Pardoner-in-Chief

[Nightshade]

[callmeslick]

good for him. Far too many people taking up Federal dollars for victimless drug crimes.

[vision]

Is this supposed to be a bad thing? This is a good thing. A really good thing.

[Nightshade]

good for him. Far too many people taking up Federal dollars for victimless drug crimes.

Excuse me... "Victimless?"

What about all of the DEAD PEOPLE in Mexico/South America and the Caribbean from drug cartel violence?

All of that blood feeds the drug addicts of America. Don't EVER forget that. (Of course, it doesn't matter to you because it's "brown people" blood.)

[callmeslick]

so, selling ounces of pot is killing people in Mexico? Try again. Like vision said, this is a GOOD thing, with excessive sentencing guidelines.

[woodchip]

Pardons are not about releasing prisoners from low level sentences.

[callmeslick]

correct. Commutations are. Both you and the original poster need to at least read the Titles(you know, the words in big print) on the charts you post here.
Yeesh!

[Vander]

What about all of the DEAD PEOPLE in Mexico/South America and the Caribbean from drug cartel violence?

I think it's cute that you're blaming drug users as if it was their decision to criminalize the drug trade. Here's a protip: People like to get high. Always have, always will. When you criminalize getting high, you are creating the criminals. Since people like to get high, there will always be demand. When you criminalize the drug trade, you are creating the criminals.

You want to eliminate violent drug cartels? Let people buy drugs from legitimate sources.

[callmeslick]

I'm still waiting for the house experts to show me where the data even DISCUSSES pardons.............just sayin'

[Nightshade]

I'm still waiting for the house experts to show me where the data even DISCUSSES pardons.............just sayin'

Oh don't you worry Slick. There will be PLENTY of pardons coming from Obama...

Hillary and ALL of her cronies are going to need them shortly.

[Nightshade]

What about all of the DEAD PEOPLE in Mexico/South America and the Caribbean from drug cartel violence?

I think it's cute that you're blaming drug users as if it was their decision to criminalize the drug trade. Here's a protip: People like to get high.

People also like to rape...steal...vandalize...KILL.

Should all of that be legal too?

[Vander]

If I did any of those things to myself, would they be illegal?

[Nightshade]

If I did any of those things to myself, would they be illegal?

You see...nice double standard there... Check this out:

If you drive an SUV, you're causing global warming and you're killing Bobo the polar bear.

People like driving SUVs (doing it to "themselves") but there are 'global consequences.'

How is buying illegal drugs NOT the same? The suppliers are killing people (anyone that stands in their way and/or the drug users themselves.)

Oh- and let's not forget the victims of people that get high... Children...



Are these people 'ONLY doing it to themselves?'

[callmeslick]

where were pardons mentioned, again, Nightshade? Do you know the difference between a pardon and a commutation? Does it matter so long as you can twist it into yet another idiot rant about Obama?

[Ferno]

What about all of the DEAD PEOPLE in Mexico/South America and the Caribbean from drug cartel violence?

I think it's cute that you're blaming drug users as if it was their decision to criminalize the drug trade. Here's a protip: People like to get high. Always have, always will. When you criminalize getting high, you are creating the criminals. Since people like to get high, there will always be demand. When you criminalize the drug trade, you are creating the criminals.

You want to eliminate violent drug cartels? Let people buy drugs from legitimate sources.

The funny thing is, they took the same rationale from alcohol prohibition and applied it to drugs.

[Vander]

Strange that you invoke a supposed double standard that you would also appear to adhere to? (though from the opposite perspective)

I'm against the arbitrary prohibition of some drugs that through criminalization has created both law enforcement and criminal juggernauts that do a vast amount more damage than the people getting high. You can complain about the burden of drugs, and I won't disagree they can be a burden, but we will always have that burden. Why compound it with violent militarized conflict?

If you want to warp that into some alleged hypocrisy with my position on climate change, knock yourself out. I have different opinions on different subjects.

