Time to Legalize Street Drugs Part III

The recent death of conservative icon William F. Buckley has inspired me to write another of my annual "Time to Legalize Street Drugs" blog entries. Buckley was for legalization. He realized that the "War on Drugs" was lost because this particular solution had only made the problem worse.

Here is a summary of the points I made in Parts I & II.

I don't use or advocate the use of these drugs. I am just against expensive taxpayer solutions that don't work and make the problem tragically worse.

Prohibition doesn't work. We found that out in the 1920s and are seeing history repeat itself.

We have spent trillions of dollars on the war through military ventures into South America, a proliferation of larger and larger militarized police forces, the propagation our courts and jails, and worthless anti-drug programs.

The War on Drugs has made the street drug business extremely profitable. Profitable enough for a street thug to kill over it. Profitable enough for those street gangs to organize and become powerful much as organized crime did in the days of alcohol prohibition. Not only are we making these thugs extremely wealthy, but international terrorists as well.

We are inconsistent. We tolerate prescription drug abuse, alcohol, behavioral drugs for insolent children, tobacco, and ever increasingly powerful caffeine and energy drinks.

Drug policy has been racist. Marijuana laws were originally anti-Hispanic. While cocaine was originally ignored in the wealthy white community, crack was not tolerated in the poor black community.

Drug policy is part of class warfare. The wealthy drug addicts can check themselves into rehab clinics. The poor get sent to prison. We give our Hollywood stars a second chance over and over again, and even expect a certain amount of drugs in that "artsy" community, but have zero tolerance for the trailer park meth addict.

Street drug epidemics are overstated. From the days of "Reefer Madness," to warnings about massive crack and methamphetamine epidemics that never really materialized.

Conservative claim to want small, unobtrusive government but they support this expensive and useless war. Our police forces have become militarized, and we have surrendered private property rights through asset seizure laws, and our government's tracking of large cash transactions under the guise of fighting drug money operations.

Milton Friedman, another conservative icon, was for legalization. He understood that the War on Drugs was doomed to failure because it was really an economic war against the immovable laws of supply and demand.

Legalization would result in a regulated, safer street product and provide tax revenue.

PART III

Let's start with alcohol. Alcohol use kills more Americans each year (through health problems and DUI traffic fatalities) than illegal drugs. The health effects of marijuana use pale in comparison to alcohol. A "high" automobile driver can maintain control of his car. Unlike alcohol, there is no lethal dose of marijuana.

What do you think would happen if we banned alcohol again? We would create ruthless alcohol lords and gangs built around the protection of their alcohol markets. Jails would be overflowing with more nonviolent offenders. More powerful forms of alcohol would reach the streets as the suppliers move to reduce the risk and cost of moving their products by creating more potent forms. Varying quality of bathtub alcohol would arise and cause health problems including blindness and death. More public officials would be bribed and corrupted. And there would be a tremendous loss of tax revenue. If you thought Prohibition was wrong for alcohol, it's the same principle for street drugs.

Friends may be more reluctant to call 911 if a friend is overdosing on street drugs, leading to more unnecessary deaths.

The War on Drugs has helped spread the AIDS epidemic. Addicts are sharing infected syringes over and over instead of being able to buy clean ones over the counter

The War on Drugs have made the drug trade so profitable that that criminals find it cost effective to move them from South America to the US in submarines! How much does a submarine cost? How expensive is it to train and pay a crew, and maintain and fuel the sub?

The government releases annual figures about how many drugs were seized, street drug prices, and polling data on drug popularity and usage. Can we trust these government figures or the interpretation of the data? Police departments certainly have an incentive to overstate the amount and value of street drugs they seize (reputation and promotions). Price fluctuations are short term until the drug makers and dealers can figure out a new way to distribute their drugs or even develop new drugs. Just look at the proliferation of the never before heard of drugs. We went from marijuana, heroin and LSD in the 60s, to cocaine in the 70s, crack in the 80s, the abuse of subscription drugs in the 90s, to meth at the start of this century. And just how accurate is the polling of our stoned drug users? How many people are going to be honest about their illegal drug use? Those who are ashamed about it will lie, and those who are not embarrassed over it will overstate it.

The Constitution does not allow the government to ban these substances. That is why it took an amendment to ban alcohol. But some where along the way the ever growing government has taken advantage of our apathy and just decided to ban street drugs despite the Constitution.

It is time to stop America's duplicity. We are the world's greater user of drugs and the most aggressive prosecutor of that use. We claim to be a society of the rule of law but have the largest prison population. We claim to want an unobtrusive government but allow the growth of aggressive and militarized police forces, and government monitoring of what we do to our own bodies. Our government was based on the idea of federalism but we now allow our federal government to force our states to comply with national drug laws.

Legalization would create more addicts as the cost of drugs go down, but more addicts would do our society better than more prisoners who start out as nonviolent offenders and leave prison trained as violent criminals.

We claim to be a government based on equality but selectively pursue street drug users and blue-collar recreational users while the rich and famous abuse prescription medicine. If you want drug screening in our factories, why not drug screening in Hollywood?

