Bitcoin-Based Drug Market Silk Road Thriving With $2 Million In Monthly Sales

Sparrowvsrevolution writes "Every day or so of the last six months, Carnegie Mellon computer security professor Nicolas Christin has crawled and scraped Silk Road, the Tor- and Bitcoin-based underground online market for illegal drug sales. Now Christin has released a paper (PDF) on his findings, which show that the site's business is booming: its number of sellers, who offer everything from cocaine to ecstasy, has jumped from around 300 in February to more than 550. Its total sales now add up to around $1.9 million a month. And its operators generate more than $6,000 a day in commissions for themselves, compared with around $2,500 in February. Most surprising, perhaps, is that buyers rate the sellers on the site as relatively trustworthy, despite the fact that no real identities are used. Close to 98% of ratings on the site are positive."

Comments

And in countries where it's legal?

[crazyjj]

You know, generally speaking, the underground only thrives when there is a vacuum to be filled.

I wonder how many violent drug cartels, gun-toting dealers, and drug-related shootings there are in countries where it's legal to buy from a pharmacy or dispensary.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

what countries where it's legal? there are VERY few.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Desler]

Which country allows you to buy cocaine or ecstasy from a pharmacy?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[bhagwad]

Though there aren't many countries allowing you to buy it legally, I agree that it SHOULD be legal. Let people take responsibility for their own lives and allow them to kill themselves if they wish to.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Tell that to all the people on the bus that die when the bus driver wrecks the bus because he/she is high. Or the on coming car that runs into the bus because the driver of the car is high. I doubt that the person taking the drugs would necessarily be the only one to die as a result of their actions.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

I doubt you'd be able to buy it at a pharmacy, but there are quite a few places where those types of drugs are permitted, in small quantities for personal use.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Moheeheeko]

You mean like Alchohol?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[RoknrolZombie]

Well, then you criminalize the actual CRIME - driving while impaired. You can't criminalize behavior that's not criminal. It's like saying you can't buy a car because it *might* be used in the commission of a crime. There are thousands of things that are already illegal that pretty much cover the bases - everything from reckless driving to child safety...these laws are perfectly capable of punishing real criminals instead of filling our prisons with responsible users.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Let people take responsibility for their own lives and allow them to kill themselves if they wish to.

The problem isn't that they kill themselves; it's that they kill other people in drug induced hazes. Or at least harm them. Even if they do kill themselves, their families still have to live through the distress. You wouldn't wish something like that upon your own family, would you?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

Can we do that with whatever bad for you stuff you like? Maybe alcohol, or fattening food or if you don't get enough exercise?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[CanHasDIY]

Tell that to all the people on the bus that die when the bus driver wrecks the bus because he/she is high. Or the on coming car that runs into the bus because the driver of the car is high. I doubt that the person taking the drugs would necessarily be the only one to die as a result of their actions.

That anecdote would hold far more weight if not for the immense number of people killed on the roads every year by drivers who aren't high on illegal drugs.

To that end... put down the goddamn cell phone.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

So then why is alcohol legal?

It does all of those things. Yet, drugs that do not cause that sort of behavior are illegal.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

Here in reality, believe it or not, the medical route is actually cheaper.

Clean needle programs, access to cheap clean drugs and treating addiction as a medical problem not a criminal one is cheaper and actually works. I know it lacks that self righteous feeling, and that is a downside, but it actually works. Unlike your stupid and immoral plan.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[cheekyjohnson]

Not that drug laws will prevent any of that.

breaking into people's homes so they can steal to feed their habit

Theft is already illegal. Punish the ones that do steal and not the ones that don't. Anything else is very similar to collective/preemptive punishment.

If you're found transporting drugs, like in Singapore, that's the death sentence

Yes, I definitely want the government to have the power to execute people merely for transporting drugs that people willingly consume. No innocent person could ever be executed, the government would never abuse this, and executing people for transporting something is worthwhile.

None of this 5 years where my tax dollars are used to give them food and shelter.

So sorry that your tax dollars are being used for prisoners. Better that we kill everyone who ends up in prison! Anything to save a buck.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Urza9814]

All the while destroying other people's lives while they're high, breaking into people's homes so they can steal to feed their habit, and a whole host of other issues, including medical as their bodies get ravaged but which I have to pay for (thanks Roberts).

Nicotine is the most addictive drug known to man. But you don't generally see people breaking into homes for money to buy a pack of smokes. Why? Because it's legal, so it's cheaper and more available. You don't generally see people worrying about paying for other peoples' lung cancer either. Why? Well, partly because the people who bitch about these things tend to be smokers themselves, power of the industry lobby, etc....but there's also a big part that is IT'S LEGAL. If it's legal, you aren't going to get fired for being addicted, you aren't going to avoid seeking help for your addiction due to fear of criminal prosecution, so you're more likely to have a job and be able to take care of your own medical needs.

The problems that you cite as reasons why drugs must remain illegal are not problems caused by drugs, but problems caused by _drug prohibition_.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

>All the while destroying other people's lives while they're high, breaking into people's homes so they can steal to feed their habit, and a whole host of other issues, including medical as their bodies get ravaged but which I have to pay for (thanks Roberts).

They do that because drugs are expensive and hard to locate, and because of gang pressure to do jobs for them once they can't easily pay.

If drugs were completely legal, they would be incredibly cheap (most drugs are made from rather cheap to manufacture compounds, or hell, grow as an unwanted weed in your lawn, for crying out loud). Walgreens (as a company, bad individuals at certain stores might do illegal things) is not going to try to trap people into doing illegal things for drugs. And unless you're so screwed up you can barely move (in which case your success rate with crime is going to be limited to the first one and no more) you can work many minimum wage jobs while high. Since drugs would be, say, $0.50 a hit, that would be enough.

And thus, no more would steal to feed their habit than idiot teenagers in gangs beating up classmates for their shoes or cellphones.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

DUI laws stop people from drinking and driving. It used to be pretty common until it became a serious offense with serious punishments.

Making drugs illegal does not prevent their use. Nothing will do that, even in nations with a death penalty for drug crimes drugs are still sold.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[bhagwad]

There are costs to prevention that we might not be willing to pay. Why not ban alcohol?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[CanHasDIY]

and allow them to kill themselves if they wish to. All the while destroying other people's lives while they're high, breaking into people's homes so they can steal to feed their habit, and a whole host of other issues, including medical as their bodies get ravaged but which I have to pay for (thanks Roberts).

Right, because A) all drug users are violent criminals who steal for a living, and B) forcing otherwise law abiding citizens to deal with career criminals in order to enjoy a mind-altering substance the government has decided, in a fair and just manner of course, ist verboten, is totally the right way to deal with it.

That, or you're spouting hyperbole based on your limited understanding of the topic.

I'll get modded down but don't care. What we need is to be more brutal. If you're found transporting drugs, like in Singapore, that's the death sentence. None of this 5 years where my tax dollars are used to give them food and shelter. Whack 'em.

Aah, how quintessentially un-American. You deserve to be modded into oblivion.

"These other people engage in an activity I know nothing about other than the fact that it's a minor inconvenience to me, and so they should be executed by the State!"

Kinda makes a person wonder what subjectively unacceptable activity you're into... Especially considering that, statistically, users of the legal drugs alcohol and tobacco kill exponentially more "innocent" people, than users of all other drugs combined.

You get rid of enough mules and the supply dries up.

Where there is demand, there will always, ALWAYS be supply. To claim otherwise is to expound an utter lack of understanding in regard to the topic of economics.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[onyxruby]

Drug cartels have long moved into using violence for crimes outside drugs. Mexico, Columbia, Somalia, Italy and on and on. Drug cartels expand to fill other vacuums they perceive as needing met. Extortion and kidnapping are two of their favorite vacuums and result in the murders of so many people that armored vehicles are routinely more popular in places like Columbia than Iraq.

The idea that legalizing drugs would somehow get rid of the violence from the drug cartels runs smack into the reality of a lot of very violent non-drug related crime. Look at places like Mexico and you will see that people are routinely murdered in large quantities by drug cartels for things that have nothing to do with drugs. The cartels have learned a life of crime and violence and will continue that life until a significant outside change forces them to change.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[cheekyjohnson]

When has criminalizing something actually stopped it from happening?

It doesn't. Drug laws have never stopped any of these things.

Attitudes like this remind me of the TSA. "Anyone could be a terrorist. The solution is clearly to infringe upon everyone's rights by molesting them at airports!" That drug user might commit a crime while on drugs. Futilely attempt to ban all drugs for everyone while wasting countless amounts of taxpayer dollars in the process!

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[bhagwad]

I believe that if my wife wants to wreck her life, that's her choice. I can try and talk her out of it of course. But not put her in jail. Because I can always just walk away.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[DarkOx]

breaking into people's homes so they can steal to feed their habit

They do that because drugs are artificially expensive due to the legal BS around them.

If the risk of jail was removed the cost of manufacturing, transporting, and distributing things like Cocaine would fall thru the floor. Only the most hopelessly strung out junkie would be unable to support their habit, if by no other means than panhandling.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[dkleinsc]

What we need is to be more brutal.

We've tried that. We've spent billions attempting to stop drug dealers and traffickers. We've changed the laws to allow cops to break into suspected dealer's homes without knocking at 3 AM (occasionally killing innocent people who think they're being attacked by criminals and start fighting back). We've tried 3-strikes provisions so that repeat offenders are in jail forever. We've tried going to the countries where this stuff is grown and shooting people. We've tried all sorts of attempts at brutality, and none of it has led to the slightest drop in drug use or the potency of available drugs.

It's done nothing to reduce drug abuse.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

I am an IT professional who happens to enjoy smoking a little weed from time to time in my off hours.

In the country where I live, I can buy it without getting hassled by the cops. (Think European capital with a "Free Zone" where it's effectively de-criminalised.)

I pay for this indulgence just like I pay for everything else (house payment, taxes, child support, etc.)--with the money I earn from my work. I don't do any crimes (and simply getting high is no more a crime than is drinking alcohol, laws or no laws).

My health is excellent.

I do not drive or operate heavy equipment when I've been toking up, any more than I do when I've had a few beers.

And your sig "We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security." is an exercise in hypocrisy. You should be bloody ashamed of yourself.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Talderas]

Dosage.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

Just like the GP!

Use google, then get a slashdot account.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Artifakt]

On the Texas/Mexico border right this year, there have been over a dozen cases where drug mules have driven trucks or cars into the Rio Grande at high rates of speed to get back across the border with their drugs and presumably try again rather than get caught. If they do lose the shipment, they will get killed in prison by a cartel agent, no ifs, ands or buts. Yet these people are still desperate enough to keep trying.
        So, your argument boils down to: We're already doing what I advocate, and it isn't working, but if we just write down a law that says we actually mean to do what we are already doing, it will suddenly start working.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[cheekyjohnson]

One has to ask which is less a drain on society

For me, all I have to ask is whether or not it's a matter of freedom. I think it is, so the cost is irrelevant to me. Not that drug laws actually prevent people from getting drugs, that enforcement costs aren't astronomical, or that it doesn't cost quite a bit of money per person in jail, of course.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

What does dosage have to do with it?

There are illegal drugs that cannot be consumed in a rate fast enough to cause death. There are drugs no one would want to consume that much.

Dosages would be better understood and less people would die if the drugs that can kill by overdose were legal and properly labeled.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[AvitarX]

It's done nothing to reduce drug abuse.

Do you really believe that? it's driven up costs, and as someone that believes in economics it has therefore lowered abuse.

I do think that the war on drugs is a net negative, and should be stopped. I also believe that making obviously false statements is not the way to go about it.

The war on drugs has reduced drug abuse, but increased people abuse (as the criminals running the industry don't really feel the need to lack legally), but has certainly reduced drug abuse by increasing the cost.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Fast Thick Pants]

Futilely attempt to ban all drugs for everyone while wasting countless amounts of taxpayer dollars in the process!

Oh, those dollars aren't being wasted... they're being very meticulously transferred by the dumpsterfull into the private prison and homeland security industries.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sooooo many loopholes in that logic.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[pclminion]

All the while destroying other people's lives while they're high

Point conceded here. Some drugs do cause people to behave monstrously. And alcohol even more so.

breaking into people's homes so they can steal to feed their habit

Point NOT conceded. A great number of people are alcoholics. However, there is no great wave of crime due to alcoholics breaking into people's homes to steal their liquor and/or money to buy more alcohol. Why is this? Two reasons. First, it is legal and therefore, moderately cheap. If you can hold down a job, you can afford to be a drunk. Second, alcohol use is socially accepted, for the most part, and thus a boozer is more likely to be able to hold a job as long as he's not falling down drunk at work. This ability to hold a job, due to social acceptance, is what enables the drunk to continue to purchase alcohol without robbing people.

You are allowing you anger to dictate possible solutions, instead of thinking about the actual outcomes. Would a death penalty on all drug traffickers actually cause a decrease in the amount of drugs consumed? That's nothing but a hypothesis. A mountain of evidence is available which suggests that the death penalty does nothing to deter criminals. They don't think they're going to get caught in the first place, so what matter is it what the punishment is? The death penalty gives you an adrenaline rush: "Justice, fuck yeah!" But that's all it does.

You are obviously uninterested in actually solving the problem, and more interested in watching people die.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[jamstar7]

DUI laws stop people from drinking and driving. It used to be pretty common until it became a serious offense with serious punishments.

Love to see some stats on that. Those I can remember say there was no change, but that could just be spin or bad memory...

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Mr. White]

Maybe he means tobacco.

No social cost there, either.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[jamstar7]

Been tried. It didn't work so well except as a way of employing a bunch of feds by making 'organised crime' flourish.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a 1 liter bottle of vodka next to me. I could easily drink it all, I would probably die. So i dont understand your dosage statement.
I also have quarter of ounce of marijuana, which if I smoke all of i will just be really high and probably sleep.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[cayenne8]

DUI laws stop people from drinking and driving. It used to be pretty common until it became a serious offense with serious punishments.

Where do you live where drinking and driving is no longer 'pretty common'?

Most everyone I know, often still pours a drink to go when driving out, and thinks nothing about drinking at bars, and then...well, you *do* have to get the car back home.

I know they crack down a bit more in the NE of the US, but most everywhere I live, I don't know anyone that is seriously worried about having some drinks and driving home. Trashed? No..no one wants that, but having a few and a buzz is no big deal to most people that want to have a few.

I certainly don't think twice about it. Heck...that's what "to go" cups are....at bars here, you can get a drink to go, they'll put it into a plastic cup for you to take out with you when you leave...of course, we're the most lax on alcohol laws down here..so, a bit of an extreme example.

But, most people I was speaking of, live outside of my area in other states....feel the same way.

Sure, you have to be a little more careful...but it isn't like a social stigma where people will shun you or think negatively of you, if you have a few drinks and drive somewhere...as long as you aren't plastered.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Talderas]

One can consume doses of alcohol that do not impart the debilitating effects that lead to the accidents that kill people. The dosage bar for most drugs is significantly lower and virtually impossible to enjoy the drug without the debilitating effects taking hold. In fact, the debilitating effects are often the point of the drug.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Or you could just look up Insight in Vancouver BC, there's been tons of documentation on its success. Seriously, failing to "provide evidence" of some claims is like failing to provide evidence that the sun will rise tomorrow, the ones demanding said evidence are wilfully blind.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry but diabetes and liver-failure is not a quick kill-all for alcohol addicts. They just get transplants or waste medical dollars.

An alcoholic is highly unlikely to receive a liver transplant. They screwed up that organ of their own free will, therefore, we reserve these precious resources for people who suffer organ failure through no fault of their own. You are simply making shit up.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

I live in Western NY. Drinking and driving does occur, but it is not anywhere near as common as it was 20 years ago. Here you are looking at five figure fines, and the possibility of jail time.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Child support? You're some woman's Bitch?

I want to marry a young female child. Why can't I do this?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not sure when the laws changed, but I got a DUI about ten years ago. Spent a day in jail, $1,200 USD fine plus I had to attend fifteen DUI classes spread over the course of several months that cost $85 USD each. That was for a first time offense where I was just over the legal BAC limit (some places issue harsher punishments for extreme levels of intoxication).

I have not operated a vehicle while intoxicated ever again.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[K. S. Kyosuke]

You mean like Alchohol?

I see you are typing under influence.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

I disagree, many drugs can be used in that way. The most popular illegal recreational drug in the USA can and is used that way.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[zill]

Drugs ruin much more than just the user's life. It affects the entire family. What is a child supposed to do when their parents uses drugs all day and there's no food on the table? "take responsibility" for their parents' lives?

That being said, some drugs are socially acceptable in the western world (despite how harmful they are). Tobacco and alcohol are the two main ones. Any drug that's less harmful and less addictive than these two should be automatically decriminalized, starting with marijuana.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[bhagwad]

Oh I don't know...maybe because the child is a minor?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[butchersong]

So in order to prevent the criminalization of... a crime (because criminalizing stuff doesn't work as a deterrent) you're for preventing drug use by criminalizing drug possession.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[BlackSnake112]

Were the drug mules forced to swallow those balloons filled with drug abc123? If so, get them to give evidence (besides the drugs) that will point to the drug lords/pushers etc. If they were a mule for an easy pay off, then jail or worse. They made a decision and that is the consequence of that action.

I would be serious money that if drug mules were getting death sentences that was to be carried out in six months of less, that many of those mules would start talking. The forced and non forced ones. Jail time is better then death.

All the talk about alcohol. Anything taken to extremes is bad. I'll say this I have yet to see anyone get addicted to alcohol on the first drink. I have seen first hand and read about people getting addicted to drugs on the first hit. They need that drug after the first hit. I have yet to see someone need a drink after the first drink.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Hatta]

I'll get modded down but don't care. What we need is to be more brutal.

Have you ever heard of the concept of proportional justice? People like you are more dangerous than the drug users you seek to destroy.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

1 liter of vodka will not kill you. Alcohol is bad for you, no need to exaggerate.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[cayenne8]

I live in Western NY. Drinking and driving does occur, but it is not anywhere near as common as it was 20 years ago. Here you are looking at five figure fines, and the possibility of jail time.

Ok..well, that somewhat confirms my observations, that they are much more uptight about it up in the NE...heck, last time I visited there, you couldn't even smoke in the bars up there anymore...

But the penalties vary greatly across the US. First offense anywhere around here, just lawyer up, and you'll get likely reduced to reckless driving....and in my state...I can refuse to take any tests...will get suspended license, but no DWI on the record.

Whatever you do, know the laws of your state, and don't give the cops any more evidence than the law forces you to.....

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[BlackSnake112]

breaking into people's homes so they can steal to feed their habit

They do that because drugs are artificially expensive due to the legal BS around them.

If the risk of jail was removed the cost of manufacturing, transporting, and distributing things like Cocaine would fall thru the floor. Only the most hopelessly strung out junkie would be unable to support their habit, if by no other means than panhandling.

Exactly what do you think many of the panhandlers are buying?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[mcgrew]

When I was in Thailand in 1974 there were only four drugs you couldn't buy in a pharmacy, and they were marijuana, cocaine, LSD and heroin. LSD and cocaine were completely unavailable, the place was awash with heroin and pot, and you needed no prescription for any other drug. Ecstasy might not have been invented then, but they had some amphetamines that one pill would keep you awake for two days straight. There was a salve available that was used for terminating pregnancies if the woman rubbed it on their belly button, or induce an out of body experience if you rubbed it on your temples. Quaaludes were available in pharmacies without a prescription as well.

Oddly, although the country was awash with heroin, the only heroin addicts I ran across were all GIs.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[bhagwad]

Would you be in favor of a law legalizing drugs for childless couples only? If you have a kid, you go to jail. Because that's the logical result of your argument.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

get a job or find better parents - isnt that how markets are supposed to work.

Blame the CIA they created the market.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[slew]

In mexico, the possession of pretty much all drugs have been decriminalized, yet there doesn't seem to be an end in sight for the mexican drug war. Essentially all the gangs in Mexico want to be the ones to supply drugs to the US and are fighting it out to do so. Merely legalizing drugs in Mexico hasn't prevented the underground in Mexico from pretty much owning major parts of the country.

As with all things, it boils down to profit. The underground avoids complying with tax, customs, employment, and environmental laws. In the USA, you see some above-ground MJ dispensaries attempting to dodge taxes and purchase through quasi-legal channels (some state require dispensaries to grow their own) ostensibly to compete with the illegal suppliers with their rock bottom prices (or maybe they are just crooked business folks, hard to tell sometimes).

An underground generally thrives simply because there is proft to be made, not some sort of nebulous vacuum to be filled. Just like illicit prescription drugs, pirated software, books, movies, and songs: when there's more money to be made legally, than illegally, then the underground will fade.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is the DEA in the USA investigating this organization? I can guarantee they are not even concerned but they will demand a huge budget increase to allow them to track and monitor such activity on-line.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Sponge Bath]

Pipe down Clippy!

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[causality]

Some drugs do cause people to behave monstrously. And alcohol even more so.

No drug, not even alcohol, can bring out of a person something that was not already in that person. A lot of people have unresolved emotional baggage, insecurities, and unhealthy tendencies that they barely keep in check, mostly through fear of consequence. This is not real character or real strength and the dissolution of inhibition can cause it to break down.

What drugs can do is break down the illusion of being normal that many fucked-up people try so hard to project. There are a lot of fucked up people trying hard to appear normal "like everybody else".

The real tragedy is that we live in such a shallow and unenlightened society that a) people blame the drug for this, b) we generally like to blame drugs, guns, and other inanimate objects for what people do, and c) the shallow, exclusive focus on external behavior and appearances means that many people don't know what real character actually is.

People who have real character don't become "a different person" when drunk or high. They don't do things while intoxicated that they wouldn't do while sober. They weren't faking it while sober. They don't need inhibitions and they don't need fear of consequence to stop them from doing stupid and harmful things. They simply have no such desires. They can get very drunk and the only observable changes are that their speech slurs, they are wobbly or stumble while walking, and they become more loquacious.

I'll reiterate, we live in a truly shallow and unenlightened society where the most ignorant and emotionally immature are the most comfortable. I sincerely believe that future historians will regard this as a Dark Age, technology notwithstanding. Drugs are simply one of those things where stupidity has a price and cannot simply be glossed over or made into a burden that someone else must bear. That's the only reason they've become such a big deal.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

You're pulling this out of your ass. The legal alcohol limit is a joke, some people are twice over it and not drunk at all, some are twice under and shouldn't be 10 meters near a car.

If Marijuana was decriminalized or legal, it would still count as a DUI if it impaired you. It's an argument used by morons.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

You were lied to. Nothing is addictive the first time you use it.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

Alcohol, which is cheap because it is legal.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Agent0013]

I'll get modded down but don't care. What we need is to be more brutal.

