Mexico's Fox to OK drug decriminalization law

[rodeodance]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060502/ts_nm/mexico_drugs_... ;_ylt=ApV9xNJSPM0LQPYbmvxJK7ms0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3b2NibDltBHNlYwM3MTY-
Reuters
Mexico's Fox to OK drug decriminalization law

2 hours, 13 minutes ago

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexico's president will approve a law that decriminalizes possession of small amounts of marijuana, cocaine and other drugs to concentrate on fighting violent narco gangs, the government said on Tuesday.

President Vicente Fox will not oppose the bill, passed by senators last week, presidential spokesman Ruben Aguilar told reporters, despite likely tensions with the United States.

"The president is going to sign that law, there would be no objection," he said. "It appears to be a good law and an advance in combating narcotics trafficking."

The approval of the legislation, passed earlier by the lower house of Congress, surprised Washington, which counts on Mexico's support in its war against gangs that move massive quantities of cocaine, heroin, marijuana and methamphetamines through Mexico to U.S. consumers.

[ck4829]

1. Mexico has the right idea

[OKthatsIT]

51. I wouldn't trust anything FOX proposes...he's too friendly with NWO

ALWAYS rethink and outthink the Fox.

[madmark]

2. good, get rid of these ridiculous laws brick by brick

[Caution]

3. And another country is suddenly more free than the US.

I used to love the idea of being a "beacon of freedom"

[sweetheart]

10. tell me about it...

"beacon of prisons"

[Vidar]

4. Applauding Mexico, hoping that they join with Chavez & Morales.

[0007]

11. I think its in the cards

[Demobrat]

5. OMG. How on earth will they ever

keep their prisons full now?

[redqueen]

6. I wonder how many law enforcement officials here applaud that move.

Wish they'd speak up a little louder.

[Asgaya Dihi]

54. Some are trying

There's a group of law enforcement that are shouting it from the rooftops where they can get someone to listen, the problem is getting groups of people to talk to in the first place or the attention of the press. Hell, they had one guy ride a horse from coast to coast last summer trying to get attention from the press and local interviews along the way.

Their web page is a bit out of date, they now have over 100 speakers instead of the number listed, all they need are places willing to sit down and listen to them for a while. You can hear some of their past work on the web page, or read a few examples of where they've been printed. It's a start, more will come as they get used to the idea.

LEAP: Law Enforcement Against Prohibition - Homepage
http://www.leap.cc/

[redqueen]

61. Yes.. I've heard of them.

Sad that it's so hard to get the attention of the 'liberal media'.

[enid602]

7. cartels

This is a great start, but I think Fox's greatest obstacle will not be US resistance, but rather resistance from the powerful Mexican drug cartels. They're too entrenched.

[splat]

8. Why would cartels resist? More customers! n/t

[enid602]

9. from the article . . .

"approve a law that decriminalizes possession of small amounts of marijuana, cocaine and other drugs to concentrate on fighting violent narco gangs . . .' You fuck with those folks, you're dead. The days when the Mexican Gov't could successfully fight the drug cartels are long over.

[redqueen]

62. Really?

I thought Italy finally managed to end the reign of the mafia... why can't Mexico do the same?

[callous taoboy]

12. I wonder if it will be like Amsterdam

with hash bars and such.


MMMMMMMMMM.... hash bars......

[superconnected]

13. I'm against what he's doing.

I don't want people high on pot, or cocain on the road driving. Sure they will anyway, but at least if they get pulled over, they get arrested and taken off the road.

I don't trust the mental integrity of people pro drugs like cocain.

I bet this really comes back and bites Foxx in the arse. I feel sorry for the population having to deal with these people on drugs - at work, in their businesses etc. Now it will be legal. They just built in a worse drug problem for their nation.

[sweetheart]

14. You presume that legal means "more"

Your presumption is typical of many folks who don't understand
that legallization is a first step towards making drugs
unhip and less popular, a first step towards promoting self control
and individual responsibility as the *ONLY* way to overcome
personal addiction issues.

As a person more close up to the drugs war than yourself,
this move will cut the drugs usage, and provide a safer
climate for the civil life of the average citizen.

Illegal has not worked for half a century, why you suddenly
think it works, given the rote failure we live with today, is
somewhat suprising.

[superconnected]

15. Can you please cite studies where legalizing drugs makes for

less use of the drugs?

