Large drug trafficking group busted in Calgary

[GGG]

Originally Posted by The Yen Man

So we leave it alone, more people become addicts, become unemployed and sleep on the streets. To fuel their addictions, they resort to a life of crime. Yah, that sounds like a pretty swell place to live.

No you take all the money currently being spent on drugs and drug enforcement and put that money into education and addiction treatment. Tax and Treat.

You also coud focus on anti poverty measures as well.

[The Yen Man]

Did I read the story wrong? I thought the $1M is what the drug bust was worth, not the amount spent on the drug bust itself.

All I'm saying is, yes we should devout more resources to education. But at the same time, we shouldn't stop raids like these either.

[Daradon]

Originally Posted by Bent Wookie

So through this whole discussion, no one has proposed a solution.

Should society just give up? Forget its happening? Completely halt enforcement?

So I am all ears- lets hear the ideas.

P.S. The highlighted part. What are you basing this opinion on?

Well that's because in truth there is no real solution and they way its framed isnt even a good representation of the problem. Drugs are a part of biology and evolution. Its a story as old as the human race and in a lot of ways not the bogeyman or excuse modern culture has made them. Your never going to get rid of drugs (nor should you, we use them on a daily basis) or addicts.

For me, I would prefer to see more money in education and treatment and less on enforcement. I would like to see a more liberal drug policy and less illegality.

And mostly I'm just saying celebrating stories like this is at the best pointless and probably actually just spreads misinformation and fear.

[Matata]

Originally Posted by The Yen Man

Did I read the story wrong? I thought the $1M is what the drug bust was worth, not the amount spent on the drug bust itself.

All I'm saying is, yes we should devout more resources to education. But at the same time, we shouldn't stop raids like these either.

Between jail time, police training, salaries, court time, etc. I wouldn't be surprised if more than a million dollars was spent on this bust.

e: I'm kind of talking out of my ass here, but it's reasonable to think this bust was very expensive once you consider all the direct and indirect costs.

[prime333]

Originally Posted by Matata

Between jail time, police training, salaries, court time, etc. I wouldn't be surprised if more than a million dollars was spent on this bust.

e: I'm kind of talking out of my ass here, but it's reasonable to think this bust was very expensive once you consider all the direct and indirect costs.

Make it legal and tax it.

[corporatejay]

Originally Posted by prime333

Make it legal and tax it.

All drugs? Or are we just talking pot here?

[Matata]

Originally Posted by corporatejay

All drugs? Or are we just talking pot here?

Pot would be the logical place to start and then proceed from there, no one is actually proposing massive overnight reform.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by corporatejay

All drugs? Or are we just talking pot here?

For me everything.

If we did a poll and asked why dont you use crack or Meth what would your answer be

A) its illegal
B) you dont know where to by it
C) Because its stupid.

The majority of people for hard drugs are saying C. For recreational drugs its probably A and B. So if illegality is not the reason people dont do drugs then making it illegal isnt beneficial.

[puckluck2]

Originally Posted by GGG

For me everything.

If we did a poll and asked why dont you use crack or Meth what would your answer be

A) its illegal
B) you dont know where to by it
C) Because its stupid.

The majority of people for hard drugs are saying C. For recreational drugs its probably A and B. So if illegality is not the reason people dont do drugs then making it illegal isnt beneficial.

Right now, maybe.

How about 100 years from now? 200 years? You don't think kids might try it because it is legal?

We don't have to look far for legal "stupid" stuff that kids try every day...alcohol and cigarettes.

[northcrunk]

Originally Posted by GGG

For me everything.

If we did a poll and asked why dont you use crack or Meth what would your answer be

A) its illegal
B) you dont know where to by it
C) Because its stupid.

The majority of people for hard drugs are saying C. For recreational drugs its probably A and B. So if illegality is not the reason people dont do drugs then making it illegal isnt beneficial.

D) I don't want to look like a sore filled skeletor and sucking #### for meth has never seemed very appealing.

[prime333]

Originally Posted by GGG

For me everything.

If we did a poll and asked why dont you use crack or Meth what would your answer be

A) its illegal
B) you dont know where to by it
C) Because its stupid.

The majority of people for hard drugs are saying C. For recreational drugs its probably A and B. So if illegality is not the reason people dont do drugs then making it illegal isnt beneficial.

Pot should be legal look at the States they've already got it right. I'm tried of the non sense why keep it illegal for adults? Alcohol and cigarettes are more harmful than pot. It's time that this government stop this "War on Drugs(pot)" and focus on what really matters.

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by prime333

Pot should be legal look at the States they've already got it right. I'm tried of the non sense why keep it illegal for adults? Alcohol and cigarettes are more harmful than pot. It's time that this government stop this "War on Drugs(pot)" and focus on what really matters.

Perhaps we should wait and see what the repercussions (if any) is of legalized pot.


I know there are many that say pot has legitimate medical uses.

Can the same be said for other "hard" drugs ie: coke, E, meth, Heroin, et al.?

[prime333]

Originally Posted by undercoverbrother

Perhaps we should wait and see what the repercussions (if any) is of legalized pot.


I know there are many that say pot has legitimate medical uses.

Can the same be said for other "hard" drugs ie: coke, E, meth, Heroin, et al.?

Look at the states.

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by prime333

Look at the states.

go on

Originally Posted by prime333

Look at the states.

Ok... what am I looking for??

I assume you are saying the new legalization in Colorado, etc. I don't think the juries in for that yet.

