iBankCoin
Joined Nov 11, 2007
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STOSSEL: A Lesson from Portugal on How to End America’s War on Drugs

We’ve all heard the arguments against drug legalization: It would be anarchy! Americans would ingest dangerous substances wildly! They would randomly commit violence! Society as we know it would cease to exist!

The people of Portugal heard these claims 10 years ago, when the country decriminalized all drugs.

People predicted the country would spiral into chaos. So did that happen?

No.

Independent studies found that, after the drug law passed, the number of Portuguese who regularly do drugs stayed about the same. Problematic and youth drug use went down.

We spoke to a chief police inspector in Lisbon who was very dubious about decriminalization. But now he’s a convert. He told us, “the level of conflicts on the street are reduced”…”drug related robberies are reduced”…and “now police are not the enemies of the consumers”.

Adults in a free society should be able to ingest anything they want to, as long as they don’t injure somebody else.

Apparently, the people of Portugal figured that out. The results are good.

We’ll take you to Portugal tonight on my special ‘Illegal Everything’, airing at 10pm on FNC.

Read more: http://trade.cc/aprs

 

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8 comments

  1. TJWP

    Don’t worry prescription drugs are harmless. People only die from those dangerous illegal ones.

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  2. Blind Read Ant

    Europeans, in general, can handle their discretions.

    The American welfare state being permitted to the ill-Rx scares me.

    I’m just one person. And it’s not cool to say that.

    But great heads up. Obrigado.

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  3. 'merica

    I don’t know about this. If I had a kid, I would be scared to death that they would try some hard drug, get hooked and ruin their life.

    Initially, there would be a curiosity with Americans – many who would never have thought to try drugs would do so. Over time, if we built a culture of moderation it could be a good thing. Americans are not like Europeans, however.

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    • fake amish

      wtf are you sayin? your future kids will try them anyway if and when they want to. this is a basic freedom issue. retarded reasons why the drug war is okay or maybe we can legalize pot. are the fucking problem. it is none of your business what anyone ingests.

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  4. Juice

    religion is far more dangerous than drugs but they don’t outlaw the lies of religion because everyone is on the take .. there’s no bidness like the holy bidness

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    • Yabollox

      Atheists are more dangerous than religion! Check out Mao, Hitler and Stalin.

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      • Juice

        Neither Hitler, Moa nor Stalin were atheists.

        That is a common refrain from believers in imaginary, powerless deities who like to blame non-believers in imaginary, powerless deities, for unimaginable atrocities that rival the Holy Christian Crusades.

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      • TJWP

        That statement illustrates the highest levels of stupidity admirably. Even if one were to accept your incorrect premiss that these men were all atheist, they certainly did not commit their crimes against humanity because of their atheism.

        This is quite unlike the crimes against humanity that have been, and are on a daily basis perpetrated against the poor and uneducated in the name of religion. From the Taliban, to the drive against contraception, to the Pope instructing African Christians that condoms are against the teachings of the religion, religion is simply a plague on humanity.

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