Legalizing Drugs: The Ultimate Alternative to Cease the Drug War

For years, the United States has constantly been in the midst of a war. As a matter of fact, it is a war that is extreme, costly, and very exposed. Not only is it fought within the U.S. boundaries, but also in foreign shores. This so-called war is the War on Drugs. No one can argue that drugs are like a plague in our society. However, as bad as the effect of drugs on our society is, the effect of prohibition is worse. Federal government has spent billions of dollars on the struggle to end this war. Even the state and local government have spent millions of dollars to cease this war. Local reformers also contribute to this war by generating their own versions of the war and by recruiting as many community groups and leaders as they can to further the effort, but it all seems useless because no favorable results have been obtained so far. The best way to cease this everlasting war is to legalize drugs. Legalizing drugs will help the community as a whole because it will save many lives, help reduce crimes rates, improve research for medicine, and increase the government’s income. By legalizing drugs, hundred of lives can be saved each year. Many of the deaths that are now categorized as â€Å"drug overdose† are, in fact, caused by drugs that are purer than the users’ accustomed dose. This will cause an overdose by merely taking the dose to which they are accustomed. Other deaths are caused by the drugs being â€Å"cut† or diluted with impure or dangerous substances. At present, drugs are cut with anything from relatively harmless things such as baking soda, powdered sugar, lactose and corn starch to poisons like strychnine and arsenic. Legal drugs would fall under the supervision and standards of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), thereby insuring cleaner and purer drugs at consistent dosages. In addition, intravenous and intramuscular drugs could be packaged in single use syringes that are designed to be destroyed by the act of using them once. Thus, preventing the reuse and sharing of needles. This will reduce the spread of AIDs, hepatitis, and many other types of infections. Hence, more lives saved, as well as the reduction of burden on many public resources since many drug abusers cannot afford to pay for medical treatment. The government would have control of all drugs. Once the government has control over the drugs, private industries would be in control of the sale of the drugs. Society learned from the, prohibition of alcohol during the 1920’s, â€Å"private industry is much easier to control compared to public industry or the black market† (Prohibition of Alcohol). Legalizing drugs with the appropriate regulation and control would severely limit the access of drugs to children. Just as minors cannot legally but alcohol, they would not be able to walk into a state regulated drug store and buy drugs. Under the present conditions, drug dealers do not care if he customer is 5 years old or 50 years old. These drug dealers are only concerned on the amount of money that goes into their pockets. New laws would be imposed to the people who can but drugs, how much a person can buy, and where the person can buy drugs. Therefore, this would create a safer and more organized society. Legalizing and regulating drug production and sale will eliminate a plethora of drug crimes, as well as crimes related to drugs. Crimes such smuggling, producing and selling drugs would cease to be profitable. It will also limit the availability of funds to finance other crimes such as illegal gambling, prostitution, extortion and terrorism. Former Nobel Prize Winner for Economics, Milton Friedman states, â€Å"The legalization of drugs would simultaneously reduce the number of crimes and improve the respect for the law. It is hard to imagine any other single provision which could make a more significant contribution to the promotion of law and order (Legalization of Drugs).† Being one of the world’s leading drug-related crime nation, the United States needs to diminish the crime rate. The best option is to obtain this is by legalizing drugs or else like former U.S. Secretary of State, George Schultz says â€Å"†¦ will never obtain any results as long as we are unable to separate crime from the drug business and the incitement to criminality this causes† (Legalization of Drugs). Drugs will likely be cheaper. The supply would be relatively consistent. Market forces such as â€Å"supply and demand† will be less of a determining price factor. Nor will the risk factor to dealers and smugglers affect price. The cost of producing most illegal drugs is minimal, particularly in an industrial setting. Therefore, legalization will reduce crimes such as burglary, mugging, and prostitution. Legalizing drugs would be useful in the medicinal world. It is probably one of the prime reasons why drugs should be legalized because it will be helpful for medical-related research. There are numerous ways in which drugs could be used in the medical field. For