I like the way the Netherlands handled it.  They legalized everything.  It took about two years for everythone to get used to it all.  Then the drug use started to go down, and more people started seeking treatment.

Hi, Does anyone on here have a problem with Meth in your state? We have big problem with Meth and it's getting out of control.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4489307/


                                                                    Thanks, Joe.

The joke that is referred to as the war on drugs is unwinnable and always will be.
There will be points where there is decline but the demand will always remain.
The desire of many people for substances to alter their reality is almost as old as humanity itself.
There are far too many people who do not see drugs as evil nor immoral. Generally this is put forth by those who desire to force others to see the world their way.
The War creates far more casualties than it does any good. It used as the rational for allowing the government to take even more freedoms from us.
We are filling up prisons to very dangerous levels. Creation and institutional hatred of our police. The justice system is unjust in exactlt who serves time and who doesn't.
Most important is that those who propagate the need for this War on Drugs themselves prop up some of the most evil and vile members of humanity. They allow the inflated prices of these drugs to create Empires of Terror and the Self proclaimed Lords of these Cartels increase their influence through the use of terrorist activities. Murder, kidnappings, rape, assasinations, corruption of government and military institutions.
This money is used to finance Terrorists worldwide.

The war on drugs is an abyssmal failure that needs to be ended soon for the good of humanity.

The wars on drugs or terrorism aren't going to cut the funding to groups like al-Quaeda. Read your commercial history books - if you want to do that, the best way is to legalise them. How long would it be before hard-pressed US or European farmers in suitable areas (say, New Mexico, Texas, Spain, etc) started growing opium poppies, or Caribbean plantations struggling with banana quotas would plant lots of coca?

Fighting the war on drugs by using guns on their home ground seems a little silly to me, when we know from history that if we just unleash the forces of global capitalism against them, a war which the West has never managed to lose, we'd put them out of the global terror business within a year.

Quite apart from the fact the Western governments could then start to tax the huge revenues of the drug trade, since it would then be part of the legitimate economy. Of course, it would create some health problems, but the commercial standardisation that would come with legality would also remove those caused by diluting cocaine with Drain-o.

It all just boils down to how badly do we want to win, and do we want to fight on our terms, or theirs?

How would legalizing marijuana help the economy of the United States of America? I think it would help in several ways. Just as much money as America gets on Tobacco and Alcohol from taxes it could make from marijuana. Instead of farmers getting 139 an acre for corn they would make 319 an acre for hemp. It takes 20-100 years to grow a tree to make several pieces of wood while it would take 8 months to a year to grow a stronger more durable plant. This would save the rainforests which could be substantial to the medical world. Many new medicines are being found in the rainforest as we speak.

Another way is lowering the death rate. Millions die from alcohol, millions die from tobacco. No one has ever died from marijuana. And no one means ZERO. Directly or indirectly. Marijuana helps you faces problems and concentrate more and also think outside the box, as alcohol turns you into a raging alcoholic and turns you away from your problems. Tobacco is addictive, physically and mentally, as marijuana is not. I have smoked pot for years and have been off and on (sometimes its difficult to get pot) and have never gone through withdrawal. As is tobacco, I see people go 2 hours without a cigarette and they start going through ashtrays looking for shorts. Lowering the death rate would give the government more taxes also. It would be the recreational drug of choice versus alcohol. The facts are all there, but the government continues to cover it up with bogus studies and lies. Why? Because the Tobacco lobby and Alcohol lobby BOTH pay them to keep marijuana illegal.

My question to everyone is this: If my smoking marijuana hurts only myself... why should it be illegal? Why should I be thrown in prison for something I did to myself that is no worse than smoking a cigarette? I could smoke a pack of cigarettes a day or just 2 joints a day. Why should a stoner be thrown into a cell with a rapist? Why do rapists get shorter sentences than that of a marijuana user? Its my choice what I do with my body, right? Should hairspray be illegal because it kills my brain cells? Or walking outside into polluted atmosphere be illegal because its harming my lungs? The whole drug war is money money money. But that money thats being spent on it could go towards food for the hungry, or medical packages for those who can't afford their hospital bills. Marijuana is also a great plant for medicines. Our is going towards fighting it and their losing this war on drugs. Put the taxes back into the hands of the American people.

Which would you prefer? Your kids/spouse drinking and driving or at home stoned and raiding the fridge or falling asleep. This law isn't up to us, it's up the how much money the government gets for it.

Truthful Liberty

So I've read multiple pages of you guys arguing about pot and I'm completely bored with it.  It's off track on the topic.  We have a large segment of the African-American community in jail for possessing small amounts of crack, we have millions spent in Columbia and other South/Central American countries fighting the drug lords.

The question is: do we need the war on drugs?  Pot isn't the target, really.  It's all the other stuff: PCP, cocaine, heroin, etc. that are wasting our tax dollars thru eradication and imprisonment.  Is this the right way to attack the problem?  You can't legalize these drugs and make drug use "better" somehow.

We're fighting the war by fighting with certain suppliers and -- not always related -- certain users.  Instead of fighting with them, why aren't we trying something different?  Instead of prison for drug users, how about institutes that help them detox and get back their lives?  Instead of prison for drug runners, how about we try something else (like put them in charge of FedEx deliveries  )?  The way we're fighting this war now isn't working. 

Focusing on pot isn't going to get to the root of the problem.  Legalizing everything won't make it better either, since that's like making guns available to anyone who wants one.