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Post by Wycco on Feb 20, 2003 9:40:14 GMT -5
da Silva,
The same thing happened in Britain during the 19th Century- duty on alcohol was horrific- many times the price on the alcohol itself.
Didn't stop anyone from consuming alcohol- it just meant everyone got their alcohol via smuggling instead of legal sources.
I'm sure you've heard of all the smuggling that went on in Britain during the 19th Century... alcohol was perhaps the most smuggled item of all.
The idea is to get the balance just right so that you tax enough to dissuade most people- but not enough to make smuggling worth while.
New York recently raised taxes significantly on tobacco- and usage is down sharply, with little or no smuggling going on.
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Post by Cine_Man on Feb 20, 2003 13:17:45 GMT -5
You could say that governments are "addicted" to tobacco, as well as a lot of sport and cultural events. No one here needs to be reminded of the vast participation of the tobacco giants in Formula One, indeed most of motorsports... but there is also massive participation in the arts... ie duMaurier Jazz festival in Montreal, and so on and so forth.
None of that offsets the pain, suffering and sorrow that is the result of the various diseases that attend. Cancer(s), emphysema, chronic bronchitis, you name it. There is a local woman here in Edmonton, Barb Tarbox, who is slated to die shortly, but is mounting a charge of public speaking that is unprecedented. Her hope is to inform as many young people as possible to the peril of smoking. At the moment, her physical appearance speaks more than volumes -- she looks more like an Auschwitz inmate, and that shocks the kids more than any theoretical discussion of a cross-section of lung.
My own wife's aunt has been given a few months' time to get her affairs in order. Same thing. A week ago, a colleague of mine died after a short struggle -- brain tumour (you know the movie Gone in 60 seconds? -- Gone in 5 weeks.)
Cine_...
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Post by pabs on Feb 22, 2003 19:34:05 GMT -5
pabs, could you check this stuff out for me? I have no idea whether I should take it at face value or not. Cine: sorry for taking so long. I've read those accusations before and I don't know what to tell you. Yes, I think they could be true. Did they actually happen? Your guess is as good as mine...
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Post by daSilva on May 1, 2003 11:40:50 GMT -5
PM pushes pot change
Tells Grit dinner 'activist' agenda coming By MARIA MCCLINTOCK -- Sun Media
OTTAWA -- Prime Minister Jean Chretien says he's never "tasted" pot in his life but his government is pushing ahead with a new marijuana law and a national strategy aimed at keeping teens off drugs.
In a speech at the Liberal fundraising Maple Leaf dinner in Ottawa, Chretien said in the coming weeks his government will follow through with its "activist" agenda.
That will include bringing in a new law to decriminalize possession of small amounts of pot -- a statement that got wild applause from the 1,000-plus Grits who paid $500 a plate to dine with the PM.
"Don't start to smoke right away. We're not legalizing it, we're decriminalizing it," he joked.
"I never smoked in my life -- yes, I smoked cigarettes when I was a kid when my father didn't want me to smoke. When he gave me the permission at 16, I stopped. Marijuana was not known, so I never asked him permission (to smoke it)."
The new pot law and the strategy will be unveiled in the next few weeks, Chretien said.
"We will soon introduce legislation to decriminalize possession of small amounts of marijuana so that young people do not have unnecessary criminal records for the rest of their lives," he said.
"At the same time we will have a drug strategy to discourage young people from using drugs, and which will target drug traffickers."
About time!
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Post by CFF on May 1, 2003 17:07:15 GMT -5
re: Canadian PM to Decriminalize Pot I watched the idiot JC on the news last night - I guess seeing's as he's entering the last year of his power trip, he wants to do whatever he can to make a lasting name for himself . Personally, I'm not sure that decriminalizing pot possession is the right thing to do. It certainly has our American neighbours (the politicians anyhow) up in arms. JC said that the legislation would be introduced sometime prior to the end of (this) June. It's still anyone's guess as to what the details are - law inforcement is wondering what the limit will be for legal possesion. Talk is anywhere from 3 grams up to an ounce (28 grams). CFF
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Post by BrainFade on May 8, 2003 11:19:28 GMT -5
Excellent news, IMO. Hopefully other "enlightened" governments will follow Canada's example. Slowly, the world's more poweful nations are changing their attitudes towards marijuana. Netherlands, UK, Canada, Australia, Switzerland (?) are all pretty relaxed about weed now. I hope this has a follow-on effect and things change here in SA too.
I don't think the US will ever decriminalise weed, though.
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Post by JWK on May 9, 2003 0:29:07 GMT -5
well, some time ago(about 5-10 years) a party called the 'legalise cannabis party' got about 5% of NZ's vote! Things here are pretty relaxed towards use... but the law comes down hard on dealers.
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Post by BrainFade on May 9, 2003 0:35:56 GMT -5
Yeah, it's pretty chilled here too, at least if you're not dealing. I've been bust twice with small amounts of marijuana and both times the cops let me go, but kept my stash. Most likely for personal consumption. Still, it would be nice for it to be decriminalised anyway.