example, marijuana helps relieve pain caused by glaucoma. Glaucoma is a â€Å"group of eye diseases characterizes by an increase in intraocular pressure (Garcia, Matthews) † in the eyeball causing damage to the optic disc and impaired vision which sometimes develops into blindness for many people every year. Medical researchers found that as the dose of marijuana increases, the pressure within the eye decreases by up to a 30%, thus, lowering the risk of suffering from such a agonizing and dreadful disease (Garcia, Matthews). Cocaine is another drug which can be used because it was the first effective local anesthetic (Spillane, 2000). However, in the late 1880’s surgical procedures using local anesthetics was replaced by a general anesthesia solution. Several countries South America such as Peru and Bolivia still use coca as both a general stimulant and for more specific medical purposes (Spillane 2000). There are, however, some recent and so far uncertain signs of reviving interests in cocaine from the medical institutions and even coca itself for other medical purposes to be used in researches as well as in diagnosis and treatments. Another illegal drug useful for medical usages is heroin. Heroin was once and is still used as a powerful pain-killer which is used to control intense chronic pains caused by severe diseases such as cancer and tuberculosis (Schaffer). Researchers have found signs showing that heroin is significantly less harmful than most of the drugs which are given in its place. There are other ways drugs could be used for medical purposes, however, due to its illegal status there has not been many in-depth studies into the possible uses of illegal drugs as was initially hoped for. Not only will legalizing drugs help the medical community but it will take the medical world into a new horizon with these drugs. The federal government does not know how to control the great amount of money that they have spent on the war on drugs, which still continues. Yearly, â€Å"the federal government spends around $20 billion dollars (Mann, 2001)† on issues related to the war on drugs. Not only does legalizing drugs help needy organizations, but it also helps the community. The money that the government annually spends on the drug war could be used for building rehabilitation centers for handicapped citizens, building more schools to educate people on drugs, or go into funds for a medical or scientific research. According to former chief of the Planning Branch of the National Institute of Mental Health, Theodore R. Vallance, â€Å"the legalization of the now illegal drugs would result in a net saving of $37 billion annual savings for the federal government (Vallance).† The federal government will also benefit from the increase in income due to taxation and licensing of drugs. Just like cig arettes and alcohol, drugs would be taxed. The tax imposed on these drugs should vary on how the drug affects the individuals who take drugs. Marijuana’s side effects, which as â€Å"loud talking and bursts of laughter, lack of memory in conversations, and chronic redness of the eyes (Glantz),† should have a smaller tax rate because its side effects are less severe compared to cocaine and heroin’s side effects. By placing different tax rates on different drugs, according to their side effects, users would start using softer drugs and the usage of harder drugs would be less common because of its high cost. People would have to either start paying to obtain harder drugs or they would diminish their drug use. Drug sales are probably the largest untaxed markets in the United States and around the world, hence, if drugs were legalized, the money from taxing drugs would be used for more serious problems. In short, legalizing drugs will benefit the community at a larger extent. The overly fought, absurd Drug War has been, is, and will continue to be an absolute failure if the United States continues to struggle with it like it has done. Instead, actions needs to be taken and the ultimate alternative is to legalize all drugs. By doing so, a number of lives are saved in many ways. Legalization helps reduce crime, making the community a safer place to live in. Legalization also allows for the exploring or research in the field of medicine. Lastly, the government can save money, but its income will also increase. Works Cited Garcia, G., Matthews, L. â€Å"Laser and Eye Safety in the Laboratory.† New York: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (1995): 102 Glantz, Meyer D. â€Å"Correlates and Consequences of Marijuana Use.† Washington D.C.: METROTEC (1984):37 Mann, Judy. â€Å"Money Spent of Drug War Could Be Put To Better Use.† Washington Post (D.C.) 17 October 2001: C12 Nadelmann, Ethan A. â€Å"An Unwinnable   War on Drugs.† New York Times. 26 April 2001: A23 Spillane, Joseph. Cocaine: from medical marvel to modern menace in the United States. Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press (2000): 58-61 Schaffer, Clifford A. â€Å"Basic Facts About the War on Drugs.† Drug Reform Coordination Network.   

