Thanks. I gave a link of this letter in my blog....

As an aside, what exactly was Miss Hilton's crime anyway? The author never makes that clear. Or perhaps being "trashy" or "monkey-faced" constitute offenses unto themselves. Frankly, as far as I am concerned, the woman can behave as immorally as she wishes -- her immorality neither does my body injury nor picks my pockets.

John Hancock Mutual Funds...

Just as with AFDC and other subsidies to bastardy back in the 90s, once the word gets out that such behaviors are not going to get paid for by someone else, you'll see a swift drop in drug use.

For the very small number who truly are "addicted".....well, that's what Skid Row is for. It won't even have to "come back"; it never went away.

Since the political structure of the Empire is based on "compassion" and mass entitlements/transfer payments, I don't expect to see this program enacted any time soon. But still, if you don't bet, you can't win.....

Your servant,

Lord Karth

With that said, no one who reads Chronciles and not even some of the most ardent supporters of a harsher penal code would ever support something like that because quite frankly it's insane. Therefore, the best option is to go the other way: non-enforcement. Do not legitimize by legalizing but save us all the expense of the half-enforcement and the attendant social disfunctions it causes through non-enforcement. Ending drug use should be the prerogative of the family, community, and church.

Nor can I really agree that drugs are destroying the minds of America's youth. I know plenty of people whose minds are no worse off after moderate marijuana use throughout college. It was no different than moderate drinking and probably better than the binge drinking that went on virtually nightly. As for other drugs, not enough people use them regularly to merit much attention (unless we're talking about the underclass, where crack cocaine and heroin use is rampant).

We cannot, in a country like the US, legalize a vice without legitimizing it and giving it affirmative action rights; on the other hand, the campaign to eliminate drugs, doomed from the start, has corrupted the police and completed the ruin the prison/criminal justice system. There is no solution that would not involve a social and moral revolution that the regime exists to prevent.

As a 22-year-old who is on the border (not the frontlines) of such a conflict, I just have to throw in a couple of cents. I agree that the buzzword "War on" anything is ridiculous and a political ploy, and that drug incarcerations as is are seriously misguided. That said, a huge number of my peers use weed, cocaine, meth, ecstasy, etc. in the United States and a growing number in Europe and the effects are devastating for the future of our society. My generation is already really far gone, reared as they were by television, radio, the teachers' union, American academia, and of course parents who came of age in the sixties and got divorced half the time whether or not they were ever hippies; but the chances that they can be redeemed for the future are seriously hampered by the use of mind-altering chemicals. I do not believe we merit the liberty to make that kind of choice; we have already proven it is well beyond our ability to do so.

Of course the problem goes much deeper than substance abuse, and the collapse of morality and social hierarchies was what led to the crisis first in the United States and now in Britain and Ireland. But these drugs reinforce the hedonistic youth subculture that in turn tempts the young away from tradition and truth: it's a constant negative feedback loop. I know what's being done in the U.S. is about as effective and lasting as the Fascists' "suppression" of the mafia in Sicily, but this has got to be addressed.

Dr. Fleming is right that most citizens and most law enforcement officers expect sexual slavery, rape and beat downs to be a part of the punishment that jail offers. This is to be a deterrent to crime, right? Unfortunately this is no more a deterrent than any other form of punishment is a deterrent short of terminating life altogther (which would alleviate the problem that states are having right now dealing with repopulating sex offenders back into local communities).

Of course all of this goes back to the phony populism that supposed makes us feel better. Miss Hilton has been brought low by the system. There is justice after all. Just like Martha Stewart right? No rich person is above the law. Given that most people will not have a mob of paprazzi follwing them when they get out of jail, just a few bucks, their clothes and bans on enployment and voting, this of course is utter nonsense. If anything, going to jail is now becoming status symbol of our new celebrity aristocracy. If princes and nobles can dirty themselves by going to war, then celebrities can go to jail and be with the little people for a month or so. It humbles them, makes them more "human" and of course, fills the time on cable TV news.

Quakers as moral perverts? Do tell....