Other changes would also have to follow the cessation of our drug war. If you want to reduce the supply of drugs you have to make it profitable for the third world farmer to grow food crops. One of the reasons we have farmers growing coca in South America and poppies in Asia is because their other agricultural crops cannot be grown and exported for profit in America and Europe. American and European farmers are protected with import tariffs and subsidies. The elimination of domestic farm aid would allow third world corn, rice, sugar, and wheat growers to become competitive in the world's largest markets.

All prohibition does is move the drug use out of the public eye. It is merely a way for moralizing citizens to showcase their outrage while at the same time giving our politicians a re-election issue as they play up our fears. While both of these groups go to bed at night feeling good about their moral superiority, kids are dying on the streets. But don't worry it is only black kids.

Let's redirect our law enforcement efforts to really save lives by aggressively prevention of other violent crime as well as DUI and traffic law enforcement.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

HELP! THERE ARE RIGHT WING ELITISTS ON MY TALK RADIO!!

I believe that one of the reasons for the demise of the Republican Party is the rise of enabling elitists in our right wing news media; particularly talk radio. When right wing talk radio began (Rush Limbaugh), the liberals owned Congress and had been entrenched for 40 years. Rush provided the foundation for the growth of the right wing media and this helped to educate the voters who put more republicans into Congress. The influence and power of the right wing media grew alongside the political power of the republicans. This attracted the attention of the elitists who were drawn to the wealth that was spreading throughout this new industry. Ivy leaguers and former Washington insiders started joining the new media looking for a stage to broadcast their opinion and make money.

After about ten years of this cozy relationship the ruling republicans became complacent and the right wing media became their enablers. I don't know if you can pinpoint exactly when it started; but it probably began shortly after George W. Bush became President. He started his presidency off on the right foot with military attacks in Afghanistan and Iraq, and a tax cut, but the rest of his domestic policies where straight out of the democratic playbook, and the Republican Party and right wing media went right along with him. His education and drug spending would have made LBJ proud, and his support of the blatantly unconstitutional campaign finance reform (i.e. Incumbency Protection Act) was shameful. Thinking back about his original campaign I really thought "Compassionate Conservativism" was just an election slogan. I didn't know it would become another name for liberalism.

The original right wing media kings were mostly middle class Americans who finally gave a voice to the rest of us average Joes. Rush Limbaugh is without a doubt the grandfather of them all. Another founding father was G. Gordon Liddy. I know Gordon was a Washington insider at one point (FBI, Nixon administration), but he was a pariah after his Watergate prison sentence and he managed to maintain an outsider's view of the beltway crowd. In the early to mid-90s more common folk joined the right wing news sources. Michael Reagan began a radio show, Sean Hannity began broadcasting, and Tony Snow and Michelle Malkin started publishing.

In the late 90s and early 00s the Ivy Leaguers and Washington insiders started moving in. Bill O'Reilly (Harvard), Michael Medved (Yale), Hugh Hewitt (Harvard), Bill Bennett (Harvard, Washington insider), and Laura Ingraham (Dartmouth, Washington insider) joined the right wing media. About this time our presidential margins of victory became microscopic and we started losing congressional elections.

In 2006, just 12 years after the Gingrich revolution, the republican Congress was gone. How did this happen if we had control of the congress and strong media allies? A lot of it was republican self-destruction. Early on they suffered a political miscalculation over the budget shutdown with President Clinton and then they proceeded to self-destruct over the fight for the leadership role in the House of Representatives. Newt Gingrich was in there, but for all of Newt's political genius, he was never really a leader. After he left there was a disastrous transition with Bob Livingston stepping aside and a subsequent battle involving Dick Army, Tom Delay and Steve Largent. When the smoke cleared the spineless republicans who were worried about public opinion selected a spineless leader in Denny Hastert.

These two political disasters were followed by incumbent behavior big spending, (education, healthcare), a failure to reform social security and immigration, a failure to tackle abortion, and the rise of corruption (Tom Delay, Tom Foley, and Duke Cunningham). This dilution of republican ideals even spread down to the state level. In the all-important California governor election in 2003, the right wing establishment abandoned conservative Tom McClintock and helped elect moderate Arnold Schwarzenegger because of his star power. He has been nothing short of a disgrace to the Republican Party.

So at the very time the Republicans had some momentum and actually had a media to support them they started to sink. This was interesting because the Democrats had managed to control the government for years with the help of their bedmates, the old mainstream left-leaning media. But for some reason the conservatives and their media allies could not do the same. I think the reason for this is that the right wing voters are smarter then their left wing counterparts and are not as easily fooled by their toadying media. It only took them 12 years to figure out how bad their politicians were, not 40. The Republicans were passing bad laws and running for re-election while the right wing media elitists were telling us to hold our nose and vote to keep them in office. This merely emboldened the big spending and corruption of the incumbents. We had people in Washington with an "R" after their name that were spending faster than democrats and corrupting faster than kings.

The right wing media had stopped being watchdogs of government and turned into lapdogs. They started hanging around with the politicians and thinking like politicians. They were only interested in the political short term and their own wealth. They stopped taking the lead and started reading polls. They told us to swallow the bitter tasting medicine and voter for RINOs just to keep republicans in office. Their only defense was that they could claim that the government was moving to the left at a slower pace then it would if the democrats were in charge.