Reflecting Journal Essay

My first team work was in the 1st semester in Research methods. The task was to form the group and write the research paper on chosen topic. Our group of four decided to look at the demographic issue in Germany. This topic was something that we were all interested in so it was not a problem choosing the topic that we all agreed on. We first decided what we wanted to look at and how we were going to achieve this. In our first meeting we decided to split the topic into more specific topics: reasons, problems caused and future predictions. We set up a next meeting in one week and agreed that each of us will do a research on these topics. In our second meeting, we discussed our findings and distributed objectives for each of us. A list was created of the tasks we needed to perform and then we allocated each task to a time slot within our meetings. Our group worked well together as everybody had almost 100% attendance and was committed to getting the project done. However, we did have problems keeping to our schedule. At the very beginning, we conducted various researches which was useful for our paper and there we reached our first challenge- a lot of necessary information was provided only in german and 50% of our group was non-german speaking person. We had to redistribute topics for each of us based on research capacities. This speeded up the whole process. A large amount of time was spent during these meetings on the summary of our findings. This left us a lot of time when we came to the write up of our report. Another problem with our report was its incompleteness. As we put our parts together it looked like there were 4 different research papers in one. We had different structures, writing styles and some of group members in his/her part included information of his/her fellow topic. These issues required extra meetings and to rewrite the whole report.

Ethically acceptable research Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Ethically acceptable research - Essay Example These rules were made regarding overflow of putting predication on nonscientific explanation and experiences rather than on proof. The primary practices at the origin of evidence-based practice can be categorized into three steps: Evidence based regulation specifies the way in which criminologists make decisions based on the identification of rating its reliability scientifically. Hence, it eliminates exceptionally dangerous practices in favor of those that have better results. One of the forms that the regulation may take is a form based on social control theory which is expressed through law as bills, rules, and policies against any nonstandard behaviors. It measures the amount of people connected to their society to the probability of them committing a crime. This can be situational and not as much reliable as evidence based regulation as instances have been seen where people commit crime as a habit or other strange examples. Moreover, as social control theory is based on hypothesis it can always be proved wrong. It is based on the explanatory and predictive form of research research. Probabilistic assumption is another form of the regulation in which professionals assume that an effect will likely occur if specific causes are present. It eliminates the need for any scientific research which is, again, much more accurate and reliable than probability. Criminology and criminal justice are social sciences meaning that these are highly influenced by any political or social incidents taking place in a particular society. Ethically, invasion of privacy, potential harm and deception are protected by law. In addition, researchers should be aware, at all times, of the influence of the research on the society. Hence, to me, evidence based regulation is the most reliable and effective use of proving the crime as it uses reasonable explanations of

