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David Floyd
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The bottom of a large bottle of beer
Jan 1970 time: 05:24
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AS,
You're missing the point entirely. I'm not concerned with how many drug addicts there are in the world, or if legalization will lead to more drug use. I don't really care.
What I care about is whether or not people are free to make their own decisions regarding their own bodies.
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Agathon
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Leafs 4TW!! - CPA
Dec 2002 time: 00:24
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Ha Ha Ha....
You're out of your league boy - arguing about these things is something I get paid to do and I've seen better attempts to argue than yours from children.
quote: Originally posted by Berzerker
Agathon -
An unsupported assertion. |
Oh God. There is a lengthy and slightly whimsical piece of dialogue which you don't seem to have understood which argues in support of the claim that Libertarianism violates its own principles when applied to the real world.
It seems you don't understand the meaning of the term "unsupported" and how it differs from "badly supported". You should have said "a badly supported assertion" and then gone on to argue why.
quote: Both are wrong, "worse" is in the eye of the beholder. |
If you are going to say this you will be thrown out of the Libertarians' Club rather sharpish, because if there is one thing they cannot stand it is moral relativism. It's quite clear that Libertarians (like John Hospers and Robert Nozick) believe that murder is wrong independently of what people might think (they say this). If one murder is bad, aren't two worse (i.e. twice the badness), all other things being equal? And three worse than two? Or is someone like you going to say that stealing an apple is the moral equivalent of comitting a bank robbery every week?
Go on - I'd like to hear this one.
quote: Your premise is that if one act is immoral, another immoral act becomes justified. |
No it isn't - I make no such claim. In fact my conclusion (not premise - they're different by the way) is that since we are often confronted in life by situations in which we have to choose the "lesser of two evils" the Libertarian notion of absolute rights has to be dropped. In other words to protect the rights of the many we may have to violate the rights of the few.
All you have to accept to be forced into this conclusion is that more violations are worse than less - and it seems insane not to say that.
quote: Now, can you cite an example of a smithy refusing to let people borrow his weapons to defend the village? If not, your hypothetical is meaningless. No smithy would have such a stockpile and a free people would be armed of their own accord. |
Oh Jeez....
It's called a "thought experiment". In moral theory (a branch of philosophy in which people argue about such things as Libertarianism) people often put forward thought experiments as a way of testing moral principles or theories (like Libertarianism) for coherence. It doesn't matter that there is no such smithy, it doesn't even need to be a smith. I could invent other examples - I only chose a smith because it is the sort of homey example used in the Platonic dialogues. The same sort of situation could occur with a gun shop owner or something completely unrelated to weaponry. It doesn't matter. All that matters is that the case could happen - and it could.
And forgive me for asking, why would no smithy have a stockpile of weapons? Is there some physical law preventing smiths from hoarding swords? Should we expect to find the weapons at the fishmonger's shop? Surely the smithy would be a logical place.
And why must a "free people" be armed? Couldn't they have forgotten?
quote: Stealing violates the libertarian principles of freedom and property rights. So obviously maximizing one's own position in life is not a libertarian principle when it involves the property of others. |
I suppose I must dignify this with an answer...
Again stealing books from the library is only an example to show the general form of PD situations. I could have used non criminals behaviour, but I chose not to.
In any case the private policing example doesn't involve stealing at all. Nor would a PD case of polluting the environment or buying guns or driving SUV's.
quote: Huh? Can you quote me advocating this? Not that I object to the fact that non-governmental police/security is increasing. |
I don't have to quote you. It's common knowledge that coercive taxation is forbidden by Libertarian principles. So other than some form of private policing I can't see any other option.
quote: if you want, if you don't all the people who do will be angry with you and treat you with dis-respect. Enjoy your life in that community... See how behavior can be effected without stealing? |
Boo hoo. My neighbours don't like me, what can they do? Nothing, apart from not talk to me - and considering some of the neighbours I've had that wouldn't be so bad. Perhaps I prefer free riding and being safe to being liked. The problem here is that there is an incentive to free ride and when that happens a significant number of people will do it - usually enough to mess it up if past experience is worth anything. Indeed you will find that it according to the PD it is rational not to contribute because I will be better off, on the balance of things, if I don't. Indeed, if I believe what Ayn Rand says, I ought always to act in my self interest over that of everyone else - so being nice and contributing would be very bad if she were right.
