USA: The Leader of the Unfree World

[Valmy]

I'd like to beat people with a tire iron who post "this".

No shit.

This

[garbon]

It's all about the War on Drugs.

Illicit drugs kill people.  From production to trafficking to use.

Yeah the streets around here are covered with the rotting corpses of dead stoners.

Well I think that ignores all the criminal activity earlier in the chain that gets the stoners access to said weed (as I could be wrong but I don't think most weed that available is local with no ties to criminal organizations).

That said, I agree that really all of this says that government should step in as a regulator as a lot of the associated crime doesn't have to be part of the production chain.

[Berkut]

He said "Illicit drugs kill people". He is right.

Solution: Make the drugs licit.

[Ed Anger]

I'd like to beat people with a tire iron who post "this".

No shit.

This

One day, a RV is going to pull up next to you and I'm going to jump out and hit you in the knee. Hook 'em Horns.

[garbon]

He said "Illicit drugs kill people". He is right.

Solution: Make the drugs licit.

I was just speaking the production and trafficking. Clearly we then need to think about the use piece. I mean it isn't like we don't have legal drugs that kill people.

[Norgy]

I'd like to beat people with a tire iron who post "this".

No shit.

This

[Valmy]

One day, a RV is going to pull up next to you and I'm going to jump out and hit you in the knee. Hook 'em Horns.

Best Languish meet ever!

[CountDeMoney]

He said "Illicit drugs kill people". He is right.

Solution: Make the drugs licit.

The solution certainly isn't letting stoners that don't grow their own shit off the hook simply because suburban white teens don't see the violence farther up the supply chain trying to get it to their Honey Bear bongs.

[Baron von Schtinkenbutt]

The solution certainly isn't letting stoners that don't grow their own shit off the hook simply because suburban white teens don't see the violence farther up the supply chain trying to get it to their Honey Bear bongs.

There won't be violence farther up the chain once Phillip Morris and R. J. Reynolds can diversify into grass and coca.

[CountDeMoney]

I don't know about that, see the "chokehold" thread.  Man died in custody selling illegal cigarettes.  BIG TOBACC-OW MAH NECK

[derspiess]

[Gups]

Otto, it appears that violent crime is falling everywhere in the Western World.  It also seems that nobody has a particularly good explanation for why this is occuring across all Western societies.

This.

Someone made a case that the key was lower levels of lead ingested by kids. I'm not convinced, I think probably it is a number of different factors.

I thinkthe lead argument (considered favourably in a Stephen Pinker book) is very convincing. The correlation for both the rise in violent crime and its decline was very strong over numerous countries.

[Valmy]

It also might explain the Romans' love of gladiatorial combat.

[derspiess]

Did you eat a lot of paint chips when you were a kid?

[Valmy]

Did you eat a lot of paint chips when you were a kid?

Not a sufficient amount to turn me into a violent football player unfortunately