Patterico's Pontifications

11/25/2006

Dafydd ab Hugh on the Atlanta Incident with the 92-Year-Old Woman

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 1:31 pm



Dafydd ab Hugh has an excellent post on the incident in Atlanta in which a 92-year-old woman opened fire on three cops serving a search warrant on her house, and was killed in return gunfire.

Dafydd describes his reaction to a Daniel Weintraub post decrying the raid. Dafydd e-mailed Weintraub some links to my posts, thinking that, perhaps Weintraub didn’t have all the facts.

Daydd says:

Weintraub’s response confirmed what I thought originally: he e-mailed me that, since he opposed the entire drug war and supports legalization, the fact that the cops were serving a lawful search warrant when she opened fire did not change his mind at all: police shouldn’t break through doors (even after identifying themselves as police) to catch drug dealers. If they had to enforce such laws (Weintraub asks), why didn’t they just stake out the residence and arrest him outside?

Dafydd says that these sorts of opinions are why he worries for the future of libertarianism. As to the specifics of the Atlanta raid, Dafydd says:

The points about the shooting that Weintraub’s brief brief missed, which Patterico brought out, are these:

1. The police were attempting to search the premises on the basis of a legitimate search warrant — not the “wrong house” (as early reports claimed);

2. It was the old woman, not the cops, who began shooting;

3. She shot three officers before they returned fire;

4. Bullets fired by a 92 year old are just as deadly as bullets fired by a 22 year old;

5. The police have every legal right, and 95% of Americans would say moral right, to return fire when fired upon.

If you’re going to attack the cops’ actions, you must respond to these points; if not, the natural response of readers who have learnt them is to dismiss you as a crank, which I’m sure was not Weintraub’s intention.

(Emphasis in original.)

Dafydd also has some broader discussions of movement libertarianism in general, unrelated to the Atlanta incident. As is always the case with his posts, it’s well-written and engaging.

I have noticed that it’s easy for many of you to dismiss my comments about the Atlanta case, because I’m a prosecutor. You expect me to be authoritarian, and since most of you don’t read my blog regularly, it’s a convenient (if not quite accurate) stereotype you can use to peg me.

But Dafydd has had bad experiences with police officers. He has seen, with his own eyes, police do irresponsible and overbearing things.

Yet he still feels this way.

So go yap at him for a while, why dontcha.

P.S. Dafydd’s stories about police relate to a discussion over a February 2005 Radley Balko post in which Balko told about a police officer bursting into his house, gun drawn, over a misunderstanding. One wonders whether Balko’s focus on wrong-house police raids started with that incident. Certainly his category on paramilitary police raids begins with a post written several months later.

I’m not critical of that, of course; one’s personal experiences often play a legitimate role in how they see the world. And it does seem to me today (though it didn’t at the time) that the cop in Balko’s story overreacted. But all of this could explain part of why Balko seems to get so emotional about the topic of dynamic entries. Perhaps that emotion is what causes him to fire off so many ill-considered comments in my direction that misstate the facts. I’m guessing that whenever he reads about any search warrant in which the occupant fires back at police, he’s thinking about his own experience, in which he wished he’d owned a gun when the policeman came into his house.

Balko should keep in mind one difference between his own experience and the reported facts of the Atlanta case: the police in Atlanta had a valid warrant, and were, by all accounts, serving that warrant at the proper location. It’s not an insignificant distinction.

148 Responses to “Dafydd ab Hugh on the Atlanta Incident with the 92-Year-Old Woman”

  1. “The poorest man may in his cottage bid defiance to all the forces of the Crown – it may be frail, its roof may shake, the wind may blow through it – the storm may enter, the rain may enter, but the King of England cannot enter; all his forces dare not cross the threshold of the ruined tenement.”

    (Pitt The Elder)

    There is no such thing as a “moral right” that attempts to stand on immoral premises, Frey.

    You people are starting your whole analysis in mid-air.

    Billy Beck (79bd23)

  2. But didn’t Lord Palmerston hold that the King of England could enter with a valid search warrant?

    If not, he should have.

    Patterico (de0616)

  3. It’s more interesting to contemplate how it is that you don’t see (or choose to ignore) the harm being done to the social fabric by these methods of enforcement, even if you have not experienced them yourself. It’s not a requirement that you have to have peed on the electic fence for yourself to discover that it can be a hazard!

    htom (412a17)

  4. htom,

    I have no problem with whose who question or work to legally change the rules regarding no-knock raids, but you should likewise acknowledge that drugs damage the social fabric of our lives, too.

    DRJ (0df497)

  5. htom,
    These procedures aren’t born in a vacuum. The are the results of hard won lessons serving other warrants. Now, unless you are going to decry the serving of any warrants then we need to let the police do their job in such a away so they can go home at the end of the day. Otherwise, who the hell is going to do the job? As it stands now, less and less people are considering that career seeing how often good police officers are getting sued, killed and wounded.
    I find it even more interesting that you don’t see how freely available, unfettered use of drugs will tear apart the fabric of society. Look at the devestation and cost that tobacco/nicotine and Alcohol visit upon society today.
    Simply beacuse the warrant was served on a 92 year-old doesn’t make her resistance any less deadly.

    paul from fl (967602)

  6. Patterico,

    These discusssions are reminiscent of your jury nullification posts. Apparently several commenters believe it’s okay to extralegally nullify laws they don’t support and even blame the police for enforcing them. I confess I took the position that there is a limited basis for jury nullification but these threads have caused me to rethink that support.

    DRJ (0df497)

  7. paul from fl:

    This ugly thing, and other ugly home invasions like it cannot be excused. The cops work for us. The cops are supposed to be protecting the citizens, not murdering them.

    This is a new one, from today.

    RJN (e12f22)

  8. The are the results of hard won lessons serving other warrants.

    As Patterico himself has pointed out – the key element is to preserve evidence. Which of course only works with small amounts. I’d really like to see someone try to flush a kilo (of anything) down the toilet, especially the new low-flow ones!

    Look at the devestation and cost that tobacco/nicotine and Alcohol visit upon society today.

    Are you suggesting another round of Prohibition? Or do we accept that in a free society, some people will make choices we don’t like?

    juris imprudent (f6e979)

  9. RJN,
    Who gave them the warrant? The judge did Like in “The People vs….” get it? The were doing their job based on an order from the people.
    They were shot at three times before they returned fire. What the hell else do you want? It sounds like you want the police to judge each and every law, each and every time it’s violated. Not their job. The do what WE TELL THEM to, in a way that is safest for them.IMHO her age and possibly her race are clouding your judgement of this situation.

    paul from fl (967602)

  10. They were shot at three times before they returned fire.

    So the police allege. They returned fire over 90 times, hitting the women, what, 4 times? I don’t know where you’re from, but where I come from that is lousy shooting even under tactical conditions. Where did all of those other rounds go?!? I for one will be very interested to read what caliber gun she had and what caliber bullets wounded the officers.

    juris imprudent (f6e979)

  11. 1. The police were attempting to search the premises on the basis of a legitimate search warrant — not the “wrong house” (as early reports claimed);

    A warrent that should have had more research conducted.

    2. It was the old woman, not the cops, who began shooting;

    She was in fear for her life, what would YOU have done if you were?

    3. She shot three officers before they returned fire;

    Sounds like the no knock raid wasn’t the safest aprroach huh. Odd…………

    4. Bullets fired by a 92 year old are just as deadly as bullets fired by a 22 year old;

    Common sense

    5. The police have every legal right, and 95% of Americans would say moral right, to return fire when fired upon.

    Give them all the facts and ask that question.

    The fact remains, if the cops would have done the legwork this NEVER would have happened. All these questions would never need to be asked.

    J (cefc74)

  12. AP: “[Assistant Police Chief Alan] Dreher would not say how the dealer knew Johnston.”

    Wonder why.

    Conceivably, the late Ms. Johnston wasn’t a known associate. And that detectives last Tuesday had no idea who lived inside, never heard of the dealer “Sam” before maybe a week ago and cowboyed up with basically no intelligence. They’re now working informants, reverse-engineering the buy to locate “Sam.” Probably have lineups going ’round the clock.

    Could be dead wrong, of course. It may turn out Ms. Johnston was The Notorious B.I.G.’s mom.

    steve (d5d31b)

  13. What would have been so terrible about sending uniformed officers to the house to knock on the door, inform the occupants that they had a warrant, and then search the house?

    GS From FL (936b55)

  14. steve,

    I just talked to my pal, the use of force expert. His biggest criticism of the raid is what you just noted: that they seemingly “cowboyed up with basically no intelligence.” We don’t know that to be the case, but based on what we know, it sounds that way.

    I’ll have a detailed post up in the next 1-3 days. Interesting stuff.

    Patterico (de0616)

  15. Juris Imprudent #10 responding to Paul in FL:

    Are you suggesting another round of Prohibition? Or do we accept that in a free society, some people will make choices we don’t like?

    The only choices aren’t all or nothing. Law enforcement typically opts for a middle ground in dealing with offenses that involve addictive products like tobacco and liquor (for minors) and drugs.

    By the way, you’ve chosen an interesting blogging name.

    DRJ (0df497)

  16. DRJ,

    The only choices aren’t all or nothing.

    Well, in the playbook of the Drug Warriors, no choice is better then any choice. What amazes me is that they fail to learn the very lesson you allude to – that prohibition is not the answer. Then again, that cheap brand of moralism has always been fairly popular.

    juris imprudent (f6e979)

  17. That the misuse of drugs damages individuals in our society, yes. Drug Abuse carries its own, inescapable, life-ending sentence. Drug use is not quite so terminal. I suspect that more die from drug abuse every year than are killed by LEOs in drug raids. I’m not sure that that comparison is very valuable.

    These idiotic drug raids, however, damage much more than those few killed and wounded. They destroy the notion that the police are on “our side”, presenting and enforcing the notion that they are an occupying force to be feared, rather than respected.