There are many other PD examples which are immune to this sort of thing - what about buying a gun - no one else need never know that I have one, but if everyone thinks this way we would all be unsafer.
I'm sure you know plenty of selfish people who are despised by many, most of the ones I know don't seem to care. You are overestimating human decency. Ask an insurance agent what "moral hazard" means, and you'll see what I mean.
The point of the PD is to show that the right's assertion that people acting in their own self interest (I don't mean stealing or killing here) will collectively always produce the optimum result (the so called "Invisible Hand") is a load of tosh.
Come one - you can do better than this. Libertarianism is pretty silly but even I can think of better counterarguments than yours.
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Ted Striker
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United States of America
Jan 1970 time: 21:24
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quote: Originally posted by Berzerker
And farming practices were tied to government regulation of the economy. |
Please show me ONE EXAMPLE of a government regulation that led to the Dust Bowl farming problems.
quote:
We haven't had a decade long drought impacting a similarly sized region. |
Unfortunatley this is completely wrong.
quote:
the 1988–89 drought was the most economically devastating natural disaster in the history of the United States (Riebsame et al., 1991), a close second is undoubtedly the series of droughts that affected large portions of the United States in the 1930s. |
quote:
We have only to look back a few years, to the 1990s, to realize how far drought can reach and how long it can last. In the past decade, drought occurred not only in the drought-prone western states but also throughout the eastern United States. The drought of 1999 in the east extended from the New England states to Florida and westward into the Ohio Valley. For the mid-Atlantic states, this was the worst drought in 100 years. The southeastern states, in particular Georgia and Florida, experienced three to four consecutive years of drought from 1998 to 2001, and dry conditions continue to plague much of Georgia and the Carolinas in 2002. Drought also had substantial impacts in the Pacific Northwest in 2001; in 2002, much of the rest of the western United States is experiencing severe drought conditions. |
quote:
The impacts of drought are greater than the impacts of any other natural hazard. They are estimated to be between $6 billion and $8 billion annually in the United States and occur primarily in agriculture, transportation, recreation and tourism, forestry, and energy sectors. Social and environmental impacts are also significant, although it is difficult to put a precise cost on these impacts. |
1) There was also a major drought in the 1950s
2) There was also a major drought in the 1970s
Government Aid
quote:
The magnitude of the droughts of the 1930s, combined with the Great Depression, led to unprecedented government relief efforts. Congressional actions in 1934 alone accounted for relief expenditures of $525 million (U.S. House of Representatives, 1934); the total cost (social, economic, and environmental) would be impossible to determine. |
Government Educating Farmers on Soil Conservation
quote:
If the Roosevelt era marked the beginning of large-scale aid, it also ushered in some of the first long-term, proactive programs to reduce future vulnerability to drought. It was in these years, for example, that the Soil Conservation Service (SCS)—now the Natural Resources Conservation Service—began to stress soil conservation measures. Through their efforts, the first soil conservation districts came into being, and demonstration projects were carried out to show the benefits of practices such as terracing and contouring (for a discussion of the activities of the SCS during this period, see Hurt, 1981). |
Why Government Spending on Drought Preparedness Makes Sense
quote:
Compared to expenditures of this magnitude, an investment in drought preparedness programs is a sound economic decision. Moreover, drought planning efforts can use existing political and institutional structures, and plans can (and should) be incorporated into general natural disaster or water management plans, thus reducing the cost of planning effort. |
http://www.drought.unl.edu/whatis/dustbowl.htm
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David Floyd
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The bottom of a large bottle of beer
Jan 1970 time: 05:24
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quote: If one murder is bad, aren't two worse (i.e. twice the badness), |
If I'm the first person to be killed no matter what, then 1 murder is as bad as 1 million, at least from my perspective, wouldn't you say? 