Have you ever heard of the concept of proportional justice? People like you are more dangerous than the drug users you seek to destroy.

Yeah!!! We need to be more brutal on dangerous people! I say we give the death penalty to those who want to give the death penalty to others!

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

1.2 liters of 100 proof alcohol, if chugged and successfully digested without vomiting, is close enough to the ld50 for a person of around 150 pounds.

It'd put you in the hospital, at least.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Tokolosh]

I believe that more innocent people are killed by drug violence as a result of the need for illegal procurement, than are killed by actual drug usage.

More people died during Prohibition than before or after.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

As you yourself note, the real issue with Mexico's drug war is the USAs drug laws.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Mexico is a special case because it isn't the Mexican drug market that's causing all the crime there, but rather the American market.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[AmazingRuss]

It was as late as the 80s in Wyoming. Drinking age was 19, there was no open container law, and you could buy mixed drinks from a drive up window. I don't know if there were more accidents or not, but there was definitely a lot more drinking and driving back then, from my experience. I got a DUI back then, and it was $100 ticket.

It ends up costing 10-15k now, so I have to think that's more of a deterrent.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

DUI laws stop people from drinking and driving. It used to be pretty common until it became a serious offense with serious punishments.

Where do you live where drinking and driving is no longer 'pretty common'?

Norway.

Or rather, I used to live there, and drinking and driving was not at all common. The discussion was about whether it was OK to drive the next morning after drinking, not about whether it it was OK to have a few and then drive home. The tolerance was set at I think 0.02% - I remember that the net result is that an adult male can have about 1/2 of a pint of beer and be close to but not crossing the limit.

Most everyone I know, often still pours a drink to go when driving out, and thinks nothing about drinking at bars, and then...well, you *do* have to get the car back home.

Part of that is probably that the US limits are ridiculously high, and the punishments light. If I was caught at the US limit in Norway, I'd have to pay 1.5 times my gross monthly salary, I'd get a suspended prison sentence (probably a month or two), be a pedestrian for a year and a half, and have to re-do my driving test after the 18 months. And if I got busted again inside five years I'd permanently lose my driving license.

And attitudes follow behavior. By increasing the punishments for this, people will do it a bit less, so they'll adjust their attitudes, and then the laws can be tightened a bit more. Norway did not start at limits and attitudes like the above, but have come there gradually. I think it's a good thing - drinking and driving don't belong together, and the limit has been put above where there is measurable impairment to driving skills - but it is not something I think can be introduced suddenly.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

>What is a child supposed to do when their parents uses drugs all day and there's no food on the table?

Dirtbags are going to be dirtbags regardless. No law on the books now is doing a fucking thing about this. This is an intellectually dishonest argument at best, contemptible fucking drivel at worst.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, now you have to choose. Either drink the liter of wodka, or smoke all the weed.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

I assume you include all drugs in that?

Are you going to go down to the supermarket and take care of the cashiers, too?

'cause alcohol is a drug if you use any medical definition of a drug.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[BlackSnake112]

Justice for the relative of the victims perhaps. It should for other would-be criminals be a warning. If they do that crime the same will happen to them. With all the appeals that death row inmates get, their dead man walking time is years if not decades away. They all know this. So that is the lack of deterrent. There needs to be an express lane put in for death row. Speed up the executions. If a criminal is caught, tried, convicted, sentenced, and that sentence is carried out in a few months, I would bet many criminals would think twice.

Lets get all the high tech stuff to all law enforcement. At least then they can catch the right person the first time. Using clear evidence that convicts that person. I am begging to think we need a robot police force. Those robots would follow the law and not have any prejudice against anyone. People can be blinded by their beliefs too easily. Hence all the wrong arrests and wrong people convicted.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Tokolosh]

Sheesh, we even have agents running around Africa now. No doubt they are creating goodwill wherever they go.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/22/world/africa/us-expands-drug-fight-in-africa.html

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[mcgrew]

All the while destroying other people's lives while they're high

That's the other peoples' fault for having anything to do with them. And you don't have to be a junkie to destroy someone's life, all it takes is an adulterous bitch and you're out of your marriage, out of your home and in bankrupcy court. Yes, it was my own damned fault for marrying her. If she'd been a junkie it would have been the same -- my own damned fault for having anything whatever to do with her.

breaking into people's homes so they can steal to feed their habit

Breaking into people's home to steal is already illegal, and if their drugs were legal they might be cheap enough that they wouldn't HAVE to steal. Look at the price of marijuana vs the price of tobacco (a deadly addictive but legal drug). A pack of cigarettes is an ounce, seven bucks including all the onerous taxes, while marijuana is WAY over $100 an ounce.

a whole host of other issues, including medical as their bodies get ravaged

Much cheaper if they die at age 40 than at age 100. At that age you've been seeing the doctor every week for fifty years, the 40 year old junkie usually doesn't see a doctor until he's at death's door. Often he only sees the coroner.

What we need is to be more brutal.

Brutality is always a bad thing. There is already far too much in the world.

Whack 'em. You get rid of enough mules and the supply dries up.

They've been trying to do that for well over half of a century. I'm afraid history and facts get in the way of your drug-free utopia.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Decameron81]

Well, then you criminalize the actual CRIME - driving while impaired. You can't criminalize behavior that's not criminal. It's like saying you can't buy a car because it *might* be used in the commission of a crime. There are thousands of things that are already illegal that pretty much cover the bases - everything from reckless driving to child safety...these laws are perfectly capable of punishing real criminals instead of filling our prisons with responsible users.

Using the same logic, driving while impaired is only considered a crime because you may end up killing someone - hence we should decriminalize driving while impaired and only arrest people when they run over and kill someone - which is the real crime.

Prevention is the key word. The reason why drug usage (just as driving when intoxicated) is considered a crime is prevention.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Morphine is pretty addictive as well

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

No.

You cannot reasonably consume alcohol without the debilitating effects that lead to accidents that kill people; or rather, people usually don't.

In driving simulators, measurable alcohol impairment start at about .015%. For a 200 pound adult male, that's a bit more than 1/2 of a pint of beer. For my own way of measuring, that seems a bit high - I've noticed impairment for coordination based activities (juggling) at significantly lower amounts.

Captcha: endanger :-)

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Capt.DrumkenBum]

Here, enjoy this free introductory sample of heroin. No charge, on the house. What could possibly go wrong.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Sloppy]

what countries where it's legal? there are VERY few.

Break it down further and you'll figure it out. Instead of country, try country+drug. Then you can look at situations like alcohol in the United States. Maybe compare that to alcohol in Saudi Arabia, or cocaine in the United States, or even (country+drug+year) alcohol in 1927 United States.

To my layman's eye (I'm not a statistician) there appears to be a correlation, where the more strenously the government insists that the public use black markets for a commodity, the more violent the trade in that commodity is.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Also, child neglect and endangerment are already fucking illegal and have fuck-all to do with drugs or alcohol.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, morphine is addictive. And before it was criminalized, there were plenty of doctors, lawyers and other responsible professionals addicted to it. This interfered with their personal and professional lives no more than smoking does today. The only significant side effect of morphine addiction is constipation. If the war on drugs was renamed the war on constipation it might get the respect it deserves.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Applekid]

Well, then you criminalize the actual CRIME - driving while impaired

When has criminalizing something actually stopped it from happening? Criminalizing and sentencing only exists to give victims some sense of justice, after it's all over and can never be undone.

This is about *prevention*.

So? Illegal drugs are illegal now, yet there are still people that get high and get behind the wheel and cause accidents. Lots of prevention those laws are doing, they are. Lots of people being denied the right to own their bodies as a result, too.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

  You don't generally see people worrying about paying for other peoples' lung cancer either. Why?

I think there's two reasons. It's legal, and it's common enough that almost everyone has a close friend or family member who smokes. My grandmother smoked for 30 years. I've got a couple friends who've smoked for 15-20. Nobody really wants their friends and family to be without care.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Bigby]

The GGP is advocating giving the driver proper punishment. If he causes an accident that results in a death, then life in prison. Paralysis? 10 years in prison and monthly payments to the paralyzed individuals. That can be quite a deterent.

Punish the crime. Preventative laws make things too complicated.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Tokolosh]

A famous study you never heard of - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/background_briefings/smoking/86599.stm

This kind of result is quickly covered up.

We do know that smoking is the greatest single cause of statistics. But if you want your study funded you better be prepared to come down on the side of conventional wisdom.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

We are not talking about 1.2 liters of 100 proof. We are talking about 1 liter of 80 proof. I am about 150 pounds, it will not put you in the hospital either.

If you were going to change the volume and the strength why not just claim 100 liters of 200 proof would kill you?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[BlackSnake112]

What does dosage have to do with it?

There are illegal drugs that cannot be consumed in a rate fast enough to cause death. There are drugs no one would want to consume that much.

Dosages would be better understood and less people would die if the drugs that can kill by overdose were legal and properly labeled.

?
What drug can be consumed at a very high rate and not kill? I am betting your thinking of pot. Considering people can die from drinking too much water, I call bs. You just want pot legal. Anything taken to extremes can kill people.

If you can get studies done by people who have nothing to gain by pot being legal or for it remain illegal you might have a chance. Those groups are the only ones who could deliver a clear unbiased result. Anyone else will have a biased result. All results from the biased groups for either side should be tossed. They have an agenda. When we are looking for facts to see if something is harmful or not, the agenda groups do not provide the answer.

For all those who say that pot id helping with whatever, look at the placebo groups in studies. They were giving nothing and yet many still get better. They think they were given something. They believe that that pill will help them. They then get/feel better. It is all in their mind. All the medical benefits of pot is like the placebo pill. Those people believed that pot will make them better. So they get better when they take pot. Hemp rope is proven, pot plants are good for that. All the medical stuff needs more unbiased research.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[bjourne]

Let's assume all other drugs are no more dangerous or costly for society than alcohol. Then if the cost for alcohol is X, and alcohol + N other drugs are legal, the total cost becomes (X+1)*N which is clearly much larger than X. It is a really stupid argument to say that "well other drugs aren't any more bad than alcohol, so they should be legal too!" because alcohol is bad enough.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[hansraj]

Not cocaine or ecstacy, but Switzerland allows you to buy heroine. Apparently the same referendum that legalized medicinal heroin use for addicts made marijuana illegal for medicinal purposes.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

Even that is not going to make an addict. Where does this free drug myth come from? No dealer is giving away free drugs, it does not happen.

Nicotine is far more addictive, and still requires multiple uses to be addictive.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Bigby]

I hate when people put "private" in front of prison in this context. Like public prisons aren't in the same boat. Just say "special interests". Instead you choose to make an apparent attack on capitalism, when it is really about big government and crony capitalism.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Red Flayer]

Emphasis mine:

Yes, morphine is addictive. And before it was criminalized, there were plenty of doctors, lawyers and other responsible professionals addicted to it. This interfered with their personal and professional lives no more than smoking does today..

Citation needed.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[cheekyjohnson]

They made a decision and that is the consequence of that action.

Yeah, and people living in dictatorships made decisions and met the consequences of those decisions. What's your point? That doesn't mean the punishment is just. Laws aren't always just.

I would be serious money that if drug mules were getting death sentences that was to be carried out in six months of less

I would bet serious money that I don't care whether or not that's true. For me, this is almost completely a matter of freedom (the cost of the enforcement adds a bit to it). I'm against punishing everyone (drug users, innocent people hurt by police enforcing drug laws, etc) for the actions of a few (drug users who commit crimes).

Again, these mentalities are reminding me of organizations like the TSA who will hurt any innocent, waste any amount of money, and infringe upon everyone's freedoms to get at a few criminals/terrorists.

Anything taken to extremes is bad.

Argument to moderation.

I have seen first hand and read about people getting addicted to drugs on the first hit.

That's fantastic, but from my perspective, you're too emotional about it. You seem to have adopted this "allow no casualties at the cost of freedom" approach (that doesn't work anyway).

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[slew]

As you yourself note, the real issue with Mexico's drug war is the USAs drug laws.

And the real issue with the opium war was the chinese drug laws?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[TheCarp]

> Do you really believe that? it's driven up costs, and as someone that believes in economics it
> has therefore lowered abuse.

How fucking scientific. Maybe I believe in pink unicorns.

You are wrong, not because economics is wrong, but because you are applying it in a simplistic manner, looking at only one part of a much larger issue. Its not just a matter of cost or cost going up. These are not apples to apples comparisons by any stretch of the imagination.

Whats gone up? well cost yes, but so has potency and purity. Do you ever hear of opium smokers doing anything?

Partially its because you can't get opium. You can certainly get heroin. And the price of heroin has gone up, but, its far more potent, its in a pure form (not counting any cut) and often injected. Its very strong, much stronger than the smoked opium that has been all but removed from the market.

Crystal meth. Similar. All other, safer, less potent stimulents are relegated to obscurity, shut out of the market. What remains is very potent and pure...and I don't mean pure in the "FDA regulations make sure everything on the label is actually whats in there" pure... I mean "Holy crap that stuff is over 90% methamphetamine, you better be careful".

Not to mention.... Ive known a few users of a few drugs.... most people don't just "do anything". I know more than a few people who only ever smoked pot a handful of times because they didn't like how it made them feel or otherwise didn't enjoy it (which is how I have come to feel about alcohol actually... I don't refuse to drink as a rule, but its been a while since I even accepted a beer offered)

A rather common model, amongst those who look at these issues, is the "Self medication" model, which looks at a large amount of drug use as little more than habbits that self medicate for other conditions (normally with the assumption that this is a bad thing, I tend to question whether its not often more effective than most think, I know people who have eliminated prescription drugs with some nasty side effects in favor of a little pot before bed.... and several others with other conditions).

I think part of the issue here is that you are forgetting that peoples behavior isn't dictated by what you think is rational for them. You are not taking their real motivations into account. You are just assuming that changing one motivating factor must have the effect that you would predict, without actually looking deeper at whats really happening.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Jeng]

If you are interested in the impact of legalizing drugs I suggest you look at Portugal.

Believe it or not legalizing drugs is actually the safer and saner option rather than putting a large percentage of your population in prison.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[xaxa]

I'm too young to know whether the punishment and fines changed, but in the 1980s and 1990s the British government successfully reduced the rate of drink driving by making it socially unacceptable. They ran horrific ads:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f5ma_Xv7rGM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eyzTFdCEXWk

These are more recent:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsY_Co-p8Bw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtJqw--DGl8

The stats: http://www.drinkdriving.org/drink_driving_statistics_uk.php

And the penalties; in case you want to compare: http://www.drinkdrivingfacts.com/drinkdriving/drink_driving_facts.aspx

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[onepoint]

I recent read in the paper, that it Aventura Florida, the DUI stop have a night judge right on the spot, it's to help process the load quickly. I'm going to find a reference to link. Also a DUI conviction in Dade County is $5000 to $7000 in fines plus Insurance companies will hit you with a few surcharges in excess of 1000 per year overall for 5 years. When I spoke to a cop, he said, "take a cab, if you get caught, it's 12K out of pocket when the gavel goes guilty"

Rather scary, but in reality, no different than my time 80's, only thing was that at 2:30 am we were drunk driving to the dinner to sober up and if we were lucky, we might have seen 4 or 5 cars on the road ( this is in a small town of population 84,000 people on the other side on NYC ). worst thing that would happen back then is that they pulled you over,, you walked 5 miles home, passed out on the lawn, and your father would hose you down publicly to wake you up.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[bjourne]

Kinda makes a person wonder what subjectively unacceptable activity you're into... Especially considering that, statistically, users of the legal drugs alcohol and tobacco kill exponentially more "innocent" people, than users of all other drugs combined.

That's not an argument in favor of legalizing drugs, but an argument for restricting the access of tobacco and alcohol. Such as only selling it to adults, in bars, outlawing attempts to market it to children and so on.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Pipe down Clippy!

Clippy | down

Clippy: Sooo... relaxing. Should totally be legal.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[downhole]

I mostly agree with you, but I'd actually mod GP up if I hadn't posted already. I believe that opinions I disagree with should be widely seen and thoroughly shredded, all in public. I usually only mod down stuff that's either totally incoherent or offtopic, uses way too many personal attacks, or is so obviously wrong and offensive that it could only be trolling.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[wisdom_brewing]

There was once this fantastic little tea shop in a small village in Switzerland, did amazing business

They specialized in Green Teas, had varieties from all over the world, extremely good quality and extremely expensive.

You bought your tea and they gave you the choice of giving your address with a perculiar little tick box.

You don't tick the box or don't give your address and you get a lovely little bag with nicely packed green tea.

You do and a few hours later a courier delivers an Amazon package to your door (still don't know where they sourced THAT) containing a specific quantity of something else that was green.

Great little business, too bad it's gone now... Owner apparently retired a very wealthy man.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

About the funniest comment I've seen on the internet EVAR!

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Dragonslicer]

it's driven up costs, and as someone that believes in economics it has therefore lowered abuse.

Am I the only one that heard Stephen Colbert's voice when reading this?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[TFAFalcon]

So we should also ban alcohol, sleeping pills, lack of sleep,......

Have you ever read how many legal drugs have the warning that you shouldn't drive after using them?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Red Flayer]

No drug, not even alcohol, can bring out of a person something that was not already in that person. A lot of people have unresolved emotional baggage, insecurities, and unhealthy tendencies that they barely keep in check, mostly through fear of consequence. This is not real character or real strength and the dissolution of inhibition can cause it to break down.

Please stop spouting armchair psychology.

The relationship between drugs and psychosis is complex and not completely understood... but your point-of-view is hopelessly outdated. Drug-related psychosis has little to do with the "dissolution of inhibition".

People who have real character don't become "a different person" when drunk or high.

"No true Scotsman..."

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Intrepid imaginaut]

No drug, not even alcohol, can bring out of a person something that was not already in that person.

In Vino Veritas is nonsense. Here's one link and there's a lot more research done out there on the mechanics of narcotic-induced personality changes.
http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=28482

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[xaxa]

I live in Western NY. Drinking and driving does occur, but it is not anywhere near as common as it was 20 years ago. Here you are looking at five figure fines, and the possibility of jail time.

Ok..well, that somewhat confirms my observations, that they are much more uptight about it up in the NE

Since over 300 people a year die because of it (in NY), it doesn't seem unreasonable to be "uptight".

About 300 people a year die from it in Louisiana too, yet that state has a just a quarter of the population.

http://www.dui-usa.drinkdriving.org/New+York_dui_drunkdriving_statistics.php
http://www.dui-usa.drinkdriving.org/Louisiana_dui_drunkdriving_statistics.php

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Red Flayer]

So then why is alcohol legal?

Tradition. We've been using alcohol as our drug of choice for millenia.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[GameboyRMH]

Most addictive naturally-occuring drug, of all drugs it's #3 IIRC behind a couple of anti-psychotics.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Intrepid imaginaut]

Hold on there. The only reason the mafia didn't vanish after prohibition ended was because they moved directly to heroin. They started using it to control prostitutes then cut out the middleman and just sold it directly to the vulnerable. Violence and crime will absolutely drop if drug prohibition ends. If the drug cartels have no or much less money, they have no power.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[adamgolding]

Nicotine is very addictive, although I've never heard of it being ranked as more addictive than Coke or Heroin:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9c/Rational_scale_to_assess_the_harm_of_drugs_(mean_physical_harm_and_mean_dependence).svg

That being said, there's no shortage of controversy about the extent to which the substance itself is the main factor in addiction:

http://walrusmagazine.com/articles/2007.12-health-rat-trap/

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[xaxa]

One can consume doses of alcohol that do not impart the debilitating effects that lead to the accidents that kill people.

Really?

Plenty of countries have a zero limit for drink driving, with good justification -- even a small drink is proven to affect concentration, decision-making etc.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[sdguero]

The statistics regarding drunk driving in the USA are hard to decifer. In all likely hood it has decreased, but definitely not more than 30%. Much safer cars have led to a lot of the decrease in fatalities (something like 1/3 of what they once were in the early 1980s) but the CDC still estimates that something like 110 million people drove drunk last year. I'd argue that the cost of current DUI laws to society (something like $12,000 for the first DUI infraction per person in CA, and total cost across the country annually of $114 billion!!!!! http://www.duifoundation.org/support/financial/) does not warrant the safety gains. Two DUIs in one year can literally destroy a relatively normal person's life. I have seen it happen multiple times. They lose their job, fall into depression and drink even more.

I feel like a nominal alcohol tax that was then used to subsidized privatized ride programs would have a MUCH bigger impact reducing drunk driving than trying to scare people straight with brutal punishments like we do now. Say one alcohol tax that generates $5 billion annually, would be enough to provide a 250 MILLION free rides a year @ $20 each! Does a new $5 billion tax sound crazy? It certainly does, but over $20 billion in booze is sold in this country annually, and it is peanuts compared to the current cost of DUIs annually.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[DeadCatX2]

It's pretty easy to find plenty of evidence that h4rr4r's post is spot on. Google "Portugal decriminalization".

https://www.google.com/search?q=portugal+decriminalization

h4rr4r speaks truth, whether or not you want to hear it.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm looking forward to the world adopting this standard towards gun control. No you say, why the double standard?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Hatta]

Ecstasy might not have been invented then

MDMA was actually invented by Merck in 1912, but didn't find its way into recreational use until the 80s.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a pointless argument.

What's a child supposed to do when their parents are perpetually hung over from drinking alcohol... Yet drinking is legal.

It's already illegal in almost every corner of the developed world to not properly take care of children, banning drugs for everyone because someone might use them while they should be supervising children is a lame argument. I know you already mentioned alcohol being a drug yourself, but if you say less harmful should be legal you seem to imply that you agree that alcohol should be legal, yet it fails your own earlier criteria of not endangering children.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[wisdom_brewing]

Agreed, but it is up there.

Crack would be the most I would say, cocaine probably slightly less than nicotine (and yes, I do know the two are very much related). Heroin is a different beast - most addiction that I have seen is not to the drug but to the escape from hell. Know several people that have died from it and thankfully many more that have quit. The people who died were almost all (one unfortunate exception) from terrible families with little or no support and nothing but scorn for their use. Those that quit did so easily one their families stepped in on an emotional level to fix the underlying problems the people were having.

I've never tried it myself (though have tried Cocaine, Extasy, pure Speed, pure MDMA, shrooms - only thing i still do is occasionally smoke a bit of weed and have too many beers) but I have spent 6 months on a morphine drip (extreme burns as a 12 year old - no drugs involved) and the week long comedown off that was a different type of hell.

The thing is, I don't want to touch any of that stuff again (wouldn't mind MDMA again once I meet the right girl, sex on it is meant to be unbelievable) other than weed and alcohol. Coming off morphine was a bitch, but once you're over withdrawals you are fine (guess the same with Heroin if you life isnt hell). Coming off nicotine... My father currently has small cell lung cancer and still smokes. His father died from cancer. I still smoke. Explain addiction to me please.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, but the fact is that if said parents can't put said child before their own petty habits, they probably shouldn't be parents. Ideally they didn't procreate in the first place, but if the state places said child into protective custody, there's a good chance it's an improvement for all involved -- except the deadbeats, who no longer get incentives to abuse their children.