What happened to the new media? Two of the original giants gave in. Rush had personal problems (divorce, drug addiction) and had become complacent. Tony Snow surrendered any pride he had and became the mouthpiece of the administration. The new wave of Ivy Leaguers and Washington insiders cozied up to the elitist Washington establishment. In October of 2006, just a month before the last congressional election, Sean Hannity (who had surrendered his values and become part of the new insider movement) joined the elitists Ingraham, Medved, and others who were meeting in the White House with the President. I don't know what they discussed but it obviously had something to do with strategy for the upcoming election. Our former watchdogs were taking orders straight from the top. The right wing media were no longer outsiders. They were shills for the beltway crowd. I give them credit for giving us a voice and helping to balance the media, but they became victims of their own success. Their arrogance allowed them to compromise their standards.
Fortunately the American voter is smarter than these Ivy Leaguers. They figured out that the new media had sold out to the new republicans. These new republicans were no different than the old democrats. We could have re-named the whole of Congress the Democratic-Republican Party. We had gone full circle and gone back to the same political party we had started with 210 years ago (except with Federalist, big government tendencies).

There is now very little difference between the two parties. You can see this by looking at the front-runners in the presidential campaigns. We have social liberals like Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney, and entrenched insiders like John McCain calling themselves republicans. The only difference between the two parties today is the support of the war effort.

If there is any hope with these elitists it seems to be with Laura Ingraham, who is the toughest on bad republican policy and the alpha-male of the group, and Bill O'Reilly who seems to walk to the beat of his own drum. We also have newcomer average Joes like Glenn Beck. I just wish that they would all grow some courage and get behind a true conservative like Congressman Duncan Hunter. But they lack the nerve to do so. They are looking for star power and are also waiting for the candidates to weed themselves out. They don't want to support a candidate this early who might crumble under pressure like Howard Dean or become caught in a scandal like Gary Hart.

I hope the 2006 election was a good lesson for our party. I am glad the American right wing voter responded by voting for someone else or not voting at all, and letting Democrats control Congress. In the long run this was the best lesson for our right wing politicians and elitist media to learn.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

LEGALIZE STREET DRUGS PART II

The recent deaths of James Brown and economist Milton Friedman have prompted me to write another blog entry on our fruitless War on Drugs. These two deaths reveal two of the worst aspects of the Right Wing. First, their inconsistency over their drug policy. They let wealthy drug addicts check into rehab centers while they send poor addicts to prison. Second, their inconsistency over small government capitalism. They claim to want small, unobtrusive government, except when it comes to law enforcement. Let's talk first about Friedman.

The late Milton Friedman, a Nobel Prize winning economist who saved the world from Keynesian economics, was against the War on Drugs. He wanted street drugs legalized. If you are not familiar with Friedman, he is the economic demigod of the Right Wing who could have written the 5th Gospel for them. They worshipped every word that came out of his mouth except for his libertarian views on street drugs. I guess they think this was the one peccadillo that they would allow him. But he was not being kooky on his drug policy. He was merely being consistent with his view of economics. The War on Drugs, as we are currently fighting it, is not a war against drugs. It is a war against the economic laws of supply and demand. No one has ever defeated the law of supply and demand over the long run. Just ask the Soviets. If you reduce the supply of anything (In this case by making it illegal), the price will go up. In the case of street drugs, the price has risen so high that the obscene profits have turned street criminals into ruthless, violent criminals who are willing to kill anybody, risk jail time, and risk their own death in a gang war slaying to make easy money. Why should a poor kid on the streets stay in high school, graduate, and start at the bottom rung of an honest job if he can join a drug empire and move up quickly just by being ruthless?

Right Wingers also seem to lack and understanding of cause and effect. Our neighborhoods have always had street drugs, but were not always so violent. We have always had gang wars and crime, but just when did it become epidemic? Hmmm? Maybe in the early 70s? What spurred the rise of the Crips and Bloods? Perhaps it was the first incarnation of the War on Drugs started by President Nixon. When did our streets become full-fledged battlegrounds where police often fear to tread? Maybe it was in the mid-80s when President Reagan started the second incarnation of the War on Drugs? The law has led to more violence, not vice-versa. The criminals become more violent and more powerful when the government restricts the supply of drugs and raises the prices. Laws aimed at protecting us are making us targets. My life and your life are probably worth less than a handful of rock cocaine.

I AM NOT FOR PERSONAL DRUG USE. I am just against solutions that don't work and make the problem worse.

Do you need further examples of how useless the current War on Drugs is? This war has given us the highest incarceration rate in the world (many of which are nonviolent drug offenders). That means higher tax rates to support the police, courts, and prisons. Our slim law resources are being wasted on nonviolent crime. Our police departments have become over-militarized with aggressive military SWAT tactics that terrorize neighborhoods as they come to kick open your door, based on the word of a junkie who is trying to get a plea bargain. Our private property is seized through blatantly unconstitutional drug forfeiture laws. We are more subject to random acts of street violence. This is the collateral damage factor of this war. Our border officials have been corrupted. And we are financing international terrorism in South America and Central Asia (Taliban and Al-Qaeda).

