The war on drugs
It’s not going away because lobbying for marijuana prohibition makes lobbyists rich. And follow the money:
Some of the groups who want to keep the drug illegal are police unions that want more members to pay more dues. One of the primary sources for cash for more policing activities are Federal grants for penalizing illegal drug use, which help pay for overtime, additional police officers, and equipment for the force. That’s what Lovell does, he gets those grants. He also fights against democratic mechanisms to legalize drugs.
March 8th, 2012 at 11:06 am
You can also add the private prisons that make a lot of money from having a large percentage of the population behind bars.
March 8th, 2012 at 11:26 am
This is a two-edges sword – there is a lot of money to be made while running the drug war, but there is a lot of money – an awful lot of money – to be made by selling pot, and licenses to grow pot, and taxes on pot, and the enforcement of the ten thousand regulations on growing and selling pot.
A modern joint – just a skinny one – will get two people stupid-stoned. That’s worth at least a few bucks. It’s maybe five cents to make, package it, and sell it, if pot can be grown the way tobacco is.
Many billions are being left on the table, eventually somebody will figure out how to start scooping it up.
March 8th, 2012 at 11:39 am
There may be a lot of money to be had in legalization, but the catch is that the ones profiting from the drug war are already entrenched in the halls of power, while the ones who would profit from legalization have to fight from the outside. They’re also at a disadvantage because they have to fight against the negative public perception of drugs just to get the politicians to not simply dismiss them without bothering to listen.
March 8th, 2012 at 11:41 am
I refuse to take as serious any “small government” type who doesn’t at least acknowledge the corrosive effect on society that the WOD has caused, let alone one that supports it.
March 8th, 2012 at 12:26 pm
Here in California those Prison-Guard Union Due$ most often get funneled to the Democrat Party Machine who control the regulatory purse-strings of staffing, construction, and other management issues…
March 8th, 2012 at 1:20 pm
Follow the money? Ummmm, yes, there ARE two sides to this fight, so let’s follow the money from the other side (legalization side), too.
A name of where a lot of it starts: George Soros.
Want to keep following the money?
I didn’t think so.
March 8th, 2012 at 1:41 pm
If you follow the complete indifference to other people’s drug use, boozing, sexing, whatever, you will find me. If I’m not married or related to you, I don’t care what you do if it doesn’t hurt me or mine.
March 8th, 2012 at 7:17 pm
Another group that has a vested interest in the status quo that most people don’t think about, are the criminal drug cartels themselves.
The existing cartels are “calibrated” to operate outside the law, including not only the costs involved (from the direct time costs of arrest/imprisonment, to the indirect ones of bribery/graft… and then there’s all the expenses of dealing with your competition) but the tremendous profit margins brought about by the illegality.
What do you suppose happens to all that under legalization? As a cartel head, do you want to compete with large corporations that operate safely and within the law? Do you want your customers flocking to far safer legal outlets than deal with your criminal distribution network? Worst of all, do you want that fat profit margin that defrays your costs, destroyed by the margin-compressing dynamics of free market competition?
Hell no. If I’m the drug cartels, the status quo has treated me just fine, thank you. Given that the law affects only law-abiders by definition, it eliminates all competition from there, widening my margins well past the point where they compensate for the added expenses of illegality. Quiet financial support of drug prohibition and its advocates is just a cost of doing business, and a smart one, too.
March 8th, 2012 at 9:10 pm
Government takes something normal and turns it into the tragedy of the commons.
March 8th, 2012 at 10:10 pm
If I go out and have a few beers, then get pulled over going home, the officer is going to give me a test. Said test is to determine how drunk I might be, for if I am TOO drunk, I might cause harm to other people. The officer want’s to determine my blood/alcohol content. Who knows how to test for THC? Eat a bag of fritos, and it might help soak up a beer buzz.
March 9th, 2012 at 1:37 am
Don’t forget about people just growing it. It can grow EVERYWHERE. And they REALLY don’t like that idea, I bet.
March 9th, 2012 at 1:38 am
And jerry, you can test for it by dodging the car coming at you at 6 mph.
March 9th, 2012 at 10:06 am
Prisons, police unions (there will be a LOT fewer police officers making $100K a year like we have in Baltimore…hell there will be fewer cops period if all they’re tasked with is rape, robbery, and violent crime), Big Pharma (who know damn well a lot of their products will lose in a free market scenario against Mary Jane) all have spent a lot of money lobbying to keep things as they are.
You’re damn right anyone who says they’re for “small govt” but doesn’t accept this is a goddamn idiot.