

"Impossible" to end drug trade, says Calderón - mtgx
http://www.economist.com/blogs/americasview/2012/11/drugs-business

======
benbeltran
As an habitant of Juarez, one of the cities that was hit the most with
Calderon's war against drugs, this is insulting. We all know it's impossible
to end drug trade. That's why most cities had this sort of "understanding"
with the cartels. They move some stuff around, they leave the people alone and
everything works out (e.g. Though Juarez had a lot of Drug related crimes
before the "war on drugs", it was mostly contained, but still we had a lower
than average rate for other types of crime like armed robbery and such).

But this wasn't about the wear on drugs, this was about territory: The local
government had deals with the local cartel, but the Sinaloa cartel started
fighting for more territory, allegedly with the aid of the army/federal
police. Suddenly Juarez is impossible to live in, not because of all the narco
murders but because federal agents and armies are stopping you every three
blocks and suddenly you have a lot of blackmail, threats, etc coming from the
guys that are supposedly there to protect. We knew they were not there to end
the drug problem, they were there as a part of it, and we know it's impossible
to end it, but it's better to have it out of sight, out of mind.

Now he's leaving and of course he had to come up with a conclusion like this.
I just hope cities get back to the balance they had from before the war and
this drug traffic problem stops spilling to the general population. As long as
there is a market there will be someone to fill the need, and being the next
door neighbor we're sadly in a good position to have those kinds of people.

Yes Mr. Calderón, it's impossible to end drug trade, you knew it, we knew it,
this is not news... And yet you had us suffering in fear and crime for six
years just because you wanted to help some buddies and look as if you were
actually doing something.

------
sharkweek
If you haven't seen the movie Traffic
(<http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0181865/>), I highly recommend it. There's a
scene where Michael Douglas' character, who plays the role of US Drug Czar, is
in a room full of politicians and lobbyists. He is told by one of them that
basically this is a war that will never be won nor end. The only success would
be vaguely getting usage down. There will always be a demand that creates the
supply.

edit: this scene from The Wire also has a great perspective on the war on
drugs -- <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BA5za4VsskM>

------
Gring
Mexico's problem is in essense, that outside market pressure makes its
inhabitants behave in a way that is at odds with keeping up a state under the
rule of law.

As a thought experiment, think what would happen if Mexico made drugs legal.
Their government would had to fight against the cartels, and might at some
point win.

What you have then is a system where Mexico has much less criminality. They
can't export to the US directly of course, but people will just buy drugs
legally in the Mexican north and try to smuggle it the the US. The US can
decide for themselves if they want to legalize it or not, and if they don't
the US criminality is still there, but the Mexican criminality is gone.

Well what would likely happen then is another 1989 Panama. One of the main
reasons why the US invaded Panama was its involvement in drug trade. So the US
would criticize Mexico publicly, and at some point probably invade it.

It looks to me like current time Mexico is stuck between a rock and a hard
place. They must be opposed to drugs because their powerful northern neighbor
wants them to, but outside market pressure, from the very same neighbor at the
same time destabilizes it.

So it's an issue that should be solved by an outside party - the US. But that
party won't tackle the issue because Mexican people can't vote in the US.

Sounds like bad US colonialism to me :-(

~~~
nickik
> Their government would had to fight against the cartels, and might at some
> point win.

I dont think that would be a big problem. Everybody that has a car coule
without any trouble start trafficing drugs into the US, without fear of the
police. The goverment would essentially only have to be passiv antil the funds
of the cartels drain.

Guns and stuff are expensive. A well organised logisics firm (for example)
could outperform these cartels in drug transportation. All the goverment would
have to do is protect the firms.

Many of the people that work for the cartels could get jobs in 'legal' frims
that do the same thing, witch would be a better workplace for people.

> Well what would likely happen then is another 1989 Panama. One of the main
> reasons why the US invaded Panama was its involvement in drug trade. So the
> US would criticize Mexico publicly, and at some point probably invade it.

MMhhh possible but Im not sure the US people or the international community
would stand for this. I doute that the US would go so far.

I think legalizing drugs is the only workable solution for Mexico.

------
sami36
The flaw in the argument that ending the drug war will financially starve the
cartels..(true) & if fighting criminality is our stated policy then it's the
right thing to do..is that it's overlooking the accompanying weakening of the
law enforcement- prison-military industrial complex & YES, I know people don't
look at it that way, but the police & the entire drug fighting establishment
are also an interest group set on keeping their budgets & their privileges.
Calderon is a coward, he should have stated the obvious before he was set to
leave office. How many lives were lost in Mexico because of his stubborn
delusion..or cynical political calculations ?