I used to believe in the War on Drugs because I am a die hard conservative. I used to think of it in political terms as a war battle between liberals and conservatives. But it isn't. It is a battle between those who understand economics and those who don't. You cannot defeat the laws of supply and demand. Using drugs is bad and putting people in prison for it is worse. And the former does not stop the latter. Conservatives claim they prefer a small, non-interfering government but they love the huge government mechanism that is the War on Drugs. They get amnesia over basic economic theory and a non-obtrusive government when it comes to this emotional battle against street drugs. It is truly hard to understand. They fight against wasteful programs such as welfare because it does not work, but they turn a blind eye to the billions wasted on the War on Drugs. Like it or not, street drugs are a part of our culture and the recreational drug users are the main supporters of street gangs and international terrorists. Not the hardcore street junkie that the laws go after.

It may seem like I am recommending that we surrender in the war against gangs and terrorists, but that is not our enemy. We are fighting the laws of economics. We have a choice of staying the course on the War on Drugs and giving obscene profits to gang members and the Taliban, or legalizing the drugs and sending tax money to our own government. It is time to stop fighting this problem and try solving it. The war cannot be won the way it is currently being fought. Spray down coca fields in Columbia, and they pop up in Peru. Put defoliants on poppies in Afghanistan and they pop up in Iran. Burn marijuana fields in California and they pop up in Kentucky. Go after cocaine in this country and they invent crack. Limit the selling of antihistamines in drug stores so rednecks will stop building meth labs and Mexicans find a cheaper way to make it. It is fruitless. None of these measures have ever had much of an affect on drug use.

So let's talk about James Brown, and while we are at it we can throw Elvis into the pile too. President Reagan named the drug addict James Brown to his Council Against Drugs. Huh? A drug addict is appointed by the president to join an anti-drug council? Elvis Presley was appointed by President Nixon to be a federal-agent-at-large in the War on Drugs. Two presidents appoint two known drug addicted celebrities to help in the War on Drugs. That is pure insanity. Do you think there is a double standard here? I am a conservative and I do not use the words "class warfare" loosely. That is the cry of the leftist. But this is certainly classism. If Rush Limbaugh breaks the law and abuses legal drugs he checks himself into a toney drug clinic and comes out 30 days later as a reformed hero that we should offer hugs to. If Billy Bob breaks the law and uses illegal drugs he goes to a hellish prison and comes out 5 years later as a hardened ex-con whom we give only suspicion. The rich and powerful abuse drugs in this country and give each other a wink and a nod. Then they scream for more police to arrest the poor who are abusing the same types of drugs. And our politicians, many who are currently users and abusers of legal drugs, and former users of illegal drugs (at least I hope), go right along with them and create more bad laws. Just to say they are doing something for their next re-election.

End the war on drugs and make our schools and streets safer. We did it with alcohol and the brewers and distillers aren't pushing their product in the schools. Regulate the sale of these drugs to ensure the quality, and tax the sale to bring more revenue to the government and less profit to the gangsters. Reduce our prison population and let the courts prosecute violent offenders instead of rushing them through a strained system with a plea bargain.

Legalizing street drugs will probably lead to more use. But we can set public policies that help discourage the addiction, much like we do with alcohol. The users will have a safe product, we will be safer on our streets, the size of our government and tax burden will shrink (well, at least the potential is there), and drug profits would go to businessmen instead of the Taliban.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

TIME TO LEGALIZE PROSTITUTION

While on my short sabbatical I re-read some of my old posts. One that caught my attention was about legalizing street drugs. I know the dangers of those drugs and I am personally against their use, however I believe the solution, the so-called "War on Drugs," has made the problem worse, not better. And one thing that really irks me is that the conservative ideologues know that their solution is not working and continue to support the war just so they can take the moral high road on the issue. That is the definition of liberalism to me: Your solution to the problem does not work, in fact it is making the problem worse, but it shows you care, so you keep using it.

This same approach is taking with prostitution in most states. We are morally against it so we prosecute it as a crime in order to show our moral outrage. The war on prostitution makes the problem worse but we feel we have to fight it to show that we are a decent and good people. This is silly and it is killing people. But moralists go to bed every night with the feeling that they are on the right side of the issue.

I am a conservative Christian and I am against prostitution, but that doesn't stop me from seeing the futility of having government-imposed morality on a victimless crime (If the prostitute is underage, or forced into the profession, that is a different crime and it should be punished severely.). In its simplest form prostitution is a voluntary exchange of goods, money for sex. Once the government starts criminalizing this exchange, the market is forced underground and this creates crime and victims. The women are terrorized by pimps and abused by johns who know that the women have few legal avenues for protection. They are lawbreakers themselves and cannot always report the crime. Even worse, since they are usually on the fringes of society, law enforcement will not use up a lot of their limited resources to protect them.

Prostitution has always been a part of society and always will be. If we legalize it, it can be regulated and taxed. Part of the tax money can be used for counseling for the prostitutes if they have a drug addiction or they need some help getting out of the business. Government oversight will lead to a heavily regulated industry. This means less risk of killer diseases and more protection for the women from johns and pimps. Government regulation will tend to raise the market price for prostitutes and this will send some of the business underground, but on a whole it will be a much safer industry. It will also free up the over-burdened resources of our courts, jails, police departments, and emergency rooms.

