quote:

ORIGINAL: tweakabelle

So let me get this straight:
Sanity is in favour of executing those who peddle one lethal drug (heroin) but wants taxes reduced on the sale of another lethal drug (nicotine) and presumably no penalties on those who peddle nicotine/tobacco. I can't believe that I am the only one who finds this position somewhat contradictory. It's a position dictated by naked self interest yet he rejects others who advocate or act in their own interests or needs.

Nor do I see any problem with imposing taxes on tobacco sales while advocating the decriminalisation of drugs such as heroin or marijuana. I would be in favour of heavy taxes on legal sales of all those drugs. This position is entirely consistent, some would say mandated, by the harm minimisation approach to drug use. Funds generated by the taxes can be used to finance rehab and other medical approaches to addiction therapies and also be incorporated in general revenue relieving the burden on taxpayers, who I am sure would welcome any decrease in the govt take on their personal finances.

quote:

"Sin taxes" only hit those who are involved in the "sin" activity, regardless of income. The more you're involved in it, the more taxes you'll pay, or the more you'll have to reduce your activity level. The "poor" may have to shell out a higher percentage of their income to pay the same taxes as someone at the same activity level who earns more, but, that's the way that goes for pretty much everything (ignoring government subsidies). Is it wrong to charge someone who makes 100x more the same for the same car? The same gallon of gas? The same sack of potatoes? Perhaps the "poor" should change their behaviors so as to avoid the "sin" taxes? Nah. That wouldn't be fair.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Politesub53


I have to take issue with this Tweakable. The people smuggling heroin knew what they were doing they were also doing it out of greed. It ruins lives, not just of addicts but of the families they have and often the people they steal from to fund a habbit.

The war on drugs isnt perfect but it isnt pointless. Just ask anyone who has lost friends or family to addiction.

quote:

ORIGINAL: kdsub

Screw money MasterJaguar cheap or expensive it kills and destroys families. This war needs to be fought and if that means killing distributors and suppliers to do it I'm all for it... I wish it was not necessary but it is. If it were cheap they would just make up the difference by more addicts and more misery.

Butch

quote:

ORIGINAL: MasterJaguar01

quote:

ORIGINAL: Politesub53


I have to take issue with this Tweakable. The people smuggling heroin knew what they were doing they were also doing it out of greed. It ruins lives, not just of addicts but of the families they have and often the people they steal from to fund a habbit.

The war on drugs isnt perfect but it isnt pointless. Just ask anyone who has lost friends or family to addiction.

You are correct. The war on drugs is not pointless. It is just counterproductive to its goals. The war on drugs CREATES the high price for heroin in the first place, which fuels the smugglers greed.

Which in turn causes addicts to raise money at a higher rate, (which in turns ruins the lives even more of family and victims of theft)

quote:

ORIGINAL: kdsub

Bull mike it is not fantasy... just look into pot use increase in Colorado with free access... do you really thing if heroin were free it would not follow the same path? If the drug is there... if it is freely accessed then people will use it...especially kids and from there a life of misery.... yes anger...and yes I KNOW.

Butch

quote:

ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
Yes. In Thailand a gram of pure heroin costs a few dollars. The same gram (after cutting) costs up to a thousand dollars on the streets here in Australia. Prohibition creates the punitive artificial price here. Prohibition creates the price differential which is so great it is always going to attract unscrupulous or desperate or greedy people.

Smuggling will never be eliminated as long as the potential profit is so great - it really is as simple as that, though if you still harbour doubts, just look at the history of the war on drugs in any Western country and see if prohibition has prevented the heroin or grass trades. Trying to stop it has been as successful (or if you prefer as stupid) as the little Dutch boy who stuck his finger in the dyke to stop the flood waters.

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Eric Garner death: Did cigarette taxes play a part? - BBC News




According to a coroner's report, Eric Garner died due to "compression of neck (chokehold), compression of chest and prone positioning during physical restraint" as he was wrestled to the ground by Daniel Pantaleo and fellow New York City police officers.

On Wednesday a grand jury, presented with the report and a video of the entire incident, declined to indict Mr Pantaleo on charges related to Garner's death. The move, coming on the heels of a similar grand jury decision in a police shooting in Ferguson, Missouri, has prompted two nights of massive protests in New York and widespread outrage in the media over alleged police brutality.

For some, however, another party bears some responsibility in Garner's death - an out-of-control nanny-state government attempting to enforce a prohibition on the sale of untaxed cigarettes.

"For someone to die over breaking that law, there really is no excuse for it," Kentucky Senator Paul said on MSNBC Wednesday night. "But I do blame the politicians. We put our police in a difficult situation with bad laws."

...

Reason magazine's A Barton Hinkle explains how New York's high state and city cigarette taxes - totalling $5.95 a pack - have created a thriving black market on the city's streets.

"A pack of smokes in New York City costs $14 or more," he writes. "That creates a powerful incentive to smuggle smokes in from states such as Virginia, where you can buy a pack for a third of that price. Fill a Ford Econoline van with a few hundred cartons, and you can make a nice five-figure profit in a weekend. Some people do."

It was participation in this underground economy that brought Garner to police attention and, according to Mr Paul's logic, ultimately led to his death.

