Opium Production Hits Record High In Afghanistan

[kcchiefs6465]

I have and I am not convinced by either side of this issue. I'm not sure legal heroin is the answer or if keeping it illegal is right. I'm still undecided for now.

I see merit from both sides but there doesn't seem to be a good middle ground.

Are you aware of the history behind drug prohibition in this country? It is unabashedly racist.

People being free to consume what they wish is the answer. Otherwise, give up the notion of being 'free.' Now the great thing about being free is that you can continue to vocally oppose heroin. You can gather information and let it be known of the dangers. People are free to disregard what you say, or to follow your advice.

The government, as is documented with thousands of sources, was very much involved in the opium/heroin trade as well as the cocaine trade (not to mention the kinds of things they let their informants do).

Class One traffickers (over 2,500 pounds) freed while prosecuting those selling small quantities. It ought to tell you something.

Moreover, look at the number of people dying yearly from the symptoms of habitual alcohol abuse. We are talking more dead than the overdoses on heroin, by far, annually. Look at the chemicals they mandate be put into tobacco products with regards to fire safe compliance. Layers of ethylene acetate (carpet glue).... for their safety? They don't give one fuck about you or the people overdosing in the hood. They pimp drugs to children. Don't take my word for it, look at the statistics. The percentage of children taking more than five medications a day is something evil. Young men growing breasts, tardive dyskinesia, suicide rates absurd... yet how many billions are they making annually, producing ads for the television to air? The hypocrisy is astounding. The DSM changed to such a low threshold that average behavior is classified as abnormal or worse. Parents so fucking gone they don't take issue with drugging their children. It's a despicable state of affairs.

 

[acptulsa]

It's a designed system that's perpetually manifests upon itself... bigger budgets, more government drones, more liabilities to the taxpayers, rights, and of course, look at all the profiteers. It's a government monopoly racket, racketeering, organized crime, influence, and corruption.

You forgot massive amounts of grand theft. Like the time they seized a woman's house under the pretext that it was bought with the profits her grandson made dealing a little pot here and there, even though she and her husband paid the mortgage off before the kid was born.

 

[pcosmar]

Were you growing or buying from the farmers down in Mexico? I remember $10.00 ounces. But that was a long time ago, and I really have no idea what Mexican pot goes for these days. Much less what the farmers are selling it for.

Not from the farmers,, but from just this side of the border and transporting North,, many years ago.

The price of Pot has gone up while the price of Coke came down..
But I have not even seen any imported pot in years.. The last was some Jamaican,,when I was in the Keys.
And that was 10 years ago and $120 an oz.

 

[specsaregood]

I call bullshit.
I have never seen a $100 dollar Kilo,,let alone $25. (saw $500 kilos long ago)

I went through a couple $150-200/kilos of Mexican schwag back in the 90's down in san diego. nasty stuff; but it was weed.

 

[thajuggla]

I have and I am not convinced by either side of this issue. I'm not sure legal heroin is the answer or if keeping it illegal is right. I'm still undecided for now.

I see merit from both sides but there doesn't seem to be a good middle ground.

I have just one question. Has keeping Heroine illegal kept people from doing it?

 

[Occam's Banana]

Do you think having 1 of every 30 citizens hooked on smack is a good thing? That's the present situation in Afghanistan.

I'm fine with legal weed and support getting rid mandatory minimum sentences, but how much good would come of legal readily available heroin? Imagine a US with 10 million heroin addicts.

You might have actually had something remotely approaching a point if "the present situation in Afghanistan" was one of "legal readily available heroin."

But that is NOT the "present situation in Afghanistan."

The "present situation in Afghanistan" is one in which the most powerful military in the history of the entire frakkin' world (as well as at least $7.5 billion earmarked for "interdiction") has proven utterly & absolutely useless for accomplishing anything other than making the problem an entire order of magnitude worse than it was before (FTA: "[heroin use] is up 10 fold since 2005").

The War on Drugs - any drugs - is and always will be a complete & abject failure. Legalize drugs. Legalize them ALL. Drug addiction is bad enough all by itself. It is just stupid and grotesquely inhumane to exacerbate the problem by enriching violent criminals and the rape-cage industry to boot.

 

[tod evans]

I went through a couple $150-200/kilos of Mexican schwag back in the 90's down in san diego. nasty stuff; but it was weed.

1976 10+ keys in Brownsville were $50.00 each, over 100 the price dropped even more...

 

[69360]

I have just one question. Has keeping Heroine illegal kept people from doing it?

I can't speak for the rest of the world. But for my part of New England I think it has somewhat. There isn't a whole lot to do here as far as nightlife, especially in the winter. So people turn to drugs. It's not as easy to get drugs here as in say NYC and they are expensive in comparison. So I think drug use may possibly increase if it was legal cheap and available.