    There are circumstances where SWAT can be useful; there are times when dynamic entry with a no-knock warrant may be justifiable. This does not seem to have been one of those cases.

    htom (412a17)

  18. So…. the cops claim the grandmother knew they were cops and tried to kill them anyway… does ANYONE actually believe that? Do folks here agree with the cops that this 92 year old woman became an attempted cop killer the day she died?

    HOGWASH!!

    rrsafety (09e9d0)

  19. Rrsafety-

    The only people who believe that are prosecutors like Patterico, who through their job maintain a chummy relationship with the police, and by force of habit blame citizens whenever a raid like this goes wrong.

    And if you think I’m being hyperbolic, just check out Patterico’s comments where he flat out states that this lady deserved to take her lumps. Disgusting.

    JagBag (329cc6)

  20. As I already explained, I was mocking someone else’s statement that the cops needed to take their lumps for executing a search warrant.

    I am working on a post with an interview with a use of force expert who is critical of the cops in some ways.

    Hardly something that I would do if I always took the police side.

    Patterico (de0616)

  21. Btw, JagBag has also previously posted under the name “Soriner” here, and suggested that it was “karma” for my wallet to be stolen because I had a particular opinion about a forfeiture case.

    Because he was jumping for joy like a poo-flinging momkey when I was the victim of a crime, I asked him not to comment on my site again. (I was on a Treo and couldn’t add his IP to the blacklist, so I simply asked him to leave.)

    So now he returns as “JagBag” making more comments, and making insinuations about me as a prosecutor.

    I have already asked him not to comment here. Also, posting under different names, without telling people that you are doing so, is a banning offense at many sites.

    For these reasons, JagBag is banned.

    No doubt, he will whine that he was banned for his point of view — even as I continue to be slammed by dozens of commenters for having the temerity to suggest that we not jump to conclusions in this case.

    Patterico (de0616)

  22. paul from fl:

    See all the words about warrants. Warrants don’t fall from the sky. God doesn’t dangle a warrant in front of cowboy cops and say “go kill some citizens”.

    Cops and prosecutors go to Judges and tell stories to get warrants. I know, tell the judge crap, crap, crap and get the warrant and then maybe we can seize the house and buy more plasma tv’s for the lounge.

    RJN (e12f22)

  23. It’s not that “the cops have to take their lumps.” Everybody gets to take their lumps, the cops included. They are human American citizens, not some kind of übermenschen. A person T-boned by a redlight runner is just as dead as if he’d violated the traffic laws instead of complying with them, and a valid warrant is not a tasteful decoration for the tombstone.

    Simply repeating “they had a warrant” and/or “that’s the law” does not confer sanctity. You ought to know as well as anyone that the law is sometimes an ass.

    But that’s all by the way. No-knock raids are a stupid and ultimately pointless activity that may have some temporary success but cannot succeed for long. This case illustrates that. It sounds like Mrs. Johnston woke up to the sound of the police ripping off the burglar bars and prepared herself. Now consider — for $100 or so I can buy a sheet of 3/8″ steel plate big enough to fasten under a table. If I then hear the cops coming, flip the table up on edge, and crouch behind it with a deer rifle, where will the cops be? SOL, is where, unless they’re wearing ballistic armor instead of mere bulletproof vests, and even then if I’m good enough to go for head shots they’re in trouble. Those and similar precautions can reliably be expected to become routine for genuine dealers and the like.

    The ultimate result of that is that the only people who would suffer from no-knock raids are the ones considered not likely to fight back. Genuine dealers can be expected to be dangerous and thus will be left strictly alone, and petty users get hassled. Will that do much for the Drug War? It is to laugh, if bitterly.

    I don’t think you’ll find very many people who don’t agree that getting rid of drugs, in the sense we’re using the word here, would be of great benefit to everyone, users included. The question is whether or not that’s possible. The law cannot compel an impossibility, though it can certainly hurt a lot of people trying, including the cops who have to try to do the compelling. Situations like this are God trying to hint, gently, that you’re trying to levitate an anvil, and broken toes are a more likely result than flying iron.

    Regards,
    Ric

    Ric Locke (b4eb6a)

  24. My primary point is that if the cops are correct – that they did enough to ensure that the woman in the home knew they were police – then one HAS to come to the conclusion that this 92 year old woman decided to try to become a triple cop killer… I don’t buy it.

    You can’t have it both ways that cops did it right AND the little old lady was a saint … someone is lying…

    rrsafety (09e9d0)

  25. I’m curious why so many commenters want to throw out the drug laws because something bad happened when the police tried to enforce those laws.

    I don’t know if anything went wrong in this case but the expectation here seems to be that the police should be able to easily disarm a 92-year-old grandmother who shot 3 officers, and if they can’t then they shouldn’t even try to enforce the laws. Maybe this inquiry will help the police and the public learn from this experience but I’m not sure there is anything the police can do or say that will change the minds of some. That seems patently unfair and the equivalent of presuming the police are guilty without a hearing.

    The reality is that the police have a hard job. They follow procedures designed to protect them and the public but, despite that, sometimes things go wrong. Investigations expose past mistakes so we can compensate those who have been wrongfully harmed, but more importantly so we can make corrections for the future. That happens regularly in the military and law enforcement and it’s a part of life. I suspect few of us could do our jobs if we had the oversight these people live with, and I admire the professional way most police officers handle their responsibilities.

    DRJ (0df497)

  26. RRsafety,

    If the police announced themselves, it’s possible Ms. Johnston:

    1. Shot out of panic and fear.
    2. Shot because she was unaware of their announcement.
    3. Shot because she had something to hide.

    I suspect the correct answer may be (1). Even if Ms. Johnston knew – at some level – that these were police, she may have reacted without thinking by grabbing and shooting her gun. Of course, the answer could also be (2) or (3). In my view, none of these solutions are exculpatory because citizen gunowners must be responsible for what happens when they choose to use their guns.

    This is a tragedy for Ms. Johnston and her family. There may be extenuating circumstances that also make it wrongful. But I suspect that this case illustrates the danger of having a gun that you aren’t trained to use and/or that you don’t practice using. It’s entirely possible that Ms. Johnston relied on the gun to deal with threats or reached for the gun without considering her other options.

    DRJ (0df497)

  27. The drug laws are a malignancy within our society. I can clearly recall standing with a group of co-workers twenty-five years ago and observing that the drug laws serve to increase addiction, and corrupt law enforcement.

    We, then, were appalled at the cost of the drug “war” and at how much addiction had increased, and at how high a profile illegal drugs had gained in urban life. We understood, then, that pushers were created by the drug laws, and that pushers made a lot of money by increasing their customer base.

    We, back then, did not understand that a huge bureaucracy was being created full of highly paid, and highly pensioned, government employees who did not want the drug wars to end.

    And, it is so sad to see that all of this drug war insanity, and expense to all of us, has at least tripled since twenty-five years ago.

    RJN (e12f22)

  28. DRJ,

    Well, #2 is being strongly denied by police. They have said that they did enough to assure that she knew they were cops. So maybe they are just blowing smoke.

    And #1 brings us to one of the problems with the no-knock entries.. they are DESIGNED to provoke panic, surprise, fear etc. So if she acted out of confusion and fear (in her own house) the problem is with the tactic of the police not with 92 year old women living alone with a gun.

    And as to #3, there is no evidence presented thus far that indicates the 92 year old woman was a criminal.

    rrsafety (09e9d0)

  29. No knock raids push the extreme edge of the envelope of the 4th Amendment. Combined with asset forfeiture laws, no one could make a case that the founding fathers contemplated such activity as “ok”.

    Police work is not a military operation. There is no level of collateral damage that is acceptable. If the captain of a boat suffers an accident often times it is his last command. Why should not the police be held accountable for thier actions?

    C Drues (ba8b3d)

  30. RRSafety,

    At this point, we don’t know the answer to any of the three possibilities, do we? But for the purposes of a theoretical discussion, I can’t agree with your response to option (1). Just because she was in her home does not render her choice to shoot a legal or a wise decision. In fact, perhaps the only thing we can say for sure right now is that Ms. Johnston did not make a good choice.

    So, sadly, Ms. Johnston made a fatal mistake by shooting at the police. If she had not had a gun, she would not have made that mistake and she would probably be alive today. This is a downsides to owning a gun. Guns can provide safety but they also bring risk and responsibilities, and every potential gunowner has to decide whether the risk of having a gun outweighs the risk of not having one.

    DRJ (0df497)

  31. Unlike some here, I don’t have any problem with the notion that a 92-year-old woman might be a drug dealer. I have even less problem with the idea that a 92-year-old black woman living in Atlanta, Georgia might have a less than positive view of the police. This is, after all, a person who spent half her life riding in the back of the bus, drinking from the “Colored” water fountain, and being rousted (and possibly jailed) for the crime of having a good time with her fellows.

    What I do have a problem with is the mistaken assumption that that has anything to do with the impact of the case, or why we are discussing it. The only thing pertinent about Mrs. Johnston’s status is that a 92-year-old woman, with nearly no preparation time, turned a no-knock raid into a dog’s breakfast and arguably managed a disaster. What does that say about the possible success of raids against younger people who have taken precautions beforehand? And what does that say about the overall utility of no-knock raids?

    Regards,
    Ric

    Ric Locke (b4eb6a)

  32. Ric,

    The likely answer to why this meltdown occurred is that the police respond differently when it involves someone who is very old or very young. I suspect the same thing would have happened if the shooter had been a young child.

    I know the commenters here are probably sincere in their opposition to no-knock raids, but most of them also admit they oppose enforcing drug laws. It’s my understanding that search warrants and raids (including no-knock raids) are significant and effective tools to enforce the drug laws. We can’t fairly charge the police with enforcing the laws but complain when legal tactics go awry – unless there is evidence to suggest they did not have reasonable procedures or that they did not follow them.

