Methanol-Tainted Liquor and Xylazine-Tainted Fentanyl Illustrate the Same Prohibitionist Peril

While the lethal effects of Iran’s booze ban are widely recognized, politicians ignore similar consequences from U.S. drug laws.

When the celebrated Iranian artist Khosrow Hassanzadeh died of methanol poisoning this month, everyone but his country's most ardent theocrats recognized that prohibition was the problem. Yet when the Biden administration unveiled its plan to address the "emerging threat" of fentanyl mixed with the animal tranquilizer xylazine last week, it claimed prohibition was the solution.

In reality, these two hazards are manifestations of the same familiar phenomenon. When governments try to stop people from consuming politically disfavored intoxicants, they make consumption of those substances more dangerous by creating a black market in which purity and potency are highly variable and unpredictable.

The danger to which Hassanzadeh succumbed is caused by bootleggers' sloppy distilling practices and reliance on industrial alcohol that is unsafe for human consumption. Hassanzadeh thought he was drinking aragh, a traditional Iranian spirit distilled from raisins, which he obtained from a supplier he mistakenly trusted.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Iran saw a sharp increase in methanol-related deaths and injuries, including permanent blindness, thanks to a combination of folk beliefs about the preventive properties of alcohol and an ethanol shortage caused by the sudden demand for hand sanitizer. In recent months, Iranian authorities have noted another surge in such casualties.

While the proximate cause of the more recent trend is unclear, the root cause is obvious: Iran's ban on alcohol consumption by Muslims forces drinkers to rely on illicit sources that sell iffy and possibly poisonous liquor. In a legal market, people who buy distilled spirits do not have to worry about methanol contamination.

"Khosrow was taken from us because of the lack of social freedoms," Nasser Teymourpour, a fellow artist, observed on Twitter after his friend's death. "You took Khosrow from us."

Although drug warriors are keen to overlook the fact, the same analysis applies to Americans who die after consuming black-market drugs of unknown provenance and composition. The alarm about xylazine in fentanyl, which compounds the danger of fatal respiratory depression and may increase the risk of serious and persistent skin infections, is just the latest illustration of this predictable peril.

Before the federal government was warning us about xylazine in fentanyl, it was warning us about fentanyl in heroin. Both dangers are caused by laws that make drug use a potentially deadly crapshoot.

Fentanyl is much more potent than heroin, so it is easier to smuggle, and can be produced much more cheaply and inconspicuously since it does not require opium poppies. Xylazine has similar advantages: It is an inexpensive synthetic drug that can be produced without crops. And unlike fentanyl, it is not classified as a controlled substance, so it is easier to obtain.

The emergence of fentanyl as a heroin booster and substitute made potency even harder to predict. The consequences can be seen in record numbers of drug-related deaths.

The government aggravated that situation by restricting the supply of legally produced, reliably dosed opioids, which drove nonmedical users toward more dangerous substitutes and left bona fide patients to suffer from unrelieved pain. Despite this recent experience with the perverse effects of prohibition, the Biden administration is confident that it can lick the xylazine menace by stepping up efforts to "reduce and disrupt the illicit supply chain and go after traffickers."

Whether it is vitamin E acetate in black-market THC vapes, MDMA mixed with butylone, levamisole in cocaine, or fentanyl pressed into ersatz pain pills, prohibition reliably makes drug use more hazardous. Sometimes that effect is intentional.

During Prohibition, the federal government required that industrial alcohol be mixed with methanol to discourage diversion. While critics called the resulting deaths "legalized murder," Anti-Saloon League leader Wayne Wheeler argued that "the person who drinks this industrial alcohol is a deliberate suicide," even while conceding that it would cost "many lives" to "root out a bad habit."

Iran's rulers seem to have a similar attitude. Joe Biden, a longtime drug warrior who now claims to embrace "harm reduction," should reject that lethal logic.

© Copyright 2023 by Creators Syndicate Inc.

Comments

[Chumby]

sarc should be thankful he doesn’t live there. Guzzling a couple 40s of methanol couldn’t be good for the lad.

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[Unicorn Abattoir]

Methanol-Tainted Liquor

Still better than Budweiser.

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[chemjeff radical individualist]

No no no. Prohibition will surely work THIS time! /sarc

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[Jerry B.]

"We have always been at war with safe, legal recreational drugs"

[Don't look at me!]

Just say no!