[snoopy]

What about all of the DEAD PEOPLE in Mexico/South America and the Caribbean from drug cartel violence?

I think it's cute that you're blaming drug users as if it was their decision to criminalize the drug trade. Here's a protip: People like to get high. Always have, always will. When you criminalize getting high, you are creating the criminals. Since people like to get high, there will always be demand. When you criminalize the drug trade, you are creating the criminals.

You want to eliminate violent drug cartels? Let people buy drugs from legitimate sources.

There are plenty of things that "people will always like" for which I doubt that you'd apply a similar argument. The bottom line: drug use isn't victim less and it's illegal. If you choose to do it (regardless of whether you think it should or shouldn't be illegal), you participate in and enable criminal behavior which affects other people. Until the law changes (I.E. Colorado) you're feeding violent drug cartels when you purchase drugs that aren't legalized. Furthermore, I'd be willing to bet that your dispute is really over just marijuana, and that's not the only thing that the cartels are selling... unless you'd like to argue that meth and heroin should be legalized, too?

[vision]

[The bottom line: drug use isn't victim less and it's illegal.

Great, but that's not the point. ThunderBunny is trying to equivocate through some sort of butterfly effect that the actions of drug users and their pushers have the moral weight of murderers. They don't, and punishments need to suit the crime.

Furthermore, I'd be willing to bet that your dispute is really over just marijuana, and that's not the only thing that the cartels are selling... unless you'd like to argue that meth and heroin should be legalized, too?

I can't speak for Vander but I am open to legalizing all drugs and diverting all the billions we spend on incarcerating pot-heads to education, reform, and rehabilitation programs for people with more serious problems.

[Jeff250]

There are plenty of things that "people will always like" for which I doubt that you'd apply a similar argument. The bottom line: drug use isn't victim less and it's illegal. If you choose to do it (regardless of whether you think it should or shouldn't be illegal), you participate in and enable criminal behavior which affects other people. Until the law changes (I.E. Colorado) you're feeding violent drug cartels when you purchase drugs that aren't legalized. Furthermore, I'd be willing to bet that your dispute is really over just marijuana, and that's not the only thing that the cartels are selling... unless you'd like to argue that meth and heroin should be legalized, too?

A few thoughts:

1) None of these things necessarily imply that you shouldn't do drugs. By the time you connect a drug user to the violent action of a drug cartel, you've had to go through at least two other moral agents, the drug cartel and the government. The members of the drug cartel have free will, and buying drugs doesn't compel them to perform any violent action. And the members of government that created the laws that allow the cartels to exist in the first place also have free will and could stop drug use from funding cartels at any time. Either of these agents would be better blamed.

2) If no one had ever illegally smoked marijuana, then would it currently be on track to being legalized?

3) Regarding whether people should be imprisoned for doing drugs, it's a circular argument to say that drug use should be criminalized because of cartel violence when it's those very laws that associate drug use with cartel violence in the first place.

[snoopy]

There are plenty of things that "people will always like" for which I doubt that you'd apply a similar argument. The bottom line: drug use isn't victim less and it's illegal. If you choose to do it (regardless of whether you think it should or shouldn't be illegal), you participate in and enable criminal behavior which affects other people. Until the law changes (I.E. Colorado) you're feeding violent drug cartels when you purchase drugs that aren't legalized. Furthermore, I'd be willing to bet that your dispute is really over just marijuana, and that's not the only thing that the cartels are selling... unless you'd like to argue that meth and heroin should be legalized, too?

A few thoughts:

1) None of these things necessarily imply that you shouldn't do drugs. By the time you connect a drug user to the violent action of a drug cartel, you've had to go through at least two other moral agents, the drug cartel and the government. The members of the drug cartel have free will, and buying drugs doesn't compel them to perform any violent action. And the members of government that created the laws that allow the cartels to exist in the first place also have free will and could stop drug use from funding cartels at any time. Either of these agents would be better blamed.

2) If no one had ever illegally smoked marijuana, then would it currently be on track to being legalized?