    DRJ (0df497)

  33. DRJ:

    There are no effective tools, certainly not no knock raids, to enforce the drug laws. If there were effective tools the drug wars would be over, and we would be at equilibrium; nickel and dime violations, with minimal enforcement.

    RJN (e12f22)

  34. The likely answer to why this meltdown occurred is that the police respond differently when it involves someone who is very old or very young. I suspect the same thing would have happened if the shooter had been a young child.

    djr – So this is what happens when they are being extra careful to not shoot a (probably) innocent suspect because she is to old!? How much more likely are they then to shoot innocent people when they are not being careful?

    Counterfactual (e910b9)

  35. DRJ:

    We can’t fairly charge the police with enforcing the laws but complain when legal tactics go awry…

    The thing about that is that it works both ways. If the police feel that no-knock raids are a worthwhile tactic, we (and they) have no valid complaint when the target manages to resist with some success. Guns, legal and otherwise, are pervasive in America, and at least some of them are in the hands of people who shoot back when attacked. The police are simply going to have to accept some level of casualties when they choose to go in shooting. That’s doubly true if we’re going to have to accept dead grandmothers as part of the price of perfectly legal activities.

    And RJN is correct. As I’ve posted on another thread, I live and move among people for whom drugs are readily available; from where I sit there are no effective restrictions on them beyond a bit of price-support resulting from the (relatively trivial amount of) restraint on the trade. I don’t use myself, don’t respect the people who do, and have seen more lives ruined by them than I care to recall — but police activity is an absolutely negligible factor in the business, and anyone saying otherwise is pissing in the wind.

    It’s said that doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result, is a mark of insanity. How shall we define escalating the same measures?

    Regards,
    Ric

    Ric Locke (b4eb6a)

  36. DRJ at 4:

    I have no problem with whose who question or work to legally change the rules regarding no-knock raids, but you should likewise acknowledge that drugs damage the social fabric of our lives, too.

    Not all of us who want to end the drug war believe drug consumption is just fine and dandy and that the rest of you are fuddy-duddies who need to get hip. Drug use is not a thing to be celebrated. It’s a serious social problem. But some social problems cannot be solved criminalizing them; in fact, the criminalization
    of drug use has made the problem worse, not better.

    How many years have we been fighting the drug war? How many billions have we spent? How many innocent people have we hurt? And yet, right now, from my second story condo in central Houston near the intersection of Crack and Whore, I can look out the back window and not wait long until I see a drug sale go down.

    Supporters of the drug war seem to proceed from the assumption that our choice is between the evil of drug use and the good of no drug use. But that isn’t our choice. We see — and will continue to see — widespread drug use no matter what our laws say. Meanwhile, the incidental
    consequences of the drug war are not benign.

    Paul (839006)

  37. “I just talked to my pal, the use of force expert. His biggest criticism of the raid is what you just noted: that they seemingly ‘cowboyed up with basically no intelligence.’ We don’t know that to be the case, but based on what we know, it sounds that way.”

    Patterico, I hope an upcoming post will deal with what you think is the appropriate disciplinary action for officers who possibly “cowboyed up with basically no intelligence,” thereby leading to the death of an elderly woman. Radley Balko points to a disturbing article in the Washington Post about another incident, which reports that fellow officers are outraged that another officer, who killed a suspected sports gambler by mistake, will receive something more than an oral or written reprimand. Instead, the officer will likely receive 3 weeks of unpaid leave and be removed from the SWAT team. This punishment is considered “way off the charts” by the union attorney. wow.

    Quote from the article: “But Thielen, union attorney Edward J. Nuttall and numerous officers said an oral or written reprimand is typically given when a Fairfax officer accidentally shoots someone.”

    A Reader (b7bfee)

  38. Most of the responses to my last post fall into the category of “The drug war is stupid.” Even if that is true, it is unrealistic to blame the police for trying to enforce existing laws using legal tactics.

    As for Counterfactual’s response (another interesting blog name), we don’t know whether Ms. Johnston was innocent of any involvement in drug activity or that she was unaware these were police officers. However, even if we assume she was completely innocent, everything I’ve read suggests that the first shots were fired by Ms. Johnston. That was not a wise choice and, as a result, the officers were forced to respond with lethal force.

    Don’t you think police officers might hesitate if the person with a gun was very old, or very young, or very pregnant, or in a wheelchair? I don’t know if that happened here but it seems reasonable and it might explain why she was able to shoot 3 officers before she was shot. I’m not saying it happened this way. My point is that it’s possible Ms. Johnston’s age affected the police officers’ behavior.

    DRJ (0df497)

  39. RJN #33:

    There are no effective tools, certainly not no knock raids, to enforce the drug laws. If there were effective tools the drug wars would be over, and we would be at equilibrium; nickel and dime violations, with minimal enforcement.

    The more I think about your comment, the more perplexed I am. National crime statistics in several categories have been rising for decades, partly because there are fluctuating crime rates in various categories and more commonly because of the expanding population. By your standards, the fact that we can’t control the rate of murders, robberies, and assaults “with minimal enforcement” suggests that we shouldn’t enforce any criminal laws. Surely you don’t believe it’s pointless to enforce criminal laws just because it’s difficult to do, so why do you apply that standard to drug enforcement?

    DRJ (0df497)

  40. DRJ, you are either disingenuous or sadly confused. Things that are not equal to the same thing are not necessarily equal to each other.

    There has never been a time in history when murder, robbery, and the like have not been at least disapproved of, and whenever there have been effective Governments they have made attempts to keep such things to a minimum. The reason for that is at root economic, though the arguments seldom are. A citizen who is too frightened of robbers and murderers to go outside is a citizen who does not contribute to the economy, does not pay taxes, and does not benefit the rulers in any way, a murderer does away with a tax-payer or a valuable peasant/slave, and a robber is effectively in competition with the Prince’s tax-gatherers. It isn’t necessary, and IMO isn’t desirable, to attempt to justify State actions on moral grounds.

    Prohibitions as we know them today are quite recent. Earlier rulers sometimes restricted or forbade imports of certain items, largely so they could profit from the restraint of trade, but the only things that correspond to modern prohibitions “for people’s own good” are religious “conversions”, which involved either mass murder or generations-long waits (or both) to be successful, and even recent versions of that (Pol Pot, e.g.) have not been notably productive.

    The worst part is that the attempt at prohibition discredits the other pursuits. A police force will always be a small minority; they depend upon psychological influence to maintain their authority, since there will never be enough of them to impose by force unless they are numerous enough to destroy the society that supports them. A police force that adopts the “be scared of police” paradigm and does not succeed is a loser that might as well be disbanded.

    No-knock raids make it worse, not better. The ones that succeed fail to make a perceptible dent in the drug problem; the ones, like this, that do not succeed expose the police to ridicule. I see no reason to change my earlier formulation: “too wimpy and indecisive to be feared, too violent and arbitrary to be respected.” When you get to that point it’s long past time to be rethinking your options.

    Regards,
    Ric

    Ric Locke (b4eb6a)

  41. Ric,

    I don’t understand your first paragraph other than you don’t appreciate my reasoning. However, since you’ve discounted the value of morality in evaluating drug laws, then by all means let’s address the economic aspects.

    From a capitalist perspective, drug dealers probably make an economic contribution but their far more numerous customers are undoubtedly economic drains. Most people who are stoned or addicted aren’t reliable contributors to the economy.

    Last time I looked, there are still many people who fear and/or respect the police. Some commenters suggest they live in the middle of anarchy – and no doubt there are places in America that are lawless – but there are far more places that aren’t. Perhaps we view this situation from different places.

    DRJ (0df497)

  42. I was trying to point out that there is a distinct qualitative difference between attempting to suppress murder and robbery on the one hand, and prohibitions of any sort on the other. Clearly you don’t agree, as many do not. That means the problem will get worse before it gets better, if indeed it ever gets better.

    And yes, I’m pretty sure we view the situation from different perspectives. In one of Dick Francis’s stories the protagonist, a person who’s lived most of his life in the lower class, encounters an upperclass woman who’s dubious about dealing with “creepy-crawlies.” He remarks wryly that clearly she doesn’t know what it’s like to be a creepy-crawly. Consider this a missive from creepy-crawly land.

    Yes, down here the police are feared, but not in any way useful to you, or them. They’re seen pretty much as an elemental force, like a tornado or a stroke of lightning, visiting death and destruction upon randomly selected individuals at unpredictable times. Not exactly the strongest basis for organizing a society, IMO.

    Regards,
    Ric

    Ric Locke (b4eb6a)

  43. Yeah, Patterico, don’t sit up there in your safe little ivory tower in Compton and presume to tell the rest of us about police relations.

    See-Dubya (4646f1)

  44. Go away, See-Dubya. You’re useless.

    Regards,
    Ric

    Ric Locke (b4eb6a)

  45. Stay, See-Dubya. You’re useful.

    Regards,

    The Management

    Patterico (de0616)

  46. I defer to Authority, but I have to confess I don’t see it.

    Regards,
    Ric

    Ric Locke (b4eb6a)

  47. DRJ:

    I agree with what Ric has to say.

    I will add that the drug laws are evil as well as expensive and cruel. It is base and immoral for a government to make laws that enrich the worst elements of society, while battering and degrading the least members of society.

    We can prove that the drug laws don’t work; drug use and drug violence has increased every year of the last 34 years.

    RJN (e12f22)

  48. Patterico:

    I haven’t read all 47 of the comments (to this point), so this may just be recapitulating what others have already said. But a couple points:

    First, I absolutely stand by everything I said in the comment you linked. Most of the cops in the Rampart District are lousy (at least all of those I came into contact with).