[TheReEncogitationer]

To Prohibitionism and Theocratic Tyranny!

[mad.casual]

When the celebrated Iranian artist Khosrow Hassanzadeh died of methanol poisoning this month, everyone but his country’s most ardent theocrats recognized that prohibition was the problem.

Wait what? You don’t need data to grasp the terribly, terribly forced “wet roads cause rain” narrative (from all kinds of directions) of this article but even the data you do have belies it. Almost to the point of being like a bad atheist parody of the underlying belief structure… or strategic opposition.

First, if I give you poison and kill you, that’s not the poison or the laws against poisoning people’s fault. *I’m* the one who fucking killed you and it *should* be illegal.

Second, regardless of prohibition or laws against poisoning, artists have been knowingly poisoning themselves to death for millennia.

Again the whole thing is ‘wet roads cause rain’. People don’t doctor ethanol or fentanyl because the law says “Don’t produce or acquire alcohol or fentanyl.” They doctor it because it’s cheaper and easier to produce or acquire a doctored product than it is to produce and acquire a quality one and this is fundamentally true without regard for the law. Your fourth paragraph demonstrates this. The law against alcohol didn't change but the number of deaths climbed. The cause divided, again by your own narrative between COVID-19, market demand, and prohibition. Take away the prohibition and you'll still have people drinking (or being fed) completely-legal aquarium cleaner and being forced to get 100% safe and effective experimental injections.

The argument against prohibition isn’t that one person by name died because of a series of consequences of actions taken under prohibition. The argument against prohibition is that going around and arresting people and throwing them in cages even in cases where they only seem like they’re consuming or are tangentially related to consumption is burdensome and oppressive, far more oppressive than not doing so and, if it’s far less, the prohibition is moot.

This, like ENB’s argument about birth control needing to be OTC because remembering to take it every morning is hard, is a libertarian/libertine illusion. Prohibitionists didn’t just whimsically choose alcohol or opioids to ban. They watched multitudes of people poison themselves, waste away, or worse and *then* decided to prohibit the substances. Acting like The Prohibition is the cause of the adverse effects is a more obviously retarded narrative than 40 virgins waiting for someone in the afterlife. Practically guaranteed to get anyone who tries repealing it to go “Well, that didn’t work!” or suffer from equally twisted/oppressive/statist “We repealed Prohibition, but now we need more safe injection sites!”

[sarcasmic]

Shorter mad.casual: unintended consequences do not exist.

[JohnZ]

Unintended consequences like the rise of crime syndicates, organized mobs. The Mafia.
Al Capone, the New York city crime families.
Jayne Edger Hoover refused to recognize the existence of the Mafia.
It's all good.
Just ask Tony Soprano

[mad.casual]

Unintended consequences like the rise of crime syndicates, organized mobs.

Plainly obvious consequence:
Repealing prohibition, or convincing others' to, because some people or even just an artist drank methanol means as soon as people drink methanol without prohibition you, even if only in others' minds, no longer have an argument against prohibition. If you still have reasons, they are the reasons repeal prohibition, not a one-off artist who poisoned themselves.

Equally obvious consequence:
Predicating the repealing of prohibition on protecting people from their own vices and/or ill-will still cedes the underlying argument that it's the government's job to protect people from their own behavior.

I mean, you are aware that there's more than one kind of prohibition, right:

Some kind of limitation on the trade in alcohol can be seen in the Code of Hammurabi (c. 1772 BCE) specifically banning the selling of beer for money. It could only be bartered for barley: "If a beer seller do not receive barley as the price for beer, but if she receive money or make the beer a measure smaller than the barley measure received, they shall throw her into the water."

So, are you saying the Feds directly created Al Capone and The Five Families, saying Al Capone and The Five Families unintentionally set up their criminal syndicates, or otherwise saying Capone and The Five Families otherwise had not agency over their own actions. Because a pretty obvious consequence of that line of thinking is that it's not Antifa or BLM's fault those fires were set and property destroyed.

Because sacrificing any/all personal liberty or agency in opposition of collectivism is not a winning libertarian strategy.

[TheReEncogitationer]

The only ones denying human agency are Prohibitionists who say that “Demon Rum,” “Devil’s Weed,” “Mary Jane,” “Captain Jack,” or “The Gambling Bug” or guns that pull their own triggers will get you if Uncle Sam or Big Brother doesn’t clamp down and save you from yourself.