[Lance_Boyle]

19. can you cite a study showing that prohibition reduces crime?

or has any impact on driving-related or work-related fatalities involving drugs?

I'll be waiting over here with the chirping crickets...

[superconnected]

21. I'll take that for a no, you can't cite studies where legalizing

drugs reduces drug usage.

I'm sure there are plenty of studies where legalizing it increases the usage.

I'm also sure that once it's legal, advertising itself will help increase the usage.

[SYNERCHOSIS]

30. Please cite them then.

It works both way, don't assume something to be true without checking it out first. If you want to know which is correct use google.

Stupid Drug War Propaganda!

[hexola]

34. The study has just begun...

stay tuned...

[sweetheart]

24. Alcohol prohibition stands as example

We have a historic case study that shows that the criminal
problem was put to rest by ending that prohibition and
focusing public resources elsewhere.

http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/miron.prohibition.al...

http://www.cato.org/dailys/3-03-97.html

[redqueen]

63. *crickets*

[SOS]

40. OK

Holland has decriminalized marijuana and medicalized hard drugs. Here is the % of population using in the past year:

Holland

marijuana - 4.5%
cocaine - 0.6%
heroin - 0.1%

USA

marijuana - 10.6%
cocaine - 1%
heroin - 0.2%

In Holland you can walk into a coffee shop and order a joint off the menu. Result? A use rate less than half of the US.

Source: Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, US Department of Health and Human Services
Source: University of Amsterdam, Centre for Drug Research

[redqueen]

64. Thank you!

[Selteri]

43. I can, nice paper argument

First, there has been plenty of time to study it with Amsterdam and Holland where Pot has been Decriminalized and can be purchased in controlled situations as Coffee Shops.

http://www.mapinc.org/lib/limited.pdf

http://www.drugpolicy.org/news/05_04_04dutchdecrim.cfm

http://www.ajph.org/cgi/content/abstract/94/5/836

http://www.mpp.org/adolescents.html

http://www.ucsc.edu/oncampus/currents/97-10-13/reinarma...

http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/152/islandsinthesun...

http://www.cedro-uva.org/lib/cohen.cannabis.html

Here are a few links, feel free to continue to try the argument you are using which is based upon misinformation. The truth is that 1 - Marijuana is less harmful, addictive and inebriating than Alcohol. It has less side affects and does not carry a hang over, it does have medical uses in spite of the crud the FDA claimed on 4/20/06. (If your kid laughs at this irony, search his room)

The truth is that Marijuana is a drug that can be used responsably with less addiction than Caffeine, it does not have a single related death from it's use. Not even Asprin or Alcohol can lay that claim in any 24 hour period.

Decriminalizing Marijuana has not been found to increase the demand for it, but instead has been found to lower the demand among the youth population as it has taken it off the streets if it can be followed up with putting a legal method of obtaining the Marijuana to ensure purity, quality and control over the substance to insure that the user is not getting something doctored with other drugs or preservatives that are dangerous to their bodies.

On to other drugs, I'm not so sure about some of the more dangerous and highly addictive drugs being decriminalized without some sort of back up treatment program being made available for the citizenry to help handle that drugs like Heroine, Crack and PCP can have a real and detrimental affects on the people who use them and the surrounding socitial structure. Some drugs are really too dangerous to be something that kids can get a hold of though, decrminalization would make that somewhat easier though some drugs are too easy to make to keep out of the hands of Kids that want them! Throwing kids and adults in Jail for possessing these drugs just puts Addicts with other Addicts in an environment that will teach them to be sneakier addicts and teach them a criminal occupation on the side. Further studies have shown that the best way to tread people who have and use drugs isn't jail, it's treatment. Criminalization only serves to help one thing, fill the prisons with people. Putting them into Treatment would put them into an environment aimed toward healing the issues that caused them to use in the first place rather than just paying someone to babysit them.

One final arguement for decrminalization is this - America was founded on the Principles of Freedom and Liberty not the ability of people to impose their views upon others based upon patent propoganda.

To really open your eyes to how far this attack on a plant comes from, read The Emporer Wears No Clothing. Pay Particular attention to historical medical uses, Henry Ford's Plastic Car in 1937 and it's use as a biofuel.