I certainly don't believe that means that CPS should take your kids the second you get arrested for drug use, but if there's any concomitant neglect or abuse, say bye-bye -- and good riddance. I've seen far too many bright kids saddled with s**tbag parents. And while the system certainly sucks, at least in this part of the US, it doesn't have to -- how many potentially awesome parents are prevented from adopting needy kids due to absolutely idiotic prejudices?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[CanHasDIY]

Kinda makes a person wonder what subjectively unacceptable activity you're into... Especially considering that, statistically, users of the legal drugs alcohol and tobacco kill exponentially more "innocent" people, than users of all other drugs combined.

That's not an argument in favor of legalizing drugs, but an argument for restricting the access of tobacco and alcohol. Such as only selling it to adults, in bars, outlawing attempts to market it to children and so on.

...

Which we already do, and yet hundreds of thousands of people are killed each year due to the use of said drugs regardless.

I'm sorry, but did you have a point?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Most everyone I know, often still pours a drink to go when driving out, and thinks nothing about drinking at bars, and then...well, you *do* have to get the car back home.

Cool, so you're saying you hang out with a bunch of irresponsible fucktards who are stuck in some sort of Peter Pan fantasy land where they're incredible drivers who are immune to the slowed reaction times, lowered judgement, and altered depth perception that comes with alcohol consumption.

I sincerely hope they only kill or maim themselves when their inevitable comeuppance occurs.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[CanHasDIY]

I mostly agree with you, but I'd actually mod GP up if I hadn't posted already. I believe that opinions I disagree with should be widely seen and thoroughly shredded, all in public. I usually only mod down stuff that's either totally incoherent or offtopic, uses way too many personal attacks, or is so obviously wrong and offensive that it could only be trolling.

Hmm, interesting philosophy... Perhaps there should be a "+1 This Guy's a Jackass" mod...

Well played.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[SuricouRaven]

The argument is that inconsistancy in law is an inherently bad thing. Thus either alcohol must be banned, or other drugs legalised. Either works to resolve the contradiction.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe instead we could outlaw negligence and endangerment of children. Oh, wait...

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[downhole]

Actually, it just might, depending on how fast you drink it, what else you've eaten recently, and what your tolerance to alcohol is. Though the type of person who has a full liter of vodka next to them and could actually drink it all has a better chance of handling it.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[wisdom_brewing]

Kudos

I prefer Iain Banks' utopia. It's much deeper than it seems.

The Culture got it right, the US is getting it very, VERY wrong...

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[spikesahead]

I think your ideas are dangerous, so rather than debate them, I think we should just smash your hands to jelly with a masonry hammer.

That will save so much time, and won't hurt me in the slightest.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[ranpel]

Your statements contradict the spirit of your sig.

Yet another display of the selective application of intelligence.

You must be a voter.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[icebraining]

Of course, the cost for alcohol during prohibition wasn't exactly lower.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

You seem to be assuming that decriminalizing all drugs would increase the associated problems. I do not believe that, or at least I think its not inevitable. Almost anyone who wants to use them already does; ie. there would be no significant difference in usage. Just perform this little thought experiment: ask yourself, or your friends, if heroin were legal tomorrow, would you start using it? I have been asking that question of people I meet for about 30 years. Must have been hundreds of people. Only one person ever said yes, and I think he may have been joking.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Just one example (you can Google sources):

1889: The John Hopkins Hospital, in Baltimore, Maryland, is opened. One of its world-famous founders, Dr. William Stewart Halsted, is a morphine addict. He continues to use morphine in large doses throughout his phenomenally successful surgical career lasting until his death in 1922.

It is the extraordinary claim that morphine addiction is problematic that needs evidence. A century of puritans saying "drugs are bad" is not evidence.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[TFAFalcon]

It would be interesting to compare the cost to society that legalized drugs in compared to the cost of crime and enforcement right now.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

I wish you could be modded "-1, bigot," but that doesn't seem to be possible. Unfortunately, you seem to get a lot of good replies, so this post will never get the obscurity it deserves.

Ignoring the whole issue of whether or not you're correct in your statements, I'd like to know why you're so eager to judge, and so harshly. Kinda sounds "brittle and reflexive" -- quite similar to Larry Craig's position on gay sex.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

I hate when people put "private" in front of prison in this context. Like public prisons aren't in the same boat. Just say "special interests". Instead you choose to make an apparent attack on capitalism, when it is really about big government and crony capitalism.

There are certain things that should not be handled by capitalism. Prisons are one of them. So, it's not an attack on capitalism per se, but yes, it's a specific attack against private prisons.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[HybridST]

I`m well aware that anecdote =/= data but ten years ago when i was a busker playing music and singing for my rent i was inundated with panhandlers in my vicinity. I made hundreds on a good day and so did they. They nearly universally blew it on booze or oxy/meths/cannabis and smokes.

The only panhandlers who "really" need your offering are the ones out of the way staring past the sidewalk-too tired to ask anymore. These persons get my change/a coffee/ a meal/ a phonecall nearly every time.

The vibrant, energetic ones partying in the street get nothing from me.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[dkleinsc]

Do you really believe that? it's driven up costs ...

1. No it hasn't

2. Also noted in my source, the purity has gone up, so the same amount of drug is more of the active ingredient than it once was.

3. An addict will spend whatever it takes to get their fix. If all the grocery stores in your area tripled their prices, you'd pay that price (or move) rather than going hungry. It's the same story here.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[wisdom_brewing]

Pot isn't meant to get you better, it is meant to make life more livable, be it through the relaxin qualities or the appetite inducing qualities.

Smoking too much pot on a daily basis WILL fuck you up, no doubt. Same goes for alcohol. Same goes for water. That's the definition of "too much".

Sure GP was being generalistic, but if you look at somewhere like Holland where cannabis is decriminalise, very few locals actually smoke it (good luck finding someone who's not a tourist in an Amsterdam coffee shop unless they work there).

I'm far from perfect. I drink too much too often. I occasionally smoke some weed and have tried a fair range of drugs in my student days. But your points are somewhat nonsensical. Find me one person who is smoking pot for the first time and has "too much" and has a reaction which is worse than throwing up then falling asleep.

A large number of illegal drugs have a point where the person doesn't WANT anymore (example MDMA) - if the initial dose and wait time for it to hit is adequate then damage caused is far lower and at a much smaller cost to society than an obese idiot eating another cheap, over-salted, sugar-bunned, processed cheese covered burger. Get quality ingredients and savour them.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[wisdom_brewing]

1 litre of 80 proof won't put much of dent on many people if it's a one off. Done on a daily basis for several years however...Please note my sig though (and excuse the smiley crap)

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sending the drug traffickers and dealers to jail is missing the point. They just operate from jail. Give them their fair trial. Then off to the public hanging or firing squad. Maybe the electric chair. Cause lethal injection is too kind and too quick. It is also too like doing many drugs. The punishment is cruel, mean, but they are being punished. That is the point. Killing them quickly and kindly should be wrong. They should be killed slowly, painfully, and on tape. Those deaths should be played in a constant loop in all prisons. It would give those released something to think about.

And what happens when it turns out we killed a bunch of people who were not actually dealing drugs? Not to mention the fact that you want to apply the Bill of Rights selectively, which would be far worse than what any drug dealer does (or even every drug dealer, ever, combined).

With the technology available today fewer people should be getting arrested for a falsely. That technology is freeing some people.

And when the technology available tomorrow exonerates some of the people we convict today, shouldn't it be able to free them too? Or did you think DNA analysis represented the final word in forensic technology?

Not just for drug crimes. If a rapist is caught, we have their DNA to prove they raped that person. They should have their equipment cut off sans any anesthesia. Maybe a little. They should feel most of it. Not just wake up and it is gone. It is punishment. Having all of it cut off is part of the punishment. You do not want to have your junk cut off, do not rape anyone. Not a difficult concept.

And what about the ones who turn out to have been falsely convicted? Do we just give them a sheepish "whoops, our bad, sorry about cutting your junk off"? Maybe give them a free strapon? Or are you still clinging to this notion that DNA evidence is always available and 100% foolproof?

Protip: CSI:Whatever is just a TV show.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

What drug can be consumed at a very high rate and not kill? I am betting your thinking of pot. Considering people can die from drinking too much water, I call bs. You just want pot legal. Anything taken to extremes can kill people.

There's a simple reason the LD50 for cannabis isn't known: no-one has ever been able to deliver enough to find out (in rats). Unlike water, taking enough cannabis actually debilitates the user to a point where they physically can't take any more.

tl;dr Shut up, Cartman.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[wisdom_brewing]

And I've had 1.5 litres (2 750cl bottles of 100 proof vodka) without vomiting as a 16 year old with no ill effect other than a rather severe telling off from my parents from coming home too late

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[downhole]

It's ultimately about the money. Yes, there's dirty people and organizations in the drug trade, and they aren't going to become saints overnight when you legalize it. But legalizing it, and doing a decent job of defending the legal trade in it, would deprive these gangs of something like 90% of their money (yes I just made that number up). In what world is it not worthwhile to eliminate the majority of your opponent's funding? With the loss of their only really highly profitable operation, the larger organizations will probably dissolve into a bunch of smallish bands that don't coordinate their operations. The violence may get worse for a short time as the smaller chunks that manage to retain some sort of group cohesion may try to get into kidnapping and whatnot, but that's much less profitable and much easier for law enforcement to root out. Long-term, it can only be a good thing.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[The Grim Reefer]

A famous study you never heard of - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/background_briefings/smoking/86599.stm

This kind of result is quickly covered up.

We do know that smoking is the greatest single cause of statistics. But if you want your study funded you better be prepared to come down on the side of conventional wisdom.

There have been several more recent studies that back this up. I think one Dutch study indicated that smokers cost an average of $325K from age 20 to 80 whereas non-smokers cost almost $100K more. Hell, even obese people cost around $50K less. I don't think any of these studies take into account the amount of taxes that smokers pay into the system either. I'm thnking it would have been more patriotic for me to have not quite years ago. ;-)

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[wisdom_brewing]

Mod this UP! Good luck getting a new liver if they find a trace of evidence you are still drinking...

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

You are assuming that if all drugs were legal, people who use drugs would use all of them at the same time. This doesn't happen very often, people tend to have a drug of choice, and stick with it, or else use others from time to time, but not all at once. One thing you would see is that people use pot in place of alcohol, which would reduce harm.

The other assumption you are making, is that making drugs illegal prevents people from using them. If that were the case, then making them legal would increase use and you might have a chance at being correct. Drugs are illegal, but people are already using them anyway, so it isn't immediately clear that making them legal would cause more use. In fact drugs have been made legal in some countries, and drug use goes down. Know why? People seek treatment when there is less stigma for it.

So both of your assumptions are extremely common, yet extremely wrong.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

I got a DUI back then, and it was $100 ticket.

It ends up costing 10-15k now, so I have to think that's more of a deterrent.

Too bad the stupidity of driving under the influence isn't enough to keep people from doing it.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

1 liter of typical vodka = ~400 mL of ethyl alcohol - most vodkas are ~40% ABV.
Density of ethyl alcohol (Std. Temp & Pressure) is 0.789 g/cm^3, or 0.789 g/mL.
LD50 for ethyl alcohol is roughly 7 g / kg.

400 mL * 0.789 g/mL = 315g of alcohol in that bottle of vodka.

So, we can conclude that that bottle of alcohol, with 315g of alcohol in it, would have a 50% chance of killing a single individual, if that individual weighed 45 kg, or, roughly 99.2 pounds.

So no, you would probably NOT die, unless you're a child, or a woman of well-below-average height/weight, or a severely malnourished man.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

There aren't many drivers in NYC yet millions of people.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[downhole]

Decriminalization is nice for the end users, but it doesn't make a difference as far as large-scale organized crime. To destroy the cartels, you have to legalize the entire supply chain. They aren't really legal if you can't point to legit corporations who grow, process, and ship the stuff by the ton, with full legal protection against theft, fraud, etc. From the perspective of the organization doing the production and distribution, taxes and legal compliance are a pain in the butt, but it beats having to maintain a private security force to protect your interests and operating in a highly unpredictable environment where your product could be stolen at any time, and your only recourse is to figure out who probably did it yourself and send your own private army after them.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[HiThere]

Additionally, sorry to be brutal, but...
Many of these drugs are quite dangerous to the consumer of them. If they are cheaply available, then the people without control will kill themselves off relatively quickly and harmlessly. And if they aren't dangerous, then what's wrong with them.

I really think making them illegal causes more problems than it solves. I will agree that it reduces some problems.

Actually, I'm not in favor of total legalization. I think there should be a 10 cent fine for being caught with an illegal drug in public, and a 50 cent fine for selling them. But a million dollar fine for publicly advertising them seems appropriate. (This would need to be carefully tailored so that writers of fact or fiction didn't end up needing to defend themselves against ridiculous charges, though. A tricky proposition.)
N.B.: The ONLY reason that I'm in favor of laws against drugs it to prohibit them being advertised. I have not heard of another argument that I find compelling, and that one argument is satisfied by a trivial penalty for anything except advertising them.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Americano]

Even if you slugged the entire liter in one instant swallow, and magically managed not to puke it all back up, no, it almost certainly would not KILL you, unless you are a VERY small person.

If you're average size/weight, it would probably get you sick, it would likely get you VERY drunk, and it would probably leave you with a whanging hangover the next day, but unless you are also on some sort of medication that would have an adverse interaction with the alcohol (e.g., downing a liter of vodka with sleeping pills or other sedatives), that's about all it would do.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[ColdWetDog]

My alcoholic neighbor can't even pay child support. How is he going to pay 'monthly payments to the paralyzed individuals'?

Especially if he's in jail for 10 years.

Currently, he's on two years of probation and has a GPS collar. If he hurts somebody, he might go back to jail, but you can forget any sort of compensation.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

They're often the point of drinking alcohol too. You just argued we should ban everything or allow everything and only outlaw imparted activities, such as DUIs.

Think before you type.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[HiThere]

Sorry, but that's not strictly true.

"Angle dust" can cause anyone who uses it to behave unpredictably violently. And I think there's a horse tranquillizer that has a similar effect.

Note that neither of these drugs is at all popular, or ever have been. So much is that the case that even with their known bad side effects they are not on the "most prohibited" list, while many relatively harmless drugs, like LSD, are on that list.

The prohibition of drugs is politically motivated. It doesn't have much to do with whether they are injurious or useful. (I will grant that before it was made illegal, opium was drastically overused. It should never have been a part of a baby's teething syrup. I'm not convinced that the appropriate solution was to make it illegal.)

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Fast Thick Pants]

The penal system is not suitable turf for free-market competition. The market forces push in the direction of maximizing the numbers of incarcerated through lobbying for "tougher" laws with mandatory minimum sentences, and prison conditions that maximize recidivism. Pushing back in the other direction are compassion, basic human decency, and the 8th amendment -- all of which will cut into profits, so anyone who runs a prison decently will be underbid by the more ruthless. And when they cut corners and people suffer and die, heck, that's prison life, don't do the crime if you can't do the time.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

including medical as their bodies get ravaged but which I have to pay for (thanks Roberts

Offtopic response, but ... you were already paying for it long before Roberts' decision, dumbfuck.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[scot4875]

For years, I've thought that "+1, Wrong" should be on the list of mods.

--Jeremy

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed, but it is up there.

Crack would be the most I would say

Why are you agreeing or saying anything based on your own opinions? Rankings of addictiveness aren't arbitrary according to people's subjective experiences. How about you cite a study that shows Nicotine isn't #1or that crack is instead of just saying "Agreed" or "I would say". No-one cares about your opinions, we care about the FACTS.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

No drug, not even alcohol, can bring out of a person something that was not already in that person.

Does it matter whether a violent drunk is acting that way because alcohol made him so directly, or merely dissolved the inhibitions which prevented him from acting that way? Is that even a meaningful distinction?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Kazoo the Clown]

Tell that to all the people on the bus that die when the bus driver wrecks the bus because he/she is high. Or the on coming car that runs into the bus because the driver of the car is high. I doubt that the person taking the drugs would necessarily be the only one to die as a result of their actions.

By this logic, it should be illegal to not get enough sleep-- whether you drive or not, since you seem to be attempting to make a case for keeping drugs illegal whether or not you drive while using them.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[malv]

Except they usually end up harming people who aren't making the irresponsible decisions.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Qzukk]

Give them their fair trial. Then off to the public hanging or firing squad. Maybe the electric chair

The Zetas thank you for doing their dirty work.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey!
anon coward from portugal here... that is kind of a falacy....
THC isn't legal in portugal it is deciminalized meaning if you get caught with something in between 0 to 5 grams you get to pay a 25€ fine
that is cumullative meaning you get caught again you pay 50€ then 75€ and so on until a maximum value that i can't remember instead of going to jail...
BUT you still have to go to a session with someone that's like "drugs are bad mkay..."

It's better than inprisonment but it also generates money to the state...
In the end the consumer gets fucked anyway with the day to day police harassment... (that hasn't changed)

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[TFAFalcon]

If drugs were legal, then their prices would drop sharply. At the same time, there would probably be move users of the 'safer', currently more expensive drugs.

As for punishments, what is needed is some enforcement of current penalties, rather then new ones. Just have Lindsay Lohan serve out her next prison sentence fully and in general population. One picture of her without her nose will do more then a dozen executions.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Shame eating "after" you drink doesn't actually sober you up....

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[TFAFalcon]

My guess is that many more cops would also start dying. Why not shoot the cop that's about to search you, when you're going to die anyway for the drugs you're carrying.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Where does this free drug myth come from? No dealer is giving away free drugs, it does not happen.

Well, not really give them away, exactly. I've partied with plenty of people who get high and suddenly their money flows like water into the drug budget. I've seen plenty of guys spend a pile of cash on various forms of dope for hot young women.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

the UK's to be more accurate

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[couchslug]

"No drug, not even alcohol, can bring out of a person something that was not already in that person."

Smoke some PCP and let us know how that works out. (Once, in the 1970s, was enough for me!)

NUANCED drug MANAGEMENT is IMO appropriate based on normal effects of each drug.

Weed isn't booze isn't dust isn't crank isn't coffee.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

The war on drugs has reduced drug abuse, but increased people abuse (as the criminals running the industry don't really feel the need to lack legally), but has certainly reduced drug abuse by increasing the cost.

No, what it's done is pushed people to find drugs which are denser and more concentrated... i.e. more powerful. People are smoking that crazy-ass shit called saltz, because it doesn't show up in a drug test. A test which doesn't actually do anything to tell if a person IS under the influence, only if they have been within a certain recent time period. That's not your boss's business, his business is whether or not you can do your job safely right NOW not last week when you were on vacation getting drunk on the lake all day.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[gambino21]

I think the difference is that if you drink or do drugs in your living room, you are only increasing the risk for yourself. If you drink or do drugs while driving, then you are increasing the risk for yourself and others who do not wish to share your risk.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Use google

You made the assertive claim, not him. You have the burden of proof.

then get a slashdot account.

It doesn't matter whether he has a Slashdot account or not, and you know it. You're lying by implying that it does.

You have managed to spectacularly lose the argument despite being completely right. Good job. Was it your intent to shill for the DEA here?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Urza9814]

Ah, yes. Some sources do indeed put nicotine above Heroin and Coke in 'addictiveness'. Here's one medical professional, from a quick Google:
http://nyp.org/news/health/051116.html

However, I suppose it would have been better to say it is 'ONE OF the most addictive drugs'. There can certainly be no argument there, and the rest of my point still stands. Addiction is a public health issue, not a criminal justice issue -- and it's time we start to realize that.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

TWICE as many people die each year from approved prescription drug reactions as are killed by drivers who tested positive for any alcohol or drugs (entire US).

I guess we should lock up physicians who prescribe drugs which kill their patients? It's only rational, if we're using numbers to decide what to do.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[TFAFalcon]

My guess would be you can't smoke pot fast enough to die from it, unless you bury yourself in a pile and set it on fire.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[causality]

Please stop spouting armchair psychology.

This is hand-waving. I wasn't "spouting" any psychology, in fact. If you want that, please visit a psychologist. Simple enough. Although, I will tell you, if psychology as a science had any real merit, the number of mentally unhealthy people would be decreasing. It's increasing. In my personal opinion it's little more than a marketing wing of the pharmaceutical companies.

Anyway, this is like I am telling you that I saw a few deer in the woods and then you complain that I haven't fully explained in rigorous terms the processes of evolution and biology which produced them. Therefore, I seriously doubt anything I say is going to satisfy you.

You see it in politics all the time: Candidate A disagrees that a given proposal is an effective way to reduce pollution, so Candidate B declares he wants us all to breathe dirty air. That's what you're doing. If Candidate B were a reasonable person, he'd consider that maybe the other guy just wants something with a higher chance of success, but he can't do that. After all, Candidate A is "the enemy" so he must be wrong! Besides, giving benefit of doubt would mean "aiding and abetting the enemy".

If you really want to do this, I am not the lightweight you were looking for. If you really want to fit the pattern, then at this point your prime concern will be saving face, so you'll either decide not to reply anymore or you'll try to make me angry with invective.

The relationship between drugs and psychosis is complex and not completely understood... but your point-of-view is hopelessly outdated. Drug-related psychosis has little to do with the "dissolution of inhibition".

It's a simple fact that there are lots of people who do not steal, rape, assault, or even murder simply because they are afraid of getting caught. The laws on the books are for people who cannot control themselves, and therefore must be threatened with force. They will not do the right thing on their own because they are outwardly motivated. Aristotle said it best: "I do because of my philosophy what others do only from fear of the law."

So what happens to these people when their fear of consequence and ability to plan ahead is suddenly and artificially reduced? This is controversial to you? I am an "armchair psychologist" because I can see this for myself?

That's all. If you think I am positing a "theory of inhibition" as an explanation for all human behavior, you have grossly misinterpreted me by reading into my words meaning that was not there. Really now, if I meant it that way I am more than capable of stating this explicitly. I bet that didn't cross your mind, Candidate B. I mention inhibition only as an example. Becoming fixated on that in order to miss the greater point being made was your decision. It's a classic failure to see the forest because of all the trees.

