The Idaho legislature is proposing a minimum $300 fine for marijuana possession. Neighboring Washington, Oregon, Nevada, and Montana have almost entirely decriminalized marijuana. Spokane-area dispensaries even advertise on the radio, but good luck if you want to buy a rifle or pistol magazine with more than a 10-round capacity. That's an ongoing argument in the courts now, too. Even Utah has relaxed on medical marijuana. But this is about Idaho again, the state so paranoid about library books they're creating "adult-only" rooms to appease book censors.
The government has been fighting a "war on drugs" for decades, and objectively, the drugs are winning. The Iron Law of Prohibition states, "the harder the enforcement, the harder the drugs." As governments crack down on a prohibited substance, the incentive is to make or smuggle the most concentrated form. Right now, the opioid crisis has spiraled to the point that deadly fentanyl overdoses are a common concern. Much of the US border debate centers on drug smuggling from Mexican cartels. We see once again the alliance of bootleggers and Baptists as one seeks the outrageous profits of black market trade, and other other the sense of moral superiority as they try to coerce society into holiness.
Image by Julia Teichmann from Pixabay
I would generally advise against drug consumption, but as Lysander Spooner wrote in Vices are not Crimes,
It is not often possible to say of those acts that are called vices, that they really are vices, except in degree. That is, it is difficult to say of any actions, or courses of action, that are called vices, that they really would have been vices, if they had stopped short of a certain point. The question of virtue or vice, therefore, in all such cases, is a question of quantity and degree, and not of the intrinsic character of any single act, by itself.
100 years ago, the US was deep into alcohol prohibition. Beer and wine had been replaced by whiskey and gin as the favored source of alcohol. The aforementioned "Baptists" had gone so far as to enact a constitutional amendment. Corn whiskey had been part of Appalachian history since colonial times, but from 1920-1933, independent bootleggers and organized crime ran the alcohol industry not unlike the drug-importing cartels, local street gangs, and underground marijuana growers of today. Alcoholism was a "public health crisis" and "moral imperative for legislation" then, to borrow modern terminology.
I drink a beer or two now and then, and have been known to enjoy a Moscow Mule. I don't like to get drunk. However, I know people who can't handle alcohol, and are prone to addiction. Continuing from the previous quotation, Spooner also adds,
This fact adds to the difficulty, not to say the impossibility, of any one’s—except each individual for himself—drawing any accurate line, or anything like any accurate line, between virtue and vice—that is, of telling where virtue ends, and vice begins. And this is another reason why this whole question of virtue and vice should be left for each person to settle for himself.
I know people in Idaho who consume marijuana recreationally or medicinally. They harm no one. Their vices are not inherently criminal. However, robbing them of $300 would be. Making such robbery "legal" does not alter its criminal nature. Even setting aside marijuana and focusing only on "hard drugs," libido dominandi is by far a more dangerous opiate than anything smuggled from Mexico.
Prohibitions and fines are a classic example of the politician's syllogism, "We must do something, and this is something, so therefore, we must do this." I think most people want to blame those afflicted by vice for driving the black market and creating its dangers, but in reality, it is government action with the stated intention of "saving society from itself" which turns vices into deadly crises. Remember also that most of the deaths and injuries from alcohol were not inflicted by careless bootleggers, but by government poisoning industrial alcohol supplies.
Idaho legislators may have the best of intentions, but this policy is short-sighted and misguided. It will result in greatest harm to those least able to pay, and turn innocent people into "criminals." This isn't how we help people in need or protect the public. Shame on Idaho for even considering this action.
We have succumbed to these Iron Laws, before but have not learned our lessons.
Libido dominandi is only one of the reasons that we find ourselves in this position. The other is that we put up with it, trust our governments, trust people with great wealth. Why do we think that only lone gunmen, with next to nothing but their lives to lose, could commit an atrocity such as murdering a classroom of children? If this is possible, then it stands to reason that groups of the rich and powerful, under the spell of libido dominanandi, will happily and justifiably kill many more in order to increase their wealth and power. We have seen this many times in history. What makes us think it is not happening again, right here and right now? What or who will benefit from our naivete?
!PIZZA
People imagine they can hold the ring of power and use it for good, but it corrupts everything they do. Meanwhile, evil pursues such power relentlessly.
I think this type of situation is the essence of libertarianism. People mistake it to mean that if you're libertarian, you support drug use. In actuality, libertarians are against the use of violence, specifically state violence, to stop drug use. This carries through to all issues.
The question isn't so much "Should X action be allowed?" but moreso "Should lethal state violence be used to stop people from doing such action?"
Precisely. If there is no victim, there is no crime. You have the right to pursue happiness, and make mistakes in the process, even if it is self-destructive. I recommend against drugs, sexual promiscuity, drunkenness, etc. but I won't call for you to be robbed, kidnapped, or executed for consenting exchanges.
Politicians doing that politicking racket. How frustrating!
A lot of policies are always going to be short sighted and misguided because they have to "be seen as doing something" in whatever terms they have with th sole hyperfocus is getting re-elected rather than actually being anything in the same universe as useful.
!BBH
It's the high time preference of modern politics. Gotta do stuff to sell to the base in order to be reelected, and/or gotta pass laws that enrich cronies and line your pockets with contributions. True statesmen are a dying breed because good people don't usually want that kind of power in the first place, and those who get elected are susceptible to corrupting influences.
$PIZZA slices delivered:
(1/5) @jacobtothe tipped @owasco