BadComrade wrote:He emulated me.

Is it hard fighting the system from your parent's den?

Who's fighting the system? I guess keeping people in jail is better than treating their addictions, sounds sane. Keep up the good work.

There are plenty of ways to get into rehab without having to get arrested specifically just for drugs: impaired on the job, pressure from friends, family and loved ones, getting a DUI, getting arrested doing another crime while intoxicated on some substance.And coming to the realization, on your own, that it is time to quit.

There are plenty of functional drug addicts who do not fall into the stereotype of "the typical drug addict".

For most, losing, or almost losing, their job, is the last thing to fall apart, last after relationship problems with lovers, friends and family, and often is the thing that prods them to seek help.

BadComrade wrote:

Andrew. wrote:If you think the local "Sheriff" - by virtue of his personal experience - is logically the best person to address this subject, you reveal yourself as an unthinking imbecile.

Then later, Andrew. wrote:I didn't say cops are dumb. Nor did I say anything hateful. And I'd like to think we would get along over a beer, talking music. I was referring to Bad Comrade's comment that somehow you trump statistics because you're invested in perpetuating the system to which they refer.

I find it amusing that you pointed out that you didn't say cops are dumb, and didn't say anything hateful, right before you put words in my mouth. I never said or even implied that Redline "trumps" statistics; I said, "I love seeing all of you retards trying to throw statistics at a fucking Sheriff."

I thought my statement was pretty self-explanatory, but since you somehow read in to it, here's what I meant: Redline is closer to these "statiscts" on a daily basis than any of you will ever be, so I find it amusing that you're trying to throw pie charts at him. Why don't you guys show Steve diagrams on how to set 2 mics up for an M-S configuration while you're at it...

This doesn't make sense. Redline was basically arguing that incarceration rates in the U.S. are no cause for concern, that everyone in prison deserves to be there, end of story. The statistics, which break down incarceration by race, income, etc, and which demonstrate that the U.S. imprisons more of its population than any other nation on earth, suggest there's greater and more complex forces at work than can be settled by suggesting that U.S. law is better at catching bad guys than the rest of the world.

Redline isn't a criminologist or a sociologist. He's not someone whose job it is to critically and objectively assess imprisonment as a national phenomenon. Your 'why don't you show Steve Albini mic placement diagrams' analogy demonstrates that I wasn't putting words in your mouth: you've just made the same confused point I said you were making. Your mic analogy would only be to the point if I or others had been arguing - based on stats and pie charts - how best to arrest someone, how best to police a district, etc. No one was doing that.

So, it seems I wasn't putting words in your mouth. You're making the same invalid argument I thought you were making. It's a specious appeal to authority and experience. It's like trotting out a Sergeant Major stationed in Iraq who says the the Iraq war was justified and the occupation is working, and expecting that to settle the argument.

BadComrade wrote:I find it amusing that you pointed out that you didn't say cops are dumb, and didn't say anything hateful, right before you put words in my mouth.

Man, I don't want this to be a 'fight." I've met you. I like you. I honestly didn't know you were a cop. I thought you worked in a record shop or something, but I'll like you just the same if you are a cop. If you're not a cop, then the above quotation is just as incoherent as the rest of your reply. That is, even if I had put words in your mouth, it wouldn't mean I said that cops are dumb or that I'd expressed hatred towards them. It would just mean I implicitly called you a mean name. If it helps, my "imbecile" charge was mean and unhelpful and I don't think you are an imbecile; nonetheless, the point you're wedded to making on this thread isn't valid, and it makes you look dumb.

Redline wrote:fidelista wrote:

let them get the drugs in a safe environment from a doctor, and let them live their lives as normally as they can.

Sounds great, where do I send my donation?

How about you just don't throw them in jail unless they are violating someone elses rights, and not just abusing themselves with drugs that may or may not be more harmful than legal alternatives?

BadComrade wrote:I also find all of the "legalize it" and suggestion of putting people in rehab instead of jail pretty funny too. I have a feeling that most people who take this stance have never really had any dealings with addicts. I also have a feeling that most people who take this stance don't live in large cities, where you encounter hardcore drug users on a daily basis.

My brother in law is a meth addict. What the fuck do you know about addiction? The only thing criminalizing the substance he's addicted to has accomplished is to force him out of respectable society with a jail record and stripped the hope of a better life away from him, which in turn encourages drug abuse. It's a horrible drug to be addicted to, but once you are addicted there are not many options available, and throwing someone in jail for being addicted to a substance you don't like accomplishes nothing except turning them into subhumans worthy of your contempt, and deserving of the miserable fate you advocate for them.

If we banned alcohol again you would see the same thing happen to your friends, neighbors, and family. They would go from normal productive members of society who consume alcohol and may or may not be addicted to it, to junkies with no future and no hope, all with the stroke of a legislators pen. But because it's a drug that you or someone close to you consumes, you would find it outrageous and unjust if that happened.

BadComrade wrote:Find me a job program that's going to hang out jobs that will pay these people enough money to support themselves without being forced to live in a halfway house,etc. Last I checked, it was pretty fucking hard to live off of a dishwasher's wages...

As a society we refuse to give a living wage to people who work hard jobs making rich people richer, and yet we are perfectly willing to drop around 30k a year keeping them in a cage along with violent criminals and sexual predators, should they develop a substance abuse habit from living the extremely stressful life of the working poor. Great use of resources.

BadComrade wrote:Oh, and for people who are acting like a huge chunk of the US
population are currently stuck in prision for drug charges:

This chart (supplied by the US Dept. of Justice) seems to
show that 52% of people in prison are in for violent crime,
and only 20% for drugs. So, 452,000 people are in prison
on drug charges. There are almost 304 million people in
this country. So that's what, 1/10th of 1% of the US
population that is in jail on drug charges? Big deal.

As my opening post states:

Using updated state-by-state data, the report said 2,319,258 adults were held in U.S. prisons or jails at the start of 2008 -- one out of every 99.1 adults, and more than any other country in the world... The report said the United States is the world's incarceration leader, far ahead of more populous China with 1.5 million people behind bars. It said the U.S. also is the leader in inmates per capita (750 per 100,000 people), ahead of Russia (628 per 100,000) and other former Soviet bloc nations which make up the rest of the Top 10.

We have more people in jail than the repressive totalitarian police state with a population of 1.3 billion people. To me, that is a big deal.

You really think that some sheriff in fucking Milwaukee spends his time studying nationwide statistics regarding incarceration rates for drug offenses?

Redline wrote:We really don't have a health crisis now. We will if they let drug use escalate through leagalization / ultra-light sentancing.

What a relief. There's no health crisis. Lucky we've got those tough drug laws out there, stopping people from taking drugs.

BadComrade wrote:Redline is a sheriff.

He's already aware of the statistics related to his profession.

Non-sheriffs on this board trying to "school" him with those very statics made me laugh.

I would also find it funny if non-recording engineers tried to show Steve how to adjust the azimuth on a tape machine he's been using for 20 years.

Andrew wrote:Redline isn't a criminologist or a sociologist. He's not someone whose job it is to critically and objectively assess imprisonment as a national phenomenon. Your 'why don't you show Steve Albini mic placement diagrams' analogy demonstrates that I wasn't putting words in your mouth: you've just made the same confused point I said you were making. Your mic analogy would only be to the point if I or others had been arguing - based on stats and pie charts - how best to arrest someone, how best to police a district, (how best to adjust the azimuth on a tape machine), etc. No one was doing that.

The only conclusion I can draw is that Bad Comrade is autistic or something.