[mad.casual]

In fairness, I should note, the criticisms of Biden's drug warrior CV is completely valid, actually novel/understated, and welcome from Reason.

My issue with the the article is that it perpetuates a conceptual loop or mythology it's intended to dispel and ignores a more underlying and fundamental truth in the ideology's own narrative. It does so seemingly in an explicitly libertine, anti-Calvinist/Puritan direction for no real reason other than to be anti-Calvinist/Puritan and perpetuate the cycle.

The fundamental precepts of libertarianism are inherently moral and, rather consistently recently, Reason seems to be making the argument that they can or even should be had in *spite* of the morality.

[Roberta]

Who needs the “-ism” in the sense of belief? What I want is the “-ism” in the sense of result or trend. If you can fool the slave master into setting you free because you convince hir you have a contagious disease s/he can catch from you, that’s a win for liberty. Actions are more important than beliefs. Sure, ideas have consequences…but actions are consequences, manifest immediately.

[Zeb]

I totally agree that libertarians should be making the moral argument first and foremost. But when you are talking about law and politics, the consequentialist argument should also be considered. People behave in fairly predictable ways when it comes to incentives and market opportunities, and if you are going to make a law, you need to consider its predictable consequences.

[sarcasmic]

Look up "the cobra effect" if you haven't already heard of it. It's an interesting story about unintended consequences.

[SRG]

"Tax the rat farms"

[mad.casual]

But when you are talking about law and politics, the consequentialist argument should also be considered.

Yeah, but your consequentialist argument still has to be grounded in agency, morals, and self-awareness (as well as chemistry/physics and libertarianism other broader principles). Otherwise, to my point, you're positing libertarianism as something it's not, and as a rather obvious consequence, setting it up to fail.

Case in point, Sullum says, "In a legal market, people who buy distilled spirits do not have to worry about methanol contamination." Libertarianism isn't some mysticism that turns water into wine and paint thinner into moonshine.

The "MUH UNINTENDED CONSEKWENSUZ!" argument only works in someone's favor if people have agency and/or a generally moral self-conception. Otherwise, consequences and intentions don't matter one way or the other.

As I indicate in the post above that you don't/couldn't address, Reason, repeatedly recently, continues to make the case "The law should be repealed or scaled back because we think it should be repealed (with some token and/or personal example sometimes serving as a proxy)." not "The law should be repealed because people are generally moral and/or capable of dealing with the consequences of their choices, good or bad, without having the government impose more consequences on them."

[Roberta]

But the consequentialist argument needs to be grounded, not in your own morals, but in the morals of the person you’re trying to convince. Review Bre’r Rabbit and the briar patch. You need to make them think the action will further their own morals, even if they’re the opposite of yours.

[Roberta]

Sometimes you're better off to hide the moral argument. If your belief is people should be free, but the substantial sentiment of society is that people should be unfree, then you need to hide your belief so as to convince people of some other reason for a policy that will make people freer; otherwise they'll suspect you're insincere — which you are! Insincerity is a winning strategy.

[Quicktown Brix]

Again the whole thing is ‘wet roads cause rain’. People don’t doctor ethanol or fentanyl because the law says “Don’t produce or acquire alcohol or fentanyl.” They doctor it because it’s cheaper and easier to produce or acquire a doctored product than it is to produce and acquire a quality one and this is fundamentally true without regard for the law.

Yes, but a legal market prevents this "doctoring" because legitimate businesses face liability.

[mad.casual]

Yes, but a legal market prevents mitigates this “doctoring” (better) because legitimate businesses face liability competition (*and* doesn't intrinsically motivate or require similarly morally/legally dubious action).

FIFY.

[Quicktown Brix]

Fair enough

[ThomasD]

And you presume everyone will only avail themselves of products sold exclusively by "legitimate" businesses.

The notion that people will not continue to buy and consume illicitly sourced substances, for multiple reasons, standing in stark contrast to reality.

Sellers cut corners because there is a market.

[Quicktown Brix]

Do you know anyone that has gone blind from alcohol in the US?

In a legal market (without excessive taxes), illicit markets cannot undercut legitimate ones. Illicit drugs are expensive because they're illicit. You pay for the legal risks sellers are taking to supply that product. Black markets for pot continue due to excessive taxes on legal weed.

[mad.casual]

Black markets for pot continue due to excessive taxes on legal weed.

