This submission's title could have done without the editorializing. The article touched briefly on the actions of the cops themselves, in a few places, but focused far more on the systematic issues as a whole, related to the prosecution of drug crimes, as well as about 75% content covering the writer's medical condition.
The whole point of the article is that government policies are causing systemic suffering among those with debilitating medical conditions. It's about the hundreds of thousands of people dying each year in the U.S. because of drug prohibition, and the millions more who are in horrific pain.
Is there one person on Hacker News that will write a heartfelt comment in support of drug prohibition? I don't think there is but am prepared to be surprised.
Otherwise, what is this post doing here? What are we learning from it? Is this just an opportunity for us to bicker about Obama vs. Bush vs. Ron Paul?
There's a difference between being vaguely against drug prohibition and having the facts and stories necessary to convince others. In the past 18 months I've read 6 or 7 books about drugs, gone to three conferences on the science of drugs, and listened to another 50+ hours of podcasts. From all this I've learned an enormous amount of stuff that I would have never learned just by reading Reddit or whatever.
There is a world of difference between knowing that many people smoke weed, versus having not only memorized the numbers from the most reputable surveys but also having read through their methodology, as well as all of the scientific research that methodology is based on. (If your curious about the validity of self-reported drug use, check out this: http://archives.drugabuse.gov/pdf/monographs/Monograph167/Mo...)
I'm not trying to defend this story specifically, although I thought it was good, but there are definitely reasons for learning more about drugs even if you're already against prohibition.
(Also, for what it's worth, if you go through my submissions page there is an enormous amount of really intellectually interesting stuff related to drugs, drug use, the war on drugs, etc., and virtually all of it would be completely new to those reading it.)
I agree, but that's not this post, is it? You think it's a good story, so, how about saying why? It'll likely be the only productive debate on the thread.
* The information about Anklyosing Spondylitis. I know someone who has it.
* The low-income workers flushing their medications that they legitimately need because they are afraid of getting arrested, being forced to pay thousands to retain a lawyer, etc.
* The fact that if the DA says they have "reason to believe" you are going to sell your legally prescribed medication, you aren't even allowed to say that your doctor prescribed it or why you need it for medical reasons in your defense. So you essentially aren't allowed to defend yourself at all, which means you are all but guaranteed to go to prison based on the flimsiest of accusations.
I can't tell you for sure why 50 people upvoted it, but I can say why I posted it (and why I originally expanded on the given title): because unlike a lot of other articles about drug prohibition (pro or con) or other side non-computer topics (TSA, etc) of some interest to some HN readers, this one specifically explores its effect on average people. Not on crime or prison or nonviolent offenders or "real drug" users (we've heard a lot about all that), but on people who take what the French would call médicaments rather than drogues---which is a lot of people---and on the deeper implications of the "drug war" on their lives, their relationships with the law, and their interactions with police. Also the AS stuff, which is interesting, but it's background and setup for the main argument of the essay.
Also, the original title is not very descriptive and not only doesn't tell you its thesis, it doesn't even tell you which drug-related topic it's about.
If there's one person on HN who doesn't think drug prohibition is an ongoing tragedy, I'd be surprised to see them say it. If everyone is just going to find different (and prickly) ways to agree with the thesis of an article, and it's not directly germane to HN, I don't think it belongs here.
"Illustrating the true dimensions of a tragedy" is not a back door for political/public-policy issues.
Here is, I think, a valid acid test:
* Does the story generate genuine debate in the comments about the core idea in the story? (Not really.)
* Do the story itself mention Obama? (No.)
* Do the comments mention Obama? (Yes.)
... then something's wrong with the story for HN. Not every good story has a home here.
> Does the story generate genuine debate in the comments about the core idea in the story?
Well, I would have liked to see some debate about the nature of police states and what sorts of police actions make a population as a whole more rather than less likely to go to the police with their problems...
...but everyone was too busy arguing over whether the story belongs on HN to get that far. Um, my bad, I guess.
What debate? Seriously: you want a debate about something that virtually everyone on HN agrees about. There are right-leaning and left-leaning people alike on HN, but even Daniel Markham opposes the police state. Are we debating just to hear ourselves talk?
The question of whether stories like this belong on HN or not is more interesting than the other questions being discussed here, because at least this question has opposing interests and can lead to a conclusion of some sort.
I find the wording kind of problematic. If someone asked me if I was for "ending drug prohibition", I would have to say no. If someone asked me about specific ones, then I would probably say yes to some of them. I would have serious problems with the legalization of meth or crack. I would also say I don't want to give a huge loophole to pharmaceutical companies to put their wares on the streets without formal testing.
I feel like I have to be that guy. How is this Hacker News?
Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.
I guess if I really needed to, I could make some argument that connected stories like this to the forces that either support or cripple innovation. I realize that the crowd that reads Hacker News is mostly into software, but Hacker News is also an important website for anyone who is into innovation and entrepreneurialism. Some people who read Hacker News have ideas for startups that, if successful, would come up under the regulatory review of the FDA. As such, the heavy-handed tactics that the US government uses against anything drug related becomes a block on innovation in that field. An entrepreneur contemplating some new bio-tech, say some interesting use of new proteins from bio-engineered stem cells or bacteria, has to feel a chill when reading an article like this.
The problem is that the government's actions appear to be both arbitrary and heavy-handed, meaning that even when an entrepreneur has good reasons for taking whatever action they take, they may not be given a fair chance to explain themselves.