    Yet even so, if they kicked in my door, I would not reach for my revolver. I would fight them tooth and nail… in the courtroom, with a lawyer. Even if I lost, I’d rather pay a fine or even go to prison than be shot to death; and that’s almost certainly what would happen if the cops and I had a nice, little gunfight: I’d end up on a slab.

    In fact, while it’s true you have the right to resist armed intrusion, if there is any possibility that the people smashing through your door are cops, you really are better off (in practice) not resisting.

    Unless they’re literally shooting as they come through the door, such that you honestly don’t think you’re going to make it to trial, the best thing to do is freeze, hands up, and comply with every cop instruction (“turn around, hands on top of your head, interlace your fingers, walk backwards,” etc.).

    There are more of them. They’re better shots than you. They have more practice. They’re wearing vests. And they have the badges on their side.

    If you really think it’s an armed robber, well, go ahead and resist… and hope like heck you’re right.

    It’s entirely possible that Kathryn Johnston believed she was being attacked by burglars; she could have acted in good faith when she fired. But even if that’s true, it doesn’t mean the cops in the Atlanta case acted in bad faith; if this is true, it’s just a tragic error on her part.

    As I said in my own post, it is entirely possible for two people each to be acting for the common good and in good faith, yet still end up shooting at each other.

    There is not the slightest ghost of evidence that the police intentionally “murdered” her… none that I have seen. The most likely sequence is:

    1. They got a warrant because somebody in that house was actually dealing drugs;
    2. They yelled “police” and immediately slammed the door, thinking those inside might attack them or perhaps just flush or flash the evidence;
    3. Johnston opened fire because either (a) she mistakenly thought the cops were robbers, or (b) she was actually one of the dealers;
    4. The police shot back because she shot at them;
    5. There were more of them, they were better shots, and they had vests… so they won.

    The cops are probably not guilty; Ms. Johnston may or may not be guilty.

    Dafydd

    Dafydd (6e94cd)

  49. Mourning in America

    “NEW YORK — 11/25/06 The case of NYPD officers opening fire on an unarmed bachelor party outside a Queens strip club — killing the groom on his wedding day and injuring two — was sent to the local district attorney for review Saturday.

    The incident began when a car full of three men rammed into an undercover officer as the group left a bachelor party at the Kalua Cabaret at roughly 4:14 a.m. ET. Police thought one of the men in the car might have had a gun, and opened fire, unloading 50 rounds and killing Sean Bell, 23.”

    RJN (e12f22)

  50. Then there’s today’s news about the no-knock, flash-bang raid where they didn’t have the warrant with them, but apparently got the house they intended (although their information was wrong — the suspect was next door), THEN produced a warrant 3 hours later with transposed digits on it. Luckily this old lady wasn’t hurt.

    Mary Silva, a 68-year-old retiree, said deputies got the wrong house when they burst into her Winton Way apartment at 6:30 a.m. on the day of the raids.

    Silva said she was sleeping when she heard loud banging at her front door and a voice calling “Open up!”

    Before she could answer, Silva said, deputies broke through her front door and threw a smoke bomb onto her carpet. As Silva stood in her nightgown, about 10 officers surrounded her with weapons drawn, she said.

    They shouted, “Where is he? Where is he?”

    Silva told deputies she lives alone. She said they responded, “Shut up! Don’t move!”

    The team was looking for 24-year-old Reginaldo Ramirez, who lives next door to Silva.

    But the search warrant deputies gave Silva lists an entirely different address — not Silva’s house or the house next door. Silva said deputies gave her the search warrant several hours after the initial raid.

    Assuming that the warrant was as after-the-fact as it appears (and the old lady isn’t lying which is entirely possible), what should happen here?

    Kevin Murphy (0b2493)

  51. Gee, Daffy D, that’ll work as long as you’re not a 92-year old woman living in the “worst neighborhood in Georgia.” Anyone living in that kind of area is likely to be streewise enough to know that claiming to be a plainclothes cop is the favorite trick of home invading, raping and murdering morlocks. They do it in order to coerce cooperation from their victims. A violent reaction in self-defense is logical, especially if you have no known reason for the real cops to be violently invading your house.

    Ernest Brown (5757c7)

  52. RJN – Debating whether we should have drug laws is outside the scope of this thread. We have them and the police are required to enforce the laws we have. The issue is whether the police did something wrong in this case and for now we don’t have the facts to answer that question.

    Kevin – For starters, I think they should fix her door.

    DRJ (0df497)

  53. Kevin Murphy,

    What I love is how Insty and Balko are portraying the story you cite as “ANOTHER wrong-house raid” — implication being on top of the previous one in Atlanta. The implication is clear at Balko’s where he explicitly references the Atlanta situation at the end of his post, and says the woman is lucky that cops were only rude to her.

    Patterico (de0616)

  54. When the crime lab comes back with the results and it turns out that the Atlanta woman had drugs in her house, what percentage of you arguing the cops did wrong will accept that, and what percentage will go all OJ-juror on us, rejecting all rational thought?

    I’m thinking the latter category will be well over 95%.

    Patterico (de0616)

  55. We can prove that the drug laws don’t work; drug use and drug violence has increased every year of the last 34 years.

    RJN,

    A link would be nice; not that I disbelieve you. I just dislike bald assertions.

    Assuming your facts are correct:

    It may well be that drug laws don’t work well. But that statement hardly proves it. The mere fact that crime rates rise doesn’t by itself show that the laws against crime “don’t work.” The key is asking what would happen if we didn’t have them.

    Milton Friedman would argue that there would be less violence and drug use. But we don’t *know* this.

    Patterico (de0616)

  56. Patrick–

    I think you miss, or choose to ignore, the libertarian point. Yes, all your 5 points are correct. No argument with any of them (although the first point was in dispute at the beginning, and such mistakes are not unheard of).

    So, to turn the tables a bit, please deal with these points:

    1) No-knock raids are extremely dangerous, both for the police and for any occupants.

    2) No-knock raids were developed primarily for use in the War of Drugs, and nearly all such raids are in furtherance of this war. One person’s necessity is another’s reducio ad absurdum.

    3) The War on Drugs, 30+ years on, has not stemmed the supply of drugs — drugs are much cheaper than they were in 1970.

    4) The only thing that has had any impact on drug use has been education, bad press, and a change in public attitudes. Look at the job these have done with tobacco, a legal substance.

    So, when these no-knock raids go bad, as they sometimes must, the libertarian reaction will be: WTF did you expect, and why does the state persist with this reckless, counterproductive and futile war? Not sure what the answer is, but it isn’t better flak jackets, more raids, and more regrettable situations.

    Kevin Murphy (0b2493)

  57. Wait for my interview with the use of force expert.

    Patterico (de0616)

  58. 50:

    A search warrant on the wrong address – not the one on the warrant – exposes the police department to civil liability. It’s one of the easy ways for the department to get sued, and they’ll likely want to pay out. Wrong-house raids are a high-end disaster.

    Pat/55:

    You are well-served to question that statistic. It’s entirely bogus. Every time you see a politician citing higher crime over the last XX years of any sort, it’s usually a lie.

    Basically, drug use/crime has risen lightly since 1999, but it’s significantly down per capita from, say, 1992 – and, I think, 1972 (although the statistics were kept a little differently in 1972, and that’s arguable.)

    See: http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/dcf/contents.htm

    –JRM

    JRM (389dbe)

  59. RJN? Looks like you fed us some bogus info there, buddy. Where did you get it?

    Patterico (de0616)

  60. Pat,

    For us (don’t know about other departments) we must have one of two things to be allowed a no-knock:

    A concern for the safety of the officer’s serving the warrant or the public at large, including persons residing in or near the targetted site

    Or, the evidence may be easily destroyed.

    Considering the response they DID get, I would say criteria #1 is established. For some reason, I highly doubt that the drug they supposably bought prior to the raid was 4 lbs of weed, suggesting it could have easily been disposed of.

    For those that think the warrant should have been served in uniform, have you ever noticed the water meters spinning in overdrive whenever a marked unit drives through the hood? Kind of defeats the purpose.

    No-knocks are pretty rare here (granted, not the crime capital of the US). I have heard (grain of salt) that the officers involved did knock prior to attempting entry. I can’t confirm, so….

    For those who think meth, crack and the like are victimless things, I beg to differ. Setting aside the effects on the user, the families that have bolts on individual doors to avoid theft and assault, the children exposed to toxic and caustic chemicals, the innocents robbed and assaulted to gain money or goods, the babies born testing positive for controlled substances, to me are all victims. We may be losing this war. It often seems as though we are.

    It is still worth fighting if these are the things I can prevent.

    I apologize for rambling.

    nudge, nudge (a2d92d)

  61. People supporting frequent use paramilitary police tactics should consider that other countries manage with far less use of such methods. Police shootings of civilians are quite rare here in Australia. (Well outside Victoria and that is seen as a scandal.)

    I can’t see anything about the U.S. that would make such tactics more necessary and at least one thing that would make them much less wise. (The degree of armament of your citizenry.)

    Lloyd Flack (b41637)

  62. nudge–

    For those who think meth, crack and the like are victimless things, I beg to differ. Setting aside the effects on the user, the families that have bolts on individual doors to avoid theft and assault, the children exposed to toxic and caustic chemicals, the innocents robbed and assaulted to gain money or goods, the babies born testing positive for controlled substances, to me are all victims. We may be losing this war. It often seems as though we are.

    Tobacco is a quite harmful drug. It can affect unborn children, and has other nasty effects. Alcoholism is no picnic either. But rarely do people break into houses to get the money to buy cigarettes or beer. Why? Because they are cheap and legal. Not to carry this parallel to far, but the issues you cite about those drugs are largely due to the cost of the drugs.

    Not that drugs are victimless — crack is a nightmare all around and I really don’t want to get into the “which drug is worse” game — but you could at least find some things that ARE particular to these drugs. Your list has hopelessly mixed causes.