Rhetorical Analyses Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Rhetorical Analyses - Essay Example Rupert Murdoch, an ultra-conservative, envisioned in the beginning of Fox News a more conservative observation of the media in contrast to the much more liberal representation that was emanated at the time. The film takes this information and then proceeds to broadcast a systematic series of events that test the validity and substance of Murdoch's journalistic approach. During the Reagan administration, Murdoch demanded the airing of a story in tribute to Reagan. The film portrays this as a problem because Fox News specifically focused on that story over other more important events. The only issue with the way in which they express this information is that they did not indicate what other stories were going on at the time that had a greater value. A very interesting point the film dealt with was its emphasis on very specific parts of internal memos Fox sent to each individual broadcasting station. In the film, they darken the outside information and focus simply on one or two particu lar lines. The material from these one or two lines involved the stories that were to be covered that day or week. The only issue with this method of persuasion is that it does not in fact show the entire memorandum, but rather a very particular part. By hiding the audience from an entire article and instead revealing only a small portion, the documentary distorts the larger issue with minute details. In its emphasis on fair and balanced reporting, the film challenges this claim through a very animated interviewer named Bill O'Reilly. Throughout his segment with the person he is interviewing, he often prevents them from giving their opinion by telling them to "Shut Up." There is a nice clip from the film that combines all sorts of instances where O'Reilly tells others to shut up. This is a very effective way to demonstrate the repetitive disgruntle that O'Reilly has towards anyone that is not a right-wing conservative. These clips also succeed in showing the irrational behavior of a very powerful correspondent. For in fact, he does not truly represent anything even close to the claim of fair and balanced reporting. By constantly interrupting people he interviews, he does not give anyone else but himself a chance to express their opinion. Not only is he biased, but the film also shows his uncontrollable temper at a press conference. At the conference, he tells his opponent to "Shut Up" repeatedly after the man simply responds to O'Reilly with one simple remark. Probably the most influential method the film has at influencing people's opinions of the Fox News organization is its usage of anonymous interviews with previous Fox employees. The interviews involve events and occurrences that went on behind the scenes in the Fox news room. The effective result of all of this is that interviewing anonymous people automatically evokes a sense of fear and suspicion in the audience. Even if the information they present is not factual, the viewer will believe what they are saying because they presume the person is being forced into anonymity by the actions of Fox News. The power in this argumentative device is that it subconsciously convinces viewers that something must be wrong with Fox if all of these normal, everyday people were all mysteriously removed from their positions. The film does not simply use dramatic interviews to entice its

Doha Development Round Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Doha Development Round - Essay Example To add to that, even USA and EU have strategic differences on certain issues. The most recent round, which was held in 2008, broke down after the member countries failed to reach a consensus regarding agriculture import rules (BBC, 2008). Though these were followed by intense negotiations, they failed to break the deadlock. The World Trade Organization was formed with an aim to supervise and liberalize international trade. The Doha round of talks was a devise formulated to achieve that aim and lower trade barriers around the world, thus facilitating growth in trade globally. Besides that, the talks were also meant to insure that multilateral trading system must benefit the developing countries that constitute over three quarters of WTO members. The Doha declaration declared that the member countries of the WTO should strive to negotiate a policy, wherein the developing countries manage to secure for themselves a share in the growth of world trade in accordance with their respective national economic growth. To achieve the above stated goals, the following twin means were identified- reducing import tariffs, thus allowing the developing countries to have wider access to the global markets, and discouraging domestic and export subsidies, which would enable the over-production of goods at very low prices. This in turn would again boost trade practices. The talks were centered around... Thus, the Doha declaration carefully worked on these strategies and elaborated a set of objectives with stipulated deadlines. The objective was to establish a fair and market-oriented trading system through a program of fundamental reforms. The program strengthened rules, and provided specific commitments on government support and protection for agriculture. The purpose was to correct and prevent restrictions and distortions in world agricultural markets. (WTO 2001). As has been discussed earlier, the major emphasis was on decreasing and eventually phasing out export subsidies, reducing support systems that pose a threat to trade relations, and broaden the limits of global markets, thus making them more accessible to the developing countries. Out of the 132 countries that are a part of the WTO, 103 countries are classified as developing or least developed. In majority of these countries, agriculture is the chief occupation for the masses. Thus, all possible steps were taken to ensure that developing countries benefit from the declaration, especially when it comes to the issue of agriculture. The issue was managed under the following dimensions- market access, domestic supports, export competition, and development issues. At certain places, these counties were also rendered special treatment, to alleviate domestic problems of food scarcity and rural development. Recently, however agriculture( more specifically, agriculture import rules) has become the crux of several deadlocks. The reforms were not limited to the agricultural sector alone. Negotiations were also carried out to implement tariff cutting schemes on major non agricultural

