2010:warmest year ever since records began

[MSimon]

I never expect statists to understand this, because they don't think so much as they emote, and they hardly understand the value of liberty at all. Conservatives, on the other hand, should really know better.

Exactly.

When feelings get promoted over reason and are enacted into law the result is bad government.

Conservatives excoriate liberals for their lack of reason and then go on to do exactly the same thing. And then when things go bad the defense is "My intent is good and only good. The bad results you see can't possibly be my fault because I didn't intend them."

[TallDave]

Quote:
Bad ideas must die in a free marketplace, not beneath a gov't jackboot.
...
Like predatory business practices. Oh, wait, those didn't die in the free marketplace, they were gaining strength when the Government took steps to stop them. (Sherman Anti-trust act)

This is a common confusion about what a "free marketplace" means. A free marketplace is not one in which businesses are allowed to form monopolies or inflict external costs on people at will. To libertarians, corporatism is nearly as great a threat to free markets as statism (Milton Friedman discusses this at length in a couple of his books. And you can see the wages of corporatism in the stagnation of Western Europe, in which every country tries to protect "their" company, with the result that the biggest companies in Europe today are more or less the same list as 30 years ago -- no Microsoft, no Google, no Amazon...)

Racism, otoh, is more in the line of a bad idea than a subversion of free market princples. If someone practices economic racism, then society should enforce consequences by consensual action: boycott, ostracism, denunciation.

[TallDave]

And then when things go bad the defense is "My intent is good and only good. The bad results you see can't possibly be my fault because I didn't intend them."

And they never seem to hear the echoes of Communist supporters in those words.

It's funny, they understand this idea perfectly as applied to economic policy, but applying it to social policy seems to be their big blind spot.

You can see a tacit acknowledgment of this problem from some of the better conservative writers, like Mona Charen and Ann Coulter, who rarely attempt a coherent argument on behalf of such ideas. I think a lot of them are coming around to classical liberalism.

[KitemanSA]

An example, just for kicks. Children do not have the right to vote. Should a child attempt to do so, he is just shewed away.

Actually, no one has the right to vote. They have a legal franchize or not. Remember, I recognize that "Right" and "Wrong" are moral absolutes. If it is not right, it is wrong. And what defines the distinction is the fact that people (sapient beings if you want to get inclusive) have the right to voluntary action. Period.

Now I will watch as you sputter and huff and bring up arguements ethical and legal.

[KitemanSA]

What adverse effects could possibly affect a child, but not an adult? Dosage? Adults can overdose too.

Let me try one more time. The distinction is on the one hand, an adult doing something to himself (vice) or an adult doing to someone else involuntarily (crime).

[IntLibber]

Cannabis IS a drug. It is a relatively benign drug, especially when compared to alcohol. (so far as I have determined) However, you are defending the philosophy that ALL drugs should be legal and freely available. That is a bridge too far.

Crack, Meth, Heroine, LSD, PCP, etc. are killers and destroyers.

To agree that a person has a right to do anything to themselves is to agree they have a right to use these substances, and it is simply impossible in my mind to separate the use of these substances from damage to everyone around the user.

These drugs are by their nature, too dangerous and destructive to allow anyone to use, and they need to be treated like the dangerous substances which they are.

Sorry dude, but LSD isn't a "killer and destroyer". It's a VERY useful drug, very illuminating, and from my experience, zero side effects. That said, when you market rat poison as LSD, then rat poison is a killer and destroyer, but, that doesn't make it LSD. I've tripped on LSD a number of times quite safely, and had no ill effects as a result. It's super fantastic to use when you are meditating, helps to achieve nirvana-like states quite nicely.

That said, the primary false argument here about legalizing so-called "hard" drugs is that by legalizing them for adults, that this will immediately trigger an epidemic of abuse by minors.

Dude, those drugs are ALREADY being abused by minors. The problem is that they are not being regulated for quality (harm to users usually is the result of poor quality control, not from the pure drugs themselves) and they are not being taxed to pay for such negative externalities as underage abuse. When you legalize it, you then can regulate who is using it, who is making it, who is distributing and administering it (so you then get to eliminate all the drug gangs, their related crime, as well as all the property crime that is a result of abusers committing crimes to earn money for their drugs, saving our society hundreds of billions of dollars a year in law enforcement, courts, and corrections expenses. Those who abuse can be treated as health care issues and not turned into criminals by a system that wants to deny their existence.

