When is Victory Really Defeat? In the Drug War, Silly.

Not Quite Hayek

A fellow Reason reader?

Either way, it's refreshing to see that the voice of sane comment on our insane drugs war is growing here in the UK.

ben

As "The Onion" once so pithily put it: "Drugs Win Drug War".

Forlornehope

Anyone who wants these substances can get them without difficulty, so the present policy is doing nothing to reduce use. By providing an incentive to illegal suppliers to recruit new users, it may actually be increasing the problem.

However in the USA the "war on drugs" is an industry with a $40 billion a year budget. That is a lot of jobs and a lot of vested interests. It doesn't matter that it is destabilising neighbouring countries. It doesn't matter that the USA is supplying drug gangs with over 90% of their firearms. There is money in running prisons and running "law enforcement". As Ian Paisley was the best friend the IRA ever had, this unholy symbiosis between the "law" and the drug cartels is set to continue.

Victor, NW Kent

Let us give up on trying to control any addiction, any crime. Let us become Colombia.

It is this spineless attitude that has allowed the narcotics industry to grow and cause so much misery, so much attended crime.

Shall we choose Mexico as an exemplar? Why not Singapore?

It must surely be understood that drugs do mental and physical damage to people, wreck their lives and the lives of their families and relatives. Being able to get them cheaper and without prosecution will not alter those tragic facts.

Forlornehope mentions the IRA - heavily involved in drug running.

David

"It is this spineless attitude that has allowed the narcotics industry to grow and cause so much misery, so much attended crime."

The "spineless attitude" as you call it bans drugs, imprisions people selling them and using them, with the result that drugs are widely availabel and funded by crime. It's useless approach, the result of which is the same at any attempt at prohibition in history.

You want to sort the drugs problem out? Legalise them, regulate them and draw the profits away from the criminals.

Rhoda Klapp

And the war on murder isn't going well, or the war on shoplifting. Credit card fraud gets a pretty free run too. Legalise the lot?

Good job the war on speeding works, and on not paying your council tax.

On a serious note, there may be a case for legalizing drugs, but it is not that we 'can't do anything about it'. If that's what you want, make the case. How will you protect my kids? Will I be able to sue Bayer (trademark holder for Herion)f or the damage I do to myself? If you tax it (most models propose this) how will you police the taxation, if you couldn't control it when it was criminal?

Forlornehope

Thank you Victor, you make my point. If the market was legal, and controlled, there would be nothing in it for the IRA and other crooks.

dearieme

"Shall we choose Mexico as an exemplar? Why not Singapore?" Because there isn't a cat in hell's chance that we can solve the drug problem by repression - we can't even keep the filthy stuff out of jails. So the rational policy is to minimise harm, which may indeed be best achieved by legalising and taxing them.

Victor, NW Kent

We certainly could keep drugs out of jails if there was the political will and moral gumption to do it.

Rhoda Klapp - thank you for writing something that represents commonsense and decency.

I am totally fed up right now with all of this laissez faire pandering to the worst in society. The current revelations about the rampant dishonesty of our legislators is a mirror of the rot in our midst.

Sane comment? That seems to mean that because a thing is difficult we should simply give up.

Am I bothered that drug peddlers go to jail? No, I just want longer and harder sentences - not to rehabilitate them but to punish them and to remove them from society.

Want to hear me on paedophiles? Your liberal skins would grow goose spots.

David

Rhoda,

All your questions could equally to tobacco and alcohol, substances with which we cope with legality despite the harm they cause with which we cope fine.

William

As Rhoda says, you ban something not because you anticipate that it will lead to it completely disappearing - if only that were the case - but because it is the right thing to do. No civilized society can seriously legalise addictive lethal drugs for its citizens and then claim to be civilized.

Rhoda Klapp

David. Lots of tobacco comes in untaxed. Kids can get it, likewise booze. Nobody has ever successfully sued a tobacco company for harm, but will a drug company get a legal getout, or will we have a multi-decade legal battle?

What will separate the drugs you want to legalize from the whole pharmacopia of drugs which can only be had on prescription?

There is a lot wrong with alcohol and tobacco sales, based on a historical precedent. So what? Legalizing drugs would need to be thought out rather better. I can't see how we would have just the right drugs, free to obtain, in a world where schools are going through kids' luchboxes to find contraband kitkats, and people want to ban transfats or fizzy pop based on hypotheses of harm which will not stand up to examination. I mention these contradictions only to make the point that a little consistency would not go amiss. My libertarian side says let them all take what they like, provided I don't have to pay for it (or contribute to treatment). My altruistic side says it ain't right to let people harm themselves. That is the argument, and the fact that law enforcement isn't winning this one is not a reason to make the decision.