Politicians passed the taxes, he said, and politicians told police: "Hey, we want you arresting people for selling loose cigarettes."

Mr Paul isn't alone in these views, either.

"We have a poor guy who died because of a tax collection issue," conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh said on his radio show.

Governments condemn cigarette use on one hand while relying on cigarette taxes to fund their operations, Mr Limbaugh and others contend.

"Garner died because he dared interfere with government reach and government muscle that didn't want to lose tax revenue to independent operators," Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass writes.

Senator Rand Paul says bad laws, like New York City's high cigarette tax, put police in difficult situations

"You want an all-encompassing state with the power to stop you from smoking? Well, don't complain about the Eric Garner case," writes the Hayride's Scott McKay. "This is what big government looks like."

The Daily Caller's W James Antle says that while public outrage is focusing on the level of force employed by the New York police, "let's not let the people who write the laws off the hook".

"A man who is killed by government overreach, fueled by anti-tobacco fanaticism, is just as dead as one who smokes a carton of unfiltered Pall Malls every week for 30 years," he writes.

...

"You want an all-encompassing state with the power to stop you from smoking?" writes the Hayride's Scott McKay. "Well, don't complain about the Eric Garner case. This is what big government looks like."

...

There's an "element of truth" in the conservative statements about the cigarette tax, writes Danny Vinik in the New Republic. "More laws inherently create more potentially violent confrontations between police and civilians."

...

Liberals act shocked and surprised by the cigarette tax argument, although it was being advanced months before this week's grand jury decision gave it extra prominence and bite....


http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-30339414

quote:

ORIGINAL: kdsub

Screw money MasterJaguar cheap or expensive it kills and destroys families. This war needs to be fought and if that means killing distributors and suppliers to do it I'm all for it... I wish it was not necessary but it is. If it were cheap they would just make up the difference by more addicts and more misery.

Butch

quote:

ORIGINAL: kdsub

Mike it is NOT apples and oranges... there is documentation that pot is a gateway drug... A person that has a need to take a chance with a drug to alter their perception of reality usually progresses from a weak to a stronger drug. I believe, yes opinion, that with easy access this progression would be quicker and deadlier with more addictions. And... the suppliers would push all the harder to addict people, especially the young just to keep volume up. It may not be you or even the majority but i think common sense would say use would vastly increase with easy access and availability.

Butch

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ORIGINAL: MasterJaguar01

You are correct. The war on drugs is not pointless. It is just counterproductive to its goals. The war on drugs CREATES the high price for heroin in the first place, which fuels the smugglers greed.

Which in turn causes addicts to raise money at a higher rate, (which in turns ruins the lives even more of family and victims of theft)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Politesub53

quote:

ORIGINAL: MasterJaguar01

You are correct. The war on drugs is not pointless. It is just counterproductive to its goals. The war on drugs CREATES the high price for heroin in the first place, which fuels the smugglers greed.

Which in turn causes addicts to raise money at a higher rate, (which in turns ruins the lives even more of family and victims of theft)

Convoluted bullshit. When the price of drugs drops low dealers turn to new buyers, often by hooking schoolkids on drugs by offering them at a very low price. A £million is still a £million if you sell to ten clients or fifty.

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ORIGINAL: slvemike4u
Polite you and I usually see eye to eye....but dealers have never needed to go out and "hook people"...their customers find them and they do so in droves.

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ORIGINAL: Politesub53

Mike, sorry cousin but I agree with Butch. You are right in that not eveyone, or even the majority, that starts on pot gets addicted to anything else, but missing the point that almost everyone who has a drug problem started on pot first.

Add to that that the pot smoked in the sixties and seventies isnt as strong as the pot thats used these days, it is well known a common side effect of pot is paranoia or psychosis.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Politesub53

quote:

ORIGINAL: slvemike4u
Polite you and I usually see eye to eye....but dealers have never needed to go out and "hook people"...their customers find them and they do so in droves.

That hasnt been the case in the UK Mike and I doubt it is the case across the US. I am not talking big time dealers, more the smaller low level types. It isnt unusual to find them hanging around outside school gates, or youth clubs etc, here in the UK. Gangbangers here in the UK are often still at school and will sell dope to classmates.

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=drug+dealer+selling+to+school+kids&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&gws_rd=cr&ei=UmdFVbCwBcXjas6jgIgI

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/newsenglish/britain/teenagers_drugs.shtml

quote:

ORIGINAL: Politesub53

quote:

ORIGINAL: MasterJaguar01

You are correct. The war on drugs is not pointless. It is just counterproductive to its goals. The war on drugs CREATES the high price for heroin in the first place, which fuels the smugglers greed.

Which in turn causes addicts to raise money at a higher rate, (which in turns ruins the lives even more of family and victims of theft)

Convoluted bullshit. When the price of drugs drops low dealers turn to new buyers, often by hooking schoolkids on drugs by offering them at a very low price. A £million is still a £million if you sell to ten clients or fifty.

quote:

ORIGINAL: JVoV

No, but extreme restrictions on where you can smoke are certainly commonplace.

One local city has banned smoking outside at restaurants even. It's not difficult for me to avoid that whole city.