Not only do you save tons of money on the externalities of the illegal drug trade, but by taxing the drugs legally, you can spend those funds on the remaining health care issues of abuse. Once you accomplish this, then so-called "hard" drugs impose zero net cost on society just like alcohol and tobacco drug products do by paying taxes and being legally distributed to adults.

[Diogenes]

Now you are going to have to either assert that the mentally ill person has a right to jump off that roof, or you are going to have to walk back the statement where you claim they have a right to do what they want.

Not only should the person be allowed to kill themselves, they should be encouraged to. I'm a heartless bastard.

Suppose the "Trained Staff" (presumably monitoring the health of the patient) decides that a patient is right on the edge of damaging his health? Suppose when he comes out of it, he demands a higher dosage? According to your philosophy, Who are the staff to tell him no?

The staff is only there to assure the user hurts no one else. If they want to die in a drug induced stupor, that's their business.

Like I have said already - if someone wants to kill themselves - no matter what their mental state or responsibilities - I not only feel they should be allowed to, I would encourage them to. I am a heartless bastard who thinks the world is better off without the drama.

Well, that is a very consistent perspective. TallDave also has a very consistent perspective regarding people having the right to practice racial prejudice.

It appears I now have two equations, perhaps I can substitute one and solve for the other?

(substituting TallDave's equation into your philosophy) do you believe people have a right to practice racial prejudice in hiring, renting and allowing people to patronize your business?

I suspect you do. After all, you're a heartless bastard.

[Diogenes]

The last time I play this game of fractal quoting. If you can't debate things concisely and contiguously, count me out.

How do guns infringe on others rights? Give me an example of this so I can understand what you are attempting to say.

Can I shoot you right now and not infringe on your rights? What if I shoot your dog or a relative, in such a way that they're disabled long term and in the short term they look like something out of a horror movie? Is that not cause for anguish, as you repeat over and over WRT drugs?

The gun lies where it is placed. It points in the direction it is pointed. It has no intent, no will. It is the tool of it's master.

The act is by the shooter. That is who should be interdicted.

people simply cannot understand the danger they are in from using them.

I understand it. Am I some kind of genius? What about you, why aren't you using crack daily? Do you have some magic divining power? Is that all that stands between you and a totally chance binge on crack tonight? What's so special about you (or me) that everyone else can't possibly get?

Could be a number of things. Perhaps people warned us that these substances were destructive, and for whatever reason or quirk in our personality we heeded that caution. Perhaps that protected us long enough to see the consequences of others less fortunate who were not given the opportunity to aver.

Someone has to be the first car over a collapsed bridge. Should we wonder why others, seeing the example decide to stop? I suspect a large measure of safety is provided by ignorance. Ignorance of the pleasure of crack. If you don't know what you're missing, you won't miss it.

To accept your premise, that people have a right to chose to use drugs, is to presume they understand the consequences of their decision.

Again the same argument but in different words.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BepyTSzueno

As if the dangers of drugs were obscure and esoteric. As if it was difficult to find out about them, and understand them; or at least that the stakes and facts are so complex as to warrant caution. As if it's not common sense, given such uncertainty about such major prospects, to err on the side of caution. Yeah, that's really beyond any common man's abilities.

Like the warning on cigarette packs. People either don't believe it, or think it won't happen to them. This is a common mistake. My point here is, many ordinary people apparently can't see the danger until it's too late.

You are oversimplifying what is actually a complex issue

Yeah, the same way anyone with a lick of sense will simplify things in ... I dunno... Engineering circumstances. You don't need to know what a black box' guts are, only that it goes bang 9 times out of 10 if you press the red button. You know this useful info because it's been all over the news for decades, happened to people you either know or were acquainted with, etc.

You are forgetting a lot of other boxes.

What of the brown box, which relaxes you, but might cause health problems 30 years in the future?

And the little green box? When you press the button on it, it makes you happy and mellow? It also makes you lazy.

The white box makes you even more happy, but perhaps not so mellow. It rides you hard after sufficient use.

The crystal box makes your teeth rot out and gives you a case of "drug bugs" (the feeling that bugs are crawling over you) and makes you crave it all the more.

And so on. The effects are not the same. They move from the relatively benign to the seriously destructive. They are all Pandora's boxes.

What makes it so insidious is that the boxes are stepping stones, with one often leading to another. If the change is incremental enough, the frog will be boiled.

PKDick thing - same thing. Shit happens. You either learn or fall for it too. Yet another analog to guns.