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Post by smokingun on May 12, 2003 2:23:27 GMT -5
I don't think the US will ever decriminalise weed, though. isn't tobacco bad enough?? why do we need to open another can of worms?? and who's to say that the buck stops with pot? why not "de-criminalize" heroin next?? it's ok to pump that shit in your veins just don't deal it. my ass. if it is highly addictive and alters your sense of reality, it is dangerous. as it stands from what i have read from DeadCat's post earlier in this thread, pot is ok, but i still think we do not need to go there. substance abuse in any form is wrong. be it alchohol, tobacco or dope. smokingun
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Post by Henrik on May 12, 2003 6:11:58 GMT -5
Problem is that there will always be some humans that will want access to mind altering substances, be it legal or not. Some people can be very self destructive.
Heroine I believe is ilegal everywhere in the world today, yet it is readily accesible just about anywhere. So, rendering it ilegal is not helping in solving the problem. Instead it is creating a whole new set of problems that relates to the illegality of it, i.e. crime, money laundering, and all the physical illnesses that users contract due to poor hygien and bad drugs.
So, sure, outlaw all drugs, alcohol, tobacco, coffee, tea, coca cola, cough medecine, perfume (yep, some people will drink it because of the alcohol). Your just not solving any problems in doing so.
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Post by BrainFade on May 12, 2003 18:17:55 GMT -5
Exactly Henrik, exactly....
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Post by smokingun on May 13, 2003 0:30:02 GMT -5
Heroine I believe is ilegal everywhere in the world today, yet it is readily accesible just about anywhere. So, rendering it ilegal is not helping in solving the problem. Instead it is creating a whole new set of problems that relates to the illegality of it, i.e. crime, money laundering, and all the physical illnesses that users contract due to poor hygien and bad drugs. and making it legally acceptable to buy and sell heroin will improve the situation?? i still think there is a reason that countries that have stict almost draconion laws against drugs have low rates of abuse. just how many malasian junkies do we hear about. the threat of death is a very real and credible one and it *does* keep some of the wannabe junkies of dope. smokingun
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Post by Henrik on May 13, 2003 1:51:38 GMT -5
Actually Smokingun, making it legal does help improve a number of issues.
For starters, I beleive that with hard drugs such as heroine, there will always be a small minority of the population that will want to use it. If it is legal or not probably will not have a huge impact on the number of users, as most "normal" people will never want to touch the stuff. I can assure you that if it was totally legal here, and somebody gave me a nice clean syringe with high quality heroine, I would never inject the stuff! As such, rendering it legal, and perhaps controlling the distribution of it by the authorities, would probably help in reducing the number of deaths resulting from its abuse, reduce the number of health problems surrounding it (AIDS, hep. etc.) and also decrease the amount of crime related to it.
As an example, here in Switzerland it was decided a number of years ago that the government would distribute heroine to addicted users, in an effort to resolve the crime and health issues arround it. Although I am totally against the fact that my tax money is being used to by heroine for junkies, it is also a fact that this solution has helped in reducing the number of health problems and deaths resulting from heroine abuse, and the number of users has actually decreased. The government program has helped some of the users to actually get rid of their addiction.
I do not believe that issuing a death penalty for heroine users will help in resolving any problems.
But, we are really getting of the subject, as the discussion was about soft drugs such as cannabis. I was simply responding to your knee-jerk reaction that if cannabis is legalized, then hell why not legalize all drugs.
Oh, and with regards to your comment about how many Malaysian junkies we hear about, could this not possibly also be a result of the Malaysian government not being exactly as open with their public information as European and other countries?
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Post by smokingun on May 13, 2003 6:35:45 GMT -5
As an example, here in Switzerland it was decided a number of years ago that the government would distribute heroine to addicted users, in an effort to resolve the crime and health issues arround it. Although I am totally against the fact that my tax money is being used to by heroine for junkies, it is also a fact that this solution has helped in reducing the number of health problems and deaths resulting from heroine abuse, and the number of users has actually decreased. The government program has helped some of the users to actually get rid of their addiction. this is most interesting. on a personal level although i have never used dope apart from tobacco which try as i might i do not quit, the drug abuse problem and the effect that it has on society and families is one that troubles me a lot. this action of the swiss government though sounds more like a workaround to a problem that already exists. and going by what you have written it sounds very positive. however i wonder what the swiss autorities stand would be to selling heroin to non-users. legslising it means making it freely available. there are arguments that making the sale illegal does not work. and on the surface this argument sounds very plausible. however what is needed is better enforcement of the drug laws. hit criminals and hit them hard. make it so that the money is not worth the price that they would have to pay. award policemen for arrests leading to convictions, make them as hungry as the criminals are. the reason i mentioned malaysia is because my mother is malaysian and we have family living over there. i would think that my sources of information albeit not first hand would still be quite reliable. at least for forming an opinion. smokingun
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Post by daSilva on May 13, 2003 10:08:21 GMT -5
Just to point out again, legalisation is very different from decriminalisation.
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