The Widening Divisions

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paperburn1
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by paperburn1 »

Diogenes
No I think I do, you are right he did all of above to keep his party in power. it was not because he believed in the "dream"
I was all about keeping his party alive.
I am not a nuclear physicist, but play one on the internet.

williatw
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by williatw »

Diogenes wrote:LBJ was a blatant racist from a place and at a time as when such opinions were popular. He didn't launch his "Great Society" because he had any love for black people, he did it in a cynical effort to grab that voting block to keep his party in power.

He was motivated by the passage of the 24th amendment which granted non-taxpayers the right to vote. In 1963, Black people voted Republican. LBJ deliberately set out to change that. This is what he said after the passage of the 24th amendment. (Ratified January of 1964)

“These Negroes, they’re getting pretty uppity these days and that’s a problem for us since they’ve got something now they never had before, the political pull to back up their uppityness. Now we’ve got to do something about this, we’ve got to give them a little something, just enough to quiet them down, not enough to make a difference.”—LBJ

“I’ll have those n*ggers voting Democratic for the next 200 years.” —Lyndon B. Johnson to two governors on Air Force One
He may have said those things and (perhaps) believed them....or merely said them to attempt to get his white southern democrats on board to try to get their support for the civil rights act. Whatever black vote he gained, he must have realized he would lose allot of white vote...which then went Republican. I believe no Democratic candidate for president since him has gotten a majority of the white male vote. Whatever his motives were (probably at best mixed); I suppose only he and God knew what they were in the privacy of his thoughts; but he did deliver on the Civil Rights Act. He strongly helped to end the abomination of Jim Crow in the South; regardless of what his reasons were for doing so. I seem to recall there was allegedly a conversation a few years later where Nixon whipped a crowd to a frenzy saying the same kind of racist things; remarking later that the Dems have lost the South for 50yrs or something like that. Did Nixon believe the racist things he allegedly said? Or was he just making a shrewd (if amoral) political calculation?

Diogenes
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by Diogenes »

williatw wrote:
However the large decline in traffic fatalities in Colorado accompanying the increase in said fatalities drivers' testing positive for pot would strongly suggest substitution is occurring. Unquestionably if people substituted smoking tobacco far less and pot more, emphysema and lung cancer would very likely decline.

I've heard this allegation before. The fact that it is being made on such a teeny amount of data implies that it's propaganda on the face of it. There hasn't been nearly enough time passed to objectively arrive at such a conclusion, therefore it's just more spin from the pro-pot crowd.
williatw wrote:
Diogenes wrote:People killed in drunk driving crashes are also indirect deaths, but they constitute a large chunk of people killed because of alcohol.
You can't ignore deaths caused indirectly by marijuana usage. Were it not being used, those deaths would not have occurred.

You can include all the deaths if you like; it won't help your side of the argument much:
3 per 100,000 for pot users
91 per 100,000 for alcohol
Alcohol deaths trump pot deaths by easily and order of magnitude plus, not even close.


I would think that deaths from pot would be primarily related to being stoned and having an accident. I would think that any physiological causes of death from pot would take at least as much time as would a physiological cause of death from Alcohol. (Decades) (And it may in fact be less toxic over a long period of time.)


I am of the opinion that Alcoholics far outnumber pot heads, and we will have to wait until we have a sufficient percentage of the population engaging in pot smoking before we can make accurate comparisons in terms of fatal accidents which are pot related.


Diogenes wrote: And of course you would have to include the deaths caused by the WOD; drug wars in Mexico & Latin America, carnage on American streets; 800K a year of mostly minority males arrested/convicted/jailed, resulting lives destroyed, mostly for pot possession.

You can't blame the carnage on the American streets on the war on drugs. The blame for that needs to reside at LBJ's doorstep for having made the Father an unnecessary part of poor families.

Children growing up without a strong father figure turn feral, and they will enact carnage even without a war on drugs. A Father is necessary to divert and control violent urges, and not having a Father figure in young men's lives leaves all the default animalistic programing intact.

You want civilized people, you have to overwrite the default programing, and it requires a father present in the family to do this.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —

Diogenes
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by Diogenes »

williatw wrote:
MSimon wrote:This is what I found:
3 per 100,000 for pot users
91 per 100,000 for alcohol
On June 17, 1997, the Office of Applied Studies of SAMHSA said there have been no recorded deaths from an overdose of marijuana.
And of course the heavy-weight champ in all this is always legal tobacco:

I hate tobacco, but if you want to smoke it go ahead. The salient difference between smoking Tobacco and using other drugs (alcohol included) is that you generally don't hurt anyone but yourself.