This line of discussion also brings us to the next point - is it OK to murder an innocent to save the lives of 5 other innocents? I would say of course it isn't OK, unless that one person volunteered to die. Killing an innocent to save other innocents is still murder, and hence wrong, just as killing one person is as wrong as killing lots of people - there aren't "degrees of badness" associated with murder: either you murder people or you don't.
quote: In fact my conclusion (not premise - they're different by the way) is that since we are often confronted in life by situations in which we have to choose the "lesser of two evils" the Libertarian notion of absolute rights has to be dropped. |
Give me a real life example in which we must choose the lesser of two evils. If you bring up an example of choosing to kill 1 person to save 5, I'm gonna call bullshit. It's still murder. The proper course of action is to either do nothing - that way, you are not morally responsible for the deaths of five people (that responsibility lies with the person who killed them), nor are you responsible for the deaths of one person - or to act in a way that will prevent the deaths of five people WITHOUT killing an innocent.
quote: It's called a "thought experiment". |
Weren't you the one talking about real world situations? Be consistent.
quote: And forgive me for asking, why would no smithy have a stockpile of weapons? Is there some physical law preventing smiths from hoarding swords? Should we expect to find the weapons at the fishmonger's shop? Surely the smithy would be a logical place. |
Well, we're going to make this a (semi) real life scenario, and replace "smithy" with "gun shop". In this case, naturally a gun shop would have lots of guns in it. Yet it would still be wrong to rob the gunshop. If most people were too stupid to purchase firearms in advance, that isn't the fault of the gun owner. Now, I think that he probably WOULD loan or even give out firearms in an extreme situation, acting in his own best interest - that's the most realistic situation, wouldn't you say?
quote: Again stealing books from the library is only an example to show the general form of PD situations. I could have used non criminals behaviour, but I chose not to.
In any case the private policing example doesn't involve stealing at all. Nor would a PD case of polluting the environment or buying guns or driving SUV's. |
I'm not sure what PD means (and I'm too tired to go look), so I'll leave this one for Berzerker.
quote: I don't have to quote you. It's common knowledge that coercive taxation is forbidden by Libertarian principles. So other than some form of private policing I can't see any other option. |
Well, both Berzerker and I are supporters of government-run lotteries. Those are usually pretty lucrative. As Berzerker will point out, much of the American Revolution was funded through lotteries.
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Agathon
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Leafs 4TW!! - CPA
Dec 2002 time: 00:24
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quote: Originally posted by David Floyd
If I'm the first person to be killed no matter what, then 1 murder is as bad as 1 million, at least from my perspective, wouldn't you say?  |
I wouldn't and I don't believe that a card carrying Libertarian would either. They hold to a notion of human rights - that is, from the point of view of morality, any murder is as bad as another - I can't make an exception in my own case. My murder would be bad from my point of view, but not from the impartial point of view which Libertarians think is central to ethics.
quote: This line of discussion also brings us to the next point - is it OK to murder an innocent to save the lives of 5 other innocents? I would say of course it isn't OK, unless that one person volunteered to die. Killing an innocent to save other innocents is still murder, and hence wrong, just as killing one person is as wrong as killing lots of people - there aren't "degrees of badness" associated with murder: either you murder people or you don't. |
It doesn't have to be murder, it could be theft or some other wrong. No one, least of all me, is arguing that such a murder would be a good thing, but surely from the impartial view of moral rights five murders is worse.
I don't understand this. Are you saying that the person who murders his wife has committed an equivalent wrong to the man who ordered the Holocaust? He might be just as much a bad person but it is actions and not characters that are subject to moral scrutiny in Libertarian theory. Are the police unjustified in their satisfaction at a lower murder rate? You owe a very convincing answer to this question.
quote: Give me a real life example in which we must choose the lesser of two evils. If you bring up an example of choosing to kill 1 person to save 5, I'm gonna call bullshit. It's still murder. The proper course of action is to either do nothing - that way, you are not morally responsible for the deaths of five people (that responsibility lies with the person who killed them), nor are you responsible for the deaths of one person - or to act in a way that will prevent the deaths of five people WITHOUT killing an innocent. |
Your example is good enough - perfectly plausible in fact. It seems to me to involve a choice between the lesser of two evils. So what's the problem?