If you thought I was trying to give in a few paragraphs the Ultimate Complete Scientific Theory of All Things Psychological then naturally you will be disappointed. That again was your choice. Have the decency to take responsibility for that and you'll suddenly find yourself less condescending and more constructive. And don't worry. If I am offering a formal, scientific, rigorous, psychological theory I will remember to label it as such.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[hajus]

Ok, so the smoking person costs the govt. less than someone who gets to live to an old age. However, the person that lives longer probably pays more taxes through a longer lifespan. That bbc link doesn't go into productivity of a person, just how much their medical bills cost.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[TFAFalcon]

Have the Mexican government get into the drug trade. Make a deal with one of the cartels, give it a drug trading concession, have the military support it for a few months, just enough to eliminate the (now unlicensed and thus illegal) competition. Then tax them and let them go about their business.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[AvitarX]

Hmmm, on point 1, I've read dozens of comments about the largest issue with drugs being that illegality increases cost.

if all grocery stores tripled prices I would reduce my consumption of food, I would definitely spend more of my time hungry, and get some extra calories from the liquor store.

if the illegality does not increase price, then all.the arguments about the prohibition increasing price being a large part of the problem are wrong.

I didn't mean to spark fury, but common sense says increased.price reduces consumption. I've seen addicts with money drink as much as they possibly could, and addicts when poor drink only the minimum needed, so in my observation, the consumption is inelastic argument is false.

again, I am against prohibition, but the legitimate arguments are about damage of the policy, and freedom. Not that the war does nothing at all.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[hajus]

Just to pick on your math, your formula is wrong. It should be X * (N + 1)

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Drugs are their primary income source, however, and in many cases their human trafficking networks involve the same people. The drug networks basically subsidize all the other criminal networks, and without it those networks would suffer greatly. I agree that alone it wouldn't solve anything, but it would make it much harder for them to hire armies of well-equipped thugs.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[stdarg]

You're right, it should only be illegal to kill or hurt someone or cause property damage, regardless of whether you're drunk. The prevention part could be done through simple deterrence - automatic higher sentence if alcohol was involved.

I suspect the campaign against "drunk" driving (in reality, the laws apply long before you're drunk) is simply a holdover of prohibitionists who simply can't stand the thought of people enjoying alcohol period. I wonder if there are statistics comparing a healthy 30 year old male with a 0.05% BAC driving a Prius to a sober 17 year old male driving a Corvette in terms of accidents and safety and all that. I don't know, but I suspect, that there are some large classes of "drunk" drivers who are safer than large classes of sober drivers.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe your next commercial flight will be piloted by a man or woman taking heroin who will be on their last drug binge before death? Hopefully your flight will make it before he/she dies.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

When has criminalizing something actually stopped it from happening?Criminalizing and sentencing only exists to give victims some sense of justice, after it's all over and can never be undone.

This is about *prevention*.

Okay your first and last sentence conflict with each other. Your second sentence implies that without victims there's not a reason to criminalize something.

People get tired but you shouldn't drive tired. People text but you shouldn't drive while texting, people drink and so on. Focus on criminalizing behavior on the road, not behavior in your own home. It seems everyone supports the nanny state.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[gmhowell]

Most everyone I know, often still pours a drink to go when driving out, and thinks nothing about drinking at bars, and then...well, you *do* have to get the car back home.

Cool, so you're saying you hang out with a bunch of irresponsible fucktards who are stuck in some sort of Peter Pan fantasy land where they're incredible drivers who are immune to the slowed reaction times, lowered judgement, and altered depth perception that comes with alcohol consumption.

I sincerely hope they only kill or maim themselves when their inevitable comeuppance occurs.

Oh come on now, that's pretty damned harsh. We should be hoping they kill or maim their offspring, friends, and relatives as well.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Tokolosh]

I suspect that in many countries smokers pay more in taxes than the healthcare costs they incur. Of course, it is not their fault if their government chooses to pay for their healthcare.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[gmhowell]

You forgot my favorite: civil forfeiture.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nothing so odd about that, GIs were a much more lucrative market for heroin for the CIA black budget drug profiteers in 'Nam - They had spending money. Not so much of a profit to be made of the locals. Opium was target at the Chinese by the British back in the day, but heroin has always been marketed at the west since its inception.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

When I was in Thailand in 1974 there were only four drugs you couldn't buy in a pharmacy, and they were marijuana, cocaine, LSD and heroin. LSD and cocaine were completely unavailable, the place was awash with heroin and pot, and you needed no prescription for any other drug. Ecstasy might not have been invented then, but they had some amphetamines that one pill would keep you awake for two days straight. There was a salve available that was used for terminating pregnancies if the woman rubbed it on their belly button, or induce an out of body experience if you rubbed it on your temples. Quaaludes were available in pharmacies without a prescription as well.

Oddly, although the country was awash with heroin, the only heroin addicts I ran across were all GIs.

Why are you looking for LSD in thailand mushrooms are plentiful.

Stay safe and have fun.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[gmhowell]

Not just for drug crimes. If a rapist is caught, we have their DNA to prove they raped that person. They should have their equipment cut off sans any anesthesia. Maybe a little. They should feel most of it. Not just wake up and it is gone. It is punishment. Having all of it cut off is part of the punishment. You do not want to have your junk cut off, do not rape anyone. Not a difficult concept.

Because nobody has ever lied about rape?

Are the seats on the short bus comfy, I've always wondered.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

You complain about tax dollars but I don't want my tax dollars spent at all on prosecuting people for no other reason that they use drug A instead of drug B. I know, I know they're doing something you don't like. I know they're making decisions that hurt those around them. That's life but I think someone once said "We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security."

We could spend money trying to stop other people from doing things we don't like or we could just tax it and focus on the guy that breaks into a house instead of the guy that enjoys a particular drug. People use many legal speeds (most diet pills) and opiates (most pain killers). Heroin was a brand from Bayer.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Kinda makes a person wonder what subjectively unacceptable activity you're into... Especially considering that, statistically, users of the legal drugs alcohol and tobacco kill exponentially more "innocent" people, than users of all other drugs combined.

'Exponential' is a type of function. You can't multiply something or divide something exponentially. If you're going to pretend to be educated, at least make a reasonable attempt at sounding like you know what you're talking about. On the other hand, thank you for being so transparently stupid so that other people aren't as easily fooled by your imagined statistics.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Please do tell what your definition of "addictive" is. Positive addiction that makes your body crave the drug, I could see. Habits supported by the fear of withdrawal are pretty damn powerful. Almost nobody is willing to go through DT's. Nurses are actually trained to give patients a beer in appropriate circumstances in order to ward off tremors. Quitting nicotine "cold turkey" isn't nearly as bad as many illegal drugs.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Bobakitoo]

Been tried. It didn't work so well except as a way of employing a bunch of feds by making 'organised crime' flourish.

And so is this. If peoples are not willing to legalize other psychoactive drugs maybe prohibition of alcohol should be brought back to the table until these anti-drugs ass-holes finally get enlightened.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Most people retire long before they die.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's not brutal. Brutal would be making ALL drugs. Legal. And FREE by the pound!
The problem would sort itself out quickly and brutally.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Never thought I'd heard free-market and lobbying in the same paragraph.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Two words: social decay.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[teaserX]

I am an IT professional who happens to enjoy smoking a little weed from time to time in my off hours.

Holy crap that never happens.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Velex]

Superstition ruin much more than just the user's life. It affects the entire family. What is a child supposed to do when their parents uses superstition all day and there's no food on the table? "take responsibility" for their parents' lives?

That being said, some superstitions are socially acceptable in the western world (despite how harmful they are). Christianity and Judiasm are the two main ones. Any superstition that's less harmful and less addictive than these two should be automatically decriminalized, starting with monotheism.

FTFY?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[brendank310]

I agree, +5 Funny is underrated.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, but sitting for an hour or two eating & shooting the breeze will (possibly - depending on how drunk you are).

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

What horse tranquillizer are you referring to?

Ketamine? It's for cats and it does not dispose you to violence, random or otherwise. It K-holes you, and then you come out of it and there are zero repercussions (discounting depression risk from long-term use). Not even a hangover, nor a need to sleep. As you were.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Posting AC because I post here and don't need this particular aspect of my medical history linked with the rest of what I have to say.

"No drug, not even alcohol, can bring out of a person something that was not already in that person."

Around six years ago, I was involved in an accident that dealt physical trauma to my skull and brain. Furthermore, my head was exposed to an electric current, which induced seizure, causing more damage. You wouldn't know it by looking at me now--medical practice and brain plasticity are wonderful things--but for a while I was having regular seizures and delusional periods.

At one point, I was given a drug that was intend to quash what were then recurring delusions and paranoia. It did, but it had side effects--rather than fleeing in fear from everyday objects, I perceived them as threats. Once I stabbed a cabinet in a desperate bid to protect my fiancee, another time I attacked the fridge with my bare hands until my fingernails were broken and bleeding. I was off the drug after two and a half weeks of terror.

The drugs were able to do exactly as they intended, which was alter how I perceived the state of reality around me. Our characters--no matter how 'real' you claim them to be--are in a very deep way a product of chemical ratios in the brain.

Your views on 'real character' strike me as dramatically unscientific. Hopefully, the historians of the future will regard this as a dark age when when our private actions were governed by unreasonable decrees.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Ryanrule]

What's seems to be the officer problem? I am sotally tober.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you ever been drunk? Do you notice how your reasoning and judgement becomes impaired while your confidence gets a boost? Everybody thinks they are ok to drive when they are drunk and the real deterrent at that time becomes the risk of getting caught.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[scubamage]

Not to be semantic, but while all MDMA is ecstasy, not all ecstasy is MDMA. Merck synthesized MDMA it in 1912 and didn't do anything with it until the 1960's when they started using it for couples therapy (and it was one hell of a great aid since it let couples truly understand one another instead of fighting right away - sadly too much potential for abuse). After it went off the radar, people started synthesizing it (to my knowledge it's not actually that hard, but still helps to be an organic chemist) and often ended up with MDA, MDB, and any number of other adulterants like cocaine, caffeine, and meth. So I think the better question is whether or not "MDMA" was available, not ecstasy, since it's basically a catch all for any number of fun colored small pills containing a cocktail of assorted chemicals.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[sixsixtysix]

I've seen plenty of guys spend a pile of cash on various forms of dope for hot young women.

time to outlaw pussy, i guess.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[scubamage]

However what if statistics show that alcohol is proportionally worse than another option? As they do in the case of cannabis.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

We all know alcohol has never been the cause of someone else being killed (this is sarcasm if anyone reading this high), and I'm sure the same will be held for people under the influence of drugs.

I am all for medicinal purpose of drugs, but I don't like the idea of recreation use of drugs when it infringes on the rights of others. Take marijuana for example. It smells and it seems to make the person apathetic, does it not?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[LordLimecat]

Sort of depends if you mean physically or psychologically.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

that's fine, but the punishment for killing the wrong person should be a $3 BILLION settlement to the victim's family and maybe the prosecutor gets got, too. we already have too harsh of a system when it comes to mental health. we execute retards (go, texas!) and punish schizophrenics. i think it is because we are so revolted that it could happen to anyone without warning, and what we can't understand we must destroy. i saw a clip on one of the lockdown shows on msnbc and this guy had killed his mother during full on schizo hallucinations. should he be treated? yes. locked up in a mental hospital? you bet. general population in prison? fuck no. many mental illnesses come on slowly, so a lot of the times it can be too late to seek treatment (its stigma doesn't help either). i, for one, am really waiting to see what happens in the theater shooting case. it'll be a great case study for sure. was he faking it because of his course of study? maybe. could he really be mentally ill? maybe. fuck, look at the giffords shooter. he is schizo, but going to prison. we really need to rethink how we treat people that really had no say in what they did. don't even get me started on true psycho/sociopaths.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[K. S. Kyosuke]

Please step out of your computer chair and show me your ICDL.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's pretty easy to find plenty of evidence that h4rr4r's post is spot on. Google "Portugal decriminalization".

https://www.google.com/search?q=portugal+decriminalization

h4rr4r speaks truth, whether or not you want to hear it.

Absolutely, but who cares about truth any more? Drugs are about MONEY! Decriminalization fucks with cash flow, and needs to be avoided at all costs.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[fearofcarpet]

What drugs can do is break down the illusion of being normal that many fucked-up people try so hard to project. There are a lot of fucked up people trying hard to appear normal "like everybody else". The real tragedy is that we live in such a shallow and unenlightened society that a) people blame the drug for this, b) we generally like to blame drugs, guns, and other inanimate objects for what people do, and c) the shallow, exclusive focus on external behavior and appearances means that many people don't know what real character actually is.

A phenomenon that is highlighted by the absurdity that something like one in five Americans takes antidepressants, making it highly likely that any crusading against the evils of "drugs" is on drugs.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[coxymla]

Using the same logic, driving while impaired is only considered a crime because you may end up killing someone - hence we should decriminalize driving while impaired and only arrest people when they run over and kill someone - which is the real crime.

Yes, that's correct.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[pantaril]

Drugs ruin much more than just the user's life. It affects the entire family. What is a child supposed to do when their parents uses drugs all day and there's no food on the table? "take responsibility" for their parents' lives?

You do the same think like when the parents are drunks and can't take care of their child properly. You send in some social worker for inspection and if she finds some problerms, she can take the child away from the parents. No need to ban drugs. Ban the actual harmfull behaviour (not taking care of your child in this case)

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Nicotine is the most addictive drug known to man"

No its not. ever heard of crack? one hit and you re addicted. I had a hit of nicoine, put me off big time.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Jesrad]

Nicotine is not addictive.

Or to put it more accurately: nicotine is not the addicting substance in cigarettes / tobacco. The careful analysis of lab tests (mostly done on rats and monkeys) shows repeatedly that nicotine fails to induce the effects we understand as demonstrating addiction.

However, the belief that nicotine is the substance that you crave when trying to stop smoking, is extremely lucrative to the nicotine-gum and nicotine-patch industry. In my country (France) the state's healthcare plan covers most of those products, making this coverage a (costly) disguised subsidy.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[mikael_j]

Ecstasy is slang for MDMA and nothing else. The fact that unscrupolous drug dealers and people who know as much about drugs as the average person knows about physics doesn't make it slang for anything else.

Yes, your dealer who just bought a cheap batch of pills with 2C-B + caffeine + amphetamine will tell you otherwise but that's because he's trying to sell his crappy pills. It's sort of like how if alcoholic beverages were illegal, you can bet there would be people trying to sell all sorts of crap as "whiskey", "chardonnay" and other beverages.

Ecstasy isn't "Various euphoric and stimulant drugs these days but originally MDMA", it's just slang for MDMA and nothing else. The problem is that in a lot of places demand for MDMA is a lot higher than supply and dealers will try their best to confuse customers to sell whatever they have in stock. Hell, I've heard rumors of dealers trying to push benzos as "ecstasy" when MDMA has been hard to find...

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[tehcyder]

I suspect the campaign against "drunk" driving (in reality, the laws apply long before you're drunk) is simply a holdover of prohibitionists who simply can't stand the thought of people enjoying alcohol period./quote> Well then, you suspect wrong, you fucking moron.

I enjoy alcohol enormously and think that drink drivers are selfish, stupid twats. I get around this apparent contradiction by not fucking drinking and driving.

If you have to drive to get a drink, move somewhere more civilised or drink at home or get a fucking taxi, whatever.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[EuclideanSilence]

I would mod you to +infinity and move your post to be first if I could.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[drsmithy]

Let's assume all other drugs are no more dangerous or costly for society than alcohol. Then if the cost for alcohol is X, and alcohol + N other drugs are legal, the total cost becomes (X+1)*N which is clearly much larger than X. It is a really stupid argument to say that "well other drugs aren't any more bad than alcohol, so they should be legal too!" because alcohol is bad enough.

The assumption here is that prohibiting drugs carries no cost. Clearly, given the breadth and depth of problems around illegal drugs related entirely to the fact they're illegal, this assumption is absurd.

The real equation to be evaluating, is whether the costs incurred by prohibition are more or less than the costs incurred by being permissive.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Drethon]

Seems like it might be better for prisons pay for themselves through prison labor but then locals would probably complain all their minimum wage jobs are unavailable to the normal population...

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[slim]

You were lied to. Nothing is addictive the first time you use it.

In William Burroughs' "Junky" he starts off by explaining that you have to take an awful lot of heroin over a sustained period in order to get addicted.

But then he goes on to document (semi-fictionalised) how he did exactly that, and what undignified depravity he did as a result.

I think it depends on the individual.

Also it should be noted that if you have a reliable supply of clean heroin, and the money to afford it, you can live a perfectly civilised life as an addict. Tainted supplys, withdrawal, and self-neglect caused by poverty are what make you ill.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Drethon]

I was hooked on my first couple of cigarettes and could hardly stay away from them for a couple of months until the addition drained to manageable levels. I still want cigarettes when someone around me smokes, and all this is on about a half a dozen smoked over fifteen years ago.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Good point. Alcohol should also be banned, because it too causes many problems and serves no benefit to society.
"But teh Prohibition!", you'll say. Yes, the US's failed attempt at prohibition is good for pointing out that laws don't stop crimes, which is true of EVERY law. It's also good for pointing out that, if you ban something, the worst that can happen is that some fewer number of people will still find access to the contraband...which is kind of the point.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Drethon]

I'm just glad they finally decided it isn't legal for smokers to blow smoke in my face in most public places...

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[nhat11]

Should we allow killing legal too?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[bhagwad]

What?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[bhagwad]

My pilot is more likely to be drunk than on heroin. And driving under the influence is illegal. Perhaps you didn't know that?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[rmdingler]

The old man at the end of the bar shared his theory on drinking with us one night. "The first thing that happens when you drink is you get real smart. When you continue to drink you get real bold. Then you start loud talking to share all that new found intellect with everyone."

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

There will always be deadbeat parents.

If not drugs it's sex and booze. They will fail to raise their kid even if they have no vices.

Don't steal my freedoms to appease them.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

Joe the Camal came over to your house and gave you a few?

Nicotine is one of the most addictive drugs known, and even it takes more than a couple cigarettes, but not very many.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[RPI Geek]

I wish this hadn't been modded -1 Troll. A troll "is a prank comment intended to provoke indignant (or just confused) responses" (source).
Whenever the topic of drug legalization comes up - no matter the venue - this argument crops up. Just because it doesn't hold water to those of us on the "tax and legalize" side doesn't make it a troll, it just makes it an argument for the other side.
tl;dr I don't agree with parent either, but that doesn't make his/her post a troll.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[wisdom_brewing]

http://www.thefix.com/content/10-hardest-addictive-drugs-to-kick7055#slide1

Was wrong on heroin, otherwise correct according to the study they are referring to.

http://www.bcliving.ca/health/top-5-drugs-most-likely-to-ruin-your-life

I've read a fair bit about it in the past but cant find the paper at the moment

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[h4rr4r]

So you mean real addiction or just in your head?

Psychological addiction is not the same. When you find gamblers sucking dick for the money to put on the ponies then we can put them in the same league.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Alcohol is an especially bad drug to outlaw because it's idiotically easy to poison yourself with home brewed alcohol. Alcohols are an entire family of molecules all of which are lethal in small quantities (but will mostly get you high before they kill you). Saudi Arabia loses several dozen people monthly due to alcohol poisoning.

Besides, it's a bad comparison, for every crime in Saudi Arabia is extremely violent because the law provides for killing and maiming people for the least offence. You know that stupid story about a kid and a loaf of bread. Sadly, that's not a fantasy. This means if a thief gets caught, he may consider himself better off as a murderer, and act accordingly.

Well, except of course rapists. Rape is very relaxed in Saudi Arabia.

The "wisdom" of allah in the kingdom of lunacy.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Esteanil]

Citation needed. Can't find anything about that. (That some anti-psychotics are addictive? Yes. But that they're the most addictive drugs in the world?)

How does this get to +5 informative without a single citation? At a glance it looks like something you'd pick up at a Scientology seminar...

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[cheekyjohnson]

If they are cheaply available, then the people without control will kill themselves off relatively quickly and harmlessly.

That's great. You'd think that proper warnings and actual education would prevent some of that. Not that it even matters.

And if they aren't dangerous, then what's wrong with them.

Huh?

Actually, I'm not in favor of total legalization.

You just said that them being illegal causes more problems than it solves.

The ONLY reason that I'm in favor of laws against drugs it to prohibit them being advertised.

Then just ban advertisements. You don't actually have to keep the drugs illegal to accomplish this.

I see absolutely no point in trying to get people to not ingest harmful things into their own bodies, and in fact, if the government is trying to force them not to, I see that as an unjustified infringement upon their freedoms.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Then let the family help the individual. If a family is weak, then there will be no support for such addict. But a strong family will take care of their own, and will help the addict family member. Why does the Government have to replace the care of a family?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[mcgrew]

Indeed. A woman I know who's been trying to get off crack and out of homelessness was surprised that after she'd relapsed and smoked crack, not only was cocaine found in her system but amphetamines as well (she's been doing well lately, staying sober and is in transitional housing).

Hell, back in the '70s you would occasionally get marijuana dusted with PCP, an animal tranquilizer that's not supposed to be for human consumption.

This is one of many reasons why they should legalize all psychoactive drugs. Back in the twenties, people went blind and sometimes died because of adulterants such antifreeze when they would use old radiator tubes for their stills. You can't regulate or control a "controlled" substance.

The biggest danger of any illegal drug is its illegality.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[tehcyder]

Where there is demand, there will always, ALWAYS be supply. To claim otherwise is to expound an utter lack of understanding in regard to the topic of economics.

You make it sound as though "economics" was some great universal set of truths. It's not. It's just a description of how things work.

A couple of hundred years ago, economists would have said that you were bound to have slaves and child labour "because that's how things are".

I don't actually care much about drugs, I'm just saying the "law" of supply and demand is not like the laws of thermodynamics.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Drethon]

Older neighbor actually. Can't say if the results were due to being ~12 years old, having an addictive personality (alcoholism runs in the family, can't say if I've inherited anything really or not, I just stay away from it) or something else. All I know is I'm one data point on that rather large graph...

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[tehcyder]

I know people who have eliminated prescription drugs with some nasty side effects in favor of a little pot before bed.

Their mistake was taking the unnecessary prescription drugs in the first place. If a little pot helps you go to sleep or whatever, fine, you didn't really have that much of a problem with sleeping in the first place.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[cayenne8]

Ahh...its not that bad.

If you have years of experience....it is pretty easy.

Hell, after I've had a few....is the ONLY time you'll see me paying attention to the speed limit, full stops at intersections....etc.

:)

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

There are no free markets. There are relatively free markets, and there are freer markets, but no perfect free markets. People want to make money. Lobbying and corruption are inevitable.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well good morning, retards. How's your CNN, today?

Drugs are neurotransmitters (you might have heared of metabolism?) that activate brain circuitry. That means that the trip you are having, is caused by unused brain circuitry that you were born with.

So you are telling me, that using my own brain is bad for me? Well then I bet you never too any:
-Coffee/cola (caffeine);
-Beer (alcohol);
-Sigarette (nicotine).