Dirty Euro

I agree, they should be legalized but charged very heavy tax rates. With strong customs rules. With heavy rules on age constraints and driving rules etc: This would raises billions in tax.

Steve.W

Alex, I like the tone behind the comments in the opening, the 'endless war' etc. Endless for if this 'problem' was solved then SOCA would be disbanded. The performance of this agency is so lamentable it cannot be taken seriously.

After the G20 the police have come under justifiable pressure, what to do? Yes, get Pravda involved, or the BBC as some might call it! Pathetic.

Rhoda Klapp

If you can enforce a tax, how come you can't enforce a prohibition? Tax it too high, and the current importers will have no reason to stop. That's leaving aside that the government will become a drug dealer, and also get addicted to the tax.

Forlornehope

It would appear that several of those commenting seem determined to maintain the major revenue stream for organised crime. Prohibition of things people want does not work. As the Americans say it's economics 101. The more successful the policy the bigger the profits and the bigger the incentive to sell the stuff. If it carries on long enough it can cause major breakdowns in law and order. The USA found this when trying to prohibit alcohol. When you look at the damage to health caused by illegal drugs it is approximately on tenth that of alcohol. As usual with these discussions opinion beats facts every day.

Victor, NW Kent

I suggest that those who are in favour of legalising narcotics should live for some time in countries where the labourer class have easy and cheap access to drugs, such as marijuana in Southern Africa or kat in North Africa. It is tolerated since it pacifies a large group that might otherwise cause trouble.

Those who have an interest in history should read about the causes of the Opium Wars and efforts by Mao and his successors to break the population of the habit. Or if you want some British history you might read up on the effects of the widely used laudanum in the Victorian age. That was legal and cheap. George IV was an addict so it was not limited to the lower orders. Mothers used to give it to their children so that they would sleep or be docile. You would object if they gave them gin or rum, wouldn't you?

The claim widely quoted, that drugs have "always" been with us is not an excuse. So was slavery, child labour, torture and public executions. They were done away with in this country but not without opposition.

Nick

"slavery, child labour, torture and public executions" are not choices made by individual victims for their own enjoyment. Who will protect our children from rock climbing. And without ROPES!

Alf Tupper

When is victory really defeat?

When you legalise hard drugs, whilst at the same time you seek to limit the use of tobacco and alcohol, having seen the damage they, at their much lower level, can do.

When you signal to all young people that authority condones the use of such drugs and they feel obliged to join in.

When you have so drifted apart from the notion that we can do anything by enforcement and all is well if we just let society numb itself.

Silly.

Steve.W

Alf Tupper – I wonder how many old people read Alex Massie's blog and feel obliged to stay out?

The reason I ask is you write about young people and drugs and suggest - “they feel obliged to join in”.

I don't get it, can you explain?

David

"I suggest that those who are in favour of legalising narcotics should live for some time in countries where the labourer class have easy and cheap access to drugs"

I do. It's called London.

Although it's mainly the middle class that use. I guess that's fine; it's the lower classes that can't be trusted, what?

David

"Mothers used to give it to their children so that they would sleep or be docile. You would object if they gave them gin or rum, wouldn't you?"

Are you calling for all alcohol to be banned, then?
I can't see anyone here advocating that drugs should be given to children, and legalisation wouldn't indicate this any more than the fact alcohol is legal means mothers are pouring gin down their children's throats.

David

"When you signal to all young people that authority condones the use of such drugs and they feel obliged to join in."

I hate to break this to you, but most young people are more likely to do something that the authorities tell them not to do.And they do-drugs are freely available.

Not Quite Hayek

Ahhh... The classic "OMGZZ!11! WON'T SOMEBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN?!" slight-of-hand in the drugs debate.

There ought to be a derivative of Godwin's Law, regarding the invokation of 'the children' in an otherwise sensible discussion.

I think I'll call it Rhoda's Law.

Rhoda Klapp

Not quite Hayek. I only asked the questions that should be part of the legalization debate. I don't know from your answer whether you are ok with the kids getting the drugs or not. Evidently they can get drugs now, even here in darkest Oxfordshire countryside it seems to take about 20 minutes to get connected. But even Libertarians have to have some answer for the question, are all people however helpless to be allowed to do anything, or are there limits? If not, say so.