3) Regarding whether people should be imprisoned for doing drugs, it's a circular argument to say that drug use should be criminalized because of cartel violence when it's those very laws that associate drug use with cartel violence in the first place.

1. Okay, but you're still responsible for you and not the other parties. If you want to claim to having no part in cartel violence then you have to abstain in your part. Yes other parties have their part, too... but it's also true that if no one broke the law by taking illegal drugs, the cartels wouldn't exist. Buying illegal drugs does compel them to violent action when the profit to which you contribute compels them to fight the law. I'm not removing blame from the cartels, but I am arguing with the logic that says "the law shares blame for me breaking it." (Thought experiment: how would I feel like a completely absurd law... something like it's illegal to eat? 1. I would feel obligated to break that law (obviously). 2. I would still have to own the implications of my choice: I'd have to accept being part of whatever harm came from participating in the food industry. 3. I'd strongly believe that the law needed to change, and would take part in advocating for that.)

2. I don't know. If it was a good thing, but also illegal, maybe instead of just going out and toking up everyone would write their senator and push to have it legalized? How would people know if it was a good thing if it was illegal? Good question... how would it get to be illegal if no one ever did it? This seems like an "do the ends justify the means?" question to which generally my answer is no, good ends can't justify wrong means.

3. I didn't make that argument. I argued: given that drugs are criminalized, you have to own the implications of participating in that activity.

[woodchip]

I can't speak for Vander but I am open to legalizing all drugs and diverting all the billions we spend on incarcerating pot-heads to education, reform, and rehabilitation programs for people with more serious problems.

Yay boy, lets make bath salts and Heroin legal. I can see so much good coming from that.

[callmeslick]

so, commuting the sentences(but not pardoning anyone of a conviction) of folks with no record of violence, mid-way through terms in prison virtually the ENTIRE society agrees are counterproductive, gets us somehow to legal heroin and bath salts???


Damn that Obama!

[callmeslick]

PARDON FACTS

https://www.justice.gov/pardon/clemency-statistics

note, Bush Jr had 189. Obama 70 to date. So, in fact, Obama has pardoned FEWER people than most Presidents in our modern history. Ain't facts a ★■◆●, Woody, NS???

[vision]

Yay boy, lets make bath salts and Heroin legal. I can see so much good coming from that.

Heroin addicts can recover, permanently, with help. A few of my friends were addicted to heroin in our youth and all of them now are now healthy, productive members of society with beautiful kids and loving spouses. Except for Matt. Matt is still a jag-off loser. Matt is never going to stop being an ass, but at least he isn't doing drugs and contributing to drug culture, so that's a plus.

[woodchip]

Tell that to the friends and family of the 10k who died:

In 2014, the most recent year of the study, 10,574 people died, compared to 3,036 four years earlier.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/heroin-overdos ... d=40205697

[Jeff250]

1. Okay, but you're still responsible for you and not the other parties. If you want to claim to having no part in cartel violence then you have to abstain in your part. Yes other parties have their part, too... but it's also true that if no one broke the law by taking illegal drugs, the cartels wouldn't exist. Buying illegal drugs does compel them to violent action when the profit to which you contribute compels them to fight the law. I'm not removing blame from the cartels, but I am arguing with the logic that says "the law shares blame for me breaking it." (Thought experiment: how would I feel like a completely absurd law... something like it's illegal to eat? 1. I would feel obligated to break that law (obviously). 2. I would still have to own the implications of my choice: I'd have to accept being part of whatever harm came from participating in the food industry. 3. I'd strongly believe that the law needed to change, and would take part in advocating for that.)

Which violent act is a drug user responsible for? Is he or she responsible for 0.0001% of every one? I just think that by the time you hold the drug user responsible for cartel violence, it's a rather vague notion, especially with all of the moral agents that have a much more obvious and immediate responsibility.

2. I don't know. If it was a good thing, but also illegal, maybe instead of just going out and toking up everyone would write their senator and push to have it legalized? How would people know if it was a good thing if it was illegal? Good question... how would it get to be illegal if no one ever did it? This seems like an "do the ends justify the means?" question to which generally my answer is no, good ends can't justify wrong means.

