A Sane Solution to the Drug Problem

'Many thought Prohibition was working when it first became law in the early 1920s.

Alcohol consumption did indeed drop in the first few years. When organized crime realized the profits that would be made by illegally supplying alcohol to customers, alcohol consumption increased, as did crime and corruption in high places.

"Prohibition removed a significant source of tax revenue and greatly increased government spending," wrote Thornton, the economics professor at Auburn University. "It led many drinkers to switch to opium, marijuana, patent medicines, cocaine, and other dangerous substances that they would have been unlikely to encounter in the absence of Prohibition."

If Toronto Mayor Mel Lastman could bring in the army to clear snow from Toronto streets in 1999, can't we expect at least as much effort to clean up an illegal operation that is raging out of control and growing exponentially across the country?' — Martin O'Malley, "Let the army bust the grow-ops", CBC News Viewpoint | March 04, 2005

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'The Canadian establishment should do more to end economic inequality between immigrants and mainstream society. It should spend more money on universities to make higher education affordable to youngsters.

The government should legalize the drug trade to end the profit that motivates the violence. And finally, the government should provide extra money for rehabilitation and de-addiction programs, rather than ripping away the social safety net in the name of ruthless economic reform.' — South Asian Post: Out Loud! With Gurpreet Singh - Wednesday, February 25, 2009


Once people in positions of power stop pointing their fingers at immigrants, university students, polydrug abusers, and other targets they attack through laws meant to protect their assets, it is up to charities to get the philanthropists out to help society at large.

For the gang problem is not addressed by strong enforcement of drug laws, but by their repeal!

Indeed, laws regarding criminal entrapment and undue search and seizure should be revised to better protect the rights of innocent parties.

This includes the use of the military only in relation to the sources of drug crime i.e. importation and trafficking, but not its use. For drug use is a health issue.

With regard to use, preventative measures should involve a gradual movement towards decriminalization with a strong incentive to introduce less harmful alternatives to illegal drugs.

The regular education campaigns against drug abuse and psychosis should be continued.

For drug addiction is a health issue.

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Originally posted: 07/07/09 1:04 PM
Revised: 12/01/11 4:01 PM

The Statistics of Crime Trends in BC: The facts

In BC, the popular myth is that crime is increasing dramaticly.

While crime overall has not fluctated widely over the last reported decade of 1996 to 2005, according to BC statistic on crime trends, crime rates have dropped overall with property crime dropping from 11 percent to 6.4 percent and violent crime dropping from 1.8 percent to 1.3 percent. Thus violent crime has been reduced by 0.5 percent points (28 percent) while crime against property dropped dramaticly by 4.6 percentage points (41 percent).

With overreporting in the papers, it appears that there is a crime wave of drug crime, and the statistics show that drug crime has risen from 0.5 percent to 0.6 percent, an increase of 20 percent. Quite possibly, the reason why violent crime and property crime rates fell during this period has to do with the rise in population, which supplied more potential drug addicts and even more manufacturers and traffickers, who probably rose out of poverty. As a result, drug criminals' growing affluence reduced both property crime and violence. During this same period, sangerous weapons offences increased by 35 percent from about 0.1 percent to 0.135 percent - which might indicate a rising sense of caution moderated by a 500 percent increase in gambling offences and 250 percent increase in prostitution — possibly in an effort to launder money, and more likely to show off such affluence.

Overall too, the number of youths being charges for all crime has dropped from 21 percent of all charges to 11 percent. This may reflect more the trend of the criminal population getting older rather than youth not getting into crime. The only crimes that are steadily rising are basically the moral ones, though, with petty crimes rising from 4.8 percent to 5 percent. Furthermore, in 1996, one in five persons would have been convicted of a crime while 10 years later, this decreased dramaticly to less than one person in seven. Where formerly out of 100 people, 20 would be criminals in 1996, by 2005 that dropped to about 15 people out of 100.

Over the same period of time, BC's population increased from 3,874,276 in 1996 to 4.260.246 in 2005. Quite possibly, the majority of the almost 400,000 new people in BC are too young to be committing crimes or are mainly law abiding.

Therefore, the truth is, despite — or maybe because of — the 20 percent in drug crime charges, there's been a record 25 percent reduction in overall crime.

IMHO, if the welfare rates were phased out in favour of a liberal Universal Basic Income and associated simple income tax with no caps on part-time income for UBI recipients in order to reduce poverty, then I'd bet drug crime offenses will become slightly reduced to about 0.45 percent and violent crime as well as property crime will reduce even further to just under 1 percent for the former and under 6 percent for the latter. However, I still feel that petty crime might stay level at 4.5 percent since there will always be a rising number of people falling into the underclass due to a dropout effect caused by compulsory public education and white collar predation.

Life for Drug Dealers and Traffickers

For all dangerous drugs, excluding cannabis, the penalty should be a life sentence.

This includes alcohol and tobacco, and applies to legitimate sellers of alcohol and tobacco too.

Suspected drug dealers would also include doctors and psychiatrists too, since some prescription drugs (benzodiazepines, certain neuroleptics and anti-depressants) are potentially harmful too.

Such a penalty would also convict alcohol and tobacco manufacturers, who could offer a substantial fine in lieu of their CEO.

Life for all dangerous drugs. It's the most sane solution.