jeffw"America First" foreign policy: JD Vance wants to abandon Ukraine but bomb Mexico and Iran
talMexican drug cartels are responsible for manufacturing and smuggling much of the fentanyl that enters the United States and causes most drug overdose deaths, killing about 150 people a day.
Vance’s repeated calls for aggressive military force, including bombing campaigns targeting…drug cartels in Mexico.
I know that the addicts in question are American, and that the manufacturers aren’t, and that assigning responsibility for domestic problems to voters probably isn’t much of a vote-winner, but I feel that maybe, just maybe, at a certain point, you gotta attach a certain amount of responsibility for drug use to the addicts rather than the foreign manufacturers.
I don’t think that we’re ever going to have a world where addictive, recreational drugs are simply nonexistent. I think that that’s probably a lot more of a dead end in terms of drug policy than people choosing not to use.
We’ve got a pretty potent military. But I don’t think that this is really a problem for which military solutions are all that useful.
Lost_My_MindMexican drug cartels are responsible for manufacturing and smuggling much of the fentanyl that enters the United States and causes most drug overdose deaths, killing about 150 people a day.
But we’re just going to ignore the broken healthcare system that CAUSED all those addictions in the 90s, right? Yeah, sure, lets get people hooked on pain killers, and then cut them off cold turkey. They’ll just stop being addicted, right? Right???
Yes, but a lot of the current drug epidemic stems from over-prescription of opiates like oxycontin. Another big factor is the absolute garbage availability of social services. If you’re homeless, cold, and in pain, heroin is a great way to feel better for a while. Housing and healthcare would go a long way to keep people away from drugs.
Very few people say “you know, this weekend I think I’ll take up smoking meth”. There’s usually something that puts them in a vulnerable position that makes it seem like a good idea.
Doesn’t matter how much you bomb Mexico. If there is a demand for drugs there will be a supply. No matter the price. A drug addict will do ANYTHING to get it
Cutting the supply would only work if you’re somehow able to cut almost all supply for 30 years straight, until the currently addicted people die off or sort themselves out
To stop the drugs you need to stop the demand for drugs. Treat addicts instead of arresting them. And oh my god stop prescribing literal Opioids as “treatment”
CleoTheWizardIt’s both actually. Obviously if you make drugs more rare, the price goes up. And when the price goes up, there will always be an amount of people that cannot pay it. The problem is that they’re then usually pushed to do something cheaper, but if the cheaper drugs are less likely to harm people, that can be a win.
Cutting supply isn’t everything, but it isn’t nothing. Part of the current problems are actually worse though because the worse drug is being added to a lot of other drugs that already have demand. So in this case it would help a lot more than usually because the dangerous substance isn’t necessarily what the addiction is for.
Drug addiction is a mental health problem. Reducing supply may have some effect in reducing overdoses in the short term, but it doesn’t solve the underlying issue, and it’s likely that new and potentially even more dangerous sources will pop up quickly. And military action is absurdly heavy handed and unless Mexico are on board with it, I can’t see it ending well (and even then).
Right-wingers don’t believe in underlying causes. Drug problems are the fault of the drugs themselves and/or a character flaw of the lazy good for nothing users. They always just want to put a useless bandaid on the symptom. The world is too complex for them to handle.
Flying SquidHe’s leaving out the fact that the people smuggling in fentanyl are mostly U.S. citizens. Shockingly, citizens are less likely to be searched and you can smuggle a huge amount of fentanyl in a tiny container. Who is he planning on bombing to stop that?
npr.org/…/fentanyl-smuggling-migrants-mexico-bord…
It’s still Mexicans, isn’t it?
America’s drug crisis is down to its healthcare system, justice system, education system and regressive social policies.
The cartels supply a demand.
acargitzEnd prohibition. Put the cartels out of business.
I wonder how they’d respond to knowing that all this cartel violence is conducted with weapons manufactured in the US and smuggled into Mexico or that their wealth and power comes from US dollars manufactured and smuggled into Mexico?