~~~
daniel-cussen
> the police & the entire drug fighting establishment are also an interest
> group set on keeping their budgets & their privileges

In a way, there's this angle, sure. However, nobody wants the drug war to get
so violent policemen drop dead all the time, like they do in Mexico. Nobody
actually wants an all out war, despite the name "War on Drugs."

~~~
antidoh
I think the US is fine with a War on Anything, as long as it's done in another
country. The actual killing is done in Mexico and Afghanistan, and we're just
peachy fine with that.

~~~
daniel-cussen
Afghanistan I'll grant you, mostly, because there are no US civilians for
miles and miles. There are some soldiers, though.

But Mexico? No. No, for so many reasons: it's a favored tourist destination,
for one. Second, relatedly, Spring Break takes place there. America will be
damned before it lets her young women drop dead in such a manner! And, that's
an industry unto itself, with a lot of US investment tied up there.

Third, the Latino population in America votes and are not peachy fine with
their cousins dropping dead. The Mexican contingent within that Latino
population is pretty large. Fourth is the giant, hardly monitored stretch of
border between Mexico and US. Afghanistan is something like three borders and
an ocean or two away from US. Pretty easy to stop violence from spilling over.
But Mexico? A bit harder.

~~~
antidoh
And yet on it goes.

~~~
daniel-cussen
Indeed.

------
phaus
It's impossible to end the illegal drug trade != No organization with the
means is willing to do what it takes.

The Mexican drug cartel supposedly has close to 150,000 "soldiers." I use the
term soldier loosely because its really just a bunch of degenerate shitbags
that have been given firearms. They are allegedly larger, more organized, and
better funded than Al Qaeda has ever dreamed of being. Still, there are
bullets enough in this world to solve such a problem. It would be long, ugly,
and bloody for all parties involved, but if we were serious enough to actually
go about it the right way, the entire planet would be far better having seen
it to completion.

When an ultraconservative thinks about the war on drugs, they are generally
thinking of the elimination of mind-altering substances from the face of the
earth. When I think of the war on drugs, I think first of finding ways to
prevent children from becoming addicted to hard drugs before they are old
enough to know what decision they are making, and secondly, the annihilation
of the violent, terrorist organizations that currently control the industry. I
understand that nothing will ever completely eliminate the recreational use of
drugs, but by my definition the war on drugs is absolutely winnable.
Unfortunately, just because something can be accomplished, doesn't mean that
it's going to happen.

~~~
ralonso
See, this is a rather simplistic and ignorant comment. I do not mean to insult
you - actually, I wish it was as simple as you're saying, just kill them and
end with it. However, the problem is incredibly more complex than what you
think it is.

I live in Mexico, next to a city that a couple of years back was one of the
worst in the country in terms of violence and drug distribution. (In fact, one
of the big cartels started in that city.) I've interacted with people involved
in those cartels and with their families. I've interacted with officers who're
in it, too. The problem is deeply rooted, and it's a problem of, among other
things, culture.

The solution is not to "kill them all," but rather to educate. According to
one article[1] (note: it's in spanish), Mexico invests less than 0.5% of its
GDP into science and research. While Mexico has always had top competitors in
international competitions for math, biology, robotics, science and
engineering in general, and even chess, they're anomalies and products of
extremely expensive private schools. Hell, even GNOME was made by two Mexican
hackers. Schools in Mexico are beyond messed up.

Lack of education, mixed with poverty, create criminals. In Mexico you rarely
ever see racism, but instead there's classism. Unlike in the US, our
government officials aren't old white guys, but people of all kinds of skin
color with money. Mexican culture - and maybe I'm wrong in this comparison,
but this is from what I understand - is similar to black culture, where you
have to fight your way out of your impoverished group by primarily violent
means. You don't earn the respect of your fellow poor friends by getting an A
on a test, but by having designer jeans or by having the latest iPhone.

And this is what gets most the "bunch of degenerate shitbags that have been
given firearms" that you mention. These are literally teenagers (or even
younger kids) that want to get out, probably even help our their family or
community, and this is the only way they can do it.

I may be going a bit off-topic, but killing them off won't do any good. In
fact, starting an all-out war might make things worse. These kids don't fear
death because they have nothing to lose. The higher ups also don't fear the
government or the army.

Another thing is that, if a war against organized crime were to start, it
would create fear instead of peace. It would make the population, at least to
my understanding, "uneasy" to say the least.

What I would propose instead of killing people would be to educate and invest
in shit other than fighting a meaningless war.

[1] <http://www.metronoticias.com.mx/nota.cgi?id=378883>

EDIT: Hmm, I noticed that I rambled a bit too much. There are several other
things I wanted to mention. I am not in a position to offer a concrete
solution as I'm not an expert in this topic. I've only seen this from afar and
read almost daily on the newspapers about what's happening in the country. As
I mentioned, the problem is far too big to be reduced into a couple of
paragraphs. There are countless books, articles, essays, blog posts, etc,
devoted to this specific topic and the solution offered varies (albeit
slightly) from person to person.

If anyone is interested in more information, let me know and I'll see what I
can do.

