Don't deal here!

[Umfriend]

Actually, the "legalization" of cannabis in the Netherlands is a disaster. Shops may have limited stock and sell freely (to 18+). But the rest of the supply chain is illegal and punishable. Hence, high prices and a criminal crew making shitloads of money without any control on production.

Sure, there will be people that can't deal with it. There are such now. Goes for many things in life. But the bigger picture is that there are milions of people who are limited in their freedom, that billions of euros end up with really bad people who victimise anyone who is an obstruction to them, the our law enforcements spend billions on the WoD wheras health/FDA type control would be beneficial to the public and far cheaper.

[Umfriend]

Ah, dZeus beat me to it. I'm with dZ, and that means a lot!

[Brian Ellis]

The problem is that he was theoretically able to get official clean syringes/needles and LEGAL drugs for weaning but, to do so, he would have had to go into a rehab centre run by do-gooders (?) who would have the rest of his life mortgaged, whether he kicked the habit or not. This requires a strong will to accept their terms; the paradox is that addicts are not generally noted to have strong wills, which is why these centres didn't work well and most inmates were thrown out in quick time, as they broke the rules and obtained the stuff elswhere, because the weaning doses were too small to stop the acute physical pain.

For me, the people who ran these centres were worse than the dealers, because they charged the earth (from future earnings) for board and lodgings AND deprived the addicts of their needs. It was a money-making racket, sanctioned by the state (subsidies for running costs). This was acknowledged as a failure and they all closed down after a couple of years. They had better success in the cantonal prison, where they dedicated a wing to addicts, who were under strict medical control, unfortunately with an inglorious degree of recidivism (about 70%, IIRC).

[Umfriend]

Nothing in that I find to be an argument against my case.

[Brian Ellis]

Nothing in that I find to be an argument against my case.

Maybe because you haven't got a case other than offering any substance like a kilo of sugar in the supermarket?

[Umfriend]

That's not my position and you know it, no?

[KRSESQ]

The problem is that he was theoretically able to get official clean syringes/needles and LEGAL drugs for weaning but, to do so, he would have had to go into a rehab centre run by do-gooders (?) who would have the rest of his life mortgaged, whether he kicked the habit or not. This requires a strong will to accept their terms; the paradox is that addicts are not generally noted to have strong wills, which is why these centres didn't work well and most inmates were thrown out in quick time, as they broke the rules and obtained the stuff elswhere, because the weaning doses were too small to stop the acute physical pain.

For me, the people who ran these centres were worse than the dealers, because they charged the earth (from future earnings) for board and lodgings AND deprived the addicts of their needs. It was a money-making racket, sanctioned by the state (subsidies for running costs). This was acknowledged as a failure and they all closed down after a couple of years. They had better success in the cantonal prison, where they dedicated a wing to addicts, who were under strict medical control, unfortunately with an inglorious degree of recidivism (about 70%, IIRC).

This sounds quite a bit different from the London and Vancouver experiments in giving addicts free fixes of heroin in a medically supervised environment to a) eliminate the need for them to commit crimes to get money for their fix, b) get them away from the criminal elements they needed to associate with to get their fix, and c) get them the counselling they need to eventually get clean.

Early indications are that the success rate is significantly higher than methadone treatment (which many addicts don't respond to) and the program is, ironically, cheaper to administer than methadone treatment.

The London experiment.

The Vancouver experiment.

Kevin

[TransformX]

That is not what I have said. Please don't quote me when arguing with whatever someone else, apparantly, has argued.

Umf, you say drugs should be legal in controlled quantities. I call that total and utter BS.
1. People who need/want higher quantities will find means to get them and thus will be considered criminals all over again.
2. People who will assist such people will become drug dealers.
3. Those who obtain more than they 'ought' to get could easily OD.

Bottom line, you're okay with people OD.

edit: Just to be clear about it, the same (other than OD) applies to most anything that is in controlled quantities, hence the term: black market.

[TransformX]

Also, another thing about 'legalised' drugs:
if drugs are cheap, easy to obtain and legal, more people will be inclined to try them, thus you'll have more drug addicts. Drug addicts tend to lay 'wasted' instead of producing, that means they don't work, pay taxes etc. You can dig around and read about Israel's economy. We have a legal drug called religion here, in which nearly a hundred thousand (100,000) people sit around and do nothing other than studying Torah all day long. They cost the tax payer nearly a BILLION new israeli shekels / year. How's that for a strain on the economy?
Are you still so inclined to let everyone have a go on cheap, high quality hard drugs, you know, for shits and giggles?

[Umfriend]

Umf, you say drugs should be legal in controlled quantities. I call that total and utter BS.
1. People who need/want higher quantities will find means to get them and thus will be considered criminals all over again.
2. People who will assist such people will become drug dealers.
3. Those who obtain more than they 'ought' to get could easily OD.

Bottom line, you're okay with people OD.

edit: Just to be clear about it, the same (other than OD) applies to most anything that is in controlled quantities, hence the term: black market.