If you doubt my salvation as a Christian based on my opinion of this issue, and you are morally outraged over prostitution just remember that you were probably a fornicator at some point in your life and you shouldn't make such a harsh judgment on this issue. And if you were ever divorced for reasons other than the narrow rationale defined in the Bible and you remarried, than you are also an adulterer. You might be both. You could keep good company with prostitutes.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Bullets on Conservatives

Since 1994, the "conservative republicans" have had everything go their way. The internet has broken the liberal mainstream media's chokehold on news. They have a voice on cable television. They own talk radio. Unions are disappearing and school choice is making headway. We elected them into the house, senate and presidency. So what do they do? They start acting like free spending big government liberal democrats. They are all a bunch of phonies. They have no principals and have been seduced by power.

In late April, Republican Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist introduced us to a Republican bill that included a $100 rebate check for all Americans to offset the high price of gasoline. REPUBLICANS DREAMT THIS ONE UP! This is straight out of the liberal playbook. "Let us show you how much we care. It won't make a real difference, but it shows we care." Do you think the Republicans have been in power for too long? I bet these idiots actually believe that this is a good idea. This stinks on so many levels.

Tom Delay, former House Republican Leader, is another example of blind political power. Though much to his credit, he did resign for the sake of the party. He was a political genius in the 90s when no one heard of him. He helped the welfare bill and he helped impeach President Clinton. But look what happened when the Republicans gained all that power. We got the Education Bill in 2001, the Farm Bill in 2002, the Medicare Bill in 2003, McCain-Feingold, a failure to address Social Security reform, more pork and earmarks, and ultimately the political corruption scandal involving Jack Abramoff. His own staff was involved in this and he thinks it is just part of a witch hunt to get him.

Here is a list of Republican representatives who ran on self-imposed term limits and then broke their promise because they learned how self-important they really were

Barbara Cubin (WY)
Jeff Flake (AZ)
Gil Gutknecht (MN)
Frank LoBiondo (NJ)
Mark Souder (IN)
Zach Wamp (TN)
George Nethercutt (WA) no longer serving

There are others who ran on term limits and technically kept their promise by becoming senators. Ooh, aren't they principled.

Jim DeMint (SC)
John Thume (SD)
Tom Coburn (OK) This guy actually wrote a book between terms entitled "Breach of Trust: How Washington Turns Outsiders into Insiders." I spoke once about liberals being so outrageous that they were parodies of themselves. Now look at Senator Coburn.

At least the left is consistent when they say they like big government. The right says they are for small government but once they get into power they are all for big government. This is called Potomac Fever.

I'm not a huge Pat Buchanan fan but he is right on more times than not.-"Every great cause, said longshoreman-philosopher Eric Hoffer, begins as a movement, degenerates into a business and ends up as a racket. So it went with the labor and civil-rights movements. And so it goes with the conservative movement and the Republican "revolution," for which Jack Abramoff is mirror and metaphor. To influence the 535 members who decide where the trillions are spent and how the power is used, 35,000 lobbyists prowl the halls of the Senate and House office buildings and Capitol. Former Cabinet and sub-Cabinet officers, congressional representatives, senators, White House aides and congressional staffers endlessly work ex-colleagues to influence decisions on behalf of clients. No company is too corrupt, and no regime has so unsavory a reputation on human rights, that it cannot find, for a fat-enough fee, a famous friend at court." Patrick Buchanan

About a year ago Laura Bush gave a speech at the annual White House Correspondents' Association dinner. I thought she made some sophomoric jokes that were beneath the dignity of the First Lady. But I moved on with life and forget about it the next day. Do you remember the "moral outrage" of some of the conservative opinion writers? I just have to wonder where their hearts are and why they are so anxious to show us their high principles.

FOX news sells itself as being fair and balanced. We need FOX news as a counter balance to the major networks in CNN, but it is neither fair nor balanced.

I listen to a lot of talk radio. I get tired of listening to a lot of right-wingers telling me that they are doting parents. How could they be? The world of celebrity makes them absentee parents. They have their regular job, guest appearances on other shows, they write books, they go on book tours, they tape commercials, they have side jobs writing editorials, they support charities, they have their mandatory "meet and greets," speaking engagements, etc. They are everywhere. They are not home with their kids. Kids need your time.

I don't believe pornography is a good idea. But I often wonder about those who take a militant stance about it. What personal issues are they dealing with? Their own temptation? If we are going to reduce it (It will never go away) we have to take a healthy approach. I'm not sure what that would be, but showing your moral outrage about it won't help. And trying to put government in charge of it won't help. It is a slippery slope. Where do you draw the line? Most people would agree snuff films, pedophilia, bestiality, etc. should be strictly off limits. But what about your run of the mill porn movie, soft porn movies, nudity in Hollywood, mainstream magazines such as Playboy, lad magazines, fitness magazines, sports magazines, cable TV, network TV, ads in your newspaper, billboards, calendars, bathing suits at the beach? Everything is getting racier and racier.

Remember when President Bush signed McCain-Feingold? He stated that he would sign it though he had doubts about its constitutionality. WHAT!!!???

Tom Delay and Rush Limbaugh both smiled for their mug shots so that their political enemies could not capitalize on the propaganda. That political move is straight out of the John Gotti playbook.

One of the few things that President Reagan did that disappointed me was presiding over the decision to make Martin Luther King Day a federal holiday. Do you realize that he is the only American with a holiday named specifically for him? MLK Jr. was a great American, but not the greatest.