Oops I'm mistaken. These aren't drugs, because they are socialy accepteable. My bad.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[tehcyder]

If a rapist is caught, we have their DNA to prove they raped that person. They should have their equipment cut off sans any anesthesia. Maybe a little. They should feel most of it.

Careful, you injected a note of near-sanity there. It quite threw the tone.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

>Then if the cost for alcohol is X, and alcohol + N other drugs are legal, the total cost becomes (X+1)*N

This is an extremely flawed model.

>It is a really stupid argument to say that "well other drugs aren't any more bad than alcohol, so they should be legal too!"

How so?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

US limits aren't really high. .08 is two beers. I haven't been able to get a buzz from two beers since middle school. If anything, I'd consider .02 to be absurdly low.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Bigby]

I agree that it isn't suitable for free-markets. But prisons (private or not) don't exist in markets, let alone free markets.

A prison exists within a monopoly. There is only one payer...the government. You cannot price the service appropriately in this context. If you price it too low, then it goes out of business. Therefore it must be priced too high.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Prevention is the key word. The reason why drug usage (just as driving when intoxicated) is considered a crime is prevention.

Why is it that alcohol gets its own special pedestal? People acknowledge that simply banning alcohol doesn't do any good, so we take a more reasonable route and allow the usage of it while making certain activities illegal if you're under the influence. Why not apply the same logic to other substances?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Shit, why stop at drug crime? Death penalties for *all* infractions will clear the brush away from the path to utopia.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[AvitarX]

You're lucky there are cabs there. I live in a Philly distant suburb. We called a cab company, after an incomprehensible conversation with the dispatcher we got a cal 45 minutes later from an actual cab. He said, I'm to far away, unless you're going further, I won't come get you.

We ended up waiting 90 more minutes, and driving home.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Red Flayer]

The plural of 'anecdote' is not 'data'.

Furthermore, modern medicine and surgical practice is far different than it was 100 years ago.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is how much time and money it costs society to handle these drug addicts. If they kill themselves fast enough, it won't be an issue, but drawn out lingering could be stress on hospitals/etc to support drug addicts who have no money.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking about getting rid of healthcare for those who can't afford it. We should also get rid of police, schools, water, roads, electricity... laws in general costs money.

Think of all the money we can save! We'll all be rich!

A strong society requires reliable healthcare and education. When the last majority are too poor to afford either, then it must be socialized. When it's socialized, we can't discriminate. The 60y/o smoker who requires 5x the healthcare cannot be ignored unless you're willing to ignore the single mother who's husband died and she is now destitute.

Most middle class people that I know were poor at some time in their life. Without the safety-net of social services, we would have just lost another good worker because they couldn't find a job for a year.

Not to mention crime rate SKYROCKETS as more people get poor as desperate to just survive.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[nbauman]

That's a pretty low bar. I can't think of any drug that's more addictive and harmful than tobacco. 400,000 deaths in the U.S. every year, and several million around the world.

Nicotine is arguably the most addicting drug in the world. People who quit nicotine and heroin say nicotine was harder.

There are people who go into their doctors' offices with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, the doctor tells them that cigarettes will kill them faster, and they still don't stop.

When a doctor tells you you're going to die soon if you don't stop, and you can't stop, that's addicting.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[pclminion]

People who have real character don't become "a different person" when drunk or high.

This was exactly the argument I used to make to myself back when I was in denial of my own alcoholism. "It has nothing to do with alcohol, this is just how I am and the alcohol exposes it." This method of thinking allowed me to pretend that alcohol was not a problem and that all it was doing was revealing what was already there under the surface. If it's in my nature to behave in this way or that way, what does it matter whether I'm drunk when I do it?

It was not until I realized that the alcohol was in fact part of the problem that I was able to see my situation clearly for the first time, and then I understood that I needed to give it up completely.

You may be in the same position I was in, trying desperately to blame anything other than the substance (including your "character," a nebulous concept with no objective reality), in an effort to justify the ongoing use of the substance. If that is the case, I hope you connect the dots sooner rather than later.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have yet to see anyone get addicted to alcohol on the first drink. I have seen first hand and read about people getting addicted to drugs on the first hit. They need that drug after the first hit.

The degree to which you're misinformed would be funny if you weren't allowed to vote. However, the fact that your opinion carries the same weight as mine makes your horrible education on this matter extremely depressing.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[HiThere]

There was a court decision that I ran into that said that if something was legal to sell, you couldn't forbid advertising it. So I want a fine for selling it just sufficient to allow the ban on advertising.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[HiThere]

I don't know. I ran a across a reference to it, so I remembered it's existence, but I wasn't very interested in it, so that's all I know. It couldn't be ketamine, as that doesn't match the description.

OTOH, it could be something like the "cat reaction" to morphine. Only some people have it, but those it makes want to climb the walls.

Still, my comment was about making claims that drugs will act in predictable ways on everyone. The cat reaction to morphine (or the dog reaction, of getting "sick as a dog") are excellent counterexamples to that.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[cheekyjohnson]

Well, if your goal is simply to ban the advertising and (sort of) legalize the drugs, that's already a large change from the system we have now. While those changes are being put into effect, that rule could also be changed.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[uninformedLuddite]

Here's a start. Do some research on Portugal's experience. I am pretty sure they have had to close a lot of their gaols due to lack of criminals. I think I read that they had closed eight gaols but couldn't find the link for you.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[uninformedLuddite]

Thank God Ohm wasn't on drugs

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[JakartaDean]

No drug, not even alcohol, can bring out of a person something that was not already in that person. A lot of people have unresolved emotional baggage, insecurities, and unhealthy tendencies that they barely keep in check, mostly through fear of consequence. This is not real character or real strength and the dissolution of inhibition can cause it to break down.

I'm not sure about this, but I'm not an expert. I do recall reports of people getting pot or other drugs laced with PCP (a horse tranquilizer, IIRC) and completely losing self control, and becoming very aggressive. If the reports of cannibalism after ingestion of "bath salts" are true, that can't be only a result of reduced inhibition.

I'll reiterate, we live in a truly shallow and unenlightened society where the most ignorant and emotionally immature are the most comfortable.

Now that's one of the most thought-provoking things I've read here, or elsewhere, for quite a while. Thank you for that.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[YttriumOxide]

All the talk about alcohol. Anything taken to extremes is bad. I'll say this I have yet to see anyone get addicted to alcohol on the first drink. I have seen first hand and read about people getting addicted to drugs on the first hit. They need that drug after the first hit. I have yet to see someone need a drink after the first drink.

I really recommend that if you want to be taken seriously, you make a distinction between different drugs.

There's a world of difference between, for example, LSD and Meth. Some guy taking a few tabs of acid isn't going to become addicted (actually, since it's a non addictive substance; and a pretty mind altering experience, wanting to do it often is extremely rare, even amongst those who thoroughly enjoy it such as myself). Some guy trying meth with his friends once is also probably not going to get addicted straight away (there's a chance, but so extremely slim, it's not worth counting); but there's a good chance that the enjoyment of it combined with peer pressure in the wrong social circles will lead him to try it a few more times, and then he probably will be addicted (it's a highly addictive drug by comparison to many others).

Or, looking at a more commonly used drug - marijuana. Hate the stuff myself, but its harmful effects are negligible; the abuse possibilities for quantity are low (once you're stoned enough, you tend to just go to sleep on the couch rather than consuming more); and its potential for addiction is also very low (psychological addiction can be quite high, as with anything enjoyable; but physical addiction is pretty hard to cultivate (not impossible, just pretty hard)).

By comparison, those who drink to excess regularly will quite easily become addicted; and kill themselves only slightly slower than meth when doing it. So, looking at these facts, shouldn't we be outlawing alcohol and legalising LSD and marijuana?

No, I don't actually want to outlaw alcohol, but it's hypocritical to talk about the dangers of "drugs" while having no real problem with alcohol and not making a distinction between different kinds of drugs.

Quite simply, alcohol is a dangerous, addictive drug in the same way as heroin, meth and crack cocaine. It's just far more socially acceptable and most people learn to control their use of it. They'd also learn to control use of other hard substances were they legal. The non- or low-addictive and non- to low-harm substances barely need any control at all other than good education about the effects so people don't try and do silly things like operate a motor vehicle while stoned out of their tree.

And as a last note, please read and consider my sig before you reply.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[YttriumOxide]

For the record in advance, I don't smoke pot. I don't enjoy being "slowed down" or not being able to think clearly (for the same reason, I'm very cautious with alcohol as well, and generally avoid it).

What drug can be consumed at a very high rate and not kill? I am betting your thinking of pot.

Personally, I'd love to watch someone TRY to overdose on LSD... 75 micrograms gets most people somewhat tripping; 200 micrograms is a good trip for an experienced user; 500 micrograms gets pretty much anyone to a point where they're unable to function (total loss of ego, awareness of world or self, etc); and the lethal dosage is assumed to be somewhere around 12 milligrams. That is, 24 times the amount that even a serious LSD user (such as myself) would consider extreme.

If you can get studies done by people who have nothing to gain by pot being legal or for it remain illegal you might have a chance. Those groups are the only ones who could deliver a clear unbiased result. Anyone else will have a biased result. All results from the biased groups for either side should be tossed. They have an agenda.

How's this one suit?

And while not a study, this is a pretty good related read for some "non potheads" trying to aim for the same thing.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[YttriumOxide]

Tobacco and alcohol are the two main ones. Any drug that's less harmful and less addictive than these two should be automatically decriminalized

For reference, that's a LOT of drugs... tobacco (or more specifically, nicotine) is extremely addictive. And alcohol is extremely harmful. A LOT of drugs are less addictive than nicotine and a LOT are less harmful than alcohol.

Or were you meaning "less addictive than alcohol and less harmful than nicotine"?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Keep in mind that the average person will incurr the majority of the costs listed in the article in a few decades or so, while smokers will die sooner on average. So due to interest, the value of a $70000 cost in 5-10 years will probably be greater than an expense of $85000 in 15-30 years.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[molecular]

while I like your comment otherwise, "exponantially more" is just meaningless.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[CanHasDIY]

while I like your comment otherwise, "exponantially more" is just meaningless.

"Exponentially" does not necessarily imply an increase, but rather that the figure in question has or is related to an exponent.

Also, you misspelled it.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[TheCarp]

Well that assumes they knew better. I am talking about people who "hadn't smoked pot since I was your age". The one I am specifically thinking the most of went to her doctor. The doctor never gave her the option of pot.... she tried it on her own after doing some research to find something other than what she was on...because the side effects were so bad.

Not just side effects, but the fact that when she complained of the side effects, they prescribed her powerful benzos (which are highly addictive with really nasty withdrawls).

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Using a cellphone while driving is already illegal

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[scubamage]

That is incorrect. The correct street term for MDMA is "molly." I think, if you actually spoke to the community of users, no one had any illusions that MDMA was often absent entirely from whatever pills were available. In fact, that is why large databases of pill assays were posted online specifically so people could see what the contents of particular ecstasy tablets were. You could find out what someone was offering as ecstasy, look up the assay, and decide to purchase. Originally, yes, ecstasy was MDMA. However it not longer is that way - the definition has changed, and the market knows it. The market knows specifically that if you are looking for pure MDMA, the thing you're looking for is referred to as Molly.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[mikael_j]

Ecstasy is still just MDMA. However, dealers will happily tell you their pills are "Ecstasy", "Molly", "Rolls" or any other slang term for MDMA regardless of what is actually in the pills (and a lot of times they may themselves believe it's real MDMA, it's not like the average dealer bothers with reagent tests).

The definition hasn't changed, it's just widely abused.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[scubamage]

I think you misunderstand how definitions work. Ask the average person what a hacker is. You and I know it originally meant someone who could find creative solutions to problems. But the fact is it simply doesn't mean that anymore. Words mean what the population feels that they mean. Or would you prefer all of us geeks go back to biting the heads off of chickens?

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[mikael_j]

I was actually going to mention the whole thing with the meaning of the term "hacker" in my previous post to avoid you replying with a reference to it. Oh well, too late for that.

Thing is, the media's use of the description "Ecstasy-like" (extremely common in the media here in Sweden, at least) shows that their definition of "Ecstasy" is completely irrelevant, they'll call any new drug "Ecstasy-like" to ride on the coat-tails of the "ZOMG ECSTASY MAEK HOLES IN UR BRAINS!!1" scare even if the drug is nothing like MDMA (I've seen opioids, synthetic cannabinoids and hallucinogens all called "Ecstasy-like" by the media even though no one the reporter writing the story interviewed made any such claims).

As for most people, the average person thinks "Ecstasy" is the compound. They also tend to think Marijuana and Hash are two completely different substances. So to the average person there really is only one kind of Ecstasy, Ecstasy. They just don't know what it is.

That leaves drug users and dealers. Most people I've met who use drugs know at the very least that there is "real Ecstasy" and "not Ecstasy but sold by dealers as Ecstasy because real Ecstasy is hard to come by", although many are aware that MDMA is Ecstasy. Then finally, the dealers. I'd say most dealers I've come into contact with have been well aware of the fact that Ecstasy really means MDMA but will happily try to tell their customers that all manner of different substances also qualify as "Ecstasy" because they want to sell what they've got in stock.

And I'll be damned if I'm going to let sensationalist reporters and dealers who are both looking to distort the truth to make money redefine the meaning of a well-defined term. This is also where the term differs from "hacker", "hacker" has multiple meanings in different contexts and more importantly is a label people attach to themselves, some people using the term not fitting the original definition but still self-identifying as "hackers". With Ecstasy the people trying to change the meaning are those who wish to make money off changing the meaning of the term.

Re:And in countries where it's legal?

[stdarg]

I enjoy alcohol enormously and think that drink drivers are selfish, stupid twats. I get around this apparent contradiction by not fucking drinking and driving.

Who's the fucking moron? What you stated isn't an apparent contradiction.

If you have to drive to get a drink, move somewhere more civilised or drink at home or get a fucking taxi, whatever.

If you wet your pants at the thought of someone with a 0.05% BAC driving slowly down a deserted street, then move your own pansy ass.

Wow, lol

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would you guys post this? Seems like its just helping them. =P

Re:Wow, lol

[Defenestrar]

Perhaps we should have a press-blackout on any undesirable or criminal element of society? No more news about terrorist strikes, deaths in military action, political protests which disrupt traffic, the homeless (vagrancy), or the actions of members of congress. Thus we could all live in a happy carefree world where inherently good people never succumb to famous degenerate modeled behavior?

Re:Wow, lol

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds good.

Re:Wow, lol

[jamstar7]

Have to ban half the reality tv shows on, too. So much for '16 And Pregnant', 'Jersey Shore', 'Real Housewives', etc.

Mebbe that'd be a good thing...

For now.

[Hatta]

This thing has got to be loaded with narcs.

Re:For now.

[Urza9814]

Perhaps. But why? The war on drugs is largely about publicity and money. Making big, quick busts to show off on the evening news, and confiscating cash to use to buy police equipment (in some southern US states, there are MASSIVE police departments with practically ZERO public funding -- they fund themselves with confiscated drug cash.) You can't really confiscate bitcoin easily, and going after the buyers is going to be a lot of police effort for very little PR win and no real cash win (particularly since the buyers are located all over the globe)

Compared to the ease of snapping up kids selling drugs on the street corner, I don't think it's worth their time to go after this kind of traffic. At least not yet.

Re:For now.

[SomePgmr]

I bet sending all your buyers to jail would totally jack-up your seller rating.

Re:For now.

[ceoyoyo]

"You can't really confiscate bit coin easily"

Why not? It's stored in a text file, isn't it? I suppose encryption might slow them down a bit.

Re:For now.

[Hatta]

Easy to work around. Make fake buyers to buy from fake sellers to boost your seller rating. That's assuming the entire thing isn't compromised, as was the case for some carding forums they've shut down.

Re:For now.

[PNutts]

Compared to the ease of snapping up kids selling drugs on the street corner, I don't think it's worth their time to go after this kind of traffic. At least not yet.

Shutting down this supply might slow down the selling on corners.

Re:For now.

[h4rr4r]

Nope.
If anything this might actually reduce selling on corners since it is easier. Shutting it down will just increase the need for people to be out and selling.

People are willing to pay, someone will supply. There is nothing you can do to stop that.

Re:For now.

[Urza9814]

Well, you aren't going to be able to grab hundreds of thousands of dollars in bitcoin in the trunk of a car on its way out of the country. That's one of their favorite tactics -- prove it's drug money and you get to keep the cash.

That's also part of the reason why they don't attempt to catch the drugs entering the country, they just wait to bust the dealers leaving with the cash. Confiscated drugs aren't much use....

Re:For now.

[Urza9814]

You pay a high premium on Silk Road, apparently for quality and convenience...from what I've heard it's a hell of a lot more expensive than what these things would cost on the street, so unless these kids are selling at a loss.....

Re:For now.

[Anonymous Coward]

No, sieze it and make the owner prove it's not. That is how this game is played.

Re:For now.

[harks]

With Bitcoin, the owner encrypts his wallet so the police can't use it, and the owner has a backup copy somewhere else where he can retrieve it whenever he's free. Or his trusted friend retrieves it.

Re:For now.

[Anonymous Coward]

prove it's drug money and you get to keep the cash.

You have it backwards. If you want the cash back, you have to be able to prove it's not drug money.

That's a huge source of police corruption.

Re:For now.

[SpeedBump0619]

So in theory I could acquire a good number of anonymous bitcoin and have my shiny new drugs drop shipped to an ex, or maybe some poor politician I disagree with. Or, I could just ship it directly to me and claim I was being targeted. Just, you know, *theoretically*.

Re:For now.

[cayenne8]

in some southern US states, there are MASSIVE police departments with practically ZERO public funding -- they fund themselves with confiscated drug cash.

Citations?

Why would you think southern states would do this any more than western, midwestern or northeastern states would?

Re:For now.

[Urza9814]

A quick Google reveals plenty of sources; here's the one I had in mind:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=91490480

In Kleberg County, where Kingsville is the county seat, Sheriff Ed Mata drives a gleaming new police-package Ford Expedition bought with drug funds. This year, he went to his commissioners to ask for more new vehicles.

"They said, 'Well, there ain't no money, use your assets,' " he says. He says his office needs the money "to continue to operate on the magnitude we need."

Another county agency, the Kingsville Specialized Crimes and Narcotics Task Force, survives solely on seized cash. Said one neighboring lawman, "They eat what they kill." A review by NPR shows at least three other Texas task forces that also are funded exclusively by confiscated drug assets.

And it's mostly in the south because that's where a lot of the drugs are coming from. I mean I know a lot comes in from Canada too, but we just don't police that border as heavily.

Re:For now.

[Anonymous Coward]

A while back I saw a forum post on Silk Road from claiming just that: the poster was an early adopter of Bitcoin and had made a number of small purchases, having them shipped to random addresses across the country. Doubtful that this actually happened, but even such a post lends some plausible deniability to those that receive drugs in the mail.

Re:For now.

[Anonymous Coward]

That's actually not true, they basically sell for wholesale prices, like close to 50% off street price.

Re:For now.

[Jeng]

Once the police arrest a buyer or a seller and obtain the persons account details the police can do anything they want with the account.

So no need to fake anything, use real, but compromised accounts. They'll even have what would be considered legitimate account histories.

Re:For now.

[jamstar7]

Well, you aren't going to be able to grab hundreds of thousands of dollars in bitcoin in the trunk of a car on its way out of the country. That's one of their favorite tactics -- claim it's drug money and you get to keep the cash.

FTFY.

If a drug sniffing dog finds a roach under the carpet in the back of your car where an assembly line worker tossed it so he didn't get caught by his supervisor, they can and will confiscate your car and sell it at auction. You still have to keep up the payments on it, though. Good ol' 'zero tolerance', funding the police since the 90's...

Re:For now.

[downhole]

From what I understand of the system, it isn't practical for them.

There's no easy way to ID the sellers since Bitcoin and Tor have strong anonymity and the material drops can be anywhere and be changed as often as the seller wants. The best you could do would be to start making buys, try to ID the shipping location, hope the seller is lazy enough to not mix it up much, then camp out undercover there and try to ID the shipper in person. Lots of work and money for pretty small-time results, and usually the seller is far away, maybe even in another country. Investigation by law enforcement agencies with jurisdiction over both places or inter-department cooperation usually only happens for pretty big-time stuff.

For the buyer, they would at least have an address for them, but the site has a reputation system, so it'd be hard to pull off more than one or two busts per account. Pulling off any busts at all might also be tough, since it's hard to prove that any one particular person paid for it or was intended to receive it. There's most of the problems with busting suppliers too, except that the amounts of money and product are even smaller, and the buyers may be all over the world.

Re:For now.

[Enigma2175]

Well, you aren't going to be able to grab hundreds of thousands of dollars in bitcoin in the trunk of a car on its way out of the country. That's one of their favorite tactics -- prove it's drug money and you get to keep the cash

It would be great if the law actually worked like that. Unfortunately, in those cases it is not the police that have to prove it is drug money, it is up to person from who they seized the money to prove it is not drug money. There have been many documented cases where the police have seized money that had nothing to do with drugs, then the owner has to sue the state to get the money back. Wikipedia says the costs to do this are high, "usually totaling around $10,000 and can take up to three years". So if the total amount seized is less than that the rightful owner of the money would be better off financially to not pursue action, meanwhile the police are buying all kinds of new (para)military gear with the money they wrongfully seize.

Re:For now.

[Urza9814]

Yea, I realize that...I struggled for a while with how to word that part, and in the end decided to go with how it _should_ work, figuring I didn't want to get into all of that yet...ya just can't win on Slashdot :)

You got any links for these 'documented cases' though? I have no doubt that it happens, but I haven't actually heard of any specific lawsuits or anything over it.

Re:For now.

[wisdom_brewing]

Innocent until proven guilty, I love that about America, perp walks and all...

Re:For now.

[Anonymous Coward]

Selfish bastard who can get innocent people in serious crime-related troubles! Fuck him!

Re:For now.

[Anonymous Coward]

I had just assumed that God sent it until now. I for one, thank my mysterious LSD benefactor.

Re:For now.

[Enigma2175]

Here's a couple:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/20/asset-forfeiture-wisconsin-bail-confiscated_n_1522328.html
http://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform/easy-money-civil-asset-forfeiture-abuse-police

These are just a couple I pulled off a Google search for "civil forfeiture abuse" but there are hundreds, if not thousands, of similar cases.

Re:For now.

[YttriumOxide]

You pay a high premium on Silk Road, apparently for quality and convenience...from what I've heard it's a hell of a lot more expensive than what these things would cost on the street, so unless these kids are selling at a loss.....