I don't have all the answers, I'm not an expert and I'm undecided on the issue. So everyone go easy on me, I'm not the enemy.

 

[Anti Federalist]

I have and I am not convinced by either side of this issue. I'm not sure legal heroin is the answer or if keeping it illegal is right. I'm still undecided for now.

I see merit from both sides but there doesn't seem to be a good middle ground.

I think danno and others make a good point.

Think of heroin as crack cocaine. Much more potent and addictive and deadly than dust coke. Which is more potent than chewing or brewing a coca leaf.

With the smuggling aspect of getting as much bang for your buck gone, you'd see less heroin and more opium, which, while it can still be destructive and addictive it is less so than heroin.

 

[Occam's Banana]

I don't have a good answer for this problem.

No one has a "good" answer for this problem, and no one ever will - because there is no "good" answer.

Utopia is not an option. Across-the-board legalization won't abolish the deleterious consequences of drug use/addiction. But it will, at least, stop the far more deleterious consequences of governments trying to "end" or "control" drug use/addiction (consequences which include, among many other things, corruption of law enforcement & public officialdom, enrichment of violent criminal gangs, incentivization of said gangs to spread & promote the use of ever-more dangerous & addictive drugs, further entrenchment and expansion of the "prison-industial complex," perversions of justice such as mandatory sentencing, civil asset forfeiture, imprisonment of non-violent drug users, rampant civil rights abuses committed in the name of stamping out drug use ... and so on and on and on and on ...)

As bad as the "disease" of drug use/addiction might be - and whatever the negative consequences of it are - the "cure" of preemptive interdiction (in the form of the "War on Drugs" or what-have-you) is far, far worse. And what is more, the "disease" will never be eradicated, anyway. Drug use/addiction will never be eliminated, and whatever extent to which it might be reduced or "controlled" by interdiction will be entirely offset by the even more numerous and negative consequences of interdiction itself. Drug use/addiction is a problem that cannot be "solved." We should just learn to be satisfied with dealing adequately with the consequences of it when and where it arises, because that is the best that can reasonably be hoped for. Initiatory and forcible intervention by the State into the problem is just going to make matters worse.

 

[kcchiefs6465]

I can't speak for the rest of the world. But for my part of New England I think it has somewhat. There isn't a whole lot to do here as far as nightlife, especially in the winter. So people turn to drugs. It's not as easy to get drugs here as in say NYC and they are expensive in comparison. So I think drug use may possibly increase if it was legal cheap and available.

I don't have all the answers, I'm not an expert and I'm undecided on the issue. So everyone go easy on me, I'm not the enemy.

Would you use heroin if it was legalized? Most people wouldn't either.

There are social issues that arise from the habitual use of any substance. Making their acts illegal fuels a black market which in turn provides lucrative profits to various factions who often war over competing avenues of trade.

What arises, in the case with injecting heroin at least, is higher Sepsis rates as clean needles are regulated and prescribed, higher bodily fluid transferred disease rates as the average heroin addict isn't going to particularly care over who is offering them a dose, higher STD rates as the rather dope sick will soon to sell sex if they're unable to get it elsewhere, extraordinarily high incarceration rates as people, for one reason or another, enjoy getting high, (and the problems that comes with a nonviolent criminal being put in an environment of criminals of which many are violent). There are many other noticeable effects.

What does that mean for the average non-drug user?

Well the higher prices caused by the monopolization of drugs (that is, certain drugs are approved and other are not [various opiates are approved and heroin is not, for an example of what I mean]) causes which where before someone could work and buy what they wished to consume, they now are unable to afford it through normal means. To be clear, I oppose the use of any habit forming drugs. I don't wish for people to start smoking cigarettes or to start drowning themselves in alcohol. But they will anyways and I don't feel myself to be superior to them in dictating how they spend their money or life. The truth of the matter is that no matter what laws or regulations, an addict will only help themselves when they want to help themselves. It's why you see people who serve years in prison often free from drugs, revert to their old ways once released.

What happens when drugs are made illegal, and the entire concept thereof, promotes more to the destruction of humanity than the drugs themselves ever did.

 

[pcosmar]

I have just one question. Has keeping Heroine illegal kept people from doing it?

Nope,, but it has been very profitable to those distributing it.

 

[pcosmar]

1976 10+ keys in Brownsville were $50.00 each, over 100 the price dropped even more...

Damn,, that was right around the time I started smoking pot.. but did not see those prices in my area of the country.

Just a few years later,,when I was transporting from south Florida to the Midwest.. We got pounds around $250,,and were selling at $400 up north.

At the farmers end,, I and sure they were not paid much,, but still better than anything else they could grow.

I am sure it is the same with Poppy Growers.. It is the middlemen that make money off it.

 

[Matt Collins]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFikB4unZgo