We all recognize that we have a problem with our judicial branch. They are legislating from the bench. So what does each side (democrat, republican) do to fix it? Nothing. Their solution is to try to name as many of their own judges as possible.

If we truly are a government of the people by the people and for the people, then our legislatures need to be under the same set of rules. The same healthcare rules, the same retirement rules, etc. There should be no legislative perks. I don't mind if you pay them well because they have great responsibility and they work hard. But they need to be under the same set of rules as the rest of us. Once you start with your own set of rules you lose contact with the people you represent. The more isolated they are from the common man, the more dumb laws they pass.

I read The DaVinci Code. I am a Christian and I don't agree with its premise, but it was a good book. I don't think I will see the movie, but I'm certainly not going to picket the movie theatre because I think the movie is heretical to my Christian beliefs. There are groups of Christians out there who are ready to boycott, raise up lawsuits, and even start hunger strikes over the movie. Despite the evidence that such boycotts only increase the popularity of such movies. They do this to showcase their moral outrage. Isn't that twisted? Their boycott actions will create controversy and cause more people to see the movie but they are going to do it anyway to prove to us that they have been morally offended.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

TIME TO LEGALIZE STREET DRUGS

The bottom line up front. Street drugs are dangerous and there is no place for them in our society. But, the solution (the War on Drugs) has made the problem worse, not better. We have too many Americans who think just fighting the problem will solve it, and this allows them to take the moral high road and sleep comfortably at night.

I am not a street drug user. I used tobacco over a 12-year period. Today my drug use is confined to seasonal allergy medicine, a daily caffeine habit, and the rare alcoholic drink. Yes, tobacco, caffeine and alcohol are drugs. Alcohol is just as intoxicating as street drugs. Nicotine is more addictive than some street drugs. Caffeine is becoming stronger and stronger.

I am not trying to promote street drug use. They create medical problems in your body, destroy your moral sense and ruin those around you. I have no pity for users and I don't buy the argument that addiction is a disease. The government should discourage the use of these drugs, but not prohibit. Prohibition did not work with alcohol and does not work with street drugs. Prohibition is responsible for the violence on the streets. It has restricted the supply making the price high enough for the suppliers to engage in violent criminal behavior and risk jail time.

Over its history, prohibition has cost us trillions of dollars. Trillions for the cost of bloated government bureaucracies, direct foreign aid, military operations in South America, border surveillance, domestic surveillance, prison construction and operation, court costs, medical expenses, the creation of local para-military police forces, property crime costs, etc. These costs ripple through many parts of our society.

If you are a conservative and you like to remind the liberals that the trillions of dollars they have spent on public assistance has not made a difference, please take an honest look at your sacred moral war on drugs. Like welfare, prohibition exacerbates the problem that it is trying to solve. We criticize liberals for showcasing their compassion by supporting a failing program like welfare while we showcase our tough on crime stance by supporting a failing war on drugs.

Prohibition is a violation of your privacy. I realize the Constitution does not give us the expressed right to privacy, but there is an implied one in our culture (Abortionists can't use this argument. You are dealing with another life.). The government should not get involved in your personal behavior unless you put others at risk (e.g. driving while under the influence). The government has used the war on drugs to confiscate private property (asset forfeiture). The government has used the war on drugs to monitor your personal finances (money laundering laws) and confiscate more taxes. The government hates hard-to-track cash transactions and passes laws disguised as anti-drug laws to try to regulate cash transactions. I should be able to enter and leave this country with a suitcase full of money without being investigated. It's my money.

SOME HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES-Street drugs bring health problems, but how widespread are they? Drug abuse destroys the lives of some users but how big of a societal problem is it? Think about the latest hysteria you have heard over methamphetamines. It sounds like every teenager in the country will be hooked on crystal meth by 2010. Sure, meth addiction and meth labs are a public hazard, but haven't we heard this story before? The last scourge in our society was Oxycontin (hillbilly heroin) in the 90s. Before that it was crack cocaine in the 80s. I remember growing up in the late 60s and early 70s fearing my older brothers would become addicted to LSD, heroin or angel dust. Remember, "Reefer Madness?" That was a movie made in the 30s about the dangers of marijuana use. They exaggerated the effects of marijuana that wasn't even close to the potency of the stuff that is out there now. Kids were turned into insane murderers who listened to- Are you ready for this? -Jazz music! Do you think there was a racist overtone there?

Race and immigration have historically been at the root of drug wars. Marijuana was originally a border issue with Mexico. Narcotics regulations came in the early 20th century after we started getting involved in Asian affairs. Cocaine, the drug of choice of our 19th century white intellectuals, was included in the narcotics regulating Harrison Act of 1914 because of stories coming out of the south about "cocaine crazed Negroes" attacking white women. Look at cocaine enforcement in the 70s and 80s. When it was the drug of choice of rich white rock stars, celebrities and politicians, nobody really cared. But when the affordable and more powerful crack cocaine hit the black community in the 80s, law enforcement and politicians started a new war on the drug.