And the fact that cannibinoids aren't water solvent and need oils or emulsifiers like Vitamin E acetate in order to be vaped. Meaning the biology of inhaling Vitamin E acetate (or other oils emulsifiers) is what's preventing THC vaping from displacing THC smoking, since both are roughly/approximately equally (il)legal.

Again, libertarianism isn't some magic wand. Repealing gun control laws in Iran isn't guaranteed to and most likely isn't going to eliminate deaths from celebratory gunfire and acting like they would is, seemingly rather knowingly, committing your own personal infraction of the "unintended consequences" rule.

[Quicktown Brix]

Again, libertarianism isn’t some magic wand.

I did not mean to imply it was; just better than what we have.

[JohnZ]

During prohibition? Yes, people did go blind from drinking poisoned hooch. Of course they also drank denatured alcohol strained through a loaf of bread. Then there were certain alcohol based stain removers and paint thinners.

[Quicktown Brix]

Yes, that was my point.

[TheReEncogitationer]

One, no one is arguing against laws prohibiting Involuntary poisoning or murder. Strawman tumbled.

Two, assertion about Khosrow Hassanzadeh willfully poisoning himself which is not found in evidence.

Three, no one asserts that Prohibition causes all bad effects of the prohibited product, rather that Prohibition adds bad effects and makes existing bad effects worse.

Four, while people can and do willfully ingest adulterants regardless of Prohibition, with no Prohibition, no one is forced to risk adulterants in order to consume a product. This is because the product is legal and both law and competition help assure purity and quality.

Your posts are proof that evidently one doesn't need alcohol or drugs, legal or illegal, to be incoherent.

[Wizard4169]

First, if I give you poison and kill you, that’s not the poison or the laws against poisoning people’s fault. *I’m* the one who fucking killed you and it *should* be illegal.

Well, yeah. The point is, legal markets have mechanisms for holding providers of dangerously defective products responsible. They can face civil suits or criminal prosecution. If nothing else, consumers can take their business elsewhere. Illegal markets don’t have any enforcement mechanisms except violence. Since black markets are typically monopolies, consumers can’t even choose another source. So yes, laws do matter.

People don’t doctor ethanol or fentanyl because the law says “Don’t produce or acquire alcohol or fentanyl.” They doctor it because it’s cheaper and easier to produce or acquire a doctored product than it is to produce and acquire a quality one and this is fundamentally true without regard for the law.

This is stupid even by m.c standards. How often do you hear about people dying from legally purchased alcohol? Unless they drink dangerous amounts, I’m guessing not too many. Same for legal pharmaceuticals; aside from deliberate abuse, carelessness or the occasional allergy they don’t kill people. The idea that adulterated ingredients are cheaper is also pretty stupid. This typically true only if prohibition or excessive taxation makes standard ingredients artificially expensive.

The law against alcohol didn’t change but the number of deaths climbed. The cause divided, again by your own narrative between COVID-19, market demand, and prohibition. Take away the prohibition and you’ll still have people drinking (or being fed) completely-legal aquarium cleaner and being forced to get 100% safe and effective experimental injections.

Kinda undermining your own argument there. No, the law didn’t change, but circumstances did. The combination of increased demand and reduced supply aggravated the existing problem. This will come as a huge surprise to anyone who is deeply stupid. Speaking of deeply stupid, might as well throw in some anti-vaxx bullshit. You know, the same bullshit that convinced some idiots to embrace quack remedies. No one anywhere (not counting strawmen and the voices in your head) has ever claimed any vaccine was “100% safe and effective”, a wildly unrealistic standard. The only meaningful standard is whether the vaccine is less of a hazard than the disease.

ENB’s argument about birth control needing to be OTC because remembering to take it every morning is hard

If you keep pulling stuff out of your ass this hard, you’re eventually going to give yourself a prolapse. Or do you have access to some bizarro world version of the site that I can’t find?

Acting like The Prohibition is the cause of the adverse effects is a more obviously retarded narrative than 40 virgins waiting for someone in the afterlife.

Yeah, almost as retarded as thrashing a strawman and then acting like you’ve actually made a point. The point is that prohibition aggravates any existing risks and creates additional hazards.

[sarcasmic]

On an historical note, during Prohibition the federal government added methanol to illegal hooch with the intent of killing those who disobeyed their commands (obey or die is the law enforcement motto).
So the analogy here isn’t that great unless the feds are adding fentanyl and other more potent drugs to captured cocaine and heroin, and putting the deadly cocktails back on the streets. Not that it would surprise me in the slightest if that is what is actually happening.

