A Silver Lining to the South

Today's entry in the "Why Can't the U.S. Be More Like...?" sweepstakes is Argentina. It seems that judges in the land of beef and tango (not necessarily in that order) have simply stopped punishing people for violating the nation's drug laws -- at least those dealing with "personal use of drugs" as opposed to dealing. An announcement by the judges included the statement, "Criminalization will only apply in cases where the possession of narcotics for personal consumption represents a danger for the public health of others." Now, my question is (in case you haven't already guessed), why can this level of plain common sense not be found here -- in any court in the land, at any level? Why is it still, after decades of evidence to the contrary, contended that personal drug use which does not constitute a clear and imminent danger to others nonetheless represents a threat sufficient to rock the very foundations of society and rend the fabric of the Republic? (And if it's that fragile, is it really worth saving anyway?) Well, one guess is that we have one thing the Argentinians definitely do not have, and that is the Puritan tradition of harboring a morbid fear that someone, somewhere, might be having fun. We also have a drug abuse-based legal system which depends for its life support on the indiscriminate use of Draconian punishment for a wide assortment of, basically, personal habits. It explains why our prison population is so exceptionally high (1% of all Americans are in the pokey, according to latest figures -- more on this in a future post); but that, in turn, adds to the self-perpetuation of the system and the power of the "law enforcement" (read "punishment") lobby. I have spoken at length about our apparent need, as a society, to have a large "loser class", so that no matter how low one sinks, as long as one is walking the streets one can be sure that there are millions who are worse off. This, of course, is a social pathology in itself, but it shows no signs of abating, especially as life in general becomes more fragmented, alienating, and impersonal. Which "failed utopia" novel was it where there was a TV channel devoted entirely to footage of people getting beaten up? We are fast approaching this state of affairs. In the meantime, the Puritans of today stalk the land, looking for reasons to arrest and incarcerate, and the "war on drugs" provides the single best rationale.

Ah yes, the Argentinians. They are volatile -- irrational at times -- politically chaotic -- economically edgy -- but they know a scam when they see one, and the "war" on personal drug use is most assuredly a scam, no matter where it is being pursued.