Depends who you buy from and what you buy. But I can say from experience that LSD is around 50% of street price in general. I did get some at around 25% of street price; but it was about 50% the amount of actual LSD per blotter, so I had to take twice as much for the same effect... still works out at 50% of street price though, so I didn't complain too much.

A friend of mine was also pleasantly surprised by the MDMA and cocaine prices (not being my substances of choice though, I couldn't say that with any certainty).

Re:For now.

[molecular]

Well, you aren't going to be able to grab hundreds of thousands of dollars in bitcoin in the trunk of a car on its way out of the country. That's one of their favorite tactics -- prove it's drug money and you get to keep the cash.

That's also part of the reason why they don't attempt to catch the drugs entering the country, they just wait to bust the dealers leaving with the cash. Confiscated drugs aren't much use....

That means they're implicitly selling drugs!

Re:For now.

[molecular]

The problem with this approach: you can use it to catch the consumers. However: that's not what you want, you want the merchants.

Pro-side: as with dragging copyright infringers to court en-masse, this method will instill fear and dampen use of the marketplace. However: that's also not what you want, because that can't be measured and therefore doesn't help your promotion.

98% of ratings on the site are positive

[cpu6502]

Same on Ebay.
Still run into problems with deficient sellers.

Re:98% of ratings on the site are positive

[wisdom_brewing]

Oblig

http://xkcd.com/325/

Why is the feedback system surprising?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm quite confused by this:

"Most surprising, perhaps, is that buyers rate the sellers on the site as relatively trustworthy, despite the fact that no real identities are used."

Why on earth is that surprising? No one will give their real identities on SilkRoad for obvious reasons. Feedback as "trustworthy" is as simple as "did you receive product as described? Yes/No". Why would a buyer require anything else?

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[Revotron]

Not only this, but I'm sure for transactions where there actually WAS a problem or the whole deal just went south, the buyer is probably... um... not quite in a position to give feedback on the website. Whether you read that as "overdosed", "poisoned by tainted products", or just "face down in a ditch with a bullet in the head" all depends on what you'd expect from a typical drug deal.

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[Defenestrar]

Now, I've never played around with any of the silk road stuff (or much of the onion style websites for that matter), but I thought they used a private/public key system for identity verification. If so, I'd disagree with the accuracy of both your and the summary's statement that no real identities are used. As I understand the system, real digital identifications are used with far more authentication than is inherent with a given name. It's only anonymous insomuch as you don't know the meat-space person who's signing their end of the key. Assuming the other person has good habits with their private keys and pass-phrases, this is about as good of a real identity verification that you can get over the internet. It's the same principal as is behind GPG/PGP or any peering trust system. A meat-space name is rather irrelevant to internet identity - the reality is in the digital identity.

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[petermgreen]

It's only anonymous insomuch as you don't know the meat-space person who's signing their end of the key.

The trouble with online identities that aren't strongly tied to a meatspace identity is that you can always get a new one. Therefore you can fill some small transactions, wait for your reputation to build up and bigger transactions to start coming in and then dissappear with everyones money. Then repeat with a new identity.

It's much harder to get a new meatspace identity.

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[Anonymous Coward]

None of that is typical you narc.

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's nice and good but as long they can't deliver drugs by internet it is the meatspace that matters.

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[h4rr4r]

I am betting you have never been part of a typical drug deal.

Think less what you see on TV and in movies and more mundane real life. People are doing this to make money, killing the buyers does not help with that.

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[Defenestrar]

That only works if the value of your scam is greater than the potential earnings your good reputation could net. It's a quick payoff, but chances are that you could make more in the long run with a continuous business as a reputable dealer (pun not intended). Of course, if the model isn't good enough to make money on it's own - just good enough to entice others in... well then you'd better have madoff with the money before the pyramid collapses (pun intended).

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[bool2]

"but I thought they used a private/public key system for identity verification."

There is plenty public key cryptography in both TOR and Bitcoin - but none of these uses establishes a permanent identity on the network. For TOR getting a new identity is as easy as picking a new path through the TOR network.

For bitcoin a different key is used for every transaction.

Does Silk road implement some other use that provides the 'identity verification' properties you mention?

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[leonardluen]

being picked up by the cops and thrown in jail probably also makes it difficult to post bad reviews.

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[iluvcapra]

That only works if the value of your scam is greater than the potential earnings your good reputation could net. It's a quick payoff, but chances are that you could make more in the long run with a continuous business as a reputable dealer (pun not intended).

Bernie Madoff always kept telling himself that he'd make back his client's money, he just needed a few good months on the market and all would be right again...

My experience with Mt. Gox, let alone Silk Road, is that digital entities (with either anonymous or inconsequential, unregulated "meatspace" personality) can be quite casual about fiduciary duty. Even if (particularly if???) they have good intentions.

OTOH, as a delivery system for illegal drugs, this system probably works great, or at least an order of magnitude better than the 1990s state-of-the-art in drug buying; if the worst crime a dealer can practice upon you is larceny, that's Progress!

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Silk Road encourages the use of PGP/GPG last I checked.

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[Anonymous Coward]

This isn't television, this is real life. Many drug dealers deliver. They aren't really interested in robbing or killing you. Bad for business, and really they aren't that type of person anyway.

And yes, I've bought drugs before. Marijuana, that is. The drug dealers I've met are just typical people, and not cold blooded, and wouldn't hurt you any more than your average guy on the street. Stop believing the shit you see on TV.

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[Anonymous Coward]

But that is very, very unlikely to happen if you simply make a small purchase and have it delivered via USPS. Most Silk Road vendors only ship via USPS due to the post office's high volume, legitimate daily deliveries to most addresses, and general lack of suspicion. UPS and Fedex are more careful to limit their own liability, have greater power to open suspicious packages, and their deliveries are less frequent and less routine when residential addresses are concerned. Any time you hear of someone being arrested due to receiving a shipment of contraband, it is because it was not sent USPS, a signature or pickup was required because the packaging failed and the contents were revealed, they were already under suspicion for good reason, or the package was opened by someone other than the intended recipient (parent, etc). Well-packaged USPS parcels are rarely lost and rarely raise eyebrows.

If you meant that the customers are a bunch of criminals who are otherwise always getting locked up, you are probably mistaken, though this would not be much of a factor since most feedback, positive or otherwise, is left very soon after delivery - before the doper could get into too much trouble for something else. The SIlk Road seems mainly to be an alternative for dabblers and responsible users who wish to eliminate the shady, back-alley element from their transactions. They get what they desire this way (much of it considered medicine, in particular contexts), and nobody gets hurt.

Re:Why is the feedback system surprising?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, yes, you could. But the ones that just keep constantly good ratings will have way more business, and after there all many on those you would have to seriously undercut their pricing in the reputation building phase to get any clients. Most will stick to the familiar ones anyways, just because you know.. thay are dealing in illegal stuff, and if the deal worked with some person in the past there really isn't a point in checking out if some new dealer is a narc or not.

Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[Lashat]

You decide.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[Anonymous Coward]

How exactly would your theoretical honeypot work? Only buyers need to provide anything remotely identifiable (e.g., shipping address). Do you think the DEA cares about going after kids who buy $100 worth of LSD?

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know about the DEA, but other government departments seem to want to spend a lot of money trying to stop people from copying data...

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[WilyCoder]

Busting people who copy data is an even LOWER hanging fruit than arresting people for drugs...

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[Defenestrar]

Care? Yes, especially if they're kids at the start of a lifetime of poor choices. Have the resources to dedicate to every case of juvenile stupidity? No - and I bet they regret it.

In fact, I'd say they care far more about that kid than the big dealer or manufacturer - for them, I suspect it's an entirely different passion that's involved (although directly related to the care for said kid).

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[Cid Highwind]

How exactly would your theoretical honeypot work?

By following the money. Server logs show which online personas bought and sold what, intercepting packages can tie those to physical addresses and identities, and comparing bitcoin IDs on suspects' computers with the block chain provides irrefutable cryptographic proof that the transactions took place. They could probably even wind everything up into one big RICO case, and then everyone who used silkroad is potentially on the hook for every transaction that took place there.

Do you think the DEA cares about going after kids who buy $100 worth of LSD?

To turn that question around for a minute, if the DEA had a chance to put literally thousands of dealers and users in prison for life, and take a huge number of bitcoins out of circulation, do you think they would pass it up?

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[h4rr4r]

You think there are doing this to help kids?

Are you insane?
How is a drug conviction going to help a kid? Not being able to get college loans will not help him, making him unemployable will not help him, sending him to jail for relatively harmless LSD while letting his brother destroy his liver with alcohol is not helping anyone either.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[Urza9814]

Why? They bust a big dealer they get cash, they get great PR, and if you have any faith in the war on drugs (which most Americans don't, but assuming the DEA agents do...) you get to keep some product out of the hands of a whole bunch of kids.

Bust the kid, you get no cash, you get terrible PR from his friends and family for ruining the rest of his life (I've got a friend, smartest person I've ever known, who went from aiming for a PhD in Chemistry to flipping burgers at McDonalds over ONE drug charge.)...the only upside is you MAY have stopped a single kid from using drugs.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[CanHasDIY]

How exactly would your theoretical honeypot work? Only buyers need to provide anything remotely identifiable (e.g., shipping address). Do you think the DEA cares about going after kids who buy $100 worth of LSD?

Considering that arresting end users is pretty much the DEA's bread-and-butter, I'd say yes, yes they do.

From above link:

(2010 - crime - drug manufacturing arrests) Of the 1,638,846 arrests for drug law violations in 2010, 81.9% (1,342,215) were for possession of a controlled substance. Only 18.1% (296,631) were for the sale or manufacture of a drug.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[SealBeater]

You are oversimplifying greatly.

Following the money. So you are saying that if I go to instawallet.org from a library, a wifi spot or though tor, create a wallet, anonymously send money to that wallet, bitinstant.com, make another, and another and another, series of one time use bitcoin wallet addresses, before it gets sent to SilkRoad, which tumbles that, they are going to track that? How? You can set 6 one time use wallets up and transfer random amounts.

Intercepting packages. Wow, someone sent me drugs? Why would they do that? Oh, you think I was on SilkRoad? Well, if I were to do so, I would have a truecrypt usb key with portable firefox and tor on it, and I dare you to be able to prove that I was ever on SilkRoad.

As for the bitcoins on people's computers, personally what I like is the place that converts bitcoins into silver and gold. That would be the payout method I would chose. Besides, you do have to have a certain level of expertise to access and operate here, and most of the community seems to be very well aware of the need for encryption.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[DragonWriter]

Considering that arresting end users is pretty much the DEA's bread-and-butter

It is not a valid conclusion that they are targetting end-users because the charges are possession. Possession is a lot easier to prove than sale or manufacture, and sale and manufacture generally also involve possession (its theoretically possible to sell, but not manufacture, without ever having possession, of course.)

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[CanHasDIY]

Considering that arresting end users is pretty much the DEA's bread-and-butter

It is not a valid conclusion that they are targetting end-users because the charges are possession. Possession is a lot easier to prove than sale or manufacture, and sale and manufacture generally also involve possession (its theoretically possible to sell, but not manufacture, without ever having possession, of course.)

No; You get distribution charges for nothing more than having the same kind of drug in different containers. Sale is easy to prove (i.e., cops buy drugs from drug dealer - bam: proof of sale).

Not sure what your point is here, but if what you're trying to say is that those arrested for possession were actually distributing/manufacturing drugs, then you have no idea what the hell you're on about. Otherwise, your statement is unparsable.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[omnichad]

It acts as a deterrent. If it's well-known that it's easy to get caught, then it happens less.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[Red Flayer]

Seems to me that the statistic you provide is meaningless unless we know the numerical relationship between users and makers/sellers. Seems to me to be quite likely that 4:1 is too low of a ratio; likely the DEA is busting a higher percentage of makers/sellers than users.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[CanHasDIY]

Seems to me that the statistic you provide is meaningless unless we know the numerical relationship between users and makers/sellers. Seems to me to be quite likely that 4:1 is too low of a ratio; likely the DEA is busting a higher percentage of makers/sellers than users.

Seems to me, if true you should be able to easily provide statistics which back your supposition, as I already have.

Else, it's fair to assume you're merely bloviating, and thus ignore your chatter accordingly.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[Lashat]

Ok. Let's play cops and robbers....or DEA and Silk Road Patrons.

I would contend that the package tracking works two ways. Not just to the destination. Package origin is also documented.

Even if the seller is savvy enough to drop-off packages at various locations, the activity will still create a narrowed package origin. If the seller spends the time to drive to the N closest package drop-off locations. Guess what? You have narrowed down the search quite a bit vs. the previously unknown origin.

All the DEA needs to accomplish this is to place multiple orders over time from a single seller. Backtrack the package with the quite helpful and cooperative shipping company. Create the shipping origin profile. One location=easy. Many locations=less easy. Next the DEA breaks out the tried and true drug-war fighting techniques. Stakeouts? Not yet. Grab available and future drop-off location surveillance video? Of course.

I am guessing that the *Federally* mandated *National* agency might want to put together an investigation effort over some years that would perhaps nab the biggest bust and make the best headlines. Promotions & Raises all around!
To this end they stage their drug-sniffing dogs/machines at the regional sorting center for the shipping companies. At some point the seller is going to contaminate the package with the controlled substance. Finding, but letting the drugs continue to ship. Thus, creating a larger more comprehensive list of where the drugs are going. Plus, we get a load of new addresses to monitor as drug buyers. Good luck with your plausible denialbility defense when you received 30 shipments over 2 years. It's sure easy to eliminate the legitimate shipments of drugs from the illicit since the DEA already has a list of approved mail-order pharmacies.

Now they go to work on the mules and seller directly by staking out the drop-off locations with the most activity in the region. They then match video/photographic footage of the drop-off location customers with the date/time stamps that the flagged addresses were sent packages. Presto! Mules and/or Sellers are identified and profiled. It's just a game of Big Fish / Little Fish after that. The DEA flips the middleman and keeps operations up and running leading to the biggest fish in that particular pond.

How much effort was spent on navigating torrents, cracking encryption, and tracking your dozen one time use account bit-coin transfers? Absolutely NONE. Good investigation skills and vast resources still work. The virtual world cannot be isolated from the physical world just yet. At least in this case. Sure, we are all waiting for when we can 3D print pills of any chemical composition at home for the low low price of resin. Lightsabers, Jetpacks, and Null Gravity drives

Maybe /.ers place too much faith in technology. Maybe the DEA and other enforcement agencies are not as backwards and technically inferior as most on /. believe them to be. Of course, I'm sure that within months some Fast & Furious type of botched operation will come to the publics awareness to confirm the stupidity of someone in one of these agencies. That does not exclude those same agencies from having intelligent and diligent people employed.

Just for fun watch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Cover

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[CanHasDIY]

Umm... Okay...

Neat story, but what does that have to do with the fact that the vast majority of narcotics-related arrests are end users, not dealers?

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[Lashat]

I wasn't directly replying to your single post. More to all the replies in this thread as a whole. I clicked the wrong "reply to this".

But to your point...

I believe that the answers are fairly simple IMHO. I don't have any statistics specific to my claims, just general knowledge.
-Supply and demand requires that there are just more users than dealers.
-Most users get arrested on drug-related charges due to police contact other than targetted narcotics enforcement. Domestic calls, traffic stops, public intoxication, etc. Users get stopped and searched for whatever reason and drugs turn up so they get arrested.
-Dealers tend to be more paranoid less likely to get caught "dirty"

In a side note, according to Law "intent to sell"=dealer and this is based on quantity of controlled substance. So, 1 dealer = many users based on weight. That is the stat I would like to see how much weight is seized from dealers vs users.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[iluvcapra]

Following the money. So you are saying that if I go to instawallet.org from a library, a wifi spot or though tor, create a wallet, anonymously send money to that wallet, bitinstant.com, make another, and another and another, series of one time use bitcoin wallet addresses, before it gets sent to SilkRoad, which tumbles that, they are going to track that? How? You can set 6 one time use wallets up and transfer random amounts.

It's not clear how you're funding this wallet in the first instance. At some point you're going to have to wire some money to an exchange or pass it through Dwolla or BitInstant, both of which keep logs of everything, and in the case of BitInstant, it's a US company and will get you on security cameras at a 7-11 or a Walmart. You can juggle the money from BTC endpoint to endpoint as much as you like, but all the transactions are public record and lead back to the funding event.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[iluvcapra]

His point is that your statistics don't back your argument. Saying 80% of DEA arrests are for users does not constitute evidence that the DEA cares about busting people with $100 worth of LSD -- it doesn't really say anything about their emphasis at all, it's a gross generalization. In order for your point to prevail on your evidence, you must establish that dealers make up a proportion of the criminally liable population in excess of 20%.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[uvajed_ekil]

Too bad it is so hard to get caught then. I have always said that certainty of apprehension and prosecution has a far bigger impact on crime rates than do long sentences, but in the US we go with the notion that banning lotsa stuff and throwing away the key once in a while is the best deterrent. And so we fail. For our legal system to work, and to deter crime, we need more cops and less resources dedicated to long-term incarceration.

Put another way, nobody wants to go to jail, even for a month, but every would-be criminal thinks they are going to get away scot-free and they generally do.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[Anonymous Coward]

I sell bitcoins to friends for cash. I buy them directly from miners P2P.

You might find a "trail" in the block history, but you have no idea which transaction belongs to which person.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[SealBeater]

Cash directly to the wallet addresses from Walmart or 7-11. Wear a hat. Do you really think they are going to canvas every 7-11 and Walmart in North America (assuming that's where you are) for their video logs of who did a moneygram? Walmart at least doesn't require ID. Fake all the info and be on your way.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[h4rr4r]

How does that help when we are talking about something so relatively harmless?

It is actually hard to get caught, and the punishments do not fit the risks of the activity.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[CanHasDIY]

I wasn't directly replying to your single post. More to all the replies in this thread as a whole. I clicked the wrong "reply to this".

Yea, I noticed that after posting, and unfortunately /. doesn't have a "delete my inane post because I thought better of it" option.

according to Law "intent to sell"=dealer and this is based on quantity of controlled substance. So, 1 dealer = many users based on weight. That is the stat I would like to see how much weight is seized from dealers vs users.

Ha, I like how you capitalized "Law." Makes it seem like more of an institution, which it has become.

As for the question of weight, I agree that's one worth asking.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[tehcyder]

To be honest, although I'm all in favour of getting off your tits by any and any means possible, when I read posts like this I just think "that's too much like hard work" and go and buy a couple of litres of cheap scotch from Lidls.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[iluvcapra]

Fake all the info and be on your way.

That's interesting. Is there any way to fund a BTC wallet with real world money that doesn't require deliberately lying about your identity?

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[SealBeater]

Sure but why would you want to?

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[molecular]

How exactly would your theoretical honeypot work?

By following the money. Server logs show which online personas bought and sold what, intercepting packages can tie those to physical addresses and identities, and comparing bitcoin IDs on suspects' computers with the block chain provides irrefutable cryptographic proof that the transactions took place. They could probably even wind everything up into one big RICO case, and then everyone who used silkroad is potentially on the hook for every transaction that took place there.

That doesn't work at all. You can't "follow the money" to the recipient. Silkroad uses a tumbler. Also: "Bitcoin IDs" are made up freshly for every transaction. Probably most bitcoins in circulation have been silk-road-tainted (much like many bills have cocaine on them). Do you arrest everyone with a bill in his wallet that has cocaine?

Do you think the DEA cares about going after kids who buy $100 worth of LSD?

To turn that question around for a minute, if the DEA had a chance to put literally thousands of dealers and users in prison for life, and take a huge number of bitcoins out of circulation, do you think they would pass it up?

Taking a huge number of bitcoins out of circulation doesn't harm bitcoin at all. It makes the remaining bitcoins more valuable.

Re:Nice Ad Placement or DEA Honeypot

[Deliveranc3]

The thing about it is that the sellers simply get another layer of protection. Their shipping and bank accounts are probably still anonymized, regular drug dealers do it, why wouldn't these guys?

One interesting thing from the article was that some of the older sellers seem to be retiring. They probably made their million and have a bunch of steady customers they can shop around to producers.

This whole thing is a really bad smell on BTC... but it's not something the DEA is likely to attack too soon. They'll go in slowly and try and get the site to store details, probably giving the proprietor a free pass, then go after the dealers and put notes on all the clients records.

The biggest problem with this is it wrecks kids lives. They want the hardcore resale channel more than the kid in the suburbs.

The point though is that BTC businesses can be successful even with the market fluctuation we're seeing. It's easy to automate selling any incoming coins so there's no reason it shouldn't... except people think it's spooky magic!

98% positive feedback

[RobinEggs]

Should we be surprised that the feedback is overwhelmingly positive? The owners of the site make money when the feedback is good; the site could die if the feedback was bad. They control the forum, including the ability to delete feedback. Connect the dots.

You wouldn't trust a company that self-reports; a company that controls the forum for user reports has the same underlying power to censor negative anecdotes as any other company that regulates from within.

Re:98% positive feedback

[Anonymous Coward]

Or maybe the drug sellers are actually doing their part.
They earn more money if they sell more, like any other business

Re:98% positive feedback

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, I've read about this particular site on other drug related forums as well, and the posts _are_ almost always positive. So I doubt it's a scam.

Re:98% positive feedback

[Anonymous Coward]

This seems more likely the case. It's not as if they could stop negative feedback being posted elsewhere if it was one big scam, it is the internet after all. Nobody is going to buy from you if you are ripping them off when there are other options.

Re:98% positive feedback

[gatfirls]

That could be possible but I have a feeling it's basically like the "old west" where your reputation is everything and once you have a good one you will do anything to keep it because it's your "word"/"honor". The whole thing is crazy to me but I can see how minus any sort of intervention the playing field levels itself out. I'd think if people were being ripped off you would hear quite a bit about it.

Re:98% positive feedback

[Anonymous Coward]

Meh, according to 4chan, people get do scammed all the time at that place. (And it's not like scams are uncommon in real-world drug dealing.)

I imagine it's just like EBay back when everyone did business in money orders, except with the added benefit of nearly complete anonymity: 1) List a few of small items to build feedback. 2) List a bunch of high price items at once 3) Disappear before the negative feedback registers.

Re:98% positive feedback

[SealBeater]

Scamming may be common in the, get in your car and hit some street corner for some random dealer mindset but no one I know operates that way. They all have a "guy" who they call and it's usually in the "guys" interest to formulate a good relationship, it benifits both, you know you can trust this person so you'll continue to do business with him, and the seller grows his client base. Same thing here.

Re:98% positive feedback

[AvitarX]

Sellers benefit greatly from reduced exposure if they have a client base too.

Escorts work the same way in general, work up a client base that supports life, and then stop advertising.

Once established risk drops significantly.

That's not what the meme is...

[Danathar]

But...But...bitcoin is going nowhere. Nobody uses it and it's worthless. This story contradicts my brainwashed grey matter that's been given the meme that virtual currency will never amount to anything!