Evolution in action? Yeah, that might be a reasonable way of looking at it. Forcing evolution till humans are immuned to the effect. Of course, since many of these drugs operate by binding to cells in fundamental systems, it seems unlikely that humanity can evolve immunity, so it appears to not even serve the purpose of survival of the fittest. Perhaps it is more akin to an extinction event?


This perspective does overlook one thing. Drug users entice others with a siren song. While they are using drugs, they look like they are enjoying themselves, and thereby lure people who would not otherwise consider the activity into trying it.

It is much like a fire pulling new fuel into the updraft. As long as it can find new fuel to burn, it will keep on burning. If it could be once put out, no more fuel need burn.

Now you are beginning to comprehend the nature of the problem.

I've dealt with drug addicts (the whole buy such and such off me so I can get a fix, or stuff disappearing, etc) thank you very much.

You may have read my response too quickly. You ignored the pertinent point:

"Laws are simplified because it isn't feasible to make them completely accurate. The legislators usually err on the side of caution."

THAT is the part I think you were starting to get. You have to make laws for EVEYRONE, not just those with "Magic Genes."

But there are others which would be very badly hurt and possibly killed from such usage.
[...]
IF the people who are injured represent some significant threshold quantity that is beyond what the legislatures regard as tolerable, then they err on the side of caution and pass a law prohibiting it.

Think of the children, yeah. MSimon's right, you're after more government.

This is like arguing with mothers who'd sooner protect their kids forever than prepare them by making them self-reliant.

A dead or disabled child is not very self reliant. As overprotective as some mothers might be, I cannot fault them for being protective against this outcome.

It is not just himself who suffers from his drug use. Recall the Uncle and Mother of the Bum in Denver. [...] These people are also victims of the pot head's usage.

Is that really too complicated for you to see? The simplistic view breaks down when it's scrutinized sufficiently.

Pot head's fault. I don't see any break down whatsoever. The parents' weren't lucid enough to recognize a write-off. It was also a failure of theirs to not instruct the pothead about drugs and their consequences.

To quote Lex Luthor:

Some people can read War and Peace and come away thinking it's a simple adventure story. Others can read the ingredients on a chewing gum wrapper and unlock the secrets of the universe.

Some people "Get" warnings and advice. Others not so much.

Apart from that, are you asserting that the pot head would have been a bum even without pot? None of the other members of his family are.

[KitemanSA]

And why should the taxpayers pay to support other people's children, instead of kicking aforementioned dopers A$$? The dopers are harming ME! Joe Taxpayer!

The drug user will use drugs whether they are legal or illegal: this is a proven fact. In fact, the facts support the idea that prohibition increases use, especially among the groups who have the least concepts of what they do.

Criminals will commit crimes, whether they are legal or illegal:

Congratulations, you have just asserted that it is pointless to stop people from doing what they will do anyway. You have just made the argument that all crime prevention is pointless. Somehow I think you only want that idea to apply to drugs, and nothing else. Unfortunately, the concept applies just as well to all cases of crime.

Gentles, I believe here we have potentially identified the fundamental issue.
* Wizwom stated "The drug user will use drugs whether they are legal or illegal"
Diogenese misquoted "Criminals will commit crimes, whether they are legal or illegal:"

Diogenese,
I have a simple yes/no question for you. Do you honestly believe that what defines a crime is its illegality?

To expand on that question, in this case, is using a drug a crime to you because it is morally wrong, ethically bad, or legally a felony?

Your answer here will allow reasonable people to decide whether you are capable of reasonable interchange.

[KitemanSA]

But it doesn't matter what the CAUSE of that delinquency is, be it crack, marijuana, of the Jerry Springer Show. The crime is the failure to meet the obligation. Prosecute the CRIME! The vice should NEVER be an excuse.

The crime is the failure to meet the obligation? I don't think you've thought this through. A man out of work, or perhaps disabled, would be guilty of this, if the crime is defined in that way.

No one has an issue with someone who is trying to do what is right by their child. It is those who intentionally, or through reckless disregard for the welfare of their child that should be the recipient of the law's wrath!

AHA! You perhaps are beginning to get my point, sufficiently in fact to try quoting it back to me. You state "intentionally, or through reckless disregard", identifying that I did take an unfortunate shortcut in my prose. But what you have pointed out is that the person failing to meet the obligation "involves someone involuntarily", which is what makes it wrong. The action on someone involuntarily (or willful failure to act as obliged) is wrong. But other than respecting your and others rights, I have no obligation unto you or others, and thus my use of drugs, not involving YOU or others involuntarily, is not wrong. Given that it is not wrong, it is not a crime and should NOT be a felony.