-------------------------------------

To kill another paper argument that the anti-drug crusaders love to use is drugged driving - It happens already, it happens every night with drunk drivers and with drivers who are hopped up on anything from LSD, PCP, Coke, Heroine, Crack, Methadone, Alcohol, Marijuana or Opium and any other drug I failed to mention. This is a paper argument ebcause it will happen either way, the solution is to make there a punishment for driving under the influence. The immediate punishment should be a loss of driving privilidges for not being a responsable driver to be followed with an assessment of addiction symptoms to determine if the person needs to go through treatment. Being still responsable for their actions they should also be required to return to society for their actions, possibly lose access to that vehicle; either by having it imposed into storage or in the cases of extreme offenders banning them from owning, renting or operating a vehicle. Jail time being for those who commited other offenses while under the influence or not, simply make the crime the crime.

[redqueen]

65. Well done!

[Selteri]

76. Thank you, I tried rather hard not to come across with anything more than

The truth. It's so much easier to remember the truth than have to sort lies after all.

One thing we should all remember - Progress is not pain free, it hurts to learn a lesson sometimes and we live in a dynamic world. Regression and Stasis are temporary conditions that are part of growth though they never gain much past learning a hard lessons the second or more times around. As we continue to progress toward the future we must remain vigilant from both the potential dangers from our progress as well as to remember to look behind us occasionally so that those things that endanger us from our past do not attack us unaware. Prohibition, Like George Bush, are examples of why we not only must learn from the present, but must look to the many examples of the past to say that we cannot allow these mistakes to continue to be repeated in a loud voice of unison.

We must learn to use these steps together so that we not allow this lesson be repeated for our children and their children.
1 - Learn to recognize the signs and take back the vital rights of a healthy Democracy with Liberty and EQUAL Justice for all! We all benefit by learning this skill that is best known as critical thinking, put bluntly, everyone needs to learn to question authority. With today's internet there is no excuse for not being able to say, "I've looked at it from at least two sides for the story and after a personal judgment I think the truth is closer to..." It's a simple statement that simply says that if you really care enough to have an option about the story that you bothered to research it a little rather than let some person tell you what you should know.

2 - Remembering the value of the worker in America by increasing the minimum wage to a full living wage, ensuring health care for all citizens willing to contribute to society by paying their taxes and other contributions that all citizens make to the community. Passing laws that make this country one where it is a right to hire rather than a right to work attitude in how the laws are passed. When the lowest of us are living on wages that are insufficient to live on then none of us are safe.

3 - Immigration Reform shouldn't just be a by-word, it's solutions are amazingly simple yet at the same time an incredibly complex one. To truly reform immigration we must pass first laws that state that the illegal immigrants will be shipped back while their employers will be shipped off to serve some time in a proper way in reflection to how much they did. I mean, a woman hiring an illegal immigrant nanny shouldn't get more than a slap on the wrist in comparison to a company hiring 5000 illegals to work on factory lines after closing up in a city where they displaced 7000 skilled workers rather than retooling and retraining their old workforce would be deserving a bit of hard time in club fed. The next step would be a simple one that would look very much like a line in an old cartoon, after the citizens who are willing to work and not disabled, retired, in training or in any other way looking for an honest income has filled the jobs then that number would become open to a legal immigrant who's skills are able to fill the open set. While this may sound to be an incredibly complicated system it would be worse as bribery would have to be watched for very carefully. To implement a system like this would require that businesses would be willing to register who is working for them on a simple registry and if they are looking for openings that have not been filled and then to somehow find out from the citizens if they might actually be looking for a job. I understand there is no way that could ever happen in a modern society, but I'm sure we can learn how to do this to create a dynamic and growing society that can truly let people in at a rate that could actually both accommodate it's growth and any growing needs as they come without hurting citizens or immigrants.

4 - Educate our children to be competitive, not put them through factory schools so we can turn out good workers. Education has not really changed that much past becoming more designed to try to handle bulk rather that to create Adults. The parents are almost just as much to blame as the schools though, there must be some discipline on the adult level too, they are children, they don't understand and reasoning only works when they are acting reasonably. At School the children need to have a healthy school environment with a class that is small enough for them to get the attention that they need with teachers that can work with them in a way that makes them want to continue to be involved with learning. At home the children must have a home that is stable with some security. If you're going to have the little urchin, you have to take the good and the bad. It isn't easy, but if it was easy, it wouldn't be worth doing it.