I return to my only point, which many seem to have missed as they dive into espousal of legalization, that the failure of prohibition is not an argument. The case must stand or fall on its merits.

I have a picture in my head, possibly unjustified, of the proponents of legalization all being users or ex-users of mild drugs seeking freedom from the remote possibility of punishment for something which has done them no harm. Am I wrong? Is this a basis for freeing all drugs? Or a limited selection?

What I'd really like to see is a cogent case made for legalization which does not rely on the old chestnuts, you can't control it, and booze and fags are just as bad. Anyone?

Forlornehope

Rhoda, you ask a fair straight question that deserves a straight answer. I am a regular drug user. Hardly a day goes by without my glass of wine and I cannot remember the last day that I got through without a quart of coffee. On the other hand, I have never smoked tobacco or anything else and the only needles that get into my arm are when I donate blood (wow, that makes me feel really good!). I also admit to being a bit of an adrenaline junkie.

The logic of the case is simple. At present anybody who wants drugs can get them and they are pushed quite hard in various insidious ways. There is, therefore, no reason to believe that legalising use would increase availability. With legalisation would come proper controls on quality and distribution. Nobody, as far as I am aware, is suggesting that you could pick these things up in the supermarket!

The argument about the evils that come from these substances is irrelevant, if, as is the case, the present policy has failed to contain them. On the other hand the "war on drugs" has created an income stream for every kind of evil organisation and continues to destabilise societies from the Americas all the way round the globe.

Unfortunately, the war on drugs represents a vast vested interest, $40 billion a year in the USA alone. The US government is as hooked on this as it was hooked by the lobbies who said lead in petrol wasn't doing any harm, that there was no health risk from tobacco, and that AGW was just made up by mad scientists looking for money.

William

I've known people to function normally in society on coffee and wine.

I've never known anyone to function normally in society on heroin, cocaine, crystal meth, etc.

It just doesn't happen.

Steve.W

Rhoda Klapp – What you call an “old chesnut” - “you can't control it” is a fact. And a fact in both inner city and darkest Oxfordshire.

Not Quite Hayek – 'Mind the children' is trotted out with the same frequency as 'It might upset the Muslims'.

Anyway our police don't have enough time, they are busy escorting people home from cash machines!

Forlornehope

William, you have clearly missed the point completely.

Kittler

William.
Would consumers of legal and pharmaceutical supplied drugs be disfunctional or would they be stable like diabetics on insulin?

William

They would be dysfunctional.

Anyone who has ever been around a long-term user of these substances would know that their long-term usage and a normal, stable lifestyle are not compatible.

Rhoda Klapp

""What you call an “old chesnut” - “you can't control it” is a fact. And a fact in both inner city and darkest Oxfordshire.""

It's a fact, but it is not an argument. Laws try to prevent many things, but fail. I have no idea whether it could be controlled given the money and manpower, within the constraints of the liberty we expect. But if a twelve-year-old can get skank in 20 minutes in a medium-sized village, do you not think the police couldn't do something about that, if there were any police? However, that is an aside.

I really haven't taken a position here for or against. To me, drug legalization is way down the list of things to do. What I wanted to see was a scenario of how it would work, with the various objections answered. Nothing convincing so far. (The arguments for leaving it as it is are fairly clear, unless someone has some new approach).

THX1138

Happy Christmas (war is over)

White House Czar Calls for End to 'War on Drugs

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124225891527617397.html

Not sure who won!

Shame I came to this late just reading been reading the comments, great debate everyone.

Legalize them all now....

Steve.W

Rhoda Klapp – The fact free argument, ah, I didn't think of that!

Alf Tupper

Steve W. & David

I don't understand the bit about old people reading Alex Massie? But here's what I mean on the point questioned.

I understand that young people do have an inbuilt aversion to do what they're told, yes. This is and always has been a part of growing up; we all did it. At the end of this phase though, they will for the most part, develop into responsible adults with ideas formed about how to look after themselves.

These ideas are gleaned from what they see around them during their formative phase. If they are surrounded with the message that drugs are permissible then they will go that further stage and read into this that they are somehow odd if they do not join in what has been sanctioned by authority.

Despite the youthful tendency toward rebelliousness, the power of authority (not in the official sense but simply that of looking for clues from what society seems to require of them) is very strong. My point being that the leap from widespread illegal drug use, to a universal acceptance, is bigger than is being mooted here, and will have very grave consequences for us as a society.

Victor, NW Kent

Steve W
I will trot in "the children". Statistics can lie and even differ but it seems to be agreed that well over 70% of registered drub addicts acquired the habit as teenagers.