Re:That's not what the meme is...

[Anonymous Coward]

It hasn't gone anywhere. Its main use has and still is for buying drugs.

Re:That's not what the meme is...

[h4rr4r]

So you can now pay your mortgage in bitcoins or weed?

Because so far it seems drugs and arms all about all you can get with bitcoins.

Re:That's not what the meme is...

[IamTheRealMike]

Well, and other things too.

Re:That's not what the meme is...

[Defenestrar]

And a wireless money transfer between separate currencies without paying the crazy rates banks/western union/etc... charge.

Re:That's not what the meme is...

[LodCrappo]

Don't be a dumbass, it's unbecoming.

I've purchased web hosting, computer hardware, and beers with it. Had you done the slightest amount of research, you would know that is only a tiny fraction of the goods and services available.

Re:That's not what the meme is...

[cant_get_a_good_nick]

Bitcoin fails one of the fundamental rules of a currency - store of value. Yeah yeah, you can talk about hyper-inflation of 'real' currencies, but even with hyper-inflation you have stability of direction. Bitcoin can halve or double on any given day. By that token, it has failed. You can't use it as an investment - your exchange risk (FX risk) outweighs any kind of interest you'd get.

Now, in certain particular instances, its advantages (anonymity) makes the failure of store of value less critical. If I convert to bitcoin right before a purchase, and the seller converts to local currency right after the sale, you minimize the window of FX risk. But then you are not using this as a conventional currency.

And "virtual" currencies were proven in the real world. Check out Planet Money's coverage

Re:That's not what the meme is...

[Anonymous Coward]

and beers with it

ah HA!

Most drug dealer are trustworthy

[aepervius]

Drug war between opposite drug clan are relatively rare , and when they do happen they usually only impact seller, not buyer. This is a business you can only advertise by "mouth to ear" so most seller understand that if they screw up, their business will drop. That's why you get so many positive rating. In fact, you get a more likely good relation ship with your dealer to which you are a known face and source of money, than for an anonymous corporation for which you are a blimp in a statistic.

Re:Most drug dealer are trustworthy

[Frosty Piss]

Drug war between opposite drug clan are relatively rare , and when they do happen they usually only impact seller, not buyer

Only at the "retail" level.

Re:Most drug dealer are trustworthy

[Anonymous Coward]

Drug war between opposite drug clan are relatively rare

Citation needed.

From observation, nearly all shootings in the city of Malmö Sweden are drug-related and due to drug wars. The same is true for other Swedish cities. Judging from this real life data, I conclude that drug wars are very common.

Do you have other data?

Re:Most drug dealer are trustworthy

[Hatta]

Most drug dealers are trustworthy. It's the cops you have to worry about.

Re:Most drug dealer are trustworthy

[balouderbaer]

From your logic, if the relation of drug related violence to total violence is large enough, we can conclude that "drug wars are common". Which would also apply to a town with exactly one shooting incident per year, which happens to be drug related.

Re:Most drug dealer are trustworthy

[mikael_j]

The problem here is that you're looking at it the wrong way. It's like saying that since most car crashes involve serious injuries or deaths then getting in a car is more likely than not to result in you becoming seriously injured or dying. Or that since 95% of heroin users used cannabis before heroin that must mean if you use cannabis it will almost certainly result in heroin use.

Of course, what these numbers say isn't anything of the sort (despite the heroin one being a favorite with governments, including the Swedish one). All they really show is that in a car crash you are likely to get hurt and that heroin users generally started with some softer drug. In the same vein, that the majority of shootings in a city are drug-related does not prove that drug wars are common, merely that when shootings occur they are generally drug-related.

And another important thing to think about, why do these people resort to gunplay? Well, consider that they have no legal course of action if someone else attacks them in one way or another (violent or not). Do you really think a hypothetical company named Svenska Cannabisbolaget AB would start a turf war against another hypothetical company named SkÃnt och GrÃnt AB if SoG AB could just call the cops and say "Hey, SC AB just firebombed our growhouse, we have security footage of three of their employees doing it"?

98%

[MRe_nl]

Drug dealers are the resistance in The War on Drugs.
If you can't trust the resistance who can you trust?

Re:98%

[jemenake]

Drug dealers are the resistance in The War on Drugs.

Actually, drug dealers are the ones hoping that the war on drugs continues, or they'll be out of work.

Re:98%

[Anonymous Coward]

The capacitance?

Re:98%

[garyok]

Drug dealers are the resistance in The War on Drugs.

Actually, drug dealers are the ones hoping that the war on drugs continues, or they'll be out of work.

Nah, they'd just open a cafe or a dispensary (or just work from home) and convert their illicit customers to licit ones. The guys higher up the supply chain on the other hand...

One day I hope to see drug laws across the 1st World that aren't designed to please some tut-tutting old baggage whose sole remaining vice is raining on other folks' parades.

Re:98%

[smellsofbikes]

Drug dealers are the resistance in The War on Drugs.

Actually, drug dealers are the ones hoping that the war on drugs continues, or they'll be out of work.

This is seriously on-topic. I know a pot dealer/grower who is spending a good chunk of his income fighting against continued/expanded legalization and medical marijuana initiatives because the ones already in place in this state are financially crippling him. Suddenly he's no longer the long-haired hippie: he has a suit, short hair, and shows up at every local public meeting on zoning to argue that allowing marijuana dispensaries is immoral and a danger to our children. It's sort of funny to watch, although I'm also fairly pissed at him because I am personally in favor of medical marijuana being easily available.

Re:98%

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, we saw this when marijuana legalization came up for a vote, the people working in the existing framework voted against it to keep their profits.

Re:98%

[Anonymous Coward]

Absolutely.
I'm posting anonymously because I used to manufacture and sell drugs for a living. There's no way in hell my OSHA nightmare of a workplace would have made anything the FDA would permit me to sell. The people I worked with had a policy of minimizing lawbreaking, so when someone wanted to try their hand at homemade vodka we went the legal route...and ended up going the illegal route, simply because it was so, so much easier.

Working illegally, manufactures can charge absurd amounts to the inexperienced, artificially drive prices up with a little collaboration (yes, drug labs DO price-fix with their supposed rivals), work in whatever conditions they see fit, use ingredients that aren't fit for consumption by anything, and adulterate their
products with the same.

Plus, it's easy. I got started extracting DMT and selling it to college kids. I tried selling homemade bread and got paperwork'd into submission, but the DMT thing worked outstandingly well.

That being said, if you want to find someone who knows their lab safety better than anyone else, find a 20-year meth lab cook who still has all his limbs.

Let's think of something else...

[Nrrqshrr]

I am most interested in the question asked in the summary: "Most surprising, perhaps, is that buyers rate the sellers on the site as relatively trustworthy, despite the fact that no real identities are used."

Maybe it's somekind of "team spirit" thing, like the Anonymous from 4chan, always looking for trouble, but at the same time very capable of working together towards a common goal.

Positive feedback bias.

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Dead men tell no tales.

Seller laced my cocaine with rat poison killed me and most of my family. Would not buy from again.

Re:Positive feedback bias.

[h4rr4r]

Has this ever happened?

So far the only such case I know of was poisoned illegal booze during prohibition and it was the government doing it.

Dead men are not repeat customers, so doing that is not a good way to make money.

Re:Positive feedback bias.

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

I'm not hip on druggie lingo, I used rat posion as an example of something that would definitly kill the user. Sometimes peopel do die I hear from overly potent stuff. What one druggie can handle might kill the next depending on the cut of cocaine/ heroin/ pixie sticks/ marshmello fluff/grannie wiskers.

Re:Positive feedback bias.

[Urza9814]

I know someone who's considered using this site. He already owns test kits, capable of testing pretty much any common recreational drug for purity. They're apparently not too hard to find. And yea, I know, the average drug user isn't going to go buy test kits -- but they're also not going to be buying off Tor, are they?

Re:Positive feedback bias.

[h4rr4r]

It is also an example of something no one would use for cut just for that reason. Unlike what DARE taught you, drug dealers are just working folks trying to make a living. Killing customers cuts into the bottom line.

Yes, people do die from high dosages. That is the result of a drug war that means users can never be sure of the purity of the product they buy. You will of course notice that all alcohol and pharmaceuticals are labeled as to their strength. I am not sure how you can blame anyone but those who support the War on Some Drugs for those fatalities.

The vast majority of drug consumption in the USA is not done by "druggies". It is done by white collar workers who no one would suspect of such.

Re:Positive feedback bias.

[PraiseBob]

In the 70's the government would spray fields with Paraquat, an herbicide. The growers reaction was to cut the plants down immediately before they started to die, and sell them. I'm sure smoking herbicide is safe.

I would imagine most sellers go to some length to keep the product safe. After all, if somebody higher in the supply chain found out about one of their underlings poisoning his product and damaging not only his reputation, but his boss's reputation, and inviting law enforcement investigations into sudden deaths, what do you think the reaction would be?

Re:Positive feedback bias.

[h4rr4r]

So again it is the government not the illegal drug sellers that are poisoning users.

Re:Positive feedback bias.

[vux984]

After all, if somebody higher in the supply chain found out about one of their underlings poisoning his product and damaging not only his reputation, but his boss's reputation, and inviting law enforcement investigations into sudden deaths, what do you think the reaction would be?

Even more sudden deaths?

Re:Positive feedback bias.

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Yeah and most alchoholics work a full time job. They're still alcoholics. People who use drugs recreationally to their detriment are also addicts, druggies, what ever you'd like to call them and also come in all shapes and colors.

The point is simple. Only people who survive the products can post ratings. 0% of those killed do. That could be due to the rat poisin, heroin cut, mafia hit,suicide, "suicide", police sting operation, asteroid hit, heart attack, fatal waterballoning, spontaneous combustion, terminal cooties, or the bubonic plaugue.

Re:Positive feedback bias.

[Anonymous Coward]

During prohibition? The government still poisons booze.

What do you think methylated spirits are? You don't pay the same tax on non-drinking alcohol, so it has to be poisoned with methanol to stop people just buying and drinking it.

And if a few desperate alcoholics die, well, that's their fault for not paying taxes.

Re:Positive feedback bias.

[AvitarX]

Most don't use them to their detriment.

Re:Positive feedback bias.

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

I think you're trying to argue with me. You want room 500 down the hall. This is the apathy room.

Shipping

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't the US shipping carriers have security systems in place to make sure drugs aren't shipped?

Re:Shipping

[h4rr4r]

Not really, there is no way to inspect the shear volume of packages shipped. There are containers made for this that block the smell and even hide the product inside normal looking products.

Sure the postal service might use dogs on occasion, but there is no practical way for USPS and UPS and Fedex to inspect every package.

Re:Shipping

[Anonymous Coward]

Generally, but such systems are expensive and used much more extensively for import mail than domestic. Also, they sure as hell can't detect every drug.

No equipment can detect $10,000 worth of LSD in blotter form packed into a Christmas card, for instance.

Re:Shipping

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't know about the US but in the little european country I live in our constitution actually states outright that the post office (or other package carriers) can't inspect packages and letters. It's covered by the same section that deals with freedom of speech...

False ratings

[wbr1]

Tor is anonymous, so is silk road et. Al. If I am making large sums ofmoney, bitcoin or otherwise, wouldn't it behoove me to spend 2 hours a week buffering my ratings? Even if I never deliver product?

Re:False ratings

[Anonymous Coward]

By jove your right! It's amazing nobody thought of that - there is no way this market could function. Clearly its existence and success is a contradiction.

Good!

[sjames]

Every transaction there avoids a transaction on the street that potentially includes gun violence and harm to bystanders.

Re:Good!

[jovius]

Not every transaction, when most probably some of the buyers are resellers. Besides the production of some the drugs is violently controlled. Switzerland provides government made heroin for free. That's harm reduction, and it's proven to be effective too.

Re:Good!

[Frosty Piss]

I'm almost 50. I've smoked pot since I was 14, and "done" a few other things as well. I've never purchased my drugs "on the street".

Now, in the early 80's in Portland, I could smoke a joint in the park and not be hassled.

Today? The cops would be all over me, and I'd have an unpleasent interaction with the "criminal justice system". The might raid my house, take my car, fine me 100's od $...

It is MUCH MUCH MUCH more legally dangerous to smoke pot today than it was 20-30 years ago.

Today, smoking pot is right up there with being a "terrorist".

Re:Good!

[h4rr4r]

In the 80s you could not get a medical card. Many states are decriminalized. In some states it is no more than a civil fine.

Re:Good!

[Anonymous Coward]

My experience is quite different. In CA, I have had cops tell me straight up they cant do much of anything about people smoking pot. Sure i might get hassled in the park, but all I have to do is grab my notarized medical marijuana paperwork out of my pocket and any state officer/employee cant touch me. A DEA or FBI (any federal officer) can though, but its pretty rare to run into those.

Re:Good!

[Anonymous Coward]

Every transaction also avoids putting more money - transfer fees, account fees, PayPal fees, etc. - into the hands of the bankers who are screwing us all.

WinWin!

Re:Good!

[gmhowell]

In the 80s you could not get a medical card. Many states are decriminalized. In some states it is no more than a civil fine.

Unfortunately, in some of those states, the DEA has been more than happy to fill the void left by the states.

Re:Good!

[Anonymous Coward]

Heh, receiving illegal drugs interstate shipped to your door can just as easily end in gun violence and harm to innocent bystanders as well.

Re:Good!

[sjames]

Only if the cops get involved. Otherwise it's not so likely.

Re:Good!

[dirtaddshp]

This couldnt be more true...

Re:No wonder you lot vote Democrat

[Anonymous Coward]

"Baww vote Republican like me so I can pretend to care about the Constitution while ordering everyone else around!"

'Round these parts I think we vote Libertarian.

The PDF

[SnowHog]

How about a direct link to the PDF? W3C Web site

Fishy

[ceoyoyo]

Mt. Gox, which purports to handle 80% of the entire bit coin exchange business, reported about 2000 bit coins exchanged per day last month. That's 60,000 coins, at a generous valuation of $10 apiece, which is $600,000 US Dollars. The article claims the Silk Road is doing $2 million / month business. So either a lot of people buying are generating their own bit coins, and the sellers mostly aren't exchanging them, or the numbers in the article don't add up.

Counting the number of feedback posts in the forum seems like a particularly bad way to measure number of sales. Particularly when the forum is anonymous and both the site operators and the dealers have a vested interest in there being lots of positive feedback.

Re:Fishy

[grnbrg]

Well, except for the fact that Mt. Gox's current 30 day volume is a little over 2 million *coins* valued at between US$7 and $10 (Average value of $8.77.).

So $2 million per month through Silk Road is not unreasonable if Gox is doing $17 million per month in transactions....

grnbrg.

Re:Fishy

[ceoyoyo]

Have you got a reference for that? I did misread their volume graph - looks like their monthly graph has three volume values per day, not one, so my numbers are low by a factor of three. But there seems to be an order of magnitude between what their volume graph shows and what you're claiming.

Re:Fishy

[grnbrg]

http://bitcoincharts.com/markets/mtgoxUSD_trades.html

30 day volume: BTC 2,079,763.64, USD$18,314,377.

grnbrg.

Re:Fishy

[ceoyoyo]

The chart at Mt Gox itself disagrees. I guess more of the bitcoin world is fishy than just the drug markets.

Re:Fishy

[grnbrg]

You're reading it wrong. The scale at the very bottom of the chart on Mt Gox shows a month, but the default zoom on that scale is 1 day.

Currently showing a volume of about 1200 BTC per hour.

grnbrg.

Re:Fishy

[poofmeisterp]

Mt. Gox, which purports to handle 80% of the entire bit coin exchange business, reported about 2000 bit coins exchanged per day last month. That's 60,000 coins, at a generous valuation of $10 apiece, which is $600,000 US Dollars. The article claims the Silk Road is doing $2 million / month business. So either a lot of people buying are generating their own bit coins, and the sellers mostly aren't exchanging them, or the numbers in the article don't add up.

Counting the number of feedback posts in the forum seems like a particularly bad way to measure number of sales. Particularly when the forum is anonymous and both the site operators and the dealers have a vested interest in there being lots of positive feedback.

Stop researching stuff. It kills teh stupid. :)

You forgot about risk

[sjbe]

And a wireless money transfer between separate currencies without paying the crazy rates banks/western union/etc... charge.

And taking considerably more risk in the process. There is no escrow or trusted neutral party ensuring everyone gets the right amount. Basically you are trusting that the other party is an honest broker. In principle you are doing the same thing with a bank but there is actually oversight of the bank. You pay a middle man a fee not just to facilitate the transfer but also to reduce the risk to you. You are reducing the transfer fee but hugely increasing the risk.

Re:You forgot about risk

[IamTheRealMike]

Western Union is not a dispute mediator. If they were, they wouldn't be the tool of choice for Nigerian scammers would they? They offer rapid international cash transfers with no questions asked, that's pretty much their business model.

You can have low-trust dispute mediation with Bitcoin, by the way. The way it works is you send coins to a 2-of-3 output. The keys are yours, the sellers and a mediators. If you and the seller agree the transaction was good, you both sign a transaction sending the coins to the seller. If there is a dispute the mediators key is used to break the tie. The mediator/escrow agency never has the ability to spend the coins so they aren't a particularly attractive target for hacking. Technical details are on the wiki, along with many other interesting possibilities the Bitcoin protocol makes possible. It isn't fully implemented today (it can be done with command line tools but isn't user friendly), but this will come with time.

Re:You forgot about risk

[sjbe]

Western Union is not a dispute mediator.

Who said anything about dispute mediation? Western Union transfers the money where you tell them to in whatever currency the recipient needs. They do the currency exchange, not the recipient. If you are involved in a stupid transaction then you are a dumbass but that's a separate issue. Western Union will reliably handle the currency exchange for you and can be trusted to do so without resorting to an illiquid and risky virtual currency. No they don't do it for free but they can do it almost anywhere in the world without any technological sophistication required and with considerably less counter party risk for the exchange. Only an idiot or someone willing to take on huge amounts of risk would use bitcoin to perform a currency exchange.

You can have low-trust dispute mediation with Bitcoin, by the way.

Only if you have a mutually trustworthy third party who is willing to do the transaction for free - in other words someone who doesn't value their time - and are willing to go to the trouble to set up a complicated transaction. Otherwise you can pay Western Union or a bank a small fee and accomplish the same end without anywhere near the risk for exchanging the cash.

It isn't fully implemented today (it can be done with command line tools but isn't user friendly), but this will come with time.

So basically you cannot do it easily and only a computer geek with a poor understanding of risk and a worse understanding of liquidity would even try. Where do I sign up?

Re:No wonder you lot vote Democrat

[Anonymous Coward]

Funny most of the people I run into here are flaming lazy gimme-gimme-gimme leftists tax and spend loonies.

I am far more libertarian than "Republican" (meaning 'modern Republican that is). Call it conservative originalist. it's just that there's too much to in the libertarian platform I cannot stomach. Plus I hate being part of a losing team.

The key here is to bring the Republicans back into the box we call the Constitution.

Meaningless. The volume-estimator is bogus

[gweihir]

This is a meaningless stunt. The estimator for business volume was the customer feedback, which happens to be completely unverifiable and may be 100% bogus because sellers are trying to fake themselves a reputation. Unless this "scientist" bought goods himself, he does not have a single verified sale. In addition, 100% of sales could be fraudulent, if there are any.

Re:Meaningless. The volume-estimator is bogus

[Anonymous Coward]

I think your comment paints a more accurate picture than anything else. 550 sellers? It seems more likely there are at most 2 sellers, assuming there are any at all. Of course there's 98% positive feedback, the whole thing seems like some kind of sham honeypot operation. You know what they say, if it seems too good to be true, trust your instincts.

Re:Meaningless. The volume-estimator is bogus

[Anonymous Coward]

I've used the Silk Road to buy various items on at least a dozen occasions, from five different sellers in four different countries and my experience is that if it's a scam then I'm not sure how they're profiting by delivering the products advertised.

And if there are only two sellers then these are clearly very well-organized sellers since they ship from four different countries.

$2 Million is Hardly "Thriving"

[CanHasDIY]

From Wikipedia:

A UN report said "the global drug trade generated an estimated US$321.6 billion in 2003."

... and that was a decade ago.

$2 million doesn't even register.

Re:$2 Million is Hardly "Thriving"

[jemenake]

$2 million doesn't even register.

Well, I think it is thriving when you consider how they're doing it. This isn't some dude in the projects on a street corner. This is a website that anybody can go browse, select from a variety of things which you're not supposed to be able to get, and then pay for in a way which is untraceable. It's basically a "Yeah, see if you can stop us", kinda deal. The fact that they're able to flip their middle finger to any and all drug prohibition laws and sit there and rake in a non-trivial amount of money in the process... that strikes me as a major shift in how prohibition laws will need to be enforced (or if they'll even try to) in the future.

Re:$2 Million is Hardly "Thriving"

[balouderbaer]

$2 million doesn't even register.

It's basically a "Yeah, see if you can stop us", kinda deal. The fact that they're able to flip their middle finger to any and all drug prohibition laws and sit there and rake in a non-trivial amount of money in the process... that strikes me as a major shift in how prohibition laws will need to be enforced (or if they'll even try to) in the future.

The weak point being that the process is based on anonymity. Therefore, buyers need to have blind trust in sellers. This enables the DEA to set up fake sales and bust the buyers. After they do this for a while, word gets out and buyers start losing trust in the process, therefore killing it. Am I missing something?

Re:$2 Million is Hardly "Thriving"

[Anonymous Coward]

The weak point being that the process is based on anonymity. Therefore, buyers need to have blind trust in sellers. This enables the DEA to set up fake sales and bust the buyers. After they do this for a while, word gets out and buyers start losing trust in the process, therefore killing it. Am I missing something?

First, I'm not sure whether that would be considered entrapment, so there's some question on whether that would work to actually get convictions against buyers. Second, there's a feedback system, like with eBay. In order to get some positive feedback, the feds would either have to have some satisfied customers (ie, they'd have to actually send some drugs to people... which they can't do) or they'd have to create some fake buyer accounts to gin up the seller feedback. All this would be just to bust a few buyers, since, once they busted a few, word would get back to SilkRoad and the seller account would be terminated. The feds also can't just go for months to rack up buyers before a bust because they'll accumulate bad feedback from the earlier buyers who hadn't received their product.

But, generally, going after the demand-side is a tough row to hoe. There are so many more of them, the charges you can press aren't as severe, and they're not as well-publicized, so you don't get that deterrent you were after. There are some example of departments posting the mugshots of prostitution johns on billboards, but those are fairly isolated cases... and it's pretty expensive, and I'm not sure how much it even works.

