It Is Not Time For Everybody To Start Singing The Same Song!

"It is time for all of us to start singing the same song." -- an actual quote from a person who believes that hemp will solve all of the world's problems. Or all of America's problems, or all of the problems of the indigenous peoples of the US. Whose problems would be solved wasn't entirely clear. But can you expect clarity from someone insisting that one substance will solve "all of the problems" someone or some large or small group of people is having? One-issue thinking is responsible for all of our problems! (See what I did there?)

It is time for people to leave each other alone and let them sing whatever song they want to, if and when they feel like singing!

It is time for people in urban areas to move away from big speakers and toward headphones. Of course, people have been doing this for some time. For people who aren't lucky enough to have such polite neighbors: it is time to call the cops less often, and instead look into the state of the art in earplugs.

And all of that is important. But to get to much more urgent business: it is way past time to legalize all drug use for adults, and stop arresting them for drug charges, and set the ones who are in jail or prison on drug charges free. Way past time.

Some people have already been talking about how a lot of the reason for drug laws is that some people are getting rich from illegal drug trade, not just dealers but also crooked enforcers and owners of privately-operated prisons.

Time to get rid of privately-operated prisons NOW.

A lot more of the reason for drug laws is straight-up racism, white people wanting to cage non-whites and finding this a very convenient excuse to have that done. Consciously, sometimes, and sometimes subconsciously. We should talk a lot more about those things, much more loudly and urgently. And about the misinformation on drugs put out by racists like Hoover and Anslinger. And about the CIA dealing crack in Compton, and the other majority-non-white areas where they've surely dealt it and heroin and then helped lock up the people they've been doing drug business with, dealing the same drugs whose illegality they've vocally supported out of the other side of their mouths. We should be screaming our heads off about such things.

Oh, and if you want to know what time it is, unless Joe Biden retires from politics instead of running for President, it's time to Google joe biden war on drugs.

But if you don't want to talk about any of that, that's your business. Now pass me the bong and get out of my face, you scary creep!

Legalize Pot, And All Other Drugs Too

Whom would it hurt? Drug dealers, who make thousands of percent profit on their merchandise; their lawyers; the prison industry; and the DEA. They'd all be forced to find careers not based on sheer insanity. One very dangerous recreational drug, alcohol, is legal for adults to consume in the US except for a few counties here and there who are as backwards in their laws about alcohol as the US is in its laws about drugs generally. For the most part the rest of the country realizes that Prohibition was a disaster except for crooks and cops. Many still don't grasp that prohibition of other drugs is no different. Many seemingly don't want to even hear about things such as that the rate of marijuana use in the Netherlands, where it's legal and about as easily obtainable as alcohol in the US, is much lower than in the US, or to think about things such as the claim by a Dutch politician: "We have succeeded in making pot boring." (Those stoned people you see stumbling around downtown Amsterdam? Most of them are American tourists.)

None of what I'm saying is rocket science and none of it is new. If sensible thinking were more common I'd say it's merely common sense. As are further things to consider such as this: I don't deny that some drugs are dangerous and addictive. The main economic commodity in "Breaking Bad," methamphetamine, comes to mind. But people with a meth problem who want help will be more likely to seek it out if they know they're not going to risk imprisonment by doing so.

So many good reasons to just legalize it all. So many bad reasons for keeping it illegal.