5 - Keep the Corporations Down! I'm not talking anti-corporate actions where ford becomes a 30 man show or anything insane like that, I'm stating that we can't have one company that serves 95% of the people because there is no competition because all the competition gets crushed. The country needs to remember that corporations can grow large, but that when a worker makes in one year what a CEO makes before lunch then there is a serious problem happening that needs to be addressed. It doesn't matter how intelligent and good a CEO is, there is no reason they should ever be paid any such absurd amount of money to where the average worker will never see that in their lifetime who works for them. I have no issue if a CEO should make income from the stocks of their company to some tremendous level because they make their business a huge success with their workers. The workers are equally important though as they are what the business has built itself upon just as much. After all, the brain cannot live if the blood does not bring it Oxygen, does it?

6 - Comprehensive environmental reform - No more whining about the answering being 20 years away, we all need to start working with what we have now. It's not very hard, you simply assess, collect and assemble so that you are using the resources that you already have the best you can. THe answer is closer than most people think.

7 - Real legal reform - REturning the laws to Bengt equitable. Our country has created a punishment class with il legalization of drugs. Right now a pedophile will be back out on the streets before someone who was caught with an ounce of marijuana in some States and on the Federal level. In other places we still have laws where people can be arrested for things as far across the field as cross dressing to wearing a shirt that is considered to have a political buyers inside of the state of the Union.

8 - Real political reform - In a real Democracy, the Government is afraid of the PEOPLE - No more need be said.

Of course, this list can continue to go on, thee are always new and more problems, but some of these are surprisingly simple things and others are so drastically needed that we must begin to act and build them in spite of our present government of the corrupt, for the power and liberty and Justice to a select few.

[Lochloosa]

48. Superconnected. Please read the book by Yale professor

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0874775418/qid=1146677...

Steven B. Duke and Albert C. Gross

Americas Longest War

They lay out good reasons for ending prohibition on drugs. And good reasons even that won't work. But, at least we will not be destroying the lives of the majority of recreational drug users.


From Publishers Weekly
The first part of this worthy book by Yale law professor Duke and California lawyer Gross reiterates powerful evidence about the abuse of legal drugs like alcohol, the failure of attempts at prohibition and the links between illegal drugs and our current crime wave. Adding a new layer of argument, the authors detail the costs to our criminal justice system, in which, they maintain, due process is regularly ignored. Duke and Gross make an intriguing case that the cost to individual autonomy posed by the prohibition of drugs is too high and they point out that "almost any common activity produces abusers." Suggesting that reducing the drug supply is impossible and that eliminating demand through treatment and education, though a laudable goal, is equally impossible, the authors offer a sober assessment of the costs and benefits of legalization. Their proposal to legalize selected drugs, including cocaine and heroin, is based on an ultimate aim of "responsible use" akin to the country's policy toward alcohol. Only in the final page, however, do Duke and Gross acknowledge the importance of long-term solutions to the poverty and anomie that make the drug abuse problem in the cities so intractable.

Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Arguing that many of the social and economic costs popularly attributed to drug use are in fact consequences of drug criminalization, Duke and Gross urge a policy of regulated legalization as the best way to minimize the harm drugs cause. Some of this material is familiar, but Duke and Gross marshal statistics and clinical studies effectively, moving from studies of the effects of specific legal and illegal drugs through a review of the historical approaches to drug use and an examination of the cost of prohibiting drugs--in terms of crime, freedom, autonomy, constitutional rights, health, and safety--to an explanation of reasons why the drug war can't succeed ("A `drug-free' society is no more attainable than a `sex-free' society") and a discussion of different forms of legalization. The harm-minimization approach Duke and Gross support emphasizes prevention and education, easy access to treatment, research and use of therapeutic drugs, public health programs to reduce the death and disease, and--like Elliott Currie's Reckoning --recognition that, among the poorest Americans, drug use will remain commonplace until the nation addresses basic issues of poverty, employment, housing, and health care. A clear, heavily documented statement of the argument for declaring peace in the war against drugs. Mary Carroll

[redqueen]

66. Thanks for posting that!

[Lochloosa]

74. Welcome...great read.

[Asgaya Dihi]

57. Yep

Given that prohibition is has been a UN mandate and hard to get around in the past studies are limited, but where nations have found the courage to try it anyway results have sometimes been pretty good. Making things legal is only a start, the rest in in the type of regulation that follows it. Legal just means no prison, it doesn't mean free use. An example of a successful program follows, or the main results of it with heroin. Read the page yourself for the rest of the details and more historical or current examples including in our own country years ago. This was a program limited only to current addicts who were given all the heroin they wanted so they didn't have to steal for it. It worked a lot better than anything we're doing now and the results are solid enough to be worth further exploration.

