Heartland

Incidentally, I'm not entirely joking when I suggest fair trade drugs. After all, the current system means that coca and poppy growers get a miniscule fraction of the street price of the drugs; far worse than (say) coffee or bananana growers, the "traditional" fair-trade crops.

Legalisation and fair-trade would cut out the middle-men (warlords, cartels, what have you) and provide a decent living wage for a hell of a lot of farmers.

They should make me president of the world. I have it all worked out

That's certainly a good answer. I'm sure most people have seen the "Drugs support terrorism" propaganda. Well, even assuming that be true, next year my friends will be growing their own cannabis, and probably shrooms.
So.. where does that money go? Into the hands of foreign despots who crush their impoverished workers like paper cups at the slightest whim? No, it's going directly to the grower, a mate with a spare cupboard.

Would this sort of thing work for MDMA, speed and the like? Well, probably. Admittedly I don't know anyone who's likely to set up a meth lab in their bathroom cupboard, but the principle remains the same: home-grown or fairly-traded drugs, made/grown under sterile environments, and made to a specific standard, will solve a great deal of the problems. Drugs aren't going to go away, if you can't beat 'em, make 'em better!

Nice People Take Drugs

I think legalisation is the choice ... for all those reasons given already before by Markfiend, Dark and others ...

and because everything that grows on earth belongs to the people
and it should be within their own decision what to do with it !!!

And because, anyway, there's never enough to do on this planet for all its inhabitants. So instead of being forced to look after jobs that are neither available nor do they make any sort of life of one's existence, those who want to use whatever drugs for whatever reason should be free to do so!!!

It's always been a hypocritical discussion, anyway. At the end of the day, those who want drugs prohibited, only care about their money, rule and
control ... and surely not about anyone's health or the reasons why some
people might destroy their lives in addiction ...

Being645 wrote:At the end of the day, those who want drugs prohibited, only care about their money, rule and
control ... and surely not about anyone's health or the reasons why some
people might destroy their lives in addiction ...

This is why I'm (cautiously) enthusiastic about Kerlikowske. He's very much for decriminalisation, and putting that money and energy into treatment. The fact is that there are people who are going to go the way of one addiction or another no matter whether it's legal or not, so better they should be helped than thrown in prison - where they're still going to be feeding that addiction.

And, as the Future President Of The World pointed out, once the next logical step - legalisation - is made, it's no longer a cash cow for organised crime, or for international terrorism. No doubt they'll always be in it to some degree, but Fair Trade policies would make it a whole lot more attractive to deal with legitimate traders, don't you think?

Naturally so, and with Fair Trade policy, those living in drugs growing countries were far better off as well ...
but such an improvement took more than the decision of a single country ...

Criminalization of drugs has become sort of faith, nowadays. And IMO from a historical point of view, in the so called Western world this does have a clearly religious-political background referring back to the Middle Ages at least ...