    Kevin Murphy (0b2493)

  63. apparently, the “imperative” of preventing people from flushing their toilets has overriden due care for the lives of citizens.
    in response to this, many of us have deeply discounted the value of an officer’s life relative to the sanctity of our homes. sure, some cops are dedicated professionals who observe constitutional boundaries, but the taint extends to them too.
    don’t be fooled by the five points in patterico’s main post, while they all relate to the situation, they are not the crux and at least one of them was frankly dumb (bullets fired at age 92 are as dangerous as those fired at age 22). duh. this is a lawyer trick (which i have used successfully many times myself) if the crucial issue doesn’t look good, focus intensely on collateral points you can win.
    the crucial issue is whether the cops took reasonable measures to identify themselves before they broke down her door. not whether they had a warrant, or who shot first. the cops themselves could have removed this as an issue if they had shown up in uniform, knocked and waited for her to open the door.
    see, a lot of people will reach for a gun the moment they hear their door going down. if it’s police, and they see you reaching for the gun, they’re gonna shoot, so you might as well spend this time getting ahold of the gun and acting reflexively to take as many of them with you as you can. dafydd seems to counsel waiting in this situation until you can positively id the intruders as criminals, and criminals will love him for this attitude as they steal his money and rape his daughter, because they love submissive, beta-dog type victims.
    i only wish kathryn johnston had managed to kill at least one of them like cory maye did, but i still acknowledge her as a heroic martyr. i don’t expect to be able to hit anything as small as an elephant if i reach 92.

    assistant devil's advocate (9bd4a9)

  64. Patrick–

    Balko may well call it a “wrong house raid” but I quite carefully did not. My problem is the officers managed to get to the right house even though the late-arriving warrant had the wrong address, which indicates a post-dated warrant.

    I have problems with no-knock raids without warrants, and think that the exclusionary rule is the wrong remedy (as it usually is).

    Kevin Murphy (0b2493)

  65. Kevin,

    The reason that the two drugs I listed (crack/meth)are such a problem is that they create a psychological dependance–the user cannot overcome the compulsion to use and have them in his system. They also have a effect on mental states after prolonged use (the “tweeker” effect). MRI’s of MDMA (for those that don’t know, methylenediazapenemethamphetamine {I’m not a chemist, that’s from memory, forgive me if I miss a carbon chain here or there}) users, even after SIX months, show massive sections of the brain that have no functional neural activity–effectively dead.

    Yes, alcohol and tobbacco have long term effects. Personally, I wouldn’t miss them if they were banned. But the deleterious effects of the controlled substances are more severe, have a more rapid onset, more health consequences, and are much more permanent.

    Alcohol makes walking a walking anus out of many people. Meth and crack makes a violent sociopath out of almost all.

    Is this what you were looking for?

    nudge, nudge (a2d92d)

  66. i only wish kathryn johnston had managed to kill at least one of them like cory maye did, but i still acknowledge her as a heroic martyr

    .ADA, you are one sick bastard.

    See-Dubya (4646f1)

  67. “For those who think meth, crack and the like are victimless things, I beg to differ. Setting aside the effects on the user, the families that have bolts on individual doors to avoid theft and assault, the children exposed to toxic and caustic chemicals, the innocents robbed and assaulted to gain money or goods, the babies born testing positive for controlled substances, to me are all victims. We may be losing this war. It often seems as though we are.

    It is still worth fighting if these are the things I can prevent.”

    That’s a cry for the re-establishment of Prohibition. Everything said about meth & crack & personal destruction & ruin of the family goes three, five, ten, twenty times for alcohol. Eliot Ness could have made the same altruist statement seventy five years ago. He would have been wrong to do so. Maybe had he been more self interested & declined to waste his time & talent in smashing up breweries and raiding speakeasies, he could have gained real crime fighting skills to capture the Cleveland Torso Murderer, the case that broke him.

    The difference between the late unlamented war on alcohol and to-day’s war on (other) drugs is that now there are not sufficient millions who think their ox is gored by other millions, distrusting of reason & the enormous power of free men to make free associations, less interested in leading their individual lives as running yours.

    Ted Monroe (71252f)

  68. nudge, nudge — your statement about psychological dependence shows me that you’ve never been a tobacco smoker.

    She shot, supposedly surprized and confusioned from the raid, (reportedly) five or six rounds, getting five hits. They, prepared for the raid, shot (reportedly) over ninty, getting (reportedly) eighteen hits. Who, exactly, is the better shot?

    Persons post-dating warrants … I don’t want to think about it. That’s why they should be public when served.

    htom (412a17)

  69. DRJ,

    Apparently several commenters believe it’s okay to extralegally nullify laws they don’t support…

    This country has a long pedigree of such. I would argue that merely because a law exists does not mean that it must be followed – and I believe that is obvious to anyone. This is why the “just following orders” defense doesn’t hold up. I am not alone in this objection – we have mountains of scholarly material on this subject.

    What authority does the state have over me when I object to the state’s actions? Especially when those actions deal with mere vices, or personal belief, or my ethnicity, etc.? Was it wrong for those in fighting for civil rights to actively, if peacefully, oppose Jim Crow? Was it wrong for violent crowds to combat peace officers trying to apprehend fugitive slaves in the North in the wake of the Compromise of 1850? The issue is far less binary than your comments allows. Especially from say a natural rights perspective – if indeed I do have certain natural rights, then the state clearly cannot legally, morally, etc. take them away from me.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  70. ‘When the crime lab comes back with the results and it turns out that the Atlanta woman had drugs in her house, what percentage of you arguing the cops did wrong will accept that, and what percentage will go all OJ-juror on us, rejecting all rational thought?’

    And when the crime lab comes back with results and it turns out that the Atlanta woman has either no drugs or a tiny quantity for personal use (which has been the post-raid justification for many a botched operation), how many arguing that the cops did things by the book will claim that this changes nothing, and that we should absolutely trust the police to knock down doors on a hunch because it’s a tough job and they have our best interests at heart?

    My guess would be all.

    Coincidentally, that’s a nice job of waiting for the facts to come in :).

    B (e8227e)

  71. @see-dubya:
    whatever you say. i just think there’s something profoundly un-american about police busting into an american’s house by surprise. i don’t think what we lose there is worth preventing somebody from flushing a baggie of weed down the john, and yes, i root for the householder over the cops not because i hate cops, but because 3 or 4 police deaths during “dynamic entries” could be a useful impetus for social change. have a nice day.

    assistant devil's advocate (deaa29)

  72. assistant devil’s advocate,

    Part of what you appear to be arguing is that the drug war is corrosive to the concept of individual liberty. I think in large part that is correct. In part this is simply because one has handed the state more power over the lives of citizens, which one should always be wary of.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  73. Horace, Ted, htom et al libertarians;
    Do you guys really want to raise your children in a world where they can use crack, meth, heroin and pot?
    Are you guys nuts? Free choice to a mature, fully formed individual (a rarity in these days of leaglized victimhood)is one thing, but to young people, well, they just need guidance and laws to prevent destructive behavior during a time when they feel invincible.

    paul from fl (967602)

  74. paul from fl,

    Do you guys really want to raise your children in a world where they can use crack, meth, heroin and pot?

    I want to live in a free society.

    More drugs of more variety are available today, in greater quantities, at a lower price, etc. than has ever been the case in this nation’s history. So, even from the standpoint from efficacy towards a goal, the drug war has failed. Only a government would continue along such a path – a private company wouldn’t be able to either because they would go bankrupt or they’d see the folly of their ways and change their tune.

    Free choice to a mature, fully formed individual (a rarity in these days of leaglized victimhood)is one thing, but to young people, well, they just need guidance and laws to prevent destructive behavior during a time when they feel invincible.

    Well, even if that were the case, that would not justify drug prohibition as applied to adult users or adults who sell drugs to adults, would it?

    Anyway, as far as I can tell you are ignoring the costs associated with the drug war. Fine, say we are helping out kids – who are we harming in the process? What are we undermining in the process? Benefits are rarely, if ever, cost free.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  75. ‘Do you guys really want to raise your children in a world where they can use crack, meth, heroin and pot?
    Are you guys nuts?’

    Strawman.

    Legalisation and regulation include the address of concerns over underage use. In some respects children have an easier time getting drugs than alcohol because drug dealers, being outside the law in any case, have no qualms about selling to them.

    That’s not to say I’m all in favour of blanket legalisation (I’d be interested to see how things work with marijuana before addressing the more obviously destructive drugs) but you need to think a little harder than this on the issue.

    B (e8227e)

  76. >>Do you guys really want to raise your children in a world where they can use crack, meth, heroin and pot?

    I would rather that they did not use those items unless they’re medically indicated. I’d rather that they not be regular users of tobacco or alcohol, either. Addiction is a bad thing, pretty much whatever the substance or behavior is, whether it’s internet posting or dynamic entry raids.

    >>Are you guys nuts?

    No. I think that I am more in danger from mistaken drug raids than I am from drug abuse. I am very grateful that the raiders were content to talk rather than embark on a shootout, and I know that they are, too. One of them is an excellent shot, BTW, but I’ve since usually beaten him in competitions.

    >>Free choice to a mature, fully formed individual (a rarity in these days of leaglized victimhood)is one thing, but to young people, well, they just need guidance and laws to prevent destructive behavior during a time when they feel invincible.

    Guidance they need, agreed. I don’t see how these drug raids contribute to that. Statutes provide a handle for the state to perform punishment, which I don’t think of as useful guidance — at all — after about the age of four or five.

    htom (412a17)

  77. >>Do you guys really want to raise your children in a world where they can use crack, meth, heroin and pot?

    Forgotten point: I do live in that world. They will be able to do so, no law will change that, and they are going to have to choose not to.

    htom (412a17)

  78. Paul

    Do you guys really want to raise your children in a world where they can use crack, meth, heroin and pot?