* Sharply reduced criminal behavior by participants.

* The ability to stabilize many addicts at a low enough level so they can return to normal work. Legal employment rose sharply.

* No overdose deaths among participants in five years.

* Major financial savings in reduced costs for health care and policing.

* Marked decrease in drug use and a small but significant number who progressed to abstinence.

* Homelessness among participants was virtually eradicated.

* The illegal markets were deprived of a portion of their normal customers and profits. But only wide scale expansion could make this a major blow to the cartels.

* Concerns about doses escalating out of control proved to be unfounded, and most participants achieved stable doses in 2 to 4 months.

http://www.dpft.org/heroin.htm

[redqueen]

67. Wonderful!

I love DUers.

[callous taoboy]

18. With your logic I should be drunk on hard booze at home, on the road,

and at work. I should also be needing a cigarette every hour. I crave neither of these drugs at all and can willingly go weeks without a single beer. It's called will power, common sense and self-control. No I don't use illegal drugs except for a puff every now and then when I am with the right people at the right moment. I have zero desire to get invovled with hard drugs- never have, never will and, yes, I know where I could find coke right now. I know where I could get 90 tabs of Oxycontin. No thanks.

[superconnected]

22. Actually that's your faulty logic.

I did not say it would increase drug usage in all cases(ie everyone single person takes drugs). I did say it would increase drug usage.

If alcohol were illegal, do you think most people would drink as much as what they normally do - even if it's very little. Would they really have a drink anyway, if the bar they meet their friends at wasn't serving?

[callous taoboy]

39. Sir, they were mixing up gin in bathtubs during prohibition.

Prohibition does not work! Not only does it not work it puts millions of lives at risk every year. Prohibition is a stupid, stupid idea.

[redqueen]

68. Amen!

We all should know that by now, if not from our experience with prohibition, then from the failed decades-old 'drug war'.

[Selteri]

45. Alcohol consumption increased during prohibition.

While at the same time prices increased and it went underground. The fact is that it's easier to control a substance than to illegalize it. People drank in greater amounts and were also doing it more often because they were doing it in social settings where it was a party for the sole reason to get drunk and enjoy themselves.

After the re-legalization Alcohol had gotten it's hooks so completely into society that it became a primary star in film and society instead of being more in the background as it had been before prohibition - IE Alcohol became more popular for nearly 30 years than it had been before prohibition. More people drank after they added decrminalizing Marijuana - Catching many people off guard who had campaigned against 'The Mexican Death Weed' That they had been shown caused cowboys to kill their bosses and other bastions of purity to turn into evil insane dangerous madmen, to find that it was Cannabis which constituted about 40% of the medicines of the day and made up half of the paper industry and was the paper of choice for long term records.

Marijuana was used medically for before it was put on Prohibition by Harry J Anslinger, the man who wanted to illegalize all drugs but cigarettes and was a main person behind Prohibition.

The list of medicinal uses that were used before prohibition

Back Pain
Migrains
Burns
Nausea
Arthritis
Lung Expectorant (I'm still not completely sure how it was used for this though)

Other drugs have had other medical uses that were just as impoortant, some were illegalized mainly because they were abusable in spite of how well they could work. Others were illegalizerd because of the side affects.

PCP - Great Anethstetic, problem patients got up off the table and attacked the doctors and nurses randomly.

Ketamine - Great Anethstetic, still used with children who are pre-pubescent (About 10-11) in adults it is known to cause severe out of body experiences. Is considered to be a main reason behind a number of OBEs at hospitals for people who didn't really get that near to death.

Ecstacy - Surpsingly enough, it's an amazing Antidepressant that can do a lot of good for people who are suicidally depressed, when made in the right doses. Problem is that some people thought that if 1 35 mg pill made them feel pretty normal and happy that two would make them feel great... they found out that three made them feel like everything felt good no matter what they did.

Methanphetamine - Was the most perscribed medicine in the 1950s.

LSD - Surprisingly enough it's a great drug for Schizophrenics - You give them the right dosage and things go normal to them amazingly well. With the right work it showed terrific results in helping these people lead normal lives better than anything even today. Problem, higher doses are recreationally hallucinagenic and the doses are so amazingly small that one needs a special scale, the microgram, to work with this potent molecule.