[Chumby]

Michael J. Fox blames his Parkinson’s on government spraying marijuana crops with harmful chemicals that he later smoked. Shaky. But that is what he claims.

[sarcasmic]

First I ever heard of that.

Speaking of, this old woman Jane had an old friend Jake who she would meet on a park bench every week at an appointed time. While there she would discretely hold his penis. It was their thing. One day he wasn't there. She figured he passed on, but kept going anyway. Then one afternoon she walked by at a different time, and he was there with another woman! She said "What does she have that I don't have?" He smiled and replied "Parkinson's."

[Chumby]

He was exposed! Maybe the Parkinson’s woman had some dirt on him and it was part of a shake down.

[TheReEncogitationer]

“Don’t tell me this town ain’t got no heart. Just gotta poke around!”
–"Shakedown Street," The Grateful Dead.
🙂

[Its_Not_Inevitable]

Alternate answer: "My penis in her hand."

[Chumby]

If his penis not running dry, perhaps they will see a John Handcock.

[TheReEncogitationer]

The biggest signature on The Declaration of Independence. It's as if he was saying: "Suck it, George III! Come and get me!" 🙂

[TheReEncogitationer]

But how would he know unless a time-travelling Snowmobile took him "Back In Time" to test this claim?

[JohnZ]

Prohibition in the 1920's and 30s didn't stop anyone from drinking booze and beer. In fact more people drank during that time than before.
With the rise of organized crime and along with it violence that it produced between competing mobs and of course the rise of Al Capone in Chicago, the St. Valentine's Day massacre and finally the confession by the prohibitionists that it was a failure and that it led to bad unintended consequences that we are paying for even today.
Prohibition does not work.

[sarcasmic]

Fast forward a century and we've got cartels competing with governments, gangs murdering each other, deaths from adulterated product, corrupt cops, abuses of power, overflowing prisons... history shmistory, we just need to try harder!

[Quicktown Brix]

Prohibition in the 1920’s and 30s didn’t stop anyone from drinking booze and beer. In fact more people drank during that time than before.

That’s not true. Prohibition did reduce alcohol consumption. It failed because it created more and worse problems than it fixed.

I have no doubt that current drug prohibition reduces drug use somewhat, especially casual use, if for no other reason than driving prices up. It probably does less to prevent addiction and probably leads to more overdose deaths for the reasons discussed above. It definitely makes crime and disease worse.

[mad.casual]

That’s not true. Prohibition did reduce alcohol consumption.

Similarly, saying prohibition caused the rise in organized crime is a bit misleading as well. It certainly contributed, but organized crime existed and spread from places where prohibition didn't exactly exist and the overarching term of 'organized crime' rather connotes that which specific country or law being exploited is moot.

Again similarly, the Pure Food and Drug Act predates the 18th Am. by about a decade and a half. The idea Sullum posits, that free markets are free of contaminants until government/societies act upon them, is a rather libertine religious notion rather than anything resembling libertarianism.

[ThomasD]

“The idea Sullum posits, that free markets are free of contaminants until government/societies act upon them, is a rather libertine religious notion rather than anything resembling libertarianism.”

This. A thousand times this.

Sullum, like most all of his ilk here at Reason are indeed libertines, and it is a religion. Which is why they insist on making these backhanded Utilitarian arguments that promise live saving outcomes.

Meanwhile the only thing that libertarianism promises is liberty.

So, sure, in libertopia alcohol, fentanyl, and all other manner of intoxicants may be freely sold by licit suppliers. But in that same libertopia people will indeed continue to die from consuming methanol , or other dangerous adulterants within products sold by less than scrupulous actors . Either as illicit counterfeit licit product, or just plain old fly-by-night, no-questions-asked, pays-your-money-and-takes-your-chances licit products.

Because both the seller and purchaser are at liberty to do so.*

*liability may or may not attach depending upon what representations were made by the seller and the degree of caveat emptor that is expected by whatever law is enforced.

As a real world example consider the "bath salts" or "incense" that used to be freely sold in convenience stores. None of which had packaging or directions indicating they were intended for human consumption, and some of which included express warnings of "not for human consumption" along with alternate directions for use.