Your view is often called "moral fetishism" because you seem to put your own moral purity over and above the consequences of your acting or not acting. What you need to tell me is just why the lives of the 5 people are somehow worth less than your clear conscience. Why does it matter that you do it? No one would throw you in jail for killing someone in this situation- so responsibility is a side issue.
Again, I don't say that killing a person is a good thing, but it can sometimes be the lesser of two evils. I can't understand how you seem to think 1 death is the moral equivalent of 5. There's nothing bullshit about it - if you think murder is a bad thing, it must be a bad thing because people's rights are violated, and if you think that, you must think that it would be a better situation overall if fewer rights were violated even if this makes you the violator, otherwise what's the point of saying it's wrong in the first place.
This is the key question. Why do you think it is wrong in the first place?
I'd say (putting on a Libertarian hat) - [i] when someone is killed their right to determine their own life plan has been disrupted by another - their freedom has been violated in the most heinous fashion. If we are committed to a society of free individuals then we must rejoice at a state in which all individuals rights are respected and deem a society less free the greater the number of members who do not have their rights respected. We can compare societies by the degree to which they have realised this for their members. But if we can do that - if we can say one is better than another - we can also say that one is worse than another depending on the number and degree of rights-violations - and that's the key move. If I am a Libertarian it makes no sense for me to say that I don't care if more or less people are free in my society. And if I make this move I will inevitably be confronted with cases in which rights can't be absolutely respected.
quote: Weren't you the one talking about real world situations? Be consistent. |
I don't see anything wrong with your example.
quote: Well, we're going to make this a (semi) real life scenario, and replace "smithy" with "gun shop". In this case, naturally a gun shop would have lots of guns in it. Yet it would still be wrong to rob the gunshop. If most people were too stupid to purchase firearms in advance, that isn't the fault of the gun owner. Now, I think that he probably WOULD loan or even give out firearms in an extreme situation, acting in his own best interest - that's the most realistic situation, wouldn't you say? |
I say it is the most realistic situation that the gun owner would hand out guns, yet it is conceivable that he wouldn't - and if that was the case force would be the only option. Look, the specifics of the case don't matter that much - the key question is: "Is it permissible to violate one person's right in order to prevent the violation of the rights of many persons?"
quote: I'm not sure what PD means (and I'm too tired to go look), so I'll leave this one for Berzerker.
Well, both Berzerker and I are supporters of government-run lotteries. Those are usually pretty lucrative. As Berzerker will point out, much of the American Revolution was funded through lotteries. |
Prisoner's Dilemma.
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Ramo
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Austin, Texas, USA
Oct 1999 time: 23:24
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quote: Trying to ensure economic equality is anti-thetical to libertarianism. |
Excuse me? Economic equality (I believe in rough economic equality, not absolute economic equality BTW) can be ensured through voluntary means. If workers control their businesses, they would likely not pay certain positions exorberant salaries, and they would likely not screw over their comrades too badly...
quote: The inventors and producers who create wealth will have to be restrained from keeping the wealth they create and the fruits of their efforts syphoned off to enrich those who don't invent and produce less. |
That simply is not true. The point of anarchism is to enable workers to be the inventors and producers. You are describing a social democratic system; i.e. a strawman.
quote: Diverting resources from the efficient to the inefficient is not better than the marketplace. |
This so-called "inefficiency" is baseless speculation. If you look at anarchist societies such as in Spain, there is often a great deal of innovation.
quote: Sure, many people seek the use/power of government to take what belongs to others, that isn't a justification for allowing that to happen. |
What justification? I was simply showing why your beliefs are not practical, not justifying a more statist system.
quote: And if they strike, I can hire people who will honor their contracts. |
And the workers could collectively refuse to work at your business.
quote: If I stole it, yes, but they would have to have a better claim to the land. |
I agree as long as you keep in mind that this usage of theft is not constrained by the wishes of the state.
quote: Yes, that's why I asked how stealing by either group is justified. |
quote: Morality matters more. |
That's a non-issue. I'm not justifying the morality of statism; rather I'm illuminating the impracticality of libertarian capitalism. Please stick to the actual debate.
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Albert Speer
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Puerile Polemic
Mar 1999 time: 00:24
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What the hell?