Almost. I believe distribution should be controlled similar to cigarettes and alcohol albeit more strict, not quantities. So:
1. Higher quantities would still be legal. There remains the issue of course of distribution to those who should not get it (kids), see 2.
2. There may be parties willing to sell to kids to but as most people could get it legally, the volume to be sold illegally will be small and far less attractive. Furthermore, it'll be far easier to chase those who operate on the fringes of society. The legal market would be a profitable one and operators crossing the line would loose their license. For the huge part of the market, having a legal operation creates a huge advantage so losing a license would be costly.
3. I can't remember ever having hear about someone wanting to OD aside from attempting suicide, for which other means are available already (trains as an example). Most ODs come from bad modes of operation which can be linked to, let's say, less than ideal circumstances in which one needs to administer the drug. Moreover, without control, many ODs are a consequence of bad product.

The idea is simple: even if you feel drug use is a bad thing, you know it'll happen. Legalising it yields control to society which has tremendous benefits:
a. Less to no crime by users
b. Taxes
c. Far less health problems due to bad product and/or means of administiring.
d. No criminal groups making shitloads of money.

[Umfriend]

Also, another thing about 'legalised' drugs:
if drugs are cheap, easy to obtain and legal, more people will be inclined to try them, thus you'll have more drug addicts. Drug addicts tend to lay 'wasted' instead of producing, that means they don't work, pay taxes etc. You can dig around and read about Israel's economy. We have a legal drug called religion here, in which nearly a hundred thousand (100,000) people sit around and do nothing other than studying Torah all day long. They cost the tax payer nearly a BILLION new israeli shekels / year. How's that for a strain on the economy?
Are you still so inclined to let everyone have a go on cheap, high quality hard drugs, you know, for shits and giggles?

I hear you and am aware of that "problem". Having said that, I think there are quite a few differences, to name some:
1. I've never heard of a "normal" governement (so aside from e.g. communist or nazi-germany) to disincentivy religion wheras many governments have already had programs directed at tobacco, alcohol and drugs.
2. The drug you speak of is actually costly to the users as they lack education and typically have lowly jobs, if any.
3. I've never heard of parents indoctrinating their children willingly to use drugs as opposed to accept religion.

I don't know what the shekel trades at so 1 bln means nothing to me but I'll assume it is a lot. I submit that drugs would at least add to the treasury wheras religion in Israel does not (speculation though).

Finally, the statement that drug addict tend to lay wasted is beside the mark. There are millions of users who function in society.

[VJ]

While I agree on principle, you are overlooking a lot of side effects:
- (some) people will want higher dosages, as TransformX suggests, thus going back to illegality and crime
- some people will want to try other even more dangerous drugs
- some people will not work properly in society anymore, loosing their jobs and thus without the means to support their addiction
- alcohol is easy to come by, and see what damages it does to personal lives
- larger group suffering health problems related to the drugs themselves (see tobacco and alcohol)
- ...
And even simpler: how can you regulate the doses people buy if you want to have it available to people? The only way seems prescriptions, but who would then write them? And even that is not failsafe.
It is a nice thought exercise, but I feel it is just opening a big can of worms...

[Umfriend]

While I agree on principle, you are overlooking a lot of side effects:
- (some) people will want higher dosages, as TransformX suggests, thus going back to illegality and crime
- some people will want to try other even more dangerous drugs
- some people will not work properly in society anymore, loosing their jobs and thus without the means to support their addiction
- alcohol is easy to come by, and see what damages it does to personal lives
- larger group suffering health problems related to the drugs themselves (see tobacco and alcohol)
- ...
And even simpler: how can you regulate the doses people buy if you want to have it available to people? The only way seems prescriptions, but who would then write them? And even that is not failsafe.
It is a nice thought exercise, but I feel it is just opening a big can of worms...

- As I said, there would be no limit on dosage so no revertion to illegality.
- True, and some die due to freely available coughing-sirup.
- As it is now, the question is whether that would increase substantially. Will someone acknowledge that there are millions of users who function well?
- True, drugs are a bad thing. Do you advocate a ban on alcohol? Any idea what havoc that would cause?
- Perhaps. Then again, at least we would avoid health issues due to bad product.
- Again, I would not regulate doses. Just the dosage of standardised product by no one would stop you from taking two pills or whatever.

A can of worms? Try the war on drugs. Try the hold drug-cartels have on society in the Netherlands, the US, Mexico, Columbia, south-east Asia and Afghanistan for starters.

[Belwarrior]

I'm a bit late in posting this but that guy and his wife got it easy.

Here in singapore, they both would have been sentenced to death by hanging. its not humane but still a necessary harsh deterrent.

see the link below for the limit of drugs you could have on yourself.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_Singapore

[Brian Ellis]

There are millions of users who function in society.

They may "function", but are they doing so on all 4 cylinders? I submit that many, if not most, of them have only 3 or fewer cylinders working. This applies equally to tobacco and alcohol. Alcohol metabolism is very complex and even a glass of wine with your evening meal will leave toxins that will affect your performance the following day, even if your BAC is quasi-zero. Smoking (even second hand) affects the natural cardiac pacemaking for quite long periods and this can have an effect on your performance, as well. Harder drugs will have even more effect.