This^ the only good source of cocaine left is from the farmer in Chile, Uruguay, Paraguay, Panama, Ecuador, Bolivia, Colombia, Peru, etc. desperately trying to keep food on the table for his entire extended family and getting ripped off by the cartels. I do not support the cocaine industry, nor will I ever financially support the cartels. This was an added bonus to me quitting heroin, and all street drugs. Not saying the US pharmaceutical companies I now support are much better though....
I mean yeah, the cartels do give back to their local communities, pay for the schools, keep small businesses afloat, but at what price? Corruption, Unprecedented Violent Crime rates in the border cities.
Don't hate the playa brother.....
If a product is desired that product will be supplied. The only questions are: By who and At what price?
Since we are talking about products that government has decided to criminalize, it puts the product supply in the hands of criminals. Since supplying it is a crime, the suppliers can not turn to law enforcement for protection the way the suppliers of all products not illegal to supply can, they must provide their own protection. And since everyone knows this it makes these suppliers high value targets for thieves. Rob them and the cops are not gonna be called on you. Rob mid/high volume suppliers and the feds are not gonna be called on you. Get robbed as a supplier and you eat the loss 100%. There is no 'insurance' available like there is to all non criminal product suppliers. Nor does the hunting, apprehension, and punnishment of thieves of these suppliers get passed onto taxpayers the way it does for all other product suppliers.
What this does it make it very risky and very dangerous to be a supplier of these products. Professional armed robbers target these suppliers because they know they won't have the feds spending 1million or 10million hunting them. All they have to do is get away with the stuff and not be known and they are home free. So these suppliers are hypervigilant in defending their product since they can't be made whole from insurance and cant pass the costs of chasing and punnishing the thieves onto society the way all other product suppliers can and do. And the punnishment must be death as you wouldn't expect them to build jails and pay guards to watch them and feed them and pay for their medical care, etc, etc, etc.... all the while opening them up to additonal charges of kidnapping where the feds would have open cases of looking for the 'missing person' thieves, would you?
So government is the responsible party when it comes to the death and destruction that is associated with the drug trade. When alcohol prohibiton ended, the Al Capone's of the world were out of biz overnight. So was the corruption. And the manufacturers and distributors went from either having to pay off the cops or hide from them or fight them to WELCOMING them around their establishments, and SOCIETY footed the bill.
Drug addiction has remained constant in the USA prior to the 1920's when the first laws were ever passed making drugs illegal for the first time in the USA till today. It has remained the SAME. Police do not fix drug users. Jails do not fix drug users. They ruin familes hundreds of thousand.s are murdered because government chooses the policy of prohibition over something else.
If drug use and sales were not criminal and doctors, etc were in charge of dealing with the drug issue murders would plummet. All the various theft crimes that are drug related would plummet. There would be tons of cops and jails that would be not needed. And courts. And lawyers. The money saved could help feed your family or whatever need your family has right now that is not adequately being met due to the taxes that are stolen from you to fund the drug war that solves nothing and creates tons of problems.
And maybe, just maybe, people would use drugs more safely (on top of not stealing to fund their habit and making their family parentless due to jail or being killed due to drug prohibition) and even possibly use drugs less or even possibly quit.
But simple economics tells us, just like math and science tells us things, that when there is demand for a product it WILL be supplied.
Maybe you think the current system is working well and are satisfied. Maybe you think it can be tweaked and then it will work pretty good.
Prohibtion of alcohol actually dramatically INCREASED alcohol use and abuse by women. Prior to that time it was a man thing. Prohibiton made it fashionable, going to the speak easy's, the 'scene' of that day.
Drug prohibtion doesn't help you unless your a cop or a lawyer or a judge or a politician or a prison guard or warden or work for a court or a jail. What it does is put you and your family at increased risk of being the victims of ACTUAL CRIMES, like home invasions where someone is looking to steal a TV to get a fix and maybe your 10yo daughter see's the guy and he is starteled and shoots her because he panics.
This does not happen by cigarette addicts or alcohol addicts because the drugs are legal and therefore affordable, people can beg to support their habit or whatever. They don't resort to violent crimes to fund those 'legal' addictions. The same would be true of coke and dope were legal.
Government is the problem. Government is the problem. Make NO mistake, it is 100% governments fault these problems exist and continue to get worse.