I refuse, as does Rhoda, to accept the finality that we must just grin and bear it.

To describe coffee or tobacco as a drug in the same breath as heroin or marijuana ignores the obvious - few people commit murder under the influence of tobacco, still fewer rob or mug to obtain money for Starbucks.

Rhoda Klapp

Steve W, make your case. I'm agog to hear it. But don't rely on the 'we can't fix it' argument. It's bogus. Describe how it is going to work your way. All drugs, or just some? Controls? Taxes?

It's my observation that legalizers don't always follow through with a framework. It's as if as soon as they can get pot at Tesco's they will have what they want and stuff the rest of us.

I keep giving the impression I'm against legalization. Not so. I'm willing to be convinced.
But I am against wooly thinking (I make an exception in my own case, of course).

Nick

Victor, NW Kent: to mention marijuana in the same breath as heroin is equally facile. I am generally in favour of legalisation but I don't think it's at all straight forward when it comes highly dangerous drugs like heroin, meth or crack. Dope, on the other hand, is only considered more harmful than alcohol because it is prohibited - not the other way around.

Steve.W

Sorry for the delay, but here goes -

The origin for all this, lest we forget, are the comments from Alex Massie. So it's back to the title of his post in which AM uses the words 'victory' and 'defeat'. He also talks about the 'endless war' in his first line. I say a war is either won or lost. I say you cannot claim a victory here. SOCA has been performing badly for a very long time and the press has been pointing this out and ruminating on what happens next. Further on AM talks of “twisted official attitudes to drug policy”, too right I say. Finally we have from AM “saner stuff coming out of Latin America”.

I too find it thought provoking that one lacklustre publicly funded organisation, the BBC, helps another one, SOCA, in its hour of need. This is I suggest, and using police-speak, “acting suspiciously”, I don't like it.

The war on drugs, WoD. I'm old enough to remember when the UK paid little official attention to drug use, in my opinion there was not much of a 'problem'. Something called cannabis tincture was available from GP's. What was it prescribed for? I've been told it was depression and did see bottles of it now and then. Did it end up 'on the streets'? I doubt it.

Also very few music clubs had even the faintest whiff of cannabis about them. Now we are told there is an immense drugs problem and a vast amount of money is spent alongside an aggressive official attitude. Each year, we are told, the problem is even worse! Only more money and more power to the agencies will solve this. It's a lie. Perhaps you want to 'solve' this and win the war, well I say pick another method and try that, at least for a while.

I fail to see how an organisation addicted to more money and more power can play any part in the addiction problems of individuals.

I picked up the comment that young people would “feel obliged to join in” (taking drugs) thinking of my younger relatives. No they would not, I can assure you. I don't think a sense of obligation is always age related. It cannot be said that older people would obliged to stay out of something while younger folk would feel the opposite. So to me 'mind the children' won't wash. At the London Mayoral Elections the green party woman candidate (I've forgotten her name!) said Boris “would be bad for the environment”,an equally silly remark. Mind you if my younger relatives with their hair and fashion sense plus the odd tattoo and piercing turned up to live in your street you might worry. And this would be your problem not theirs.

What would I do regarding the WoD? And emphasis on the 'do'. I don't know, but I'm sure what we are doing is crazy. In a city you cannot build without demolishing first, so we have to first admit the failure of the present policy. Then perhaps we have to admit that not all things wrong can be put right. I'd be against registering addicts, my near neighbour smoked and drank himself to death known only to the local GP's and the A&E Department, he collapsed frequently and would be taken to hospital. It was his business, his life, nothing to do with the state. The cost to the state you ask? Tom had a vast property portfolio and paid large amounts of tax. What Tom did was foolish not criminal, there's no point in putting a man like that on a list.

Another stab at the money side of it, it is said that a huge amount of petty crime is committed to fund a drug habit. I'm not sure about that, I think a lot of petty crime is just that, petty and twerpish. It's convenient to portray it as linked to drugs. It's reasonable to deal with this crime but to throw extra money at it, to raise it from the petty to the state threatening because we think drugs are involved? I think not.

In engineering there is a thing called tail chasing, it goes like this. You have a design, say the Ford Anglia, now and then a new feature is added, this improves it. Eventually it can be improved no more, you are tail chasing. You start again, your next effort is new, it's called the Ford Escort, it's the only way. We have to stop tail chasing, like heroin it's a bad habit. We have to stop our present approach of throwing more money and resources at the WoD, it won't work it's another bad habit.