Legalizing drugs WILL without a doubt increase drug abuse... there are people who don't do drugs because of the fear of punishment and being punished prevents people from doing drugs (ie- people in jail, etc.).
Now David, you say that you don't care if people do drugs or not as it is their own bodies... didn't I already say that drugs without a doubt harm more than the user... they harm society... I'm not talking about **** like gangs and dealers that would be removed with legalization... I'm talking about the children of addicts and other victims of drug abuse (ie- a crackhead acts nutty and shoots somebody for no reason!)... you don't care if people do drugs? What if drug addicts are hurting others?
Furthermore, even if drugs were legalized and the whole drug dealer structure disappeared... that would not stop drug related crime... Drug addicts do not go robbing because they can't afford the drugs that someone on the corner sells them... they would be unable to afford the drugs the corporation sells them... a crack addict has very little oppurtunity to make money. he will not have a steady, high paying job so he is going to rob people to pay for his addiction, whether his drugs are supplied by a dealer or a business
So legalization solves nothing UNLESS you have a society where drug use is abhored and drug users are ostracized by the community... such was the state of affairs earlier in this country when drugs WERE legal... people didn't do them in large amounts because society abhored it. Today it is different
thanks
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chegitz guevara
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Ft. Lauderdale, FL Communist Party of Apolyton
Jun 2000 time: 00:24
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quote: Originally posted by Ned
The libertarian assumes that man is good and will naturally make choices that will benefit society as a whole. |
Actually, they assume that people are naturally selfish, and that taken together, all our selfish decisions will counter-balance one another's.
I believe that human beings are good or evil, sharing or selfish, depending on their circumstances in which they find themselves. If we create an environment in which it is advantageous to be a selfish ***** (such as we have today), that what you will get. If you create an environment in which it is advanatageous to be cooperative, then you will get cooperation. And there will always be exceptions, altruists in selfish systems and greedy, lazy people in cooperative systems.
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chegitz guevara
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Ft. Lauderdale, FL Communist Party of Apolyton
Jun 2000 time: 00:24
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quote: Originally posted by Berzerker
chegitz -
"Could probably"? C'mon! |
I'm not going to assume that any specific corporation will be able to do whatever it wants. Only that the possiblity strongly exists.
quote: Only if virtually everyone allows it. |
You assume we could stop it.
quote: If they want to create their own state, somewhat like an island out in the Atlantic serving as little more than a haven for big businesses, so what? |
What makes you think they'd set it up on some Atlantic island instead of right here at home. If there is nothing here to stop them, why should they go elsewhere to create the conditions they want?
quote: Your argument is that a smaller government limited to securing our rights could not resist big business. The irony of your argument is that big business did not get it's protection and favoritism until after government began getting big and stepping on our rights as power became more centralized. |
Powerful landowners and businessmen had power from the very begining and were crushing Americans underfoot from the very begining. And not just us, but also Africans and American Indians. Corporations merely allowed them to accumulate even more wealth and power, and crush us even further underfoot.
When the state was completely a creature of the corporations during the robber baron age, it was if there was no government at all. Corporations hired their own thugs to crush competitors, workers, and communities. The state helped them to do it, but because they were getting so out of control, it created people like me, communists, who would overthrow the whole system, lock, stock, and barrel. The state, prodded by progressives, began to force corporations to curb their worst excesses. Frankly, if the state hadn't intervened and forced big business to recognize unions, pay minimum wages and unemployment, we'd be communist today. In that sense, I don't really mind libertarianism, because after a few generations of libertarian society we'll have communism. 
quote:
Equating respect for freedom with fascism because you don't like capitalism is absurd. |
You didn't get my point. What I'm saying is that you'd only be allowed to go after half your agenda, i.e., curbing state interference with corporations and state aid to the lower classes. Your social role would be to crush the downtrodden. The moment you tried to carry out the anti-corporate part of your agenda, you'd be tossed aside like so much rubiish.