~~~
phaus
Of course a war isn't as simple as killing the enemy. I assumed that was a
given.

I feel sympathy for the people who are forced to join violent gangs. I also
feel sympathy for the young, uneducated, impoverished people who join such
gangs because they feel they have no other option. But if they are committing
violent acts not just against rivals but also against young, uneducated,
impoverished people who are completely innocent, then the amount of sympathy
starts to fade. When and if the Mexican government decides that they have
truly had enough, these misguided youths still have the option of throwing
down their weapons.

~~~
ralonso
>When and if the Mexican government decides that they have truly had enough,
these misguided youths still have the option of throwing down their weapons.

See, here's the thing: like every other government in the world, those in
control are the corporations. Because investing money in something that, to be
fair, doesn't actually affect them (and in reality, it benefits them greatly),
and which gives them no return, they won't do it.

And this is where these topics usually get a bit tough because any supposition
isn't based entirely on fact (primarily because it's so easy to cover up or
dismiss accusations, since all of those in power are ultimately working
together (and this, again, is also pure speculation)). It borders on
conspiracy.

~~~
phaus
I agree, I touched on this topic below in a response to anigbrowl.

------
lifeguard
Thank you Bush administration for meth.

"At one time, the sleeping pill Quaalude was as big a problem in the United
States as heroin and cocaine. But then, in a matter of just a few years, it
disappeared. If the successful strategy the DEA pursued in cracking down on
Quaaludes had been followed when meth surfaced a few years later, experts say
it is unlikely the meth epidemic would ever have happened. "

[http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/meth/faqs/quaaludes....](http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/meth/faqs/quaaludes.html)

~~~
stfu
Under the unrealistic assumption, that this is not a troll comment, it should
be nominated as the most loony anti-Bush statement in a while.

Just because the Bush administration (successfully!) got the misuse of a
sleeping pill under control, they were getting people hooked on meth?

There is absolutely not causation identifiable in the linked article. Plus the
effects and user groups seem to be very little overlapping, _illegal use of
the drug had surged, especially among teenagers. Users would 'lude out,"
combining the drug with alcohol to achieve a drunken, sleepy high_ sounds like
a suburban middle class problem, while I suspect Meth a lot less socially
accepted. But Meth is a disruptive drug through its super low barriers of
entry to become a producer, therefore super price competitive and a tendency
for over supply.

~~~
lifeguard
Uhhh, the link proves popular drugs can be "disappeared". The link shows the
US government only partially limited ephedrine (meth) and thus failed.

To a thoughtful reader the article illustrates going after precursor chemicals
used to make drugs, rather than focusing on policing of users as an effective
way to eradicate abuse.

Watch a video of the complete Frontline episode. There is an interview of the
DEA official describing his higher-ups killing a complete ban due to lobbying
from companies that make over the counter cold medicines based on ephedrine.

Bush and Congress were both lobbied effectively by big pharma.

~~~
theorique
Ephedrine is not meth. Ephedrine is ephedrine, meth is methamphetamine.

Pseudoephedrine is a cold medicine (decongestant) that is used as a feedstock
chemical in the production of meth. It is a relatively harmless medicine in
prescribed doses. A complete ban of this medicine would greatly inconvenience
tens of millions of hay-fever and allergy sufferers, including me.

Currently in the USA, due to the meth industry, individuals 18 years of age
and older are limited to purchasing 2.4g per day of pseudoephedrine, and need
to provide a government issued ID to make the purchase.

~~~
lifeguard
Most meth being sold is made in Mexico, from legit ephdrine/ephedra. Then it
is smuggled into the USA for sale.

If there were no industrial sources of ephedra, meth/speed would have to be
made from plants like Ma-huang. The economies of making it this way do not
support the explosion ephedra drove in meth production.