Anyone who buys a product, knowing that the packaging is a lie, is surely responsible for whatever misadventure follows.

[Wizard4169]

Yes, organized crime existed before prohibition. That doesn't mean handing them a lucrative new business was somehow a good idea.

Actually, the market was making dramatic strides towards improving product quality and labeling before the government stepped in. If you look close enough, this is usually the case with government regulation. The state steps in and claims the credit for fixing a problem that was already half-solved. Then they keep pushing towards (and sometimes beyond) the point of diminishing returns.

[JohnZ]

Yes it did. The creation of Speakeasys and other illicit "taverns" drew in people who would other wise never have thought of imbibing.

[Quicktown Brix]

We don't need to argue about this. This has been well studied and the numbers are widely available.

[Wizard4169]

Overall alcohol consumption did decline, but it's unclear how much of this was due to Prohibition. Consumption had been trending downwards for decades. Without this, Prohibition probably never would have passed in the first place.
Drug prohibition is somewhat similar. Any reduction in use is probably marginal. Most prohibited drugs appeal to only a limited number of people, and few people would become regular users if they were suddenly available legally. The one notable exception is marijuana, as shown by increasingly successful pushes for legalization.

[Brandybuck]

> politicians ignore similar consequences from U.S. drug laws.

Yes, ignore. They KNOW the consequences, they just choose to ignore them. Maybe because they were indoctrinated by a lifetime of public school and media, or maybe because they just don't care. But a century after prohibition it is NOT a mystery that this type of stuff happens.

And yes, BOTH SIDES. Biden is the biggest drug warrior that ever lived, next to Feinstein and Pelosi, but the Republicans are no better, and always volunteer to be the political shock troops in the WOD. Trump could have changed things, but the only time he got off his ass about the WOD was when a celebrity bimbo begged him.

[mad.casual]

They KNOW the consequences, they just choose to ignore them.

I'm not Iranian, so maybe there is something woven into the cultural narrative there that Jacob is completely glossing over, but I am/have been a consumer of illicit substances, including alcohol. Summing up or conflating any/all laws that prohibit alcohol production and consumption, especially across cultures, and calling for the repeal of any/all of them based on the fact that someone didn't *know* the risks of drinking homemade spirits seems rather analogous to summing up any/all laws against murder or assault, especially across cultures, and calling for the repeal of any/all of them because someone didn't *know* the consequences of murder or assault.

As I indicate out of the gate, maybe Iran doesn't teach HS Chemistry and/or even forbids the discussion such that even Iranian Rednecks/Towelheads don't know that drinking moonshine carries the risk of methanol poisoning (like American Rednecks generally do). But that would seem to be more of a failing of Free Speech and public education than on prohibition. Even if drinking alcohol were completely legal, giving methanol to someone drink unwittingly should be some form of (illegal) fraud, abuse, or exploitation/coersion.

[Brandybuck]

Legal alcohol in Iran would definitely minimize the occurrences of methanol poisoning in Iran. Sure a few deaths as drunkies insist on guzzling aftershave or something. But its beyond obvious that the prohibition increases the bad alcohol. We saw it in our prohibition. It's no mystery. One doesn't need to have studied chemistry to know that legal whisky is better than some illegal hooch.

[mad.casual]

One doesn’t need to have studied chemistry to know that legal whisky is better than some illegal hooch.

Khosrow Hassanzadeh would seem to stand as an example of the falseness of this presumption.

[ThomasD]

"...legal whisky is better than some illegal hooch..."

Yep. There it is again.

There is that particular strain of "libertarian" who claims to reject superstitious religion and it's "sky god" instead positing their tongue in cheek "flying spaghetti monster" all the while putting their faith in government to save people from themselves. with their particular choice of hooch or whatever else they deem to be undesirable.

It really is their religion. They simply lack the mental depth to recognize it as such.

[Wizard4169]

Yet another deeply stupid statement, on at least two points. First, the guy didn't choose iffy black market booze over legal whiskey. He chose a risky product over nothing. Second, people may engage in dangerous behavior out of ignorance, but sometimes they choose to take risks they're fully aware of.

[Jefferson's Ghost]

The entire argument about drugs, alcohol consumption, and other, often illicit activities (including bans on gambling — even “numbers” rackets,” prostitution, etc.) and attempts at their prohibition or elimination ignores the elephant in the room: “People will do what they want to do, and if what they want to do is illegal, some of them — often a good number of them — will do it anyway.”