I do wish to take this opportunity of your having mentioned Tobacco to point out that usage rates are declining. They are taxing it and restricting it and maligning it out of existence.


I have said before that by watching Tobacco usage we will eventually know if MSimon's theory is correct or not. (Prohibition is impossible.) If Tobacco usage can eventually be choked off to nothing, this will prove his theory wrong.



Image
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —

williatw
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by williatw »

Diogenes wrote:
williatw wrote: And of course you would have to include the deaths caused by the WOD; drug wars in Mexico & Latin America, carnage on American streets; 800K a year of mostly minority males arrested/convicted/jailed, resulting lives destroyed, mostly for pot possession.

You can't blame the carnage on the American streets on the war on drugs. The blame for that needs to reside at LBJ's doorstep for having made the Father an unnecessary part of poor families.

Children growing up without a strong father figure turn feral, and they will enact carnage even without a war on drugs. A Father is necessary to divert and control violent urges, and not having a Father figure in young men's lives leaves all the default animalistic programing intact.

You want civilized people, you have to overwrite the default programing, and it requires a father present in the family to do this.
They’re not (the 800K per year) of mostly minority youth being charged with "Alex DeLarge" (A Clockwork Orange--watch it if you haven't already, makes some of your points that I actually agree with) type murder and mayhem, the majority are being incarcerated for narcotics (mostly pot) possession. Blacks don't consume pot in any greater number than whites do but they sure get jailed in far greater number for the same offense. If they were being jailed (minority youth) for the animalistic feral behavior (murder, rape, assault, theft, carnage, etc.) I have no objection, whether they commit the aforementioned in greater amounts per capita than white youth do or not. If for no other reason than I am more likely to be a target of such behavior than you are. I do strongly object to their being massed jailed for the same offense that middle class white youth do in equal or greater abandon (pot smoking) without risking significant incarceration. As an aside I heard that in New York City they get around the decriminalization of pot this way: if it is on "public display" you still get arrested charged; but the stop and frisk policy (which target minority males overwhelmingly), works like this; you’re stopped you’re frisked and ordered to empty your pockets. If you are carrying pot, then guess what...now it is on public display, hello jail.
Last edited by williatw on Tue Jul 01, 2014 4:06 am, edited 1 time in total.

williatw
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by williatw »

williatw wrote:And of course you would have to include the deaths caused by the WOD
Diogenes wrote:You can't blame the carnage on the American streets on the war on drugs. The blame for that needs to reside at LBJ's doorstep for having made the Father an unnecessary part of poor families.
You forgot the part after the semi colon:
williatw wrote:drug wars in Mexico & Latin America
They have nothing do do with our failed WOD? 50K + dead Mexicans and countless thousands other dead Latinos? Or is it that they just don't count much since they don't vote in American election; if they did the war on drugs would end faster than if they conducted drug raids much in affluent white neighborhoods here.
Last edited by williatw on Tue Jul 01, 2014 1:19 am, edited 2 times in total.

williatw
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by williatw »

Diogenes wrote:I hate tobacco, but if you want to smoke it go ahead. The salient difference between smoking Tobacco and using other drugs (alcohol included) is that you generally don't hurt anyone but yourself.
Don't smoke never have and I would not wish you to start.

Diogenes wrote:I have said before that by watching Tobacco usage we will eventually know if MSimon's theory is correct or not. (Prohibition is impossible.) If Tobacco usage can eventually be choked off to nothing, this will prove his theory wrong.
Image
Not to speak for MSimon...but the experience with the welcome decline in legal, regulated Tobacco consumption doesn't prove the efficacy of prohibition, only the effectiveness of educating the public about dangers of usage, emphasis on treatment (helping people quit), resulting social censure against. Not forcing people not to smoke with jack-booted assault weapon carrying no-knock warrants door battering down thugs. We thankfully managed to avoid the mass incarceration/illegal insanely lucrative market to organized crime phase. We apparently showed wisdom in dealing with tobacco that we failed miserably with in alcohol/drug prohibition.

hanelyp
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by hanelyp »

Over the last few decades I've observed a relentless campaign to make tobacco "uncool". In the last couple decades there's been an equally relentless campaign to make pot "cool". The result is declining tobacco use and enforcement of pot use becoming near impossible.