Millions of dollars of ephedrine based cold 'medicine' are sold over the
counter each year making companies like Pfizer serious profits. So they
lobbied Bush & Congress not to ban it completely.

These events created the meth hell America has been living in, and it could
have been stopped.

~~~
theorique
_Millions of dollars of ephedrine based cold 'medicine' are sold over the
counter each year making companies like Pfizer serious profits. So they
lobbied Bush & Congress not to ban it completely._

And good for them. I'm not sure why you are placing 'medicine' in quotes. I
have found that pseudoephedrine helps allergy and hay fever sufferers like me
to deal better with dry winter weather and spring pollen. Substitutes like
phenyleprine are weak at best.

Every time I purchase pseudoephedrine, I am reminded of the government's
futile war on drugs, when the clerk scans my ID and has me sign the keypad
stating that I won't buy more than 2.4g per day or start a meth lab.

Which I won't. I just want to use a legal OTC medication for its intended
purpose.

------
codeboost
What he is saying is that it is in human nature to get high. And we better
accept this and tailor our legislation accordingly, instead of trying in vain
to deny it.

Legalizing would stop violence, increase taxes, allow for open research of the
substances, would de-stigmatize use, which in turn would make users more
willing to seek cure or support of others and would allow for better education
of future potential users (aka children) on the caveats of drug use and abuse.

Drug use has produced a great deal of 'positive' outcomes for our society.
They have drastically changed our culture, art, economy and technology.

Of course, their dark side is well known, but I think it would be a lot easier
to deal with the dark effects of drugs if they were legal.

I'm glad there's lots of signs that this is about to happen all around the
world pretty soon. Let's see what happens.

------
checoivan
There are so many ramifications, specially with what happens in terms on the
national relationships once the money flow is cut to some with drugs being
made legal. We don't know how bad things could get for Mexico, and which
strings are being pulled when the wrong people being left out of the money.
There's also the people. It's easy to think a narc will become a happy member
of society and do the nice drugs business once it's legal and stay there in a
bubble. You're talking about people knowingly poisoning others and murdering
by the hundred. Legalizing the substance won't make those people ethical well
behaved persons caring for society. With truckloads of capital to move to
other industries, imagine if the doors are fully open for top cartel people to
move freely and move to rule the food, communications, or health industries.
They're not the kind of people who would rather loose money to stop producing
a bad batch of food that poisons people or avoid making people sick to
increase profits.They can easily threaten a government inspector, wipe whoever
gets in their way since they already do that, plus they have many of the law
enforcers in their payroll. It's not like making new law will stop them from
doing things their way. If legalization is the solution, at least first their
economy and power can't be big enough so that they won't wreck other hubs in
the country. So far seems like a fight to make cartels as small as possible to
be controllable.

~~~
jasonwatkinspdx
Without ongoing revenue the shadow government cannot sustain its own life.
It's blood is bribes (quite literally sadly).

This idea that cartels can take their capital on hand and then move directly
into being the monopoly player in some other market is more than a bit
fantastic.

~~~
checoivan
They already do it, but it's the extend of it the worrying thing. There's
plenty of known "Narc owned" businesses in mexico. I'm from there and it's
quiet a thing to see strange things like 3 car washes in the same block, with
no clients, open 24/7 and some escalades parked. Now imagine if they had a
steady flow of clean fully open income to invest and the doors open to become
public persons.

~~~
Smirnoff
I have a feeling you mean drug lords or cartel or drug dealers when you say
narc. However, narc is actually a good guy, ie a cop or federal agent
enforcing the drug laws.

~~~
jasonwatkinspdx
In Mexico it's common to refer to people connected to the cartels as 'los
narcos'. A bit backwards from what you'd expect in English, but that's how
things go when languages collide.

~~~
theorique
It's short for "narcotraficante" - drug trafficker. Hence, "el narco" is the
drug producer/dealer.

------
rizzom5000
Wow, a politician who gets economics 101! Can we get some more of those?

~~~
anigbrowl
We have plenty such politicians. We need an electorate that understands
economics 101.

~~~
Jach
Surely the simpler solution is a restoration of dictatorship (it worked
wonders for Paraguay under Dr. Francia), with a Benevolent Dictator (plenty
exist!) who understands Econ 101 (and, one insists, a great deal of other
things the electorate is ignorant about that are highly relevant if one's job
is running a country). It also tidies up the problem of inaction. But I'm sure
the new report from the Organisation of American States will bring about
radically new ideas that everyone will agree to implement immediately!