Legalization and regulation of such “illicit” activities at least offers the chance to keep most of organized crime, and their inherent violence, out of the picture.

[Brandybuck]

Up above someone excused prohibition by saying it didn't create organized crime. So what? The organized crime was already there and engaged in illegal gambling and illegal prostitution.

If people want it and it's illegal, organized crime will be there providing it.

[ThomasD]

"Legalization and regulation" of private adult behavior is not libertarian. Doing so with the express goal of "saving lives" is even less so.

Might as well argue in favor of sodomy laws as they are entirely equivalent.

[Jefferson's Ghost]

"“Legalization and regulation” of private adult behavior is not libertarian. Doing so with the express goal of “saving lives” is even less so."

You misunderstand me. By "regulated," I mean such things as a minimum age to purchase alcohol and certain other drugs, as well as a level of quality control over what is IN those pills -- I don't mean the government taking "control." As far as what consenting adults do in their homes, I could not care less. Safe drugs would reduce the frequency of overdoses and deaths from low-quality, home-made "pharmaceuticals."

[Honest Economics]

For sound economic perspective go to https://honesteconomics.substack.com/

[Its_Not_Inevitable]

How’s about a preview here or “teaser”? Make us want to click your link. Do better.

[TheReEncogitationer]

If it has no articles on Prohibitionism, fuck no!

[Longtobefree]

Well, let's see; which gives the fascists greater opportunities to control the general populace, prohibition or legalization?
So maybe we are seeing the natural progression of a totalitarian party taking over a nation?

[Jefferson's Ghost]

"Well, let’s see; which gives the fascists greater opportunities to control the general populace, prohibition or legalization?"

Well, from my perspective, organized crime (even if only organized at the neighborhood level), is fascistic by default -- one could claim that total control over the "market" is essential if they are to retain their power. Such entities rely on monopoly, ensured by force, to survive.

Legalization can prevent such monopolization, through market forces, by making it less profitable for any particular entity.

Legalization + Regulation lies somewhere in-between. If over-regulated or over-taxed, or both (CA pot laws, as a for-instance), it can create its own "fascism," which is of marginal improvement over attempts at prohibition, since it still results in a largely underground market.

[mad.casual]

So maybe we are seeing the natural progression of a totalitarian party taking over a nation?

Libertarian Moment Periapsis!

[Jefferson's Ghost]

"So maybe we are seeing the natural progression of a totalitarian party taking over a nation?"

Actually, I see TWO such parties.

[Brandybuck]

Indeed. When a governor of a state thinks he can control what is taught in PRIVATE colleges, and his entire party cheers, that is an authoritarian party with aspirations of totalitarianism.

Same boot, different laces.

[mad.casual]

Actually, I see TWO such parties.

Let me guess, the Caucasoid party and the Negroid party, right? No? Cops and Robbers? Cowboys and Indians? Pirates and Ninjas? New York-style and Chicago-style? People who eat ketchup on hot dogs and normal adults?

The breadth and depth of my thought is too big to rightly conceptualize *exactly* what you mean, please narrow all the options down so that we can understand your binary thinking and how evil and wrong the binary ends of your thinking are because they are binary and binary thinking like that is evil and wrong.

[JohnZ]

The left has always wanted totalitarian power.

[Nominalis]

Is there anything that prohibition cannot accomplish? First it created the market for fentanyl and now just a little bit more prohibition is going to solve the problems associated with the proliferation of fentanyl. Be prepared for "Frack Fentanyl", ten times as potent and twenty times as prosecutable.

[JohnZ]

The situation is only going to worsen as more and more Xylazine gets into the mixture. There is no way at this time to stop someone from O.D.ing due to this powerful tranquilizer, nope not Narcan.
The best investment right now is to invest in casket makers.

[Chumby]

One could make a killing. Cemetery plots can be lucrative too since folks are just dying to get in.

[Naime Bond]

In a legal market, people who buy distilled spirits do not have to worry about methanol contamination. More than 140,000 people die from excessive legal alcohol use in the U.S. each year. Talking about one death from illegal or legal booze and trying to draw 'conclusions' from it is stupid.

[CindyLeslie]

My last paycheck was $8750 just ecom working 12 hours every week. My neighbor has found the estimation of $15k for a long time and she works around 20 hours for seven days. I can not trust how to direct it was once I tried it information..

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