Along with racism we have to discuss classism (No, I am not a liberal, I just hate inconsistencies.). If a rich person becomes addicted to Oxycontin and uses his wealth to buy it illegally, we use the euphemism, "prescription drug abuse." Once they are caught, its group hugs for everybody at a tony $100,000-a-month rehab clinic. If a poor person becomes addicted to it and illegally attains the drug, we call it, "hillbilly heroin addiction" and slam him into a taxpayer supported $1,000-a-month prison. The rich victim leaves the clinic after 30 days, writes a book, appears on Oprah, and is publicly admired for overcoming his demons. The redneck gets 5-10 years of hard time and a felony record. I am not into class envy. I'm just trying to be consistent. Though I am a Rush Limbaugh fan, I don't like seeing addicts like him and Brett Favre being treated differently than addicts like Billy Bob and Cletus.

Drug enforcement has also led to the creation of over-zealous, over-armed, militarized local police forces. These SWAT teams are necessary for drug busts, armed robberies, hostage situations, first response for terrorists, etc. But as their presence becomes more standard, their costs must be justified and they will be used for less dangerous routine arrests. These officers are the more aggressive members of your local police force. They are better trained and better equipped. Don't you think this might make them more anxious for a confrontation? I have no problem with them aggressively confronting armed felons. These are street animals that need to be dealt with harshly. But SWAT teams that are being used for less potentially lethal activities are more likely to escalate the violence.

INCONSISTENCIES-We already discussed how alcohol, cigarettes and caffeine are drugs. But how many of our war on drug warriors "experimented" with drugs in their youth? "Experimented" is the coward's euphemism for "used." At some point they realized that their habit was counterproductive and quit. This left them with a self-righteous attitude about the hardcore addicts.

How many of these travelers of the moral high road are abusing or relying on prescription medication? Three out of four of my closest neighbors' wives are on some type of prescription medication for mental disorders. This is anecdotal information, but if you looked at my neighborhood it would appear that the middle class is enjoying a Huxleysian Soma society while the poor are shooting up street drugs.

How many of our children are doped up on Ritalin and other psychotropic drugs? We educate our children in schools about illegal drug use and explain (rightly) how it won't make their lives easier, and then we shove prescription meds down their throats to calm them down and try to make our lives easier.

PROHIBITION JUST DOESN'T WORK-We have tried to attack the demand side of the drug problem. Drug arrests are growing each year, courts are backlogged, and our prison population is growing larger. There are treatment centers, education programs for school children, public service announcements, etc. But the demand is still there.

We have tried to attack the supply side. We have directly assisted in military operations to try to eradicate coca production in one part of South America only to see it spring up in others. We have tried to wipe out the opium crops in Afghanistan only to see more farms gathering in Iran and Pakistan. We have tried eradicating marijuana in California only to see production move to Oregon and Washington. We have cracked down on the supply of the chemicals needed to produce amphetamines in the US only to see the production shift to Mexico. We have cracked down on supply routes along the Mexican border only to see an increase through the Caribbean or Canada. It is one huge international shell game.

People have used mind-altering drugs since the beginning of time for pain, sexual gratification, relaxation, religion, escapism, etc. Prohibition has never stopped this and merely drives up the price making the criminal suppliers richer and more likely to engage in violent and illegal behavior. If we legalize we will need fewer prisons, fewer police, and we can reduce some foreign aid. The taxpayers should save billions in tax dollars as the size of the government shrinks. But maybe our politicians don't want this to happen. Maybe they want us to perpetually believe that we are on the verge on winning the war on drugs. And maybe they don't want to give up one of their proven vote getters, a tough on drugs campaign stance.

Legalization will be followed by regulation and this will protect the consumer by standardizing the quantity and quality. We currently do this with other medication. This means fewer overdoses, fewer exploding garage labs, and a decrease in medical costs. The same thing happened when prohibition was repealed and poisonous bathtub gin, radiator alcohol, and exploding whiskey stills went away. The trick is not to over-regulate (make production to expensive) and force the industry underground. Taxation will be the next step and that will bring in revenue. Again we should resist the urge to over-tax and create black markets. Taxes should be used as a way to discourage use and raise revenue. The revenue can be used for treatment facilities for abuse. We should ban advertising, and aggressively pursue drugged drivers, anybody providing drugs to children, and anybody who commits a crime while under the influence.

Illegal immigration should subside a little bit. There will be fewer mules moving back and forth over the border. National and local resources that went to counter drug activities can be moved to border security. Lower prices will also mean less money for terrorists in South America and Afghanistan.

There will be a whole host of other benefits from legalization. This includes direct benefits like less property crime committed by addicts and more research on the medical benefits of some of these street drugs. We might even see new types of industry created.

Don't expect this to happen anytime soon. Social change is always slow, especially when the politician is committing political suicide. We could start out small with limited legalization in limited areas. Drug use and drug price will initially go up in those areas as the stoners hear about it and move there creating more demand, but the market will eventually stabilize. Certain employer like the military, public safety jobs, factories with dangerous machines, school workers, etc. can still prohibit use. If you want to use these drugs, you will have to find work elsewhere. Some employers may encourage responsible drug use. I prefer a truck driver who is hyped up on a little speed versus one who is a little drowsy.

Alcohol prohibition did not work and gave us organized crime and the Kennedy dynasty. Drug prohibition has not worked and given us the Crips, the Bloods and MS-13. Why don't we learn? We have to stop fighting this problem and learn to manage it.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

THE RIGHT WING IS NOT ALWAYS RIGHT- So those of us on the right have to be on guard and not become sophists. If you are passionate about something, you tend to be very credulous, and offer blind faith to the side that you support. This also leaves you with a blind hatred for the other side as well as blindness to your own inconsistencies.