The facts are that people abuse and always will abuse something, there are better and more sane ways to control them that will cause less harm to society than straight incarceration for posession.

[No DUplicitous DUpe]

55. But wouldn't there be so much more money for education and treatment?

Making criminals out of a steady percentage of citizens that will choose to use drugs, no matter if they are illegal or not, make no sense. Although I have tried not smoking pot, once, I think...I would have no desire to use, or even try a drug like heroin, if it became decriminalized. So it would not increase my drug use, and I am a user. Do you think people who do no drugs would try them cause you could buy them without fear of jail?
I don't think so.

[SYNERCHOSIS]

31. Does it make you feel safer that people get arrested

for pot no matter if they are driving or not? Do you even care that over 700,000 people are arrested for pot possession? These people have their entire life thrown upside down because they smoked a plant? As long as they aren't driving that is the only thing that matter right?

Have you ever smoked pot? Driving high is the least of my worries when driving, if anything I'm more worried about people driving while on coffee, talk about a dangerous substance to be on while operating a car!
In fact if more people drove while high we might see a lot less road rage and a lot more friendly driving.

Not to mention that be worried about driving safety completely ignores the injustice of current drug laws. And just because pot is illegal whop says it will be legal to drive while high, those are two different things!

Please join the critical thinkers and stop being led by a government that lies to you daily just to be lulled into a false sense of security.

[Utopian Idealist]

32. If only it was done in this country....

We could save a lot of valuable resources, (and money....)not to mention the room that would be left in prisons for violent offenders.


The number of marijuana arrests by state and local authorities in the United States since 1965 now totals more than 11 million.<1,2>

Federal authorities also make marijuana arrests, though these are not compiled by the FBI's division of Uniform Crime Reports. The number of federal marijuana arrests may be as high as 10,000 annually: The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) reported making 5,835 marijuana arrests in 1996.<3> Federal marijuana arrests are also made by the National Park Service, the Postal Inspection Service, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the U.S. Customs Service, and other agencies.

1. Crime in the United States: 1997, FBI's division of Uniform Crime Reports; Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1998; Pp. 221-222.

2. Data print-outs from FBI's division of Uniform Crime Reports (e.g., "Estimated Drug Abuse Violations Arrests, 1979-1993") and Crime in the United States volumes for 1975-1979, 1992-1998.

3. Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics--1996, Bureau of Justice Statistics; Albany, NY: Hindelang Criminal Justice Research Center, 1997; p. 413, table 4.38.


http://www.mpp.org/archive/arrest94.html#anchor214020

[madmark]

33. operating heavy machinery while wasted is a problem and should

stay illegal (along with brain surgery, anaesthesia and a whole host of other lucid sensitive activities); but the catastrophic costs of the drug laws (and their affront to liberty)trump the prohibition of drugs. Also elimination of the blanket prohibition will allow the resources of law enforcement and the courts to focus on the offenders engaged in actually dangerous behavior described above.

[Bridget Burke]

41. Stay out of Mexico & you'll be OK.

Mexico is learning to deal with its own problems. The US has "helped" enough.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

47. I don't like people drunk driving either

But that doesn't mean that I want to start throwing anyone with a beer in their fridge in jail for three years either.

[napi21]

16. OH GEE, will Mexico now have an illegal immigrant problem too?

I know that sounds like a smart a** question, but think about it. f what you want to do is legal in a country next door to you, wouldn't you go there instead of being hassled here???

[superconnected]

23. Oh Good one!

Let us hope, let us hope!

Hey you ppl who want legalized cocaine, now you have a place to go! Mexico!

Have a safe trip. Infact may you all drive on the freeway there with like minds!

[redqueen]

69. Did you get around to reading all the links

that all these kind DUers posted for you?

No reason for nasty comments alluding to your desire to see people who disagee with you get hurt...

That's just sad.

[w4rma]

17. Good. (nt)

[Rex]

20. This will hurt the BFEEs drug trade.

I'm sure 'America' will be outraged.

[Kazak]

25. *imagines...

...American crossing south across the Rio Grande*

[corporate_mike]

26. BAD IDEA

Hundreds of people, including many police officers, have been killed in Mexico in the past year as drug cartels battle for control of lucrative smuggling routes into the United States.

Violence will only increase.

[DoYouEverWonder]

27. Every country should decriminalize drugs

and someone has to start somewhere.

