Rand Paul opened mouth, stuck foot into it. Again

[alfredo]

http://www.wkyt.com/home/headlines/100593309.html


FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) - Republican Rand Paul's opposition to
federal funding for state and local drug enforcement initiatives
could cost him votes in a region likely to be a key battleground in
the U.S. Senate race.

Paul wants to cut federal funding for undercover drug
investigations and drug treatment programs. Both are badly needed
in Appalachia, a hotbed for marijuana growers and drug dealers
selling prescription pills and methamphetamines. His Democratic
opponent, Jack Conway, favors using federal money.

"I don't think it's a real pressing issue," Paul told The
Associated Press, suggesting that eastern Kentucky voters are more
concerned about fiscal and social concerns.

------

They say a Libertarian is a Republican that smokes dope.

[Warpy]

1. I'm all for cutting the DEA to ribbons and allowing them to join

the real military or get other honest work. They need to go.

However, we're going to need treatment centers whether or not we take the sensible step of legalizing drugs. Some people will always run into trouble, whether it's drugs, gambling, or crackpot religion, and they all need someplace to go got help.

[alfredo]

2. Rand Paul is clueless to the effects on crank and oxycontin

on the people of eastern Ky. Either that, or he doesn't care.

[Warpy]

5. He's as oblivious as every other ideologue is

If it doesn't fit neatly into his dogma, it simply does not exist.

We've got pockets of serious problems with black tar heroin here in NM. I know what it looks like. I also know these people would be a lot better off if we didn't treat them like criminals for using drugs to escape the pain of a hopeless life.

The drug war has only made the whole thing much worse, increasing violence and enriching a lot of the worst people on the planet.

[alfredo]

6. He's a spoiled brat. He doesn't know and doesn't care.

Charity/Altruism is not a Libertarian value.

[Bandit]

10. Neither has caused near the pain and suffering as alcohol

Yet how hard is it to get alcohol?

[alfredo]

13. When white lightning was killed off, they grew pot. When

the cops became effective at destroying the pot fields, they went to meth and oxycontin. What it comes down to: they need jobs so they don't have to go to the "other side" to keep a roof over their heads. As the song said "A country boy will survive."

Pot is one of the few cash crops that works in the mountains.

[phleshdef]

3. That area needs the enforcement funds too. The drug situation there is really, really bad.

Hard drugs and high end pain pills have taken over parts of Appalachia and turned into nothing more than a white man's ghetto. I grew up around there myself and still have family down by the WV/KY border. Some of the areas there have the worst drug problems per capita in the country.

[Warpy]

4. How much of it is fueled by illegality, itself?

Remember, black market drug prices depend on illegality and street crime increases so people can pay those black market prices. Take the profit out of the black market by legalization and drug gangs start to fall apart.

There's some research information out there that illegality and the anxiety associated with an iffy supply helps keep people addicted.

Prohibition has not worked, does not work, and will never work. You can't try to make sin illegal. It just makes it one hell of a lot more profitable.

[eridani]

7. Cutting law enforcement is a great idea

Cutting treatment programs is sheer idiocy.

[madmax]

8. And may he continue to do so for many

more weeks to come. :)

[alfredo]

14. I can't wait for the debates.

[Enthusiast]

9. Paul is dead wrong on this issue.

Illegal use of prescription pills and methamphetamines is at epidemic levels in Kentucky and surrounding states. Marijuana is one thing but these drugs are destroying young lives.

[Erose999]

11. He should shift focus from MJ to meth. I would imagine methlabs are probably rampant in rural areas

in Kentucky.

And as a "doctor" you'd think Paulbot Jr. would know about the dangers of prescription drug addiction and what a problem it is in the areas he wishes to represent. But then again Paulbot Jr. is a teabagger, so I suppose we shouldn't have any presuppositions of him knowing anything.

[alfredo]

12. He thinks E Pluribus Unum means every man for himself.