Re:$2 Million is Hardly "Thriving"

[Anonymous Coward]

They certainly can make an offer of drug sales without it being entrapment, so long as they don't try to talk you into it. You've actively sought them out and initiated the purchase yourself. Along the same lines, I've seen hilariously obvious "chemical supply" sting sites that just so happen to prominently sell the reagents and glassware you need to make meth by the RP/I route, and almost nothing else ...

It surprises me that LEA don't seem to have made a serious fake seller attack against the Silk Road yet. As you say there are obviously problems with doing this in an effective manner due to the reputation system and their inability to actually send drugs, but nonetheless they could create significant distrust in the system using a swarm of new-ish fake sellers validated with fake feedback; they wouldn't have to increase the actual risk all that much, just the perceived risk. Perhaps they don't want to draw more attention to it, although it's already been pretty well publicised with stories in mainstream media.

Shipping through the mail

[Anonymous Coward]

I am puzzled. How does shipping work? Just packages through the regular mail? I think it is safe to assume that they aren't DOWNLOADING the drugs ;)

Actually, no.

[tlambert]

Well, then you criminalize the actual CRIME - driving while impaired

When has criminalizing something actually stopped it from happening? Criminalizing and sentencing only exists to give victims some sense of justice, after it's all over and can never be undone.

This is about *prevention*.

Criminalizing something doesn't prevent it by way of disincentive. Swift, public punishment of perceived transgressors, however, does.

The intent of the penal system is to demonstrate to the rest of society that those who transgress societies rules will be punished, and therefore deter future events by people other than the people being punished. It's kind of lost its value as a deterrent these days, at least in the U.S., since punishment is neither swift, nor is it public, and we take great pains to protect the rights of the accused, rather than the purpose of the process, which could care less if you occasionally string up the wrong person.

We've also been steadily eroding available punishments for a while now, since anything you ban for a little bit is suddenly the "unusual" in "cruel and unusual", and enacting an "unusual" punishment is therefore "cruel". Depending on which side of Rousseau's argument you come down on, there's probably a certain level of "oops" that should be tolerable for the benefit of the larger society: "Bummer of a social contract you got there, Hal, thanks for fulfilling it for us, though...".

Lest you think corporal punishment is no longer alive and kicking...

In the rest of the world, it's pretty much alive and well, e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caning_in_Singapore which is a punishment on a par with public stocks in colonial U.S., or "birching", which was used as a punishment in British prisons through 1962 (and continued on the Isle of Man through 1976), and still in use in Trinidad. Jusicial Corporal Punish is still in use in 33 nations: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judicial_corporal_punishment , and caning was still in use in schools in Britain and Wales until 1987 - 5 strokes for poor exam results. Paddling is still in use in schools in 22 U.S. States, 24 if you include Ohio (school board procedures require; parents may refuse) and Utah (with prior written permission to act in loco parentis - in place of the parent).

And we seem to have no problems with waterboarding, although we try to do it under the cover of extraterritoriality.

Re:Actually, no.

[Intrepid imaginaut]

The main question here is whether or not crime rates are lower in these countries, and they are not, to my knowledge. The Netherlands with its much laxer narcotics regime however is taking in prisoners from other countries because they haven't enough to fill their own.

Re:Actually, no.

[Dragonslicer]

The intent of the penal system is to demonstrate to the rest of society that those who transgress societies rules will be punished, and therefore deter future events by people other than the people being punished. It's kind of lost its value as a deterrent these days, at least in the U.S., since punishment is neither swift, nor is it public, and we take great pains to protect the rights of the accused, rather than the purpose of the process, which could care less if you occasionally string up the wrong person.

Deterrence isn't the only intent. Separating convicted criminals from other potential victims is also a significant goal. In this case, wrongly imprisoning someone is a major failure of the system, because in no way does it separate a criminal from potential victims.

Re:Actually, no.

[HiThere]

Rephrase:
We take great pains to protect the rights of some of the accused.

The poor and minorities don't get much protection. Neither do those harboring attitudes about government actions that the government doesn't like. There may be some other similarly abused categories.

If you are rich enough that hiring a good lawyer isn't a problem, or you are supported by a powerful organization then you can generally expect your rights to be protected by due process. But it requires much more than just being accused. And even if you are "protected by due process", you can expect to spend months-to-years of your life sitting in a courtroom. Which, for some reason, isn't considered punishment.

Re:Actually, no.

[dj245]

The intent of the penal system is to demonstrate to the rest of society that those who transgress societies rules will be punished, and therefore deter future events by people other than the people being punished.

I must be some sort of commie idealist then. I thought the point of a penal system is to rehabilitate people into being productive members of society.

The US system has not been following this philosophy for a long time, if ever. But the point of a penal system should not be punishment. Most people should agree that a person in prison is a drag on the country's GDP. They are counted as population, but produce basically nothing. For a healthier and more productive society, the goal should be to get the person out of prison as soon as possible, and give them skills to be productive and socially acceptable in society.

The only countries that do this successfully are branded as "communist" and the prisons are labeled as "resort prisons". It is hard to argue with their relapse rate statistics however.

Re:Actually, no.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd like to see some evidence for that claim, since we are having too muxh prisoners and not enough jaile spots. Plus; prisons are not private instituions here.

Or at least that's the officiel story. I'd love to be enlightened, if the official story is false.

Re:Actually, no.

[Anonymous Coward]

Idiot.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTOAd6Bk9ws

You want to rehabilitate these subhuman animals? I say trial, 1 appeal then take them out back and shotgun to the head. The penal system is to enact punishment. Per.fucking.iod. I couldn't care less if these animals are rehabilitated, they need to be removed from society.

You bleeding heart leftists make me sick. How about you invite these scumbags over to your house for for rehabilitation huh? Come on fuckwad, put up or shut up. Pussy.

Nice

[Anonymous Coward]

Drug dealers now accept virtual Monopoly money.

Re:Nice

[balouderbaer]

Try asking a dealer in the street if he takes bitcoin and see what happens...

Re:Nice

[1s44c]

Drug dealers now accept virtual Monopoly money.

All money is virtual monopoly money. With BitCoin there is a fixed amount in the monopoly box, with USD the government can keep printing more and giving it to themselves and their bankster pals thus constantly devaluing the USD you hold.

Drugs are illegal because...

[gestalt_n_pepper]

1) Illegal drugs fund the CIA (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_and_Contras_cocaine_trafficking_in_the_US). No possibility of corruption there, of course.
2) Illegal drugs finance the banks (http://www.dailyfinance.com/2010/06/29/us-banks-laundered-mexican-drug-money/), even helps them weather financial crises (http://www.guardian.co.uk/global/2009/dec/13/drug-money-banks-saved-un-cfief-claims).
3) Last, but not at ALL least, illegal drug money finances congressional campaigns (http://www.veteranstoday.com/2010/10/18/gordon-duff-how-drug-money-is-buying-our-new-congress/).

Illegal drugs! They feel good, taste good and they're so good for you! ...if you happen to be part of the world's money/power elite. This is why they'll never go away, and they'll never be legal.

I'd bet against BitCoin, but...

[coldsalmon]

"The market can stay inefficient longer than you can stay solvent." -- Keynes

Bitcoin, Tor AND government investigation?

[gman003]

If they could somehow fit Raspberry Pi and the DMCA into it, it would be the Perfect Storm of /. articles!

It's in no danger of "crossing the chasm"

[tlambert]

It's not a viable currency, even for this particular illicit use.

Total 2003 was $321.6 billion/year in illegal drug trade:

http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/articles/2005/06/30/un_report_puts_worlds_illicit_drug_trade_at_estimated_321b/

So $1.9 million/month works out to just under 0.07%, less than 7/100ths of a percent of the total drug trade. That's presuming that the current economic climate hasn't resulted in higher drug use in the 9 years intervening since 2003. Judging by the increases in cigarette smoking and alcohol sales, I'm going to go out on a limb and say other drug use hasn't remained stable at 2003 levels.

~1million arrests per year

[gatfirls]

You and I have a pretty different definition of the word "stop". That's 1million arrests per year, of drunk people. Can you imagine the numbers of incidents not ending in an arrest? Staggering. The laws are basically just cash cows for the states/etc. They really do nothing for prevention. People like to talk about the reduction of deaths but if you look at the stats they follow right along with non-alcohol related vehicle deaths, which probably means it has a lot more to do with vehicle safety features than any meaningful reduction in DUI occurrence. Making "drink and drive" (bars, restaurants, etc) establishments illegal would do a ton more than the purely punitive laws we have. Like smoking and everything else, as far as the states concerned, the bottom line is income. Safety is the guise.

Better!

[roman_mir]

Every transaction that avoids the official banking records and prevents flow of data to the government is even better, because it prevents the data from being used against the individuals involved.

After all, Capone was thrown to jail not for crimes but because of income tax evasion.

Re:Better!

[gmhowell]

After all, Capone was thrown to jail not for crimes but because of income tax evasion.

He committed the biggest crime of all: denying the big boss his cut.

Re:Better!

[sjames]

Fully agreed.

Re:Better!

[uvajed_ekil]

That's asking for it! It is one thing when you traffic in a schedule I substance, while holding an illegal firearm on your person, in a school zone, but when you bypass the tax man, you're REALLY asking to get caught!

Long term sting?

[witherstaff]

I also don't understand how anyone trusts this. Sure bitcoins can be rather anonymous with laundries and easy to use taint detection on addresses. But the buyers are giving physical addresses. Unless there's some anonymous package remailer service it seems like delivery without being known would be difficult. I'd be concerned about a long term sting operation by some letter agency selling things on the site and let it coast for a year or so and then hit everyone you sent a package to.

Re:Long term sting?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd be concerned about a long term sting operation by some letter agency selling things on the site and let it coast for a year or so and then hit everyone you sent a package to.

Well, if it works anything like the gunwalking program, that was probably the idea, but the government forgot to record who all received the drugs.

Careful

[HangingChad]

If it starts getting too profitable the drug companies will step in and take it over.

Re: your signature

[HiThere]

Cthulhu 2012 - Why vote for the lesser evil?
Unfortunately, he isn't on the ballot, and I can't decide which candidate is his logical substitute.

Undermiming the government further

[much noisier]

It's great to see a whole new way to enact civil disobediance against prohibition laws, which seek to fulfill an objective that is neither desirable nor feasible.

Imagine !

[Anonymous Coward]

Imagine a beowulf cluster of drug seeking college professors !

questionable assumptions

[reiisi]

One counter to the hypothetical the article proposes:

If fewer people smoke, more people are healthier, longer. If they don't look for some other means of slow suicide. Sure, that's given.

But does that necessarily mean longer time in nursing homes?

If more people over 65 are healthy enough to keep working, we can raise the mandatory retirement age and let them keep working.

We do know that, statistically, retirement itself is bad for the health, and in the specific way that tends to send people to the nursing homes.

Re:questionable assumptions

[Tokolosh]

Firstly, it is not hypothetical.

Secondly, we all die eventually. Unless killed by a car accident, most medical expenses are incurred late in life.

Thirdly, smokers (I am not one) tend to die earlier from diseases that cause fairly rapid death, and so do not linger.

Therefore they save medical costs by being ill for a shorter time, and pension/retirement costs by dying younger.

This assumes that the society has adopted socialized medicine and old-age pensions. These problems and questions and reasons to interfere in the lives of adults go away in a free (non-socialized) system - see parent.

Re:questionable assumptions

[tehcyder]

This assumes that the society has adopted socialized medicine and old-age pensions. These problems and questions and reasons to interfere in the lives of adults go away in a free (non-socialized) system - see parent.

A society has to pay for medical care and pensions and old age care one way or another. In your "free" system, rich people pay insurance companeis rather than the government, and poor people simply don't get anything as they can't afford to fund it themselves.

It's basically oligarchism which tends towards fascism, with a powerful well off elite living off the backs of the majority, and is the inevitable consequence of so-called libertarianism.

Re:questionable assumptions

[uninformedLuddite]

If more people over 65 are healthy enough to keep working, we can raise the mandatory retirement age and make them keep working.

FTFY?

So you're buying from a high-tech drug dealer...

[Anonymous Coward]

would YOU dare giving him a negative review? ; )

Rot in hell, scumbag

[Anonymous Coward]

Fuck off, you psychotic piece of shit. How dare you cite caning as an example of my country being okay with corporal punishment? Like you said, it was abolished in 1987, and these days, letting teachers assault their charges is rightly regarded as fucking barbaric. And then you mention Singapore! That's fucking hilarious, because SIngapore has one of the highest rate of capital punishment in the world. Probably the highest rate among countries regarded (wrongly) as civilised. Examples of crimes that you receive a mandatory death sentence for in Singapore:

Possessing 500g of cannabis
Possessing 200g of cannabis resin

They will kill you if you have a decent amount of weed. Do you still think anybody should follow Singapore's lead in anything?

As for suggesting that justice couldn't care less if you "string up the wrong person", I hope you are wrongfully convicted of something one of these days. Just being accused of the wrong thing is enough to ruin your life. Seriously, fuck yourself. One innocent person being punished is unacceptable.

You are human shit.

My god, I read your post again. It seriously is one of the most disgusting, vile tracts I've ever seen anybody put a modicum of thought into. You make me ashamed to share the planet with you.

Re: your signature

[dkleinsc]

Sadly, also not running this year are General Zod nor Senator Kelly (although I'm sure some think that Obama and Romney are both mutants).

The hypothetical

[reiisi]

Huh? Everyone has already quit smoking?

A projection is always a hypothetical.

What I'm saying is that their projection makes a number of limiting assumptions. (Projections can't avoid that.)

One assumption they seem to not assume is the optimistic possibility that I mentioned, about moving the the mandatory retirement age back. Retirement, for people too poor or under-motivated to go out and get involved in charity work, starting a new business, hobbies that can now be done full-time, or whatever, is bad for the health in a way that is very expensive for society with mandatory health insurance.

That's just one variable that has a reasonable probability of changing.

Another, which i did not mention, is the pessimistic probability of people turning to other drugs as they quit tobacco, and committing delayed suicide that way. (It appears the more realistic one, but I don't like pessimism.)

And that ignores the whole question of how we are going to re-invent the economy as we go, a variable that is continually changing. The evolution of the means we use to care for the elderly is another. (Assisted care, as opposed to medical incarceration, is a growing trend.)

The problem is not how to kill people off before they become a drag on society, the problem is how to help people remain able to add value to society. And how to make sure enough of the added value can be translated to making the necessities of life available.

Re:And in llamas where it's llama?

[sixsixtysix]

Those responsible for executing the executors of the people executed...have just been executed.

Manufacturers

[Taco Cowboy]

Nowadays, illicit drugs are being manufactured in quantity

Some of them rent vacant factories in 3rd world countries, set up all the required machineries and produce those drugs in tonnage

Many of the raw materials needed to produce those drugs - especially those in the "designer" category, - can be easily acquired in the open market, come in 200kg drums (if they are in liquid form) and in skip bins or in jumbo bags (if they are powder / solid)
 

"Most surprising" is not really

[Anonymous Coward]

Most surprising, perhaps, is that buyers rate the sellers on the site as relatively trustworthy, despite the fact that no real identities are used. Close to 98% of ratings on the site are positive.

This statement is an indicator as to how shallow this report is... as anyone who has merely browsed Silk Road and read any sellers' requirements will readily find out that unless the customer gives a perfect rating, the seller will never deal with them again. And this policy can't be all that effective as accounts are easy to acquire. What isn't easy is bitcoins. What bitcoins offer is anonymity... but to achieve this anonymity is a total pain... and the bitcoin market is volitile. I suppose once a buyer has bitcoins in their Silk Road account, they'd probably prefer to keep the account and not have it blacklisted by sellers. It shouldn't be surprising that sellers are actually reasonably trustworthy, if they want to keep making money, and that they appear to be even moreso, as this is capitalism and the only effective advertising they have is the buyers' ratings. So the ratings are inflated, but regardless, most sellers must be honest if they wish to keep selling.

that's not true

[circletimessquare]

nicotine is highly addicting, but not highly inebriating

something like cocaine, heroin, and meth compel you to use them to the same degree as nicotine, but they add the extra "benefit" of making you unable to hold a job or continue a relationship (the inebriation does that, unlike with nicotine)

marijuana, alcohol, lsd, mushrooms, etc., should be legal because they do not easily addict (although you shouldn't use drugs that produce strong hallucinations without a babysitter, and the irresponsible assholes that do will mean these drugs will stay illegal)

but strongly addicting and inebriating substances (this excludes nicotine, because it is not strongly inebriating), such as heroin, cocaine, meth, etc., when made easily and freely available, become the "solution" to many more people for the average problems of life, to the point they can no longer maintain a job and a relationship, and the "solution" becomes a much larger life destroying problem

of course, you can still get these drugs, but there are financial and distribution barriers to acquiring them, which means these drugs destroy far less lives than if they were legal and freely available. the war on drugs will never be perfect. that's not the point. marijuana should be made legal and the highly addicting and inebriating substances should be focused on more effectively. to simply keep the addict population as low as is possible. THAT's the point

also of course, for those who are addicted, HEATH CARE, not incarceration, is the key to rebuilding destroyed lives

but i will never understand, and never respect, the blind idealistic opinions of people who only consider the evil effects of prohibition on society, and do not consider the far greater evil effects of highly addicting + inebriating drugs themselves on destroyed lives. and for those of you who say it is your right to destroy your life if you want, you don't ever do that in a vacuum, you drag your family, friends, community, and random innocents who you damage while inebriated or you wind up stealing from to support your habit (right, like government should hand out free drugs, like i want my tax dollars to bankroll your empty life: no i want to bankroll your recovery)

no one has infinite willpower, everyone has moments of weakness, and most people don't act with responsibility (especially in regards to drugs, since that is the whole point: escape from responsibility and the stress). and when something like cocaine or heroin or meth becomes more easily available during those times of weakness we all have because some magically thinking society made them legal, you have introduced a permanently hobbling deficit on many more people's lives. if you don't understand this phenomenon, stop talking about drug policy, as you know absolutely nothing about drugs, or are being dishonest in the service of your own blindness on the subject, perhaps even your own addiction or addictive personality

more than war, slavery, government brutality: drugs have destroyed more human lives in the history of homo sapiens. understand that, or understand nothing about the subject. the idea that just prohibition is the problem, that a bunch of controlling busy bodies just go to all this effort because they just don't want you to have any fun, is the opinion of an idiot 12 year old. hard drugs will ruin your life. know it or learn it

who wants their personal freedom destroyed by introducing a permanent interrupt switch in your mind that constantly asks for a drug, pretty much for the rest of your life, when you are feeling down? anyone who isn't warning the hell out of people to stay the hell far away from hard drugs is an idiot, anyone who actually knows these drugs from experience and is actually a person miraculously still interested in their own well-being or the well-being of others is making that warning

420 Posts

[RPI Geek]

When I read this article, there were 420 comments.
Coincidence?!?

Open question...

[grumpyman]

Ok for folks who considers prohibition is the problem, please help me understand how it can be implemented, and if there's any line that needs to be drawn.

anyone actually tried to use it?

[Anonymous Coward]

I've been really eager to give it a shot, for example to score some premium grade uncut cocaine, assuming that I hypothetically would like to snort some. I think the whole marketplace idea is phenomenal. But I'm scared its gotten too high profile and I'd somehow get caught.

without going moral or legal on it

[KingBenny]

I can see why they don't advertise, i also know why they don't need to, if your stuff is good, you'll have people crawling out from between the cracks in the floor in no time, offering you their mother and their sister if need be. Word spreads like wildfire when it comes to that I can also see why most wouldn't sell bad shit. It's no use killing your customers since they won't come back. At best it's cut up to make more from the same amount bought. To cut it up with rat poison would give you a surefire way to get the law on your ass and moreover less people to sell to. I can also see how this, sadly, creates a giant whipping stick for something great like the torproject to be brought down. Other than that, it's considered smart not to poke your nose into places where your head might get cut off. So that's really all i feel like saying. Never visited, never will. Those days are over and if were to feel the need i wouldnt really need to get it online either. The centre of europe has more foreign traffic everyday passing through than you get people here going back and forth to work i think.

Corporal punishment in Britain

[tlambert]

"Corporal punishment remains legal when used by parents, except in Scotland, which has legislated to ban parental corporal punishment."

http://www.politics.co.uk/reference/corporal-punishment

How dare you claim your country is not OK with corporal punishment?

I think the confusion lies in terminology

[tlambert]

It lies in the difference between "penal system" and "corrections system". Here's a good quote by Mary Stohr which reflects this: "Earlier scholars were more honest, calling what we now call corrections by the name penology, which means the study of punishment for crime." [reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corrections%5D

The terminology change came about in the 1950's, when psycho pharmacology had reached the point that we believed everyone was capable of being rehabilitated, and insufficient study had gone into the sociopathy and psychopathy to discover that the conditions are in fact not (yet) correctable by any known means.

It's ridiculous, but most prisoners in the U.S. are there for non-violent offenses, including drug use, and other that legalization, which I think is a nonviable approach for economic power reasons related to acquisition and distribution. It has been suggested that criminal organizations and cartels actively lobby against legalization efforts in order to protect the profitability of the drug economies in which they operate (just as I suspect you will never see a Jacksom Hewitt or H&R Block lobbyist in favor of a flat tax).

I think my bottom line is that (a) there are in fact people who can not be fixed, no matter how much effort is expended, and (b) there are powerful economic interests in favor of not fixing their customer base or reducing the economic value of their products by keeping a fraction of their customer base from going to prison.

No.

[reiisi]

Raising the mandatory retirement age is raising the age at which the government's employment rules say, "Move over, get out of the way, let the younger kids have their turn at having fun!" It's the age at which the government comes after both the employer and the employee and starts denying tax breaks, issuing fines, etc., if the employee won't quit working full time.

I think you're thinking about the age at which a non-full-timer can start drawing pension funds and retirement benefits.Before you raise that age, you have to look at the average life expectancy, the general state of health, etc. in the last n years before people die, etc. You want to set that age so that the non-existent average person has a reasonable expectancy of a reasonable amount of time to enjoy retirement.

And then you get into definitions of "enjoying retirement", and "a reasonable amount of time" and such idiocies.

In an ideal world, the government would not be collecting or paying pension or insurance, and would not be having to draw either line. Leave it up to the individual. Sure, the average twenty-year old is going to do stupid things like buying sports cars and tobacco instead of saving.

No, the average twenty-year old will not. Some will, but by the logic of letting the tobacco smoker just die early if he wants to, we should be willing to let the person who doesn't want to save responsibly die early for lack of pension, too.

Of course, there will usually be family and friends who will pick up the burdens in both cases. And they are the ones who should.

If they can and if they will. Which is the whole problem here.

Anyway, the government, if it's going to get involved, should constantly adjust the regulations so that people who want to do right things aren't getting too many roadblocks in their way.