------
Tichy
In a way I am indifferent to legalizing drugs, because I won't buy them
anyway. However, I wonder what it would be like in reality? Would it mean you
could walk down the supermarket aisle and buy a substance for 9,99$ that ruins
your life within seconds? The danger seems to me to signal "drugs are safe" by
legalizing them - usually the government is supposed to ban dangerous foods, I
think?

Sure, you can already buy cigarettes and alcohol, but I don't think they make
you addicted after just one shot.

Just asking - perhaps there are plans for distributing them in a different
way?

Also, even if they were legalized, would it mean those drug cartels would go
away? They are now an organization embedded in society, why should they loosen
their grip? Like if an independent drugstore opens to sell legal heroin, what
would stop them from setting it on fire and shooting the owners?

~~~
rms
There's not really anything out there that makes you addicted in one shot.
Oftentimes people have awful experiences on first dosages of heroin, because
overwhelming nausea is a common side effect of high dosages of opiates. It
takes more than once to be addicted.

Cigarettes are mostly as addictive as crack cocaine and it still takes
sustained high levels of use over days to develop a physical addiction to
either.

------
jpxxx
I for one am grievously offended. This degree of Truthspeak is a Droneable
offense, and the number of priceless American jobs that would be lost with
marijuana reform is an insult to the tens of thousands of Mexicans slaughtered
for them.

------
alan_cx
I still dont understand they governments, especially the uber capitalist ones
like the US, make damn sure with their laws, that the money and power are in
the hands of drug dealers and cartels.

Restricting supply ups the price. You cant control demand in anything close to
a reasonable way. Frankly people want drugs. Americans know this better than
most since they had prohibition.

I have always wondered if some how it suits government to have violent
criminals controlling the supply and money. If just the money which goes to
the war machine, or something else?

------
qq66
It's impossible to end any trade for which there is a market. Drugs, sex,
nuclear weapons, state secrets, etc. all seem to create markets to satisfy
demand. It might be that the best way to protect innocent lives is to actually
encourage the development of the markets to keep them above board and in the
public eye.

~~~
ucee054
Shall we create a liquid, transparent, legal market for murder as well?

~~~
qq66
I would guess that one would only want to create a legal market for an illicit
good when the illegality of the market is causing more harm than the market
transaction itself. I think that many countries, for example, have tried
legalizing prostitution as a way of tackling forcible sex trafficking,
unfortunately as far as I've read these efforts have failed to thwart sex
trafficking.

------
galactus
I read people saying "duh, this is obvious". Of course it is, and everybody
knows it, but it is still important when political personalities start to say
it publicly.

------
pcvarmint
Duh!!!

Where there is demand, there is supply.

This is as inviolable as the law of gravity.

------
petercooper
Ending fraud, speeding, the sale of body organs or any number of crimes is
also impossible. Impossibility is a poor rationale for appeasement.

~~~
bluedanieru
When people say 'impossible' there is a mutually understood subtext of
'without going absolutely off the fucking rail to make it happen'. In order to
stamp out the drug trade you need to:

* Render extinct-in-the-wild (or just plain extinct) a great many species of plants, fungi, and even a few animals, many of which have a rather large range and are difficult to kill.

* For whatever you miss in step one either because the precursors have legitimate uses we can't do without, or because we find we just can't kill them all, you need to tightly regulate and enforce a strict prohibition on those precursors in order to track who is doing what with what.

* Implementing the above step in a way that will really effectively reduce drug availability to nearly zero would require nothing short of global, endless warfare and a dystopian police state that would make Oceania look like - I don't know, Iceland? This is because some drugs are synthesized with very common materials and as such the only way to be sure no one is making them is to know what everyone is doing, all the time.

* To the extent you can't implement the previous step in full, you need to be sure the punishments meted out for failure to comply are _especially harsh_ , so that enough people who think they can skate by under the radar are deterred.

* If you can do all this, you will drive the prices of drugs so high that the reward for manufacturing even a small quantity of something, provided you have the means to move the product, will definitely motivate people to try anyway. And if they achieve some success, they now have resources to fight you/bribe your allies.

So, doing the War on Drugs 'right', means giving up anything more than a
pretense of freedom and democracy. Meanwhile, the cost of just legalizing the
shit and treating addiction as a medical issue seems far less dire in
comparison. When people say 'impossible' they mean 'impossible to do so in a
way consistent with our values'.