Hacker News sometimes upvotes articles that are not about software or startups, but they are about the US economy. This article (above) could be tied into that category of posts. After all, the USA is at risk of getting a very uneven form of innovation. If everyone who wants to do a startup dealing with drugs has to face (or their customers have to face) arbitrary actions from the government, whereas those entrepreneurs working with software face very little regulatory review, then the USA is going to get a lot of innovation with software, and relatively little innovation in fields in which drugs are involved. We will have an abundance of small web startups and a shortage of small biotech startups.
For a variety of reasons, too long to cover in this comment, it would be better for the USA, and the world, if innovation could happen evenly across all sectors, so that the only brake on entrepreneurs was their own imaginations.
This article gratifies my intellectual curiosity. Current drug policies stifle innovation here and abroad. I work with students in SSDP who would make great hackers, but they are stigmatized from even trying to apply for computing jobs at many places due to fears of random drug tests and past drug convictions.
Granted, what would be more appropriate to Hacker News would be articles about Dr. Shulgin, arguably the greatest drug hacker of all time.
82% of Americans report using or having used Marijuana, and 73% report using illegal drugs other than marijuana. 89% admit to having used any illicit drug.
Can someone remind me again why Obama wants to lock 89% of Americans in cages?
"I think Obama's against those policies, that's just a really tough political battle for him without a lot of payoff."
The fact is that he went out of his way to block scientific research by appointing Leonhart as DEA administrator. He goes out and claims he supports scientific integrity, but his actions show this is completely false. Nominating someone who supported science wouldn't be controversial or cost him any political capital, but he nominated her anyway just to stall progress and create a climate of fear.
No one is claiming it would be politically feasible for Obama to pass laws allowing heroin in the checkout lines of Wal-Mart, but the fact is that he's rejected every opportunity for change, even the ones with zero political cost.
Fact is the federal gov't has not been harrasing people in states that have legalized pot nearly as much in the previous administartion.
But congress might actually be changing in a way that is more condusive to change becuase the tea party/libertarian types are more open to this than the socially conservative republicans a lot of them are replacing. We'll see. But even I think it is a lower level priority for the federal government and comes down to state and local government. The cops in this story are local, not the FBI.
"The federal gov't has not been harrasing people in states that have legalized pot nearly as much in the previous administartion."
This is mostly true. Unfortunately that has been the extent of the progress. And the administration still routinely makes threats against states that are thinking about reforming their drug laws.
"The cops in this story are local, not the FBI."
* Many local police departments get funding from the feds if they to spend it on drug enforcement. The vast majority of cities that get offered this money can't afford to turn it down, because it also gets used to keep the rest of the town afloat.
* The fact that drugs are illegal on the federal level strongly discourages local governments from legalizing drugs. Many citizens are afraid that the feds will start conducting raids in their town or find a way to cut off their highway funds or otherwise penalize them. Elected officials are afraid of getting sent to jail if they legalize drugs in their towns, even though technically it's perfectly legal.
Your link to the DEA shows a total 9 news releases relating to marijuana enforcement actions for 2009-2010. This compares with 15 for 2008, 15 for 2007, 16 for 2006, and so on. Your CBS link quotes the DEA's 'record number of pot seizures' but the actual story makes clear that the record is set by the number of seized plants rather than the number of enforcement actions.
The grandparent post observed that that the federal government was 'not harassing people...nearly as much as the previous administration.' It did not make any claims that federal enforcement had halted. Indeed, your linkage seems to support rather than refute the claim that was made.
I don't support drug prohibition, but I have to take the outraged complaints about the federal government with a pinch of salt; California voters had the opportunity to legalize the growing, possession and sale of pot 6 weeks ago and decided not to do so. I have heard numerous people mentioning that they voted against it or didn't want it to pass because it would have impacted the business of someone they know in the trade, since legalization would probably have led to a price collapse, at least in the short term. Whether this perspective was held by enough people to alter the outcome of the voting I do not know, but it seems the police are not the only ones invested in the status quo.
It's actually much higher than that, for a few reasons.
* It doesn't correct for students (12th graders) who were absent on the day of the survey, or for the 12-15% of students who drop out of high school before the fall of their senior year. By using clever methodology they are actually able to measure how the differences in drug use among students who were absent the day of the survey, but they don't correct for it. (They explain the differences in the methodology though.) And as for students who dropped out, Appendix A of volume 1 of the same report explains how they concluded that dropouts were probably 1.5x more likely to have used marijuana by 12th grade. So if you take into account that the 20% of dropouts and absentees have a lifetime prevalence closer to 88%, then that would increase the total lifetime prevalence of marijuana use by about 1%, so to 83%.
The survey partially corrects for this by counting those who recant after admitting to use on at least two previous surveys (multiple years apart) as having used marijuana. However, students weren't surveyed until 12th grade, so it stands to reason that if the 1.8% linear rate of recanting held until age 13 years 11 months, the average age of first marijuana use, then you'd have to add about 5.5%. Again this is somewhat speculative, but probably roughly accurate.
* It seriously undercounts those who later become heavily addicted to drugs. So anyone who didn't use drugs through 12th grade but then became a drug addict essentially wouldn't be counted at all.
* It doesn't count people who would have used marijuana at some point after 12th grade, but who died of non drug-related causes before they got a chance to. This is significant because unlike alcohol where virtually everyone who will ever drink has already started by age 18 or so, a large percentage of eventual marijuana users are still trying the drug for the first time up until their mid 30s.
The fact is that if you make it to age 50, your chances of having smoked weed are probably closer to 88-90%. The Erowid thing I linked to is also good in general for as a quick way of grokking the validity of the numbers.
It doesn't seem strange to me. Most people have gone through high school and had some chance to hang around with college kids (or gone to college). Anyone who has done those things has almost certainly been offered a hit, and there is almost no downside to accepting such an offer.