It is the criminalization of drugs that creates the criminals.

[sweetheart]

29. Link to help inform you better

Following is a link by police officers about ending
prohibition and why... i recommend doing the discovery
process to find out why many professional law enforcement
officers recommend an end to criminalization.

When your frontline troops make a recommendation,
only a fool general plays deaf.

http://www.leap.cc/

[Jack_DeLeon]

38. Yes selling should be legal too...

after all with drugs being illegal only criminals profit off of it.

If it were completely legal then legitimate businessmen and farmers could get in on the action.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

59. THE 21st AMENDMENT IS A BAD IDEA

Hundreds of people, including many police officers, have been killed in the past year of 1932 as booze cartels battle for control of lucrative smuggling routes into the United States.

Violence will only increase.

[redqueen]

70. Did ending prohibition increase violence here?

[Az_lefty]

28. so now they will be running legal drugs across the border?

[InkAddict]

36. Returning Americans fined/detained >border/pre-boarding pee tests (+)

Fines to reduce national deficit. LOL~O-lay!

[phusion]

44. pre-boarding pee tests!

lol...that's outrageous. But unfortunately I can see it being proposed by some asinine congressman.

[ThsMchneKilsFascists]

56. yup a couple of grams at a time..lol

From the OP
'Mexico's president will approve a law that decriminalizes possession of small amounts of marijuana, cocaine and other drugs to concentrate on fighting violent narco gangs'

Peace
TMKF

[DisgustedTX]

35. SIEG HEIL FOX! SIEG HEIL!

We welcome your citizens and their scourge!

[Bridget Burke]

42. You mean this policy might lead to drugs being available in Texas?

Oh, the horrors. Who will protect the purity of the innocent Texans--heretofore 100% drug free.

And what the Hell do you mean by SIEG HEIL?

[redqueen]

71. I'm curious about that too... did Hitler decriminalize possession?

[Jack_DeLeon]

37. Good first steps...

while I dont think the law goes far enough. I think it is a good first step.

It is always good when the government stops interferring in the lives of its citizens, ultimately though selling should be legal.

The war on drugs is essentially an unwinnable war against capitalistic forces.

[Selteri]

52. History has proven the best wat to handle these things are...

Decriminalize - the Drug
Authorize - citizens without criminal records to produce them under quality guidelines
Control - the source by selling lisences to people to sell the product through only
Authorized producers and insure it is not delivered to the undersaged.
Treat - those citizens who show addiciton problems as addicts in need of help and not criminals.

[n2doc]

46. Holy S**t! If this goes through it is going to be quite a test

The list of drugs being decriminalized is amazing. I would have expected Pot and maybe coke, but sheesh. I would expect a lot of laws going in place for "fines" for possession, as the local "law enforcement" folks move in for their bribes share of the economy. And instead of going to europe for their fix, Mexico is so much closer. I can imaging spring break in Cancun will never be the same again....

[phusion]

58. It's really going to be nuts...

I can imagine in a few years some attempts to prevent Americans from "indulging" in these freedoms below the border. It should be interesting to watch...

[Sgent]

49. If you think prohibition works

take a look at any college campus.

Previous to the early 80's, alcohol in some form was generally legal for people 18 & older. After MAD changed the laws, the incidencts of underage drinking, binge drinking, and alocohol abuse on college campuses has skyrocketed.

[bunkerbuster1]

50. Rachel Maddow raised a great point this AM - faux "Libertarians"

I don't have the exact quote, but she wondered how many faux Libertarians, the people who call themselves that because they think people will be scared if they own up to being Republicans, will stand on principle and support Mexico's decriminalization.

I agree with her--I think such American "libertarians" will find some excuse to either not comment, or outright condemn Mexico.

[goforit]

53. Hopefully this will curb the severe violence that surrounds drugs.

Now if they could only raise revenue through taxes to
bring down the deficit in their country with th use of drugs.

[RedStateShame]

60. How dare Mexico?!

Don't they know that the only drug dealers they can allow in their country are Merck, Pfizer, and Eli Lilly?

On the other hand, I'll bet all my friends that ran to Canada in 2004 feel really dumb right now.

[redqueen]

72. Heh...

They can always move to a warmer climate.

[Jacobin]

73. Should make the border towns a lot more popular as

tourist destinations......

[bdamomma]

75. it was breaking news on Olberman

that Vicente Fox will not agree to this.