Here is a partial list of things the right does that irks me. I will be developing most of these ideas in future posts.

MORALITY- The right claims all of the virtue associated with Christianity and patriotism, but they often publicly fail. One tires of hearing about our leaders with drug and alcohol problems, adultery, divorce, acting as absentee parents, political corruption, etc. We are not perfect, but if you are going to be a leader or spokesperson for the party of values, you'd better act it and hold yourself to a higher standard.

BROKEN POLITICAL PROMISES AND PRINCIPLES-What have conservatives accomplished since the right wing revolution of 1994? Sure, I understand that government change is glacial, but what is the leadership doing? Historically the right has stood for smaller government, lower taxes, Social Security reform, Welfare reform, being tough on crime, a strong defense, anti abortion, school reform, and school prayer. What have we accomplished? Limited tax cuts, limited welfare reform, a pre-emptive strike on Islamic Jihad, and stronger jail sentencing. That's a start, but we have moved backward in so many other areas. The military has shrunk, the size of the government has increased (Department of homeland security, Medicaid Bill, Education Reform), our schools and the immigration situation are getting worse, and abortion has fallen off the political radar screen. Where is the leadership on all these issues? It seems like part of the right wing plan was to build a consensus with the liberals. You don't need to build a consensus when you are in charge. Margaret Thatcher defined consensus as lack of leadership. They should listen to the Iron Lady. It appears that once the conservatives assumed power they forgot all of their principles and just dangled a few carrots in front of us and then decided to focus on maintaining their own political power by passing the blatantly unconstitutional Campaign Finance Reform.

FEDERALISM- I listed federalism separately from the other political issues. I'm not sure why, maybe because I want to talk about it a little bit more in depth. Federalism is a way to keep government smaller and more efficient. The point is to have each level of government (local, state, federal) stay out of each other's business. The lower down the scale that a problem gets handled the more responsive the government. Politicians at the federal level like to get into state and local business. When it comes time for reelection you will hear them pushing all sorts of crime and education issues that really should be reserved for the states. Did you know that carjacking is a federal offense? Don't you think there are already enough state laws dealing with car theft, kidnapping and gun crime? What about drug laws? Shouldn't each state decide which drugs to make illegal and what the punishment should be? Do you really think that a Washington bureaucrat knows how best to educate a child in Montana?

The conservatives have traditionally been behind federalism as a way to limit the size of government. Two relatively recent issues dealing with conservatives and federalism really got my goat; gay marriage and Terry Schiavo. State government should have handled both of these issues. But the conservatives wanted the federal government to get involved just so they can show that they are the party that stands for preserving life and traditional marriage. So damn the IXth and Xth Amendments.

WAR ON DRUGS-This is pointless and stupid and not working and a tremendous waste of resources. It has created more problems than it has solved. You can't complain about billions of dollars being thrown into the money pit of public assistance and simultaneously cling to this sacred cow. Mend it or end it.

SAUDI ARABIA-In the mid-70s we reacted to the oil embargoes by cozying up to the world's biggest oil producer. We made an agreement to send them F-16s and western technology and they promised to keep the price of oil down. Twenty years later we started learning the true cost of this pact with the devil. The hard- core religionists in Saudi Arabia decided they didn't like the Royal Saud's relationship with the western infidel who is also a friend of Israel. So they turned to their 18th century Wahabbism (catapulting the Saudis 8 centuries ahead of most Muslims) and started looking for answers. Their solution was to start recruiting terrorists from a pool of bored, rich sons of Saudi millionaires. This is one of the chief sources of worldwide terrorism. It is not the Ba'athist of Iraq and Syria.

While the war on terrorism toils on American politicians turn a blind eye to the Saudis who have learned to use their oil money to polish their image. They fund the Council on American Islamic Relations which is merely a spin machine that uses political correctness to silence anybody who criticizes Arabs. They are also some of the biggest donors to our former presidents' libraries. Feed the egos of former presidents and you will have lifelong friends. This has been very effective. You can tell that their propaganda is successful when you hear President Bush make a hopelessly idiotic statement such as, "Islam is a religion of Peace."

Hopefully one of the pretexts for the invasion of Iraq was to station US forces on the Saudi border. Have you noticed that we haven't had any additional 9/11 styled attacks? And with our forces in Afghanistan this also means that we have US forces surrounding the Saudi's retarded Persian cousins in Iran, another chief source of world terrorism.

DODGING THE DRAFT-A lot of our conservative leaders and spokesmen today, where draft dodgers in Vietnam. I don't buy the chickenhawk argument, it's not logical, but dodging the draft does tell you something about a man's character.

GOVERNMENT SPONSORED GAMBLING-This is a pet peeve of mine. I am not a gambler, though I have bought an occasional lottery ticket (2x a year?), and have gone to one or two casinos. I believe that gambling should be legal. If you are stupid enough to throw your money away, go ahead. But the government should not be involved. They should not have casinos or riverboats. They shouldn't even have a lottery. Even if the lottery is used to fund education.

There's more, but this post is getting too long.