    Ah for the children (TM)(c)[etc] – you had to wonder when someone would trot this out. Did anyone propose legalizing drugs for minors? Or was it suggested that they be treated more like alcohol/tobacco? You’ll still have some minors getting ahold of things legally forbidden them – so? That’s pretty obviously the situation today – would you go more draconian to change that?

    The Drug Warrior Way is to treat all adults like children (very young children at that), incapable of making a self-formed, intelligent decision.

    juris imprudent (f6e979)

  79. Patterico:

    My claim was offered as a thought experiment, and it was obvious that it was so offered. If the drug laws were working to reduce drug use we would now be seeing a tiny portion of what we were seeing in 1972. Not so. Instead we are seeing a great expansion of drug use, incarceration for drug use, incarceration for drug trafficking and enormous costs when compared to 1972.

    DRJ:

    What a crock.

    RJN (e12f22)

  80. “Apparently several commenters believe it’s okay to extralegally nullify laws they don’t support…”

    Like the Stamp Act?

    Ernest Brown (db43f0)

  81. “Apparently several commenters believe it’s okay to extralegally nullify laws they don’t support…”

    Like the Fugitive Slave Act?

    Like the Alien and Sedition Acts?

    Like the Volstead Act?

    Ernest Brown (db43f0)

  82. We can prove that the drug laws don’t work; drug use and drug violence has increased every year of the last 34 years.

    That’s an obvious “thought experiment”?

    Seems like an obvious factual assertion to me.

    Patterico (de0616)

  83. ‘My claim was offered as a thought experiment, and it was obvious that it was so offered. If the drug laws were working to reduce drug use we would now be seeing a tiny portion of what we were seeing in 1972. Not so. Instead we are seeing a great expansion of drug use, incarceration for drug use, incarceration for drug trafficking and enormous costs when compared to 1972.’

    This is the fallacy of single-variable causation. Your claim that if prohibition were working drug use would be on a consistent downward trend is based on an assumption that legality is the only factor which affects drug use. In reality it’s very possible, even likely (based on the general population’s unwillingness to gamble with the law) that prohibition reduces drug use from where it would otherwise be, but that other factors work to increase it.

    The real question is whether the effect that prohibition does have on drug use is worth the negative effects in cost (both in incurred expenses and lost revenues), loss of invidual freedom and the channeling of cash into the black markets both in the US and abroad. Those who think drugs are just too addictive for society to cope with are clearly in the quiet majority otherwise the law wouldn’t be where it is.

    That’s not to say that they’re right, just that addressing their real concerns rather than raising easily refutable rhetoric is key if you want things to change.

    B (e8227e)

  84. Patterico:

    I now say that the burden of proof is on you. If you don’t think my claim is accurate why don’t you disprove it. What you will come up with, if you try to disprove it, will be itty bitty minutiae thus proving the essential truth of my claim.

    paul from fl:

    We have that kind of world now. A new world, where the vast amount of money now spent for incarceration, and law enforcement was instead available for treatment would have to be a better one.

    RJN (e12f22)

  85. 79/82:

    Here’s a thought experiment: What would you say if the raw number of murders was down from 1976 to today? And what if violent crime rates have been dropping since the efforts to reform were replaced with combinations of reformation and punishment? (I can’t find 1972 right now, but IIRC, the crime rate was higher in 1972 than 1976).

    My thought experiment is backed by:

    http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/ucr.htm#cius

    Crime is down. This is doubtless partly due to economic improvements, but also due to tough sentencing laws. The increase in crime over the last couple of years is during a time when drug laws have seriously softened in the most populous state in the union.

    The raw number of murders is down from 1976, or 1972, or almost any time over the last 34 years.

    If you want argue legalization, have at it – I view legalization of meth/coke/heroin as a very bad idea, but it is not an entirely bankrupt argument. But don’t argue that crime is up. It isn’t. (Well, it is, slightly, over the last year or two. But it’s down from any other point, including times when drug use was treated with a stern warning. Like now, in California.)

    –JRM

    JRM (389dbe)

  86. B,

    Those who think drugs are just too addictive for society to cope with are clearly in the quiet majority otherwise the law wouldn’t be where it is.

    Well we have a very easy way to deal with that concern – compare today with period when drugs were largely legal – the 19th century.

    Anyway, as far as I can tell, drug use was banned not based on any objective data, was based on “moral panics” not on sound sociological data. That as far as I can tell remains the basis for these laws.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  87. JRM,

    Is that the actual number of crimes or number of crimes that were reported? In my social science stastics course one of the things that we learned to be wary of was the figures put out by government on the number of crimes, etc., but they invariably undercount the number of actual crimes.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  88. I now say that the burden of proof is on you. If you don’t think my claim is accurate why don’t you disprove it. What you will come up with, if you try to disprove it, will be itty bitty minutiae thus proving the essential truth of my claim.

    Frankly, your “thought experiment” read exactly like a factual claim. JRM has debunked that claim, and if it was a thought experiment you should have been a lot more clear about it.

    Patterico (de0616)

  89. JRM,

    This is doubtless partly due to economic improvements, but also due to tough sentencing laws. The increase in crime over the last couple of years is during a time when drug laws have seriously softened in the most populous state in the union.

    There is no evidence for any of these claims in the link that you provided.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  90. 89:

    Tough sentencing laws are from me; there is not much dispute over the effect of tough sentencing on crime that I know, though the degree is disputed. I don’t think anyone serious disputes the correlation between economics and crime, though again degree is disputed.

    Drug laws have seriously softened in California due to Proposition 36, which permits most users to avoid any jail time whatsoever by getting into a program. (Its predecessor in interest covered only non-recidivist users without certain other disqualifying features; Prop 36 disqualification is tougher.)

    –JRM

    JRM (389dbe)

  91. Patterico,

    As far as I can tell RJM debunked nothing in this statement:

    My claim was offered as a thought experiment, and it was obvious that it was so offered. If the drug laws were working to reduce drug use we would now be seeing a tiny portion of what we were seeing in 1972. Not so. Instead we are seeing a great expansion of drug use, incarceration for drug use, incarceration for drug trafficking and enormous costs when compared to 1972.

    This statement doesn’t concern itself with violent crime.

    RJN did make this statement though:

    We can prove that the drug laws don’t work; drug use and drug violence has increased every year of the last 34 years.

    Still, JRM’s figures don’t appear to really address this issue either.

    DRJ,

    RJN – Debating whether we should have drug laws is outside the scope of this thread.

    Honest and open debate does not resemble the rules of a football game.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  92. RJM #79:

    DRJ:
    What a crock.

    No doubt you believe you have completely refuted my point but I have no idea what you are referring to. Even if I did, what kind of an answer is this?

    DRJ (0df497)

  93. Tough sentencing laws are from me; there is not much dispute over the effect of tough sentencing on crime that I know…

    Assuming something which is not proven. Since it was so simple for you to come up with one link, why not one that deals with your actual assertion? Oh, and to stop one line of commentary before it even starts: correlation does not equal causation.

    Drug laws have seriously softened in California due to Proposition 36, which permits most users to avoid any jail time whatsoever by getting into a program. (Its predecessor in interest covered only non-recidivist users without certain other disqualifying features; Prop 36 disqualification is tougher.)

    Demonstrates nothing.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  94. Anyway, as far as I can tell JRM and RJN were addressing two completely seperate issues.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  95. Horace,

    I discussed drug laws in other threads and Patterico indicated he was more interested in this topic. I respect that because he is the host. It’s not like he never takes on tough topics or that he unreasonably shuts down debate. Nor do I. Just because I tried to address the topic doesn’t mean I censored you, nor do I have any desire to do that.

    But I do wish I had a dollar for every time you offered “sociological studies” to support your points, always without any links or even authors’ names. You’ve even referenced your “social science statistics course” – STA 301, perhaps? Please link something or give it up. JRM linked DOJ data and you certainly didn’t refrain from critiquing his data. How about giving us the same opportunity?

    DRJ (0df497)

  96. Anyway, as far as I can tell JRM and RJN were addressing two completely seperate issues.

    RJN made a blanket statement: “We can prove that the drug laws don’t work; drug use and drug violence has increased every year of the last 34 years.”

    JRM refuted it with DoJ data, and lo and behold, it was no longer a claim, but a thought experiment.

    Patterico (de0616)

  97. Anyway, the link provided above gives us some raw numbers; I could correlate those numbers with any change in society since the 1970s and come up with a hypothesis for why violence was curbed. Indeed, a lot of those would be rather reasonable hypotheses and they would have had little to do with any changes in the legal system. Who knows, maybe it was the advent of the PC that brought about the changes? Or perhaps it was new oppurunities for people of color in a less formally racist society? Anyway, unless you can actually demonstrate causation (and there are a number of ways to do this), all one has is a hypothesis which stands on nothing more than mere speculation.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  98. Patterico.

    As far as I can tell the DOJ data says nothing about about drug use or drug violence (the two variables that are at play here). I’d be more than glad to see where those two variables are measured by the DOJ if you can point that out to me.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  99. Patterico,

    And please do it by the link provided, since that is what you attributing as the source of the “debunking.”

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  100. Browse through the link, Horace. The link I just gave you is a link available on the page JRM provided a link for.

    Patterico (de0616)

  101. This link concerns drug related arrests; this maybe a poor proxy for the two variables RJN put before us: http://www.fbi.gov/filelink.html?file=/ucr/adducr/drug%20abuse%20violations.xls

    Actually, I didn’t look at it. My internet security software told me it was doing something inappropriate (inapprorpiate to the software at least).

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  102. So I have fishing through a webpage to find the material that debunks him? Why not just send me to the specific page?

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  103. From Patterico’s link:

    College student victims

    Overall 41% of violent crimes committed against college students and 38% of nonstudents were committed by an offender perceived to be using drugs, 1995-2000. About 2 in 5 of all rape/sexual assaults and about a quarter of all robberies against a college student were committed by an offender perceived to be using drugs.