By "if no one had ever illegally smoked marijuana," I'm allowing for people having had smoked it before it became illegal.

I think it's interesting that you're against ends justify the means here but seem to be invoking it in the earlier argument to argue that someone should deprive themselves of their own liberty to use drugs because of some very indirect consequences.

3. I didn't make that argument. I argued: given that drugs are criminalized, you have to own the implications of participating in that activity.

Fair, I suppose that was more directed at Thunderbunny.

[callmeslick]

little background on dope and death. I lived for quite a few years in and around the town of Willimantic, CT. Look it up, the town nickname is Heroin Town. For DECADES, completely ignored(or paid off, to be accurate) by the DEA and state law enforcement, the largely Puerto Rican operations imported, packaged and distributed heroin to the entire Northeast and MidAtlantic. Probably close to half the total. They ran a pretty tight ship, few collateral deaths to violence and all, but the place was and still is crawling with dope users. Nowadays, by all reports, the business has been taken over more often by Dominicans working for Mexican cartels. I digress, as my point is that no one really gave a crap when people of color were falling out. Nobody went out and ordered Narcam or the like for every ambulance crew. Suddenly, white suburban and rural kids are junkies and, CRAP!!! We have a huge problem!!! Give me a freaking break. We allowed big pharma to dispense heavy duty opiods for decades for every damned ache and pain. Not a problem there, either. We sit back, as a society, and get VERY selectively outraged over this issue. As usual, the cynical observer might add.......

[Krom]

There are a whole lot of bad actors out there we could economically crush by legalizing drugs, not just the cartels but also the majority of terrorist groups out there. Of course it would also devastate people and countries who are not necessarily bad but simply have no other means of paying for their next meal, which would feed back into terrorism and violence in the short term.

Not arguing against legalizing drugs to stop drug violence, just saying there would be consequences from doing so.

[Nightshade]

If I were in charge...I'd make it very simple...

You high? You die.

If you kill someone while driving if you're drunk or on "recreational drugs" where the impairment caused the fatality, you get the death penalty.

If you maim someone (leading to major life changing injuries like paralysis or major chronic pain or brain damage), you get life in prison.

[vision]

If I were in charge...I'd make it very simple...

You high? You die.

Holy crap, that's the kind of thing dictators say. Wow. I rarely get shocked by the stupidity I see on this board from the same people over and over again, but wow...

[Ferno]

There are plenty of things that "people will always like" for which I doubt that you'd apply a similar argument. The bottom line: drug use isn't victim less and it's illegal. If you choose to do it (regardless of whether you think it should or shouldn't be illegal), you participate in and enable criminal behavior which affects other people. Until the law changes (I.E. Colorado) you're feeding violent drug cartels when you purchase drugs that aren't legalized. Furthermore, I'd be willing to bet that your dispute is really over just marijuana, and that's not the only thing that the cartels are selling... unless you'd like to argue that meth and heroin should be legalized, too?

even legal, prescription drug usage is not victimless.

You high? You die.

Then TB... you'd have to kill half of us in this little community of ours. And I don't think you have the stones to even come after one of us.

[woodchip]

Duartes for President!!

[Vander]

Furthermore, I'd be willing to bet that your dispute is really over just marijuana, and that's not the only thing that the cartels are selling... unless you'd like to argue that meth and heroin should be legalized, too?

I do think every drug should be decriminalized. My personal interest is marijuana, but if recreational marijuana were legal today, I would still think every drug should be decriminalized. (please keep in mind decriminalization and legalization aren't the same)

The goal of our drug policy should be to reduce the harm of drug use, both to the individual, and by extension society as a whole. Criminalization just introduces new dimensions of harm, both to the individual and society. From escalated violence of a criminal drug trade we've created, to the escalated size and power of law enforcement we've created to fight it.

I say divert drug war resources to education and addiction treatment.