Psychiatric Nursing Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 1

Psychiatric Nursing - Essay Example Furthermore, this study attempts to categorize certain â€Å"life events† by their triggering mechanism. Naturally, to each patient, the triggering mechanism will be different; however, by analyzing the association between adverse life events and relapses in a number of individuals with schizophrenia, the authors were able to specifically link certain causal factors with relapses. Lastly, the authors note that a noted increase in what they term â€Å"moderately severe† life events can also lead to a noted increase in psychotic symptoms for the patient. This journal article studies ways in which to develop guidelines for nursing care professionals dealing with suicidal schizophrenics. Due to the high number of attempted suicides within this demographic, mental health professionals require expert direction on how to confront suicidal nature in patients and in what ways to best administer to their needs; all the while ensuring patient safety. The study found that immediately confronting the issue of suicide and the patient’s thoughts, feelings, views, and past history on the subject was the best way to assess suicide risk. This study further supports how health care professionals dealt with the patient in question - C.S. Because no time was wasted in pursuing answers to questions relating to his thoughts and feelings towards suicide, medical professionals were able to fully gauge his intentions. In short, by tactfully attempting to understand the patient in the shortest time possible, medical professionals are able to more efficiently develop a care plan uniquely suited to the patient’s particular needs. This journal article seeks to create a clear and concise body of knowledge for medical professionals on the provision of care for outpatients with bipolar disorders (Goossens et al, 2007). The study further

Efficiency of Clustering algorithms for mining large biological data Research Paper

Efficiency of Clustering algorithms for mining large biological data bases - Research Paper Example They are categorized into portioning, hierarchical and graph-based techniques. The most widely used of the three algorithms are the graph-based technique, and the hierarchical technique. However, the partitioning techniques are used in other disciplines; it is less used in gene sequence clustering and as such, there is no substantial theory of whether the partitioning methods are efficient. This study analyzes four clustering mining algorithms using four large protein sequence data sets. The analysis highlights the weakness and shortcomings of the four and proposes a new algorithm based on the shortcomings of the four algorithms. Introduction Today, protein sequences are more than one million (Sasson et al., 2002) and as such, there is need in bioinformatics for identifying meaningful patterns for the purposes of understanding their functions. For a long time, protein and gene sequences have been analyzed, compared and grouped using alignment methods. According to Cai et al. (2000), alignment methods are algorithms constructed to arrange, RNA, DNA, and protein sequences to detect similarities that may be as a result of evolutionary, functional or structural sequence relationships. Mount (2002) asserts that comparing and clustering sequences is done using pair-wise alignment method, which are of two types, global and local. Consequently, local alignment algorithm proposed by Waterman and Smith (Bolten et al., 2001) is utilized in identifying amino acid patterns that have been conserved in protein sequences. The global alignment algorithm proposed by Wunsh and Needleman (Bolten et al., 2001) is used to try and align many characters of the entire sequence. It is clear from the above that; the pair-wise alignment method is expensive when it comes to comparing and clustering a large protein data set. This is because there are very many comparisons performed during computation, since every single protein in a data set is compared to all the proteins in the data set ( Bolten et al., 2001). This brings into question the efficiency of the pair-wise alignment methods in comparing and clustering of large protein data sets. The pair-wise alignment method, both local and global, do not put into consideration the size of the data set, especially too large data sets that may overwhelm the computer memory. Han & Kamber (2000) argues that, unsupervised learning is aimed at identifying from a data set, a sensible partition or a natural pattern with the help of a distance function. Biology and life science fields have extensively exploited clustering techniques in sequence analysis to classify similar sequences into either protein or gen families (Galperin & Koonin, 2001). Currently, protein sequences can be classified in similar patterns using various, readily available sequencing and clustering methods. As had earlier been mentioned, these methods can be grouped as graph-based, partitioning and hierarchical methods. These methods, especially graph-based an d hierarchical methods, have been used consecutively or together to complement each other as argued by Sasson et al. (2002), Sperisen & Pagni (2005), Essoussi & Fayech (2007) and Enright & Ouzounis (2000). In the field of protein comparison and sequence clustering, there are very few instances in which partitioning techniques have been used. For instance, Guralnik & Karypis (2001) proposed an algorithm or sequencing method-on the