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In the 1960s, imprisoning a half million people for smoking pot in the USA would have seemed laughable. Forty years later, that is roughly the number of people in prison for non-violent drug offenses, many of them for marijuana.
    http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/409/toohigh.sh tml

Many other prisoners are also there for things like theft related to a drug habit (despite that addiction is often more a medical problem, or sometimes also from an economic problem leading to depression which our society refuses to deal with).

One major reason pot was pushed to be illegal is because hemp is such a versatile product and threatened timber and paper monopolies (although there were other factors as well).
    http://blogs.salon.com/0002762/stories/2003/12/22/ whyIsMarijuanaIllegal.html
    http://www.cannabis.com/faqs/hemp2.shtml
    http://www.theagitator.com/archives/002065.php

So, will it be any surprise if copyright laws go the same way -- towards Richard Stallman's "Right to Read" cautionary tale?
    http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Will there be a half million kids in prison for using file sharing software in a couple of decades? Or just even using GNU/Linux? :-)

But it's not a police state, it just lacks a lot of democracy and free speech.

I think that there is quite a lot of evidence to suggest the opposite--under quite a lot of definitions, Singapore is a police state.

Here's a great example (from here)

"The actual number executed for drug offenses is higher, said Amnesty, because for the last three years the Singapore government has released only the total number of executions and has refused to say who was executed for what."

There will be disagreement if such harsh penalties for a victimless crime makes for a police state. However, I believe that most definitions of a police state would include a judiciary which is purposefully non-transparent (you don't know who is in there, for what reason, and you don't necessarily find out the outcome.)

I have been told once, on the drugs issue, that, because of the drug laws, its the police that are most involved in drug trafficking.

"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

For starters, there is the ongoing medical marijuana debate. A bunch of states currently allow for the use of medical marijuana in their state. Federal law still has marijuana in the Schedule I category which means it has no medical use, so feds arrest users.
Medical marijuana is an easy one, as so many medical organizations support it.

The current drug czar also uses federal funds to campaign and lobby against drug laws reform at the state level.

The federal government also recently passed a spending bill which "would take away federal grants from local and state transportation authorities that allow citizens to run advertising on buses, trains, or subways in support of reforming our nation's drug laws".

Here is a quote from an article regarding assisted suicide, and the federal government's attempts to stop it by invoking drug laws: "Ashcroft... invoked the federal Controlled Substances Act, a law aimed at drug traffickers, and threatened to use it against physicians who prescribe drugs to help patients end their lives."

There are many other arguments to stop the drug war of course.. our constitution gives us the right to freedom of speech, which presupposes freedom of thought. Many drugs allow us to change how we think, so they should not be banned by the government. The Center for Cognitive Liberty and Ethics makes this argument, which I personally find quite compelling.

I'm glad you asked this question, and hope I have given you some ideas to think about.

The World Bridge Federation already tests for drugs and some has already lost a medal for refusing the test.

You know, political activism sounds good and all -- really, it does. And, I would like to believe that if enough people were made aware, we could do something about the Patriot Act. But I happen to not have that much faith in our political system.

Consider the subject of marijuana reform. NORML has been lobbying and working toward this goal since 1970. Although, due to their efforts, some progress has been made at the state level, the federal branch of government has largely been inflexible. Polls indicate that one third of Americans support legalization. Do a search on Google and you'll find many states where polls have indicated 75% of polled residents support legalization for medical uses. Many scientists, doctors, actors, and others from all walks of life have come forward to decry the war on marijuana. Nevertheless, after all of this, the federal government isn't having any of it.

How much damage could be done if it were to take 30 years to repeal the Patriot Act?

"Casual drug users should not be arrested, but taken out and shot. The country is at war, and all who use drugs are traitors." - Los Angeles Police Chief Daryl Gates (who started DARE) testifying before Congress.

Man...you must be smoking pretty strong stuff to believe that. First off...BONG HITS ARE NOT ILLEGAL! What could be illegal is what's in the bowl. But the actual device itself isn't. At least in some part of the US and most of Canada. There were some strange incidents, like the owner of Chills Cigarette Papers being arrested for "manufacturing drug paraphernalia." And then there was the arrest of Tommy Chong. Christ...who couldn't see THAT one coming. But still, is it necessary? No...pipes and papers could be used for many other things...

The other thing is, and I know this from great experience, you don't need a bong to smoke. Or at least a store-bought bong. Bongs can be made out of a great number of things, all of which look inconspicuous. Besides that, you can use papers to roll a joint; use a regular tobacco pipe; set it on fire and put a bottle with the bottom cut off over it; create a lung with a pop bottle, some tape, an empty bread bag, and a piece of tin foil; you could make a gravity bong with a pop bottle, a bucket, and a piece of tin foil...I could go on, but you get the point. There are a great number of ways to smoke pot. And many don't even require walking into a store...

I'm so pleased. Really really pleased. Aside from furthuring the hopes and dreams of everyone's favorite science fiction writer, this has a real potential for curbing South African violence. Call me liberatarian, but much like the pending legalization of all controlled substances (I can dream can't I?), a potential for cheap diamonds could destroy any black market demand for our little carbon friends.

What, you mean like this?

http://www.stopthedrugwar.org/walters/

Or this?

http://capwiz.com/norml2/home/

These auto-writers were how I got started. The first one takes litterally ten seconds to send a letter with. Then as I got more comfortable with what should be said in such a letter, I found myself willing to invest a couple of minutes writing an email of my own. These days I usually take the time to call. I have my representatives' office phone numbers on hand and I can call and give my opinion in about four minutes. On occasion I take the time to write a paper letter (which gives me a chance to test out the latest version of KWord while I'm at it) and drop it in the mail.

However, with a warrant (although the Ellian Gonzalez case is a counter example), the government can for the most part do what they want with me and my property.

The government hasn't needed a warrant to seize your property for quite some time now. Thanks in large part to the War on Drugs, the government can take anything they want from you, whenever they feel like it! It's called Civil Asset Forfeiture.

It's all for the children, of course.

The following was written with implicit sarcasm tags:

All the social problems with Alcohol and cigarettes went away when they were made legal. It should work just the same with cannabis.

1. Cigarettes (nicotine) have never been illegal in this country (USA). Smoking is prohibited in certain situations, but not nicotine. So no fair conclusions can be drawn here.

2. The sale and consumption of alcohol (ethanol) were prohibited in the USA for a while, and caused many, many problems which I won't attempt to summarize here -- they are too numerous. But read some of these pages:

   • Prohibition: The Drug War, Page One
   • Alcohol Prohibition Was a Failure
   • Marijuana and Alcohol Prohibition

Prohibition of any drug is not only a violation of human rights and an Orwellian interference with privacy -- it's also deadly. We need to stop the drug war now.

These aren't some crazy hacker computer criminals that are getting free access to your computer, it's the government.

I fear the government more than I fear "crazy hacker computer criminals".

Just imagine how it would feel to bust some drug dealers and get their computer hardware and browse through their files and see that all the files are encrypted.

Well, since the drug dealer has not done anything wrong I don't see the problem. In this hypothetical situation, I'd feel like the good guys won a battle -- the evil nasty feds have been stopped by the underdog hero.

Stop the drug war!

(And no, I'm not a drug dealer or even an "illegal" drug user. Hell, I don't even smoke nicotine or drink alcohol. But the war on drugs and the war on privacy are just two of the abuses of power that the US government has taken upon itself. These things have to stop.)