Many of the people who are most abused in prison are members of or suspected members of gangs. How do you feel about imprisoning gang members? How about killers? Same way as pot smokers? Maybe not. But they are entitled to just as much protection from abuse.

The first question that occurs to me is, why do we have gangs in the first place? What is wrong with our society that provides the impetus for such associations?

If gang members violate the rights of others then they should be punished. Whether that punishment is probation or prison or whatever should depend on the severity of the rights violation they committed.

Yes, I think *everyone* should be free from the deliberate infliction of pain of any sort.

Most people just don't pay any attention to the prison issue until it effects them personally, usually through a loved one going to prison.

One final point: Remove the non violent "drug offenders" from prison and a lot of the problems will solve themselves. It is the grotesquely overcrowded conditions in most jails and prisons that allows the deliberate infliction of pain to be so prevalent.

...address? Maybe we can get him back, at least for a day or so, to get a REAL roundhouse going with LWM, Kitt, and Ay** (sorry, forgot the spelling). That should be real profitable.

All the blather by Hillary will come to nothing.

People will still be caged for simple possession and minor dealing.

Another question: Legality aside, what is the difference between a "drug dealer" and a liquor store owner?

I also have another family member (not particularly close) that has been dealing cannabis for about 35 years now. He doesn't sell to anyone but those he has known a long time so no sales to children. Does anyone here think he should be locked in a cage?

And Kitt, your answer to my question proves that liberals are basing policy regarding one of the most serious issues of our time on sheerest fantasy, Overton window or not.

Hillary Clinton is going to be the Democratic nominee. Probably, hopefully, in she will take the WH in 2009 because the alternative would be Rudy, Fred, Mike, Mitt or John. It ain't gonna be Ron.

Deal with it.

Even a fair number of folks around here, who probably wouldn't vote for Ron Paul, think she is the anti-Christ. She isn't. She's a sensible moderate conservative. We could all do much worse and probably not too much better. The world will not end if and when she becomes president. It survived George Bush, so far, and it will survive her. If Pat Lang likes her, that's quite an endorsement.

Prohibition of mind altering substances causes more problems in society than it solves.

Agree or disagree?

Umm...agree that some mind altering substances should be allowed with the proper social safeguards to prevent destructive behavior. Don't agree they should all be legal or that prohibiting any such substance is necessarily the cause of more social problems than unrestricted use would cause.

Full disclosure, since I forced one from you: I volunteer doing emergency and event medicine, and I have a close relative that works 50 hours a week evaluating drug treatment programs for a living. I don't particularly enjoy being exposed to serious infectious diseases because people are too high to treat themselves, or wrestling with people that have become a danger to themselves and others by abusing drugs. My close relative is frequently in tears after interviewing people whose lives have been destroyed by some drugs -- they aren't all just pot in a different bottle.

Saying we should just legalize all mind altering substances and wash our hands of the consequences on grounds of rights over our bodies is like saying that we should never intervene to attempt to shelter and medicate homeless mentally ill people because they have a right to their misery, their unreasoning fear, and their cardboard box. It's uncaring, irresponsible, and badly thought through.

That should be real profitable.

-- Svensker

Come on now. Didn't you see my last post? ;o)

I also have another family member (not particularly close) that has been dealing cannabis for about 35 years now. He doesn't sell to anyone but those he has known a long time so no sales to children. Does anyone here think he should be locked in a cage?

If that's his sole source of income, sparky, he should be the last one who wants to legalize drugs. He'll have to get a real job because some drug company in big pharma will cut him out of the market. He should probably vote for Hillary. He'll have his weed and be able to deal it to.

And Kitt, your answer to my question proves that liberals are basing policy regarding one of the most serious issues of our time on sheerest fantasy, Overton window or not.

-- Aycharaych

Geebus, what a hyperbowler you are. "proves" "basing" "serious issues of our time" "sheerest fantasy". Cripes. Get a room with your vocabulary.

Full disclosure: I did inhale. I also snorted, popped, etc.. Anything that didn't require a needle I took. All back in the day, of course. Fortunately for me, I don't seem to be one of those addictive personalities. Some of my friends were. It wasn't pretty.

The bottom line for me in this discussion is common sense. I'm all for bars with music, but I don't want a bunch of belligerent young men howling, shoving each other around, and peeing on the sidewalk at 1:00 a.m. at the end of my block. I think the jails are way too full of people who did little more than try to get by, but my daughter lived for a time in a neighborhood with a crack house at the end of the block. Apart from the truly scary creatures who hung out 24/7/365, it was pretty unpleasant crunching across crack vials to get out to the car in the morning, finding syringes in the bushes, and wasted folks passed out on the front stoop. The cops swooping in now and again and bracing everyone in the neighborhood weren't exactly reassuring either.

Social policy is complicated, needs frequent adjustment, and we've almost never got it right. That doesn't mean there shouldn't be one.