Thread: Ex-Mexico president calls for legalizing drugs

Ex-Mexico president calls for legalizing drugs

(4:48 a.m.)By E. EDUARDO CASTILLO / Associated Press Writer
Posted: 08/09/2010 04:48:08 AM MDT

MEXICO CITY-Former President Vicente Fox is joining with those urging his successor to legalize drugs in Mexico, saying that could break the economic power of the country's brutal drug cartels.

Fox's comments, posted Sunday on his blog, came less than a week after President Felipe Calderon agreed to open the door to discussions about the legalization of drugs, even though he stressed that he remained opposed to the idea.

Fox said places that have implemented the legalization strategy have not seen significant increases in drug use.

"We should consider legalizing the production, distribution and sale of drugs," wrote Fox, who was president from 2000 to 2006 and is a member of Calderon's conservative National Action Party. "Radical prohibition strategies have never worked."

"Legalizing in this sense does not mean drugs are good and don't harm those who consume them," he wrote. "Rather we should look at it as a strategy to strike at and break the economic structure that allows gangs to generate huge profits in their trade, which feeds corruption and increases their areas of power."

He said the government could tax the sale of legalized drugs to finance programs for reducing addiction and rehabilitating users.

Fox also called for the quick withdrawal of the military from public security work, a measure Calderon ordered when he succeeded Fox in December 2006 and stepped up a crackdown on the cartels.

Fox, who left office with low popularity, has been

criticized by some Mexicans for implementing an anti-cartel strategy aimed at arresting the gangs' leaders.
The approach led to power vacuums that fed fighting among rival cartels, bringing violence that has killed more than 28,000 people since Calderon took office. The government says the largest number of victims have been tied to gangs.

Fox wrote that drug violence has damaged "the perception and image of the country, and economic activity, particularly in tourism and foreign investment."

Mexico already has some of the world's most liberal laws for drug users, after eliminating jail time for possessing small amounts of marijuana, cocaine and even heroin, LSD and methamphetamine in 2009.

In Latin America, several countries have decriminalized possession of small amounts of some drugs for personal use, but legalization has made little headway in the region.

The issue came up at public forum on crime attended by Calderon in Mexico City on Tuesday, where analyst and writer Hector Aguilar Camin said Mexico should take steps toward legalizing "all drugs in general."

"It's a fundamental debate in which I think, first of all, you must allow a democratic plurality (of opinions)," Calderon said. "You have to analyze carefully the pros and cons and the key arguments on both sides."

Hours later, Calderon's office issued a statement saying that while the president was open to debate on the issue, he remained "against the legalization of drugs."

In his blog, Fox harshly criticized rampant drug violence, writing that "the first responsibility of a government is to provide security for the people and their possessions ... today, we find that, unfortunately, the Mexican government is not complying with that responsibility."

The city most affected by drug violence has been Ciudad Juarez, which lies across the border from El Paso, Texas.

Four senior federal police commanders in Ciudad Juarez were removed from their posts after subordinates accused them of having links to drug traffickers.

The action by the Public Safety Department came just hours after 200 federal police officers detained one of their superiors at gunpoint Saturday, alleging he had connections to drug cartels and participated in kidnappings, killings and extortion.

The department said in a statement late Saturday that the commander held by officers earlier in the day was being transferred to Mexico City along with three other officials. All will be investigated for "possible irregular conduct," it said.

http://www.lcsun-news.com/las_cruces-news/ci_15713652

You gotta' be kidding! That would only legalize the cartels and put them to work for the government! These people are insane!

If we legalize the illegal drugs in our country, it will take away the criminal element. People will stop killing one another over the drugs, and drug users could get treatment instead of jail time. We don't need drug users clogging the jails.

When we re-legalized alcohol in our country (1930's) the violence that the "alcohol" dealers dished-out was eliminated.

At the very least, our society should consider the legalization of marijuana. And this is coming from someone who has never even smoked a nicotine cigarette before.

The Ostrich

I disagree about legalizing drugs will take away the criminal element. All I see this will do is allow corporations to openly support drug pushers. I could easily seeing the Mob or any Mexican Cartels suddenly opening up shop to sell their product while continuing to kill supports of opposing Cartels. Perhaps a weed shop next to KFC?