[KitemanSA]

You seem to have made a great breakthru above, so maybe you can remain able to think and learn.

My concern is to address the bad results that affect innocent people. If there are no (or few) bad results to innocents, I have no objections. As with alcoholics, some people can take it with no ill results, and some people can't. If the law can sort the harmless people from the destructive ones, the same purpose can be accomplished without banning everyone.

Wow, perhaps another breakthru!
Please understand that I COMPLETELY support your desire to address the "bad" results that effect innocent people. Absolutely, 100% agreed. The question is how.

Rule # 1: People have the right to voluntary action (morality, right/wrong). Corrolary: it is wrong to involve someone in a action involuntarily. (Please note that if someone wrongs you they have already voluntarily engaged in the action, so your response, directly or thru government does not violate their right to voluntary action. This is why government can achieve good results from punishing crimes.)
Rule # 2: You can't do GOOD (ethics, best, better, good, bad, worse, worst)) by doing WRONG.

So here is the issue. Government keeps trying to do good by making personal actions that are bad for the folks that do them in felonies and treating those bad things like they are wrong. But they are not "wrong". And in treating them like they are wrong, the government is involving people in an action involuntarily, which is wrong in itself. To try to do good, the government is doing wrong. See rule #2. This is why government cannot achieve good results from punishing vices.
If the government were to instead return those actions to their correct condition (vice, not crime) and treat them like vices, the appropriate reactions can be instituted. And the appropriate penalties can be instituted when their vices get away from them and they commit crimes as a result.

PS: Rule #3: Like all toxic substances, government programs are subject tot eh J-Curve!

[Diogenes]

I only have one question - Are you employed in any way by the government? If so, doing what and where?

No. Why do you want to know?

[KitemanSA]

No doubt, but it is only the result of people being made aware of the danger, and look how long it took and how many lives were snuffed out early before people figured it out. Also, don't discount the effect of the taxes, regulation, and counter advertising which has been waged against tobacco.

Aha grasshopper, again you begin to see the light.
Treat drugs as the vice they are, as you treat the vice "tobacco", and good things can happen with drugs use problems too!

[KitemanSA]

This is a good general statement. My issue is that the broadness of it overlooks the fact that some personal actions have consequences that DO hurt others. It's the "big picture" view. In many ways we are like cells in a body. The notion that one cell can be infected with a virus, and that is only THAT cell's business overlooks the fact that that virus poses a threat to other cells as well.

Thank you.
I do not overlook the fact that people can do things that hurt others. And to the degree those others are hurt involuntarily, that is a crime, and can appropriately engage government solutions thru criminal prosecution.

There are situations wherein the t-cells and other immune cells go haywire and attack unoffending cells (drug war). These are diseases too, and it is GOOD to cure ones-self of these disease.

And of course there is the problem with analogies. Are you defining the virus as criminal activity or drug use? Trying to stay within the analog gets very difficult.

[Diogenes]

Lassie faire has demonstrated a willingness to succumb to the evils of man.

Have libertarians learned that lesson yet?

Yes. The libertarians have learned their lesson. Government is worse and they have guns and frequently use them. (How is that Drug War working? Last I heard it was a government program that produces misery, doesn't do its intended function, and is turning Mexico into a narco state - good job eh?)

When you can show me a line of reasoning demonstrating that the government success or failures in Drug interdiction is completely different from Crime interdiction, then I will buy this line of thought. As it stands, every negative effect you claim for government involvement in drug interdiction applies exactly to government attempts to suppress crime in general.


To allege that no good purpose is accomplished by Government law enforcement is an idea so widely refuted by common experience as to make the proponent of it regarded as non serious.

PS. I personally don't believe in utopia. No institution run by man can bring it.

Utopia is 100%. Engineers may not believe in attaining perfection, but they certainly OUGHT to believe in optimization. What that means is that you will have the maximum benefit with some % of losses.

No one is suggesting that the current system is perfection, nor is anyone suggesting that it cannot be improved upon, but what is being suggested is that more tolerance of drugs will be reducing optimization even further than what we are doing now.

The worst systems are usually those where government colludes with business. Or runs the economic system outright.

The business that government is least capable of regulating, electronics and software, is the business producing the fastest advances. Note also that unionization is also minimal in that business.

So yes. As a former communist and now libertarian I have learned my lesson. Less government is better government.

Agreed, except when it is a role which ONLY government can and should perform. Defense is such a role, as is law enforcement. I do not want a private company performing law enforcement. It MUST be done by government.