    This should be of special interest to Patterico’s college commenters.

    DRJ (0df497)

  104. Ahh, again, as far as I can tell the link which was originally provided has no direct link to this second link.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  105. DRJ,

    Yeah, the two web pages are distinct as far as I can tell. And Patterico’s link doesn’t appear to address your first variable at all. I don’t really now how it could to be frank.

    Note this table:

    Drug-related homicides

    Year | Number of homicides | Percent drug related

    1987 17,963 4.9 %
    1988 17,971 5.6
    1989 18,954 7.4
    1990 20,273 6.7
    1991 21,676 6.2
    1992 22,716 5.7
    1993 23,180 5.5
    1994 22,084 5.6
    1995 20,232 5.1
    1996 16,967 5.0
    1997 15,837 5.1
    1998 14,276 4.8
    1999 13,011 4.5
    2000 13,230 4.5
    2001 14,061 4.1
    2002 14,263 4.7
    2003 14,465 4.7
    2004 14,121 3.9
    2005 14,860 4.0

    Now let’s pick this apart a bit. In the late 1980s we saw – after the panic over the Len Bias case – a surge in new drug laws. What do we see directly after that? A surge in homocides, especially which are drug related! 😉

    Anyway, if you look at this table you will note one thing: that the # of homocides track fairly well the economic performance of the U.S. The highpoint was when the economy wasn’t doing all that wonderful (the late 1980s through the early 1990s) and then the numbers dropped dramatically during the boom years of the 1990s and they’ve stayed low through the relatively well off years of the second Bush administration.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  106. Horace,

    Did you mean to address JRM? I haven’t offered any drug law statistics although I did ask you to provide links to substantiate your sociological claims.

    DRJ (0df497)

  107. Anyway, one of the problems with the table is that it starts in 1987. Heck, we could have had 50,000 homocides in 1986 (I mean, I doubt it, but you get my point).

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  108. DRJ,

    I’m sorry. Too many three letter nicknames for my poor substandard brain! I profusely apologize.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  109. What I see from those homicide statistics is a downward trend. In any event, quoting Horace #93: “Correlation does not equal causation.”

    DRJ (0df497)

  110. This link, originally provided by JRM, leads you to this link. It sort of pops out at you.

    Maybe you were looking at his second link?

    Patterico (de0616)

  111. Overall 41% of violent crimes committed against college students and 38% of nonstudents were committed by an offender perceived to be using drugs, 1995-2000. About 2 in 5 of all rape/sexual assaults and about a quarter of all robberies against a college student were committed by an offender perceived to be using drugs.

    Yeah, criminalization seems to encourage this behavior, especially in the case of robberies. I will note though that they use the term “perceived.”

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  112. Horace,

    No problem. The alphabet names are confusing. And I’m glad you have elected to debate the data.

    DRJ (0df497)

  113. Of course, it would be even nicer if you actually believed the DOJ data.

    DRJ (0df497)

  114. DRJ:

    I did not know you were into a drug law discussion, on another thread, and had been rebuked by Patterico. I would not have been so free and easy with the crock if I had known. Sorry.

    RJN (e12f22)

  115. DRJ,

    Yeah, but it is only a downward trend after 1993. Perhaps it was the collapse of the Clinton healthcare plan that did it.

    Patterico,

    I only saw one link, and that was the link to the FBI. And again I will note that even this other link does not appear to deal with one of NRJ’s (JRN?) two variables.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  116. Well, I had said DoJ. He gave the link in comment 50.

    Patterico (de0616)

  117. I know Patterico would not let himself become involved in something like it, but I am thinking of “The Wire Season #3”, and I am smiling.

    RJN (e12f22)

  118. Patterico,

    The FBI is part of the DOJ though. A lot of people use the acronyms interchanbeably.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  119. I don’t know what the hell that means, RJN.

    Patterico (de0616)

  120. Well, there’s the link. Is it consistent with this assertion?

    “We can prove that the drug laws don’t work; drug use and drug violence has increased every year of the last 34 years.”

    Patterico (de0616)

  121. Bowing out for a while; things to do.

    Patterico (de0616)

  122. RJM,

    No rebuke. I’m free to discuss things here just like you are, but at that point Patterico wanted to stay on topic and I respected that.

    DRJ (0df497)

  123. And the larger point is that none of these links demonstrate some causal connection between increased severity of the drug laws and decreased rates of drug violence (if the rate of such has actually decreased), etc.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  124. Well, there’s the link. Is it consistent with this assertion?

    Drug use appears to be up or stable (depends on the drug in other words) throughout society.

    Drug violence isn’t measured as directly one would like; its a broader term than simply homocide.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  125. The Police Numbers Game and the War on Drugs

    “Like the military body counts of the Vietnam era, the police numbers game- how many rather than how well- cna be severly misleading. In 1970 New York Stateommission of Investigation reported undercover NYPD narcotics officers made 7,266 purchases of suspected heroin. Operating under a policy of attempting to strengthen prosecution cases by making two buys of suspected heroin before arresing dealers, the narcotics unit made 4,007 drug sale arrests as a result of these activities. These are impressive numbers, but the amount of controlled substances taken out of the drug traffic by all these buys and arrests was incredibly small … the total weight of controlled substances siezed was 4.97 pounds. Since streeet level heroin in NYC at the time ranged between 4 and 12% pure, the net effects of this very dangerous undercover work was soething less than a half pound of pure heroin and the arrest of only minor dealers”

    – “Above the Law: Police and the Excessive Use of Force” Skolnick and Fyfe

    I realize these numbers are outdated – but wonder aloud if the results are not really the same when normalized for current times.

    If my figures are correct (they are hard to come by) some 8 million dollars was spent in my state last year on new SWAT equipment and training. This does not count the cost of often wrongful loss of lives, destruction of personal property etc. which related to the ensuing and increasingly popular “no-knock raids”. Not to mention the extreme damage done to police/community relationships and pending lawsuits.

    I don’t view this problem in terms of peoples political persuasion, nor on their view on drugs. (I happen after many, many years of being anti-drug now think they should be decriminalized for adults in many cases). I do think however that the use of SWAT teams are incredibly dangerous, unecessary – certainly for warrants – and not cost effective in terms of results against drug use. No-knock warrants should go back to being unconstitutional except in the most extreme and well researched cases.

    I just can not fathom the rationale or cost/benefit of turning good community police forces in to paramilitary units trampling the edges of our constituional protections aremd with military super-weapons, falsh-bangs, APC’ helicopters and tanks.

    Nick

    nickcharles (0591d5)

  126. I’d like to know how they came up with this:

    The overall rate of current illicit drug use among full-time employees has fallen from 17.5% in 1985 to a low point 7.4% in 1992.

    If this is merely a measure of how many folks fail the initial pea test then all they are doing is measuring stupidity. Most employers do not engage in random testing of their employees.

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  127. But I do wish I had a dollar for every time you offered “sociological studies” to support your points, always without any links or even authors’ names.

    Do you have a good university library fairly close to you?

    Horace (cbe5f9)

  128. A Quote Regarding Police Accountability

    P-

    Thought the following quote was interesting, almost funny (sadly).

    “I object to the repetitious requirement for notification in writing [to citizens who have complained about police actions] at the completion of the investigation to notify and outline your reasons for the findings. I don’t know of anybody in the police department who has that kind of writing ability that could clearly state why, in writing, certain conclusions have been reached.”

    – Chief Inspector Frank Scafidi, Philadelphia Police Department, testimony before U.S. Civil Right Commission, April 1979″

    From “Above the Law: Police and the Excessive Use of Force” by Skolnick and Frye

    Geez – I wonder why when police do something wrong there are almost never any repercussions?

    I thought this self investigation stuff was supposed to work. I am sure Johnstons family and all of us for that matter can’t wait for the report from the police.

    Hopefully, there really will be a real independent investigation to include the wisdom of using the SWAT tactics which seem to have caused a non-violent simple police work situation to escalate into shootings and killings.

    Nick

    nickcharles (0591d5)

  129. The Wire season 3 deals with, among other things, the police department, in Baltimore, manipulating crime statistics to avoid the wrath of their mayor.

    Another thread in the season’s episodes involves a police Major who decides to create drug free zones, in his sector of responsibility, by moving all the drug dealers to run-down enclaves of his neighborhoods (the Major does not tell his bosses he is doing this). There is no enforcement in these enclaves; so, crime drops, and his neighborhoods become idyllic urban havens.

    RJN (e12f22)

  130. Legalisation and regulation include the address of concerns over underage use. In some respects children have an easier time getting drugs than alcohol because drug dealers, being outside the law in any case, have no qualms about selling to them.

    So it appears, from high atop the ivory tower. Here in the real world, the only reason drug dealers don’t sell alcohol to kids is because alcohol doesn’t get them the same profit margin (nor anything close) to what they get for drugs. The reason has nothing to do with demand (far more kids want alcohol than drugs) and everything to do with supply (they won’t pay prohibition prices because they can get alcohol more cheaply elsewhere).

    The one cold, hard fact that the Legalize Everything crowd needs to own up to is that anything that is legal for adults will be more easily available to children than anything that is prohibited to everyone. That doesn’t mean it’s a bad trade-off, but it does mean that there is a trade-off, and part of that trade off is that if drugs are legalized, more kids and adults will use.

    Xrlq (f52b4f)

  131. My claim: prohibition pushes drug dealing into dark corners where kids can get what they please with no questions asked. They can’t buy alcohol in the same way.

    Your claim: drug dealers sell drugs to kids and not alcohol, but I was wrong when I said the same thing.

    If logic and reading comprehension place one in the ivory tower then count me in.

    On a side note, I’m quite happy to believe that controlled legalisation might increase use among all age groups but in order for it to be a cold, hard fact there needs to be cold, hard evidence in support. If that evidence is available I’ll be happy to have a look, and the degree of change will also help determine the cost/benefit calculus of prohibition.