Can you say the same for fighting fraud, speeding, and the sale of body
organs? I think that you cannot.

~~~
ucee054
Or you can _go after the wall street bankers_ who launder the drug money,
pulling the plug on the pushers' finances.

~~~
bluedanieru
Are you suggesting this in addition to the above, or as an alternative? It is
not an alternative.

------
rorrr
Duh. We've been saying this for years.

Legalize all drugs and tax them.

You can't stop something that people want them.

If you think it's bad for somebody's health or is addictive, then I've got
news for you: alcohol, sugar, caffeine, bacon.

I've never even tried pot or anything stronger, but I still support
legalization.

But let's cut to the chase, this is not about drugs and health issues. This is
about money and jobs for DEA. Essentially, we're pissing away our tax money to
pay for DEA agents and their expensive toys, who, in turn, don't provide any
real service.

This drug war is expensive, it costs dollars and lives. It's trivial to end
it, but it's not happening. Too many dollars at stake.

~~~
jessedhillon
_But let's cut to the chase, this is not about drugs and health issues. This
is about money and jobs for DEA. Essentially, we're pissing away our tax money
to pay for DEA agents and their expensive toys, who, in turn, don't provide
any real service._

 _This drug war is expensive, it costs dollars and lives. It's trivial to end
it, but it's not happening. Too many dollars at stake._

I was with you until this, not because I disagree but because I think it's an
irrelevant issue. There are many examples of enforcement/regulation wings of
the government being rolled back when the political tide turned against them.
The issue is that law enforcement expenditures, like military expenditures,
are pitched as a response to public fears.

If you talk to older generation, suburban family folks who support
criminalization instinctively, their number one stated concern is, in my
experience, that they are afraid of drug-related crimes -- robbery, burglary,
theft i.e., crimes being committed to support a habit (so the hypothesis
goes). Now the obvious response to that is to point out that those things
happen now, but then you are engaging an issue of the heart by attacking a
point made in their head. This will probably segue into an argument about
stiffer criminal penalties -- the exact opposite of what we want -- because
_the person is still afraid_.

DEA toys don't figure into this argument, even if that is the end result, so
if you want this to happen before that generation is old and gone you have to
have an argument that addresses the core concerns people actually have. If you
have to talk about the DEA, even if you are technically correct, I doubt
anybody can be swayed by such an argument -- it's all cerebral and doesn't
address the central issue, which is fear.

That's MHO anyway.

~~~
prawks
To play devil's advocate: do you think that drug-related crimes would increase
or decrease as a result of legalization?

It's a question I haven't considered before, but one that takes a bit of
consideration. I certainly don't see it decreasing. (I support legalization by
the way, I side with libertarians on issues regarding the choice of what to do
with one's body. However, the libertarian camp also advocates a government
who's primary concern is protecting citizen's from violence. Just an aside.)

~~~
bluedanieru
By "drug-related crimes" are you referring to crimes of trafficking, or crimes
committed while under the influence (because the perpetrator is under the
influence).

For the former, I don't see how it could do anything but decrease. As to the
latter, I suspect initially it would go up, but I don't think that would last.
And, the drop off in crimes related to trafficking would more than make up the
difference. Having said that, crimes related to trafficking do tend to be
heavily concentrated into fewer areas, so the typical suburban white fear-
loving voter would probably _perceive_ that crime has gone up.

------
wildranter
Which parties win more in the war on drugs even if most battles are lost?
Hmm... let's see...

Firstly, government agencies that are in the frontline they get as they get
hefty budgets to spend on whatever they find necessary to carry out their
mission. Since they fight a war that means weapons, vehicles, communications
and surveillance tech, etc. here profits go to industries that provide the
goods, lobbyists, and corrupt government agents.

Secondly, by having no illegal cheap alternatives, people who like to get
stoned will have to resort to legal drugs. Alcohol, and nicotine come to mind
as being equally cheap, but not as effective. Also, prescription drugs, harder
to get and a little more expensive, tough widely accept by society. No need to
layout the parties who profit the most here.

In the end everyone else in society has something to loose by dealing with the
aftermath of yet another hopeless war. Something much worse then educatating
peers about the drug use and spending tax money in improving society as a
whole.

We have to end this nonsense. But, here's the the trillion dollar question.
How can we do it when so many people profit on this?

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jQueryIsAwesome
Decriminalization for all substances but legal production only for the ones
that do not severely harm the body in short-term (not heroin, crack, crystal
meth and similar ones)

