I believe that all currently-illegal drugs can be divided into three categories:
1) Definately legalize. Includes pot, hash, "E" for certain. Probably a lot more.
2) Definately DON'T legalize, because they tend to cause mongo violence. PCP is the best-known. Meth is borderline, I'd want to take a closer look at the issue.
3) The ones I don't know yet know which of the first two categories they fit into
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More accurately, I think we can legalize a good selection of the milder stuff, and thereby limit the demand for the really scary crap down to where they're either not sold, or the demand is so low that a ban is practical.
Another possible way of dealing with the "really bad stuff" is to label them a "known hazard", thereby putting the seller in legal liability if the user freaks out and kills somebody. Deal with it in civil court versus criminal that way.
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Strong hallucinagens are a special case. If you offered me a "street tablet" of LSD at a rock concert, I'd run away screaming. BUT if a fully-trained student of Dr. Tim Leary offered to guide me through a trip, in calm surroundings, with a medically known dosage of LSD, I'd jump at the change. Yes I'm serious, I've studied the matter in some depth though I've never taken an illegal drug in my life (based on my choice and reading Leary himself, not based on laws). I'm a fairly advanced student of self hypnosis and I know a thing or two about how cranial innards work.
Per Leary, the key to a safe and productive (clinically *useful*) LSD trip is "dose, set and setting". "Dose" means you're getting a known amount of good stuff. "Set" is your own mindset going in - if you know that what you're doing is safe, and you trust your guide, and go into it without fear, then that fear (or other negative emotion) won't spiral out of control under the effect of the drug. "Setting" means calm, safe, ground-floor surroundings WITH a fully qualified non-tripping guide.
Leary never had anybody seriously freak out under his guidance. One of his students brought hundreds of people down off of bad trips in a special tent at the first Woodstock, working tirelessly.
Some of what Leary and his students were doing with "deep self-programming" via LSD was just incredible...like hypnosis on steroids.
Given the need for a guide, I don't quite know how to legally handle the serious hallucinagens. License the guides, and let them dispense? Let psychiatrists or whatever dispense it?
Dunno. What I *do* know is that a lot of very, VERY effective *science* was lost when idiots misunderstood Leary and he ended up demonized. (Hint: Leary was appalled at recreational use of LSD at concerts or whatever, he considered it wildly stupid.)