    B (08fd8d)

  132. Alcohol is a drug. It is wrong to distinguish it from other drugs simply because the high is more socially acceptable.

    “The one cold, hard fact that the Legalize Everything crowd needs to own up to is that anything that is legal for adults will be more easily available to children than anything that is prohibited to everyone.”

    -Xrlq

    Maybe, but I knew kids that had outside access to drugs without outside access to alcohol (although they got alcohol anyway, from their parents’ stores).

    Leviticus (43095b)

  133. B:

    My claim: prohibition pushes drug dealing into dark corners where kids can get what they please with no questions asked. They can’t buy alcohol in the same way.

    Your claim has no basis in reality. Of course they can buy alcohol the same way! They never do, but that’s because alcohol is available to kids at roughly the same prices paid by adults on the licit market. It’s not because the dealers would be unwilling to sell kids alcohol at 100x markup if the kids were willing to pay it. Go ahead, wave a $100 bill at a crack dealer and say “Must have beer.” You’d be amazed how quickly the formerly unavailable alcohol became available from your friendly neighborhood crack dealer. And no, he won’t check your ID, either.

    Your claim: drug dealers sell drugs to kids and not alcohol, but I was wrong when I said the same thing.

    You were wrong when you confused “can’t” with “don’t need to.” Drug dealers will sell anything to kids that they can sell at a horrendous markup. They just can’t get that markup for alcohol because the kids have better alternatives available to them.

    On a side note, I’m quite happy to believe that controlled legalisation might increase use among all age groups but in order for it to be a cold, hard fact there needs to be cold, hard evidence in support.

    No country I’m aware of has tried full-blown legalization, so there is no “cold, hard” evidence to prove anything, one way or the other, but the fact that controlled legalization would lead to some increases in use, and that uncontrolled legalization would lead to more, is Economics 101. I’ll leave it to the more advanced economists to tell us what the best estimate is as to how much. My argument isn’t with those who argue that a few more addicts is a small price to pay for getting rid of all the drug-trade-related crime we have now; in fact, I’m inclined to agree with that argument. My beef is with the looneytarians who pretend that part of the trade-off doesn’t exist at all.

    Xrlq (b0c958)

  134. ‘No country I’m aware of has tried full-blown legalization, so there is no “cold, hard” evidence to prove anything, one way or the other, but the fact that controlled legalization would lead to some increases in use, and that uncontrolled legalization would lead to more, is Economics 101.’

    This argument is based on the assumption that legalisation necessarily leads to a lower price at market. For the batshit libertarians this may indeed be a given (because they likely couldn’t stomach the idea of heavy taxation) but it’s by no means a given. From my position, drugs are a serious social negative which is compounded by the associated negatives associated with prohibition. If drugs were legalized along with a tax burden sufficient to keep them at the dramatically expensive levels they are now the Economics101 argument ceases to be a given. The social negative of drugs is counterbalanced by significant tax revenues and enormous savings in enforcement and incarceration costs and organised crime/terrorism lose a large share of their income.

    Making legally acquired drugs as expensive as illegally acquired ones would of course give the drug pushers the opportunity to carve out a market share, but the opportunity to legally purchase drugs of a known standard without the threat of arrest would likely squeeze their profits to the extent that they’d cease to be able to run their business.

    This being a risky venture with potential unforeseen consequences I wouldn’t dream of legalizing everything in one go, but as I see it the potential benefits are worthy of consideration, and the pricing issue covers the stated concern about easier access to children too.

    B (e8227e)

  135. “Maybe, but I knew kids that had outside access to drugs without outside access to alcohol (although they got alcohol anyway, from their parents’ stores).” – Leviticus

    So you are saying that you knew (know) kids who go get pot from somebuddy at school, but couldn’t get alcohol from that same person? So in turn they took alcohol from their parents? And you use that to argue against this: “The one cold, hard fact that the Legalize Everything crowd needs to own up to is that anything that is legal for adults will be more easily available to children than anything that is prohibited to everyone.”

    Simply having a temporary connection to pot, or misc. illegal drug out there isn’t the same as access to alcohol. A few years back I knew plenty of people who drank on the weekends and were underage. Just as I knew some who would go smoke pot. I know that its a ton easier to go up to a friend who is legally able to buy beer, then it is to find a friend who has access to a drug dealer. Now don’t get me wrong, I am all for de-criminalization of marijuana. Perhaps even legalizing it. Past that, I cannot see real benefits to legalizing other types of drugs. I can understand the rationale behind it though.

    G (722480)

  136. If drugs were legalized along with a tax burden sufficient to keep them at the dramatically expensive levels they are now the Economics101 argument ceases to be a given.

    It woud still be a given, albeit to a lesser extent. If newly legalized drugs were taxed to the extreme level needed to match today’s black market prices, they’d still be “cheaper” in other ways (less dangerous, zero vs. significant risk of arrest, etc.) that will impact on the individual decision to use or not use. And as long as you’re taxing them anywhere nearly that high, a black market will thrive, as it currently does for cigarettes in jurisdictions where those taxes are so high. So basically, in your scenario we’d still have a lower cost to the individual user, and we’d still have some reduction in drug-trade-related crime, but we’d have less of both than we would under true legalization (either with no sin taxes, or with sin taxes comparable to those currently levied on alcohol and tobacco).

    Xrlq (b0c958)

  137. Xrlq

    Anyone who disagrees with you on a question that is still awaiting an answer is a looneytune. Wow. What a great posture during a discussion.

    I would not be surprised if overall drug use diminished with legalization. The prices should be less than half of present street prices, leaving no incentive for pushers. Real treatment should be at hand for all users.

    RJN (e12f22)

  138. I’d be interested to see. I have serious doubts that a black market in the legalisation but heavy taxation scenario would push prices below where they are in the prohibition scenario. The overheads of maintaining and running a production and distribution network rely on massive profits to sustain them and if, as you say, the risk reduction would make legal drugs ‘cheaper’ (a point in which we’re in agreement) then that wouldn’t apply to black market goods. The danger of arrest, violence or poor product are all factors people put up with because they currently have no choice. On a related note tobacco smuggling into for eg. of a high tax regime like britain is simplified dramatically by the acceptance that tobacco can be moved across borders. Removing that right in regard to drugs, and running the same checks as are currently run to find them (with the same penalties) would significantly affect the maths.

    B (e8227e)

  139. RJN, merely disagreeing with me does not make anyone a looneytune. Anyone who thinks reducing the cost of anything will result in fewer people using it is a looneytune.

    Xrlq (f52b4f)

  140. “Simply having a temporary connection to pot, or misc. illegal drug out there isn’t the same as access to alcohol.”

    -G

    I understand this. All I’m saying is the argument that “legalizing drugs will give kids easy access to them” isn’t really valid insofar as kids already have easier access to drugs than alcohol in many scenarions.

    Leviticus (43095b)

  141. If by “many scenarions” you mean kids have easier access to over-the-counter drugs, I agree. If you mean anything else, you’re full of it. Ever heard of the law of supply and demand?

    Xrlq (f52b4f)

  142. It’s the “Price, Supply, and Demand” curve. If there is no demand, sending the price to zero doesn’t produce sales.

    htom (412a17)

  143. Horace #127:

    But I do wish I had a dollar for every time you offered “sociological studies” to support your points, always without any links or even authors’ names.

    Do you have a good university library fairly close to you?

    Absolutely, and I also have a membership in a multi-University library system that gives me access to several top-tier college libraries. So, please, cite your sources.

    DRJ (0df497)

  144. Would gambling be a similar example? Many states that previously banned everything but bingo now offer lotteries. Demand for lottery tickets is booming, especially when the pot is large, and we know that some people spend more than they can afford. More easily available product can generate more demand and more abuse.

    I’m not against lotteries but it seems that to legalize drugs might produce a similar result even if drugs are heavily taxed. People will find legal and sometimes illegal ways to get the money they want to indulge in pleasurable activities.

    DRJ (0df497)

  145. Anyone who thinks Kathryn Johnston wasn’t a bit freaked out…

    …should go get comfortable in front of the TV… relax. Laugh at the Simpson’s or shed tears at Britney’s plight with K-fed… then have someone set off a flash-bang grenade next to you.

    See how well you are able to be reasonably react to subsequent cacophony while under the influence of ringing ears and disorientation…. and to make the test even more effective, wait until you are 88, alone, and a female in a crime ridden neighborhood and then test your reactions.

    allan (f05b8b)

  146. I need to read more about the Atlanta Nanna – but for starters….
    Law makers certainly do not consider the safety of home owners in their no-knock bust-ins because there is a probability they are either at the wrong house or the critters they want to bust simply aren’t there.

    Last night saw a TV interview with a guy who refused to answer his door late at night. First thing he did was get his “registered” gun. He was either a former cop or something similar in the field of law.
    Now, for sure he knew what no-knocks were – but he didn’t take any chances. He slid the curtain open and saw a young guy- and let him see the gun. The kid said his car broke down – but when he saw the gun, he and his partner [who was behind bush] decided to take off.

    OK — a few nights later, they go to a different house – this time a gentle elderly man anwered the door – after being told they were surveying the area regarding environmental impact of something or other.

    The man was a college professor and decided he could help these young college kids with their project. While he was getting some books out – one kid slit his throat and when the wife came running – the other kid stabbed her to death.

    Their plan was to steal credit cards – get some dope and leave the country for further adventure.
    They were caught because they left the knife sheath behind and both pleades guilty etc.

    Now IF they had decided to dress like cops – or IF the cops armed with a warrant and guns were coming at your home –would you answer your door at midnight??

    For the few thugs that might be caught in a bust -the risk to society is far too great. They have to come up with a better alternative.

    hu-nose (d8d051)

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