Taking drugs is, of itself, essentially victimless. The only person being harmed is the user, and, since it's his own decision, he's not a victim. Not taking care of your family isn't illegal, there are plenty of folks who aren't addicts who are crappy parents / workers / citizens. We don't arrest them. And there are plenty of functioning addicts who manage to hold down jobs, not rob or assault innocents, and pretty much do OK, other than being addicts. They get arrested.
Robbing someone is, and should be a crime, whether the motivation is simple greed, or addiction. Adding drug use as an additional offence serves no good purpose that I can see.
The "War on Drugs" hasn't worked, and never will work, because it can't work. The 18th Ammendment showed that pretty clearly. The only people who benefit are drug dealers, law enforcement, and companies that build prisons. If you leagized all drugs tommorow, you wouldn't see a big jump in the number of users, since there simply isn't a large number of folks out there who aren't doing drugs simply because it's illegal. If they've got other reasons, and they do, those will still apply, and they won't magically become addicts. As a deterrent, prohibition simply hasn't worked. For that matter, niether has "education." Programs like DARE have produced no measurable change in drug use rates for those who have taken them. In other words, they don't work.
--Shannon
Robbing someone is, and should be a crime, whether the motivation is simple greed, or addiction. Adding drug use as an additional offence serves no good purpose that I can see.
The "War on Drugs" hasn't worked, and never will work, because it can't work. The 18th Ammendment showed that pretty clearly. The only people who benefit are drug dealers, law enforcement, and companies that build prisons. If you leagized all drugs tommorow, you wouldn't see a big jump in the number of users, since there simply isn't a large number of folks out there who aren't doing drugs simply because it's illegal. If they've got other reasons, and they do, those will still apply, and they won't magically become addicts. As a deterrent, prohibition simply hasn't worked. For that matter, niether has "education." Programs like DARE have produced no measurable change in drug use rates for those who have taken them. In other words, they don't work.
--Shannon