuse as well. So I stay away from everything, except maybe a joint once a year to relive my Stanford grad days. But just like outlawing alcohol isn't the answer, so is outlawing any other substance. And I'm tired of my tax money going down that hole.