[The Yen Man]

Originally Posted by GGG

For me everything.

If we did a poll and asked why dont you use crack or Meth what would your answer be

A) its illegal
B) you dont know where to by it
C) Because its stupid.

The majority of people for hard drugs are saying C. For recreational drugs its probably A and B. So if illegality is not the reason people dont do drugs then making it illegal isnt beneficial.

I think you're giving the average person too much credit, as well as underestimating the addictiveness of some of these drugs. If you make it legal and easily accessable to anyone, I am willing to bet there are going to be a lot of people who are more open to try it just to see what it feels like. Everyone thinks they aren't going to be addicted because they have strong will power to do so.

Originally Posted by Daradon

Well that's because in truth there is no real solution and they way its framed isnt even a good representation of the problem. Drugs are a part of biology and evolution. Its a story as old as the human race and in a lot of ways not the bogeyman or excuse modern culture has made them. Your never going to get rid of drugs (nor should you, we use them on a daily basis) or addicts.

For me, I would prefer to see more money in education and treatment and less on enforcement. I would like to see a more liberal drug policy and less illegality.

And mostly I'm just saying celebrating stories like this is at the best pointless and probably actually just spreads misinformation and fear.

All that is well and good and i don't disagree with the fact you will never get rid of it. Stating the drugs are part of biology and evolution? Evolution? Not sure Darwin would agree and in fact, I would suggest they hinder or change evolution.

My point is, you legalize it, make it readily available to everyone- weed, coke, meth, oxy, whatever. Then what? Other than making money off taxing it, how does that solve any problems associated with drug use- Mental illness, vagrancy, criminal activity. Then we dump that tax money into telling people to not do them???

I would suggest legalizing it would cause more issues.

But anyway, back on track, I for one believe enforcement is effective and this bust does disrupt activity and causes ripples in the drug trade that a detrimental to business.

[Daradon]

Originally Posted by Bent Wookie

All that is well and good and i don't disagree with the fact you will never get rid of it. Stating the drugs are part of biology and evolution? Evolution? Not sure Darwin would agree and in fact, I would suggest they hinder or change evolution.

My point is, you legalize it, make it readily available to everyone- weed, coke, meth, oxy, whatever. Then what? Other than making money off taxing it, how does that solve any problems associated with drug use- Mental illness, vagrancy, criminal activity. Then we dump that tax money into telling people to not do them???

I would suggest legalizing it would cause more issues.

But anyway, back on track, I for one believe enforcement is effective and this bust does disrupt activity and causes ripples in the drug trade that a detrimental to business.

That's my point. You can't solve any problems with irresponsible drug use. It's a part of life. You can only treat it. Making it illegal obviously does nothing to stem it. So why not treat the problems that will inevitably occur instead of 'fighting' it or 'solving' it.

Its not a case of solving anything. Do you solve death?

As for the evolution comment I simply meant its a part of nature and will always exist. All drugs do is rewire or shortcut our chemistry to pleasure or reward centers. Just like natural highs, like sex, people will seek it out, control it, and in some cases become addicted to it.

All sorts of animals get high when they can. Its natural. You could remake humans tomorrow and there'd be new ways and new compounds to fool our brains again to get high. Its part of nature.

[jayswin]

Originally Posted by Bent Wookie

All that is well and good and i don't disagree with the fact you will never get rid of it. Stating the drugs are part of biology and evolution? Evolution? Not sure Darwin would agree and in fact, I would suggest they hinder or change evolution.

My point is, you legalize it, make it readily available to everyone- weed, coke, meth, oxy, whatever. Then what? Other than making money off taxing it, how does that solve any problems associated with drug use- Mental illness, vagrancy, criminal activity. Then we dump that tax money into telling people to not do them???

I would suggest legalizing it would cause more issues.

But anyway, back on track, I for one believe enforcement is effective and this bust does disrupt activity and causes ripples in the drug trade that a detrimental to business.

But just for arguments sake, Bent Wookie, and keep in mind this is coming from someone who's not in law enforcement. What about the theory I've heard that there will always be a certain amount of drugs in any given city and all these busts do is momentarily affect a certain organization?

It's something that's been talked about before when weighing out the benefits of putting so much money into the war on drugs. So the idea is basically you have a city like Calgary....

Just using random numbers, we'll say Calgary has "room" for ten organizations that traffic $100 mil worth of drugs a year.

10 organizations, $10 mil a year each.

Calgary police bust 2 organizations and "remove" $20 mil from the streets. Now there is a $20 mil loss of supply and traffickers in the city. The demand is still there, so $20 mil worth of drugs "move into" the city.

I would suggest there's some credibility to that idea, as police are constantly busting drug ops, but is there ever less drugs on the street on a year to year basis? Decade to decade? A lot of people say no. There's just too much money to be made and an almost unlimited amount of people willing to take the risk to get into it.

I'd argue, like we've seen in the States over the past decades that you keep pouring money into drug busts, but at the end of the day the same amount of demand is there, and therefore the same amount of supply will always be there.

[Daradon]

Simplified but basically true.

As well, the biggest reason there is so much money involved and therefore people who will commit violence to get a piece of that pie is because it's illegal in the first place. Change the dynamic, remove most of the violence, and get rid of the need to make the busts in the first place.

As flameswin said and I was getting to in my nature argument is that demand will always always always be there. Legal or not, dangerous or not. A bust might stir the pot, but everything is still in said pot.