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Ted Striker
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United States of America
Jan 1970 time: 21:24
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quote:
When the state was completely a creature of the corporations during the robber baron age, it was if there was no government at all. Corporations hired their own thugs to crush competitors, workers, and communities. The state helped them to do it, but because they were getting so out of control, it created people like me, communists, who would overthrow the whole system, lock, stock, and barrel. The state, prodded by progressives, began to force corporations to curb their worst excesses. |

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Berzerker
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topeka, kansas,USA
May 1999 time: 23:24
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Speer - quote: Legalizing drugs WILL without a doubt increase drug abuse... there are people who don't do drugs because of the fear of punishment and being punished prevents people from doing drugs (ie- people in jail, etc.). |
Then why didn't addiction rates skyrocket when all drugs were legal? You have nothing to support your prediction that legalisation increases drug use, we have evidence to the contrary. Drugs were legal in this country up until the late 1800's and early 1900's, but consumption was not higher than now.
quote: Now David, you say that you don't care if people do drugs or not as it is their own bodies... didn't I already say that drugs without a doubt harm more than the user... they harm society... |
You haven't explained how my use of pot or cocaine in the privacy of my home "harms society".
quote: I'm not talking about **** like gangs and dealers that would be removed with legalization... |
Why not? They are proof you and people who agree with you are "harming society" with your policies.
quote: I'm talking about the children of addicts and other victims of drug abuse (ie- a crackhead acts nutty and shoots somebody for no reason!)... you don't care if people do drugs? What if drug addicts are hurting others? |
Then he cares, did you not read his argument that these people who do hurt others should be punished? But you want to punish millions of people based on what these people are doing, and you tell us America is not moral enough when you advocate punishing the innocent because of the guilty? LOL.
quote: Furthermore, even if drugs were legalized and the whole drug dealer structure disappeared... that would not stop drug related crime... |
There is a distinction between drug related crime and drug war related crime. All your drug war has done is give us drug war related crime, not reduced or eliminated drug related crime. And you accuse us of not caring when you brush aside all the crime created by the drug war?
quote: Drug addicts do not go robbing because they can't afford the drugs that someone on the corner sells them... |
Really? If the heroin you need costs $100 a day, where are you getting the money?
quote: they would be unable to afford the drugs the corporation sells them... |
Albert, do you know what legal heroin/cocaine costs? Do some research before making such ridiculous claims.
quote: a crack addict has very little oppurtunity to make money. |
Neither do winos, but they can get their money by panhandling, they don't need to steal.
quote: he will not have a steady, high paying job so he is going to rob people to pay for his addiction, whether his drugs are supplied by a dealer or a business |
You haven't been paying much attention to the rhetoric of the drug war pushers. One of their goals was to inflate the cost of illegal drugs. If you're robbing people to buy a drug, then the cost of the drug effects how much you steal. Legal heroin costs very little, illegal heroin costs alot more.
quote: So legalization solves nothing UNLESS you have a society where drug use is abhored and drug users are ostracized by the community... |
Nothing you've said so far is accurate, so claiming what legalisation does or does not do based on your mis-information is problematic.
quote: such was the state of affairs earlier in this country when drugs WERE legal... people didn't do them in large amounts because society abhored it. Today it is different |
Lol, wrong again, cocaine was in Coca-Cola and Bayer sold heroin/morphine and could be bought even in saloons.
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Ted Striker
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United States of America
Jan 1970 time: 21:24
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quote:
Drugs were legal in this country up until the late 1800's and early 1900's, but consumption was not higher than now. |
Proof?
quote:
cocaine was in Coca-Cola and Bayer sold heroin/morphine and could be bought even in saloons.
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Is that a contradiction of the above?
Hey, ask the Chinese what the legalization of Opium did to them in the 19th Century.
Last edited by Ted Striker on 05-01-2003 at 09:30
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Dr Strangelove
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quote: Originally posted by Ramo
It was done in 2000, IIRC. The point is that Speer asserted fear of going to jail prevents people from doing drugs, but Portugal's experience indicates otherwise. It's entirely possible that drug consumption would increase were drugs legalized in the US, but not because people fear punishment. |
Nope, it would increase because no one knows how to do business in the 21st century like we Amercans do. Financing, marketing, distribution, you name it, we're the world leader. The world should shudder at the thought of drug trade going completely legal in the US.
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