As for making it legal, I have yet to see enough studies on the affect it has on people. I have worked with weed smokers. We could tell who smoked how much by how stupid and paranoid they were at the end of the day. I also have seen children born to weed smokers and not a single of them was healthy. ><

Either way, I am curious to see how it would all work. I mean all these cities that are going over board and making laws against smoking cigarettes in Town, at Bars and even in your own front yard. How would they react to legal cocaine, meth and/or weed?

Ah, I ramble but before I forget, something I found rather funny:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/03/ ... 2125.shtml


If California legalizes marijuana, they say, it will drive down the price of their crop and damage not just their livelihoods but the entire economy along the state's rugged northern coast.

"The legalization of marijuana will be the single most devastating economic event in the long boom-and-bust history of Northern California," said Anna Hamilton, 62, a Humboldt County radio host and musician who said her involvement with marijuana has mostly been limited to smoking it for the past 40 years.

Disagree with that Ostrich. We would just do the same thing, legalize the criminals who would contiue to manufacture and distribute narcotics to our citizens. It won't stop the cartels. It'll just give them more reasons to kidnap and murder. They would start turf battles between cartel gangs and our own suppliers, between hit men and law enforcement agents.

Besides. Why would you want to add another extreme debilitating destructive element to an already overloaded condition of social problems? So we can ask the federal government to pay forever for their habits, their never ending medical treatments, and more crimes they would commit to feed their habits? Plus add a terrible influence over young people and weak-minded naive idiots.

Illegal narcotics must be found and destroyed in our society not legalized. Keep the money confiscated from dealers and distributers and fund the DEA.

I greatly respect your opinions, but disagree. Our own people (American entrepreneurs) would be manufacturing and selling the marijuana and possibly other drugs...probably in special stores (as you have liquor stores, perhaps you would have "drug" stores). (actually, that's kinda funny!)

The Mexican drug cartels would be largely out of business in the USA; they would still be in business in Mexico and in countries where drugs are illegal. Of course, they may switch over into human smuggling exclusively in the USA (even more than they are now) which obviously isn't good.

In Afghanistan, we had the opportunity to stamp-out opium/heroin production, but we didn't do it, because unfortunately their economy relies on opium production. If we had taken a hard-line and destroyed the opium, it would have driven even more Afghanis against the United States. So we didn't go after it, but one could argue that our population is suffering for that decision, as more and more heroin infiltrates our country from Afghanistan.

I think that drugs and prostitution are two areas where the government should just stay out of the way. In the case of drugs, try to educate the public to the dangers of them, and find ways to treat people, instead of locking them up, which turns users into felons and ruins their lives even more. By fighting the illegal drugs, we actually create young drug dealers in low-income neighborhoods who kill each other and kill innocent people with stray bullets. If drugs were legalized, people wouldn't kill one another over them...you would still have theft/burglaries because desperate people need money to buy drugs...but you wouldn't have the indiscriminant violence that plagues so many of our cities.

And in the case of marijuana, you don't have many car accidents relating to marijuana smoking, but you have many car accidents caused by the abuse of alcohol (which is a legal product). Marijuana is actually less dangerous than hard alcohol, yet one is legal, while the other remains illegal.

That's the point of view that I'm presenting, although I'm undoubtedly in the minority.

Ostrich

Originally Posted by JohnDoe2

"We should consider legalizing the production, distribution and sale of drugs," wrote Fox, who was president from 2000 to 2006 and is a member of Calderon's conservative National Action Party. "Radical prohibition strategies have never worked."

Great plan coming from a complete idiot. Why don't you just legalize all crime in Mexico, then you won't have any criminals. Typical Mexican logic.

Now wait a minute. Didn't Calderon blame the drug cartel's on the drug use in the U.S. It was the high use and demand in the U.S. that was causing all the violence on the border.

Biggest U.S. Cash Crop: Marijuana

The annual marijuana crop harvested in the US is now the nation's most valuable, worth more than cultivation of corn and wheat combined, ...

www.jointogether.org/news/.../biggest-us-cash-crop.html


Based on a comparison with average production values of other crops from 2003 to 2005 marijuana is the top cash crop in 12 states, one of the top 3 cash crops in 30 states, and one of the top 5 cash crops in 39 states.

Marijuana is the largest cash crop in Alaska, Alabama, California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Kentucky, Maine, North Carolina, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee, and West Virginia.

http://solari.com/blog/?p=2923

"a federal court recently ruled Rastafarians have the right to smoke marijuana for religious purposes."

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-178048.html