Yes, Simon, I'm looking at people like you making drug enforcement impossible.
The daylight is uncomfortably bright for eyes so long in the dark.

Diogenes
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by Diogenes »

hanelyp wrote:Over the last few decades I've observed a relentless campaign to make tobacco "uncool". In the last couple decades there's been an equally relentless campaign to make pot "cool". The result is declining tobacco use and enforcement of pot use becoming near impossible.

Yes, Simon, I'm looking at people like you making drug enforcement impossible.


He will regard that as a compliment. :)
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —

MSimon
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by MSimon »

Not to speak for MSimon...but the experience with the welcome decline in legal, regulated Tobacco consumption doesn't prove the efficacy of prohibition, only the effectiveness of educating the public about dangers of usage, emphasis on treatment (helping people quit), resulting social censure against. Not forcing people not to smoke with jack-booted assault weapon carrying no-knock warrants door battering down thugs.
Yes.

And I might note that tobacco use is in decline without prohibition. And what do we find in med pot states? Pot use by youth declines. What did Holland find with its pot coffee shops? Pot use by youth declines. IIRC the same for Portugal.

It looks like Prohibition is a vector for spreading pot use not limiting it. Objectively.

It will be difficult to end Prohibition. There are an awful lot of government functionaries whose income depends on it.
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.

MSimon
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by MSimon »

hanelyp wrote:Over the last few decades I've observed a relentless campaign to make tobacco "uncool". In the last couple decades there's been an equally relentless campaign to make pot "cool". The result is declining tobacco use and enforcement of pot use becoming near impossible.

Yes, Simon, I'm looking at people like you making drug enforcement impossible.
Drug enforcement was never possible. When the DEA used to give out estimates (they don't any more) they used to say that they only captured 10% of the amounts trafficked.

All I have done is point out the futility. And also note that the more legal pot is the less the youth use it. It is people who support prohibition who are increasing the use of a drug they abhor. Deliciously ironic.

And of course objectively the people who support Prohibition also support Gangs. Doubly ironic from people who claim to be in favor of Law 'n Order.

What is happening is that Prohibitionists are becoming a Joke. On themselves.

Given that about 50% of youth for the last three generations have been dubbed criminals we have a very large cohort used to defying government. I like that. It is one of the great ironies of prohibition.
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.

MSimon
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by MSimon »

Also working against Prohibition is the increasing knowledge of the endocannabinoid system.

https://genomefreedom.liberty.me/2014/0 ... id-system/

And once you allow medical use all the steam goes out of the prohibitionist effort. By my reckoning 31 States plus DC have some kind of medical cannabis law.

I see another 1932 in the Republican future. And more socialism. All because of the Republican love of socialism. Price supports for criminals (Prohibition). Too funny.

The Right is on the verge of never being able to win another Presidential election for a very long time. Hilarious. They are the Party of Prohibition - which is in decline. And the Party of Religion - which is in decline.
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.

williatw
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by williatw »

williatw wrote:As an aside I heard that in New York City they get around the decriminalization of pot this way: if it is on "public display" you still get arrested charged; but the stop and frisk policy (which target minority males overwhelmingly), works like this; you’re stopped you’re frisked and ordered to empty your pockets. If you are carrying pot, then guess what...now it is on public display, hello jail.

As Cuomo explained, the state legislature decriminalized possession of up to 25 grams in 1977, making it a violation punishable by a $100 fine. But possessing marijuana "in public view" remained a misdemeanor, punishable by up to three months in jail. Police in New York City routinely convert the former offense into the latter, justifying arrests by instructing people they stop to reveal any contraband they may be carrying or by removing it themselves in the course of a pat-down. Although New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly concedes this practice is illegal, court records and reports from defense attorneys show that it continues, which is why Cuomo last year endorsed abolishing the distinction between mere possession and public display. Yesterday Cuomo reiterated his support for that reform, which was blocked last year due to opposition by Republican legislators.
In the first full year of enforcement of the separate "open view" marijuana law, there were 514 arrests for the crime. Today, police arrest 100 times more people for this offense, and these arrests comprise the single largest category of arrests in New York City, accounting for 15 percent of all NYC arrests and 20 percent of NYC misdemeanors
A table included in Cuomo's prepared remarks shows the number of such arrests has increased especially rapidly since the mid-1990s, rising from 4,310 statewide in 1994 to 53,124 last year. New York City accounted for 94 percent of those pot busts in 2011. More than four-fifths of the arrestees were black or Hispanic, even though survey data indicate that whites are at least as likely to smoke pot. Last year 72 percent of the people arrested on this charge had no prior criminal record. And even though only about 10 percent of these cases end with a conviction, Cuomo noted, that doesn't mean they are no big deal:


Arrest has consequences that persist after release. There is the humiliation of arrest and, in some cases, detention during processing. More enduring is the stigma of the criminal records that can have lasting and deleterious effects on the young person’s future. A "drug" arrest can have a significant impact on a person’s life and key decisions made by employers, landlords, licensing boards and banks
http://reason.com/blog/2013/01/10/cuomo ... or-curtail

williatw
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by williatw »

Pot Legalization to Appear on Ballot in Washington, D.C.


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Washington voters in November will decide whether to legalize marijuana for recreational use, pushing the nation’s capital into the growing political effort to roll back prohibition on the drug.

The city’s board of elections today said a measure qualified for the ballot that seeks to let residents grow cannabis indoors, share it with friends and possess as much as 2 ounces of pot. Buying or selling it, though, would remain illegal.
The effort in the District of Columbia, whose laws are subject to oversight by Congress, will provide a test of the federal government’s tolerance toward a movement to legalize marijuana that has spawned campaigns around the country.





http://www.businessweek.com/news/2014-0 ... on-d-dot-c

williatw
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Re: The Widening Divisions

Post by williatw »

Seeing More Blacks in Prison Increases Support for Policies that Exacerbate Inequality


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Informing the public about African Americans’ disproportionate incarceration rate may actually bolster support for punitive policies that perpetuate inequality, according to a new study published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.

Stanford University psychology researchers Rebecca Hetey and Jennifer Eberhardt found that White participants who were exposed to higher racial disparities in incarceration rates reported being more afraid of crime and more likely to support the kinds of punitive policies that exacerbate these racial disparities.

The expansion of harsh policies — such as the three-strikes law in California and other states — has led the United States to have the largest per capita prison population in the world. Not only has the prison population become larger, it has become disproportionately Black. Although Blacks represent 12% of the U.S. population, they now comprise nearly 40% of the prison population.

“Most people likely assume this must be due to rising crime rates, but the explosion in the prison population, as well as its changing complexion, are better explained by harsh criminal justice policies,” says Hetey, lead author on the study.

Hetey and Eberhardt wanted to know whether making people aware of racial disparities in incarceration would bolster or diminish their support for such draconian policies.

In one experiment, a White female experimenter asked 62 White voters to watch a video that showed mug shots of male inmates. Some of the participants saw a video in which 25% of the mug shots were of Black men, while others saw a video in which 45% of the mug shots were of Black men. Participants then had an opportunity to sign a real petition supporting an amendment that would ease the severity of California’s three-strikes law.

Just over half of participants who’d seen the mug shots with fewer Black men signed the petition, whereas only 27% of people who viewed the mug shots containing a higher percentage of Black inmates agreed to sign. This was the case regardless of how harsh participants thought the law was.

To determine whether fear of crime might explain these findings, Hetey and Eberhardt conducted a second experiment in which they showed 164 White New Yorkers statistics about the prison population. They read about Black inmates either in terms of the national incarceration rate (about 40%) or the New York City rate (about 60%). Next, they were asked about their support for the stop-and-frisk policy.

About 33% of the participants who saw the lower national statistic were willing to sign a petition to end the policy, but only 12% of those who saw the higher city rate of Black incarceration were willing to sign the petition.

Participants who saw the higher rate of Black incarceration were more likely to report concern over crime, which was associated with reluctance to sign the petition.

“Many legal advocates and social activists seem to assume that bombarding the public with images, statistics, and other evidence of racial disparities will motivate people to join the cause and fight inequality,” says Hetey. “But we found that, ironically, exposure to extreme racial disparities may make the public less, and not more, responsive to attempts to lessen the severity of policies that help maintain those disparities.”

Eberhardt concludes, “Our research shows that numbers don’t always speak for themselves. Reducing inequality takes more than simply presenting people with evidence of extreme inequality.”







http://www.psychologicalscience.org/ind ... ation.html

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