Talk:Federal drug policy of the United States/Archive 1

Archive 1

Linked to prison overcrowding ??

The statement have no source. What is true is that the U.S have a high prevalence of prisoners and many of those are drug users. But that is not the same as that there is a clear link from prohibition of drugs to prison overcrowding. For ex Japan have since the 1950:s had very strict drug laws and they have very low number of prisoners. The connection is much more complicated than the previous text. So I delete the text. Dala11a (talk) 19:25, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

The connection between the "war on drugs" and the incarceration rate in the USA is well-established in the scientific literature. If the "link" where said to be general, and in not as in this case when it is implied to be US-specific, there might be an argue - but not now. Steinberger (talk) 15:36, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

The short text "These policies have since been linked to prison overcrowding." oversimple a complicated issue to much. . The Japanese example show that the restrictive drug laws must no be equal to prison overcrowding. The Japanese probably state that their their long history of restrictive drug laws is the reason for the low incarnation rate in Japan. What is a fact that a some groups in the U.S claim the anti-drug laws for the high incarnation rate. But that is not the same that there is a link to the anti-drug laws. The quote from the new Drug czar point at that he and the president is planning for other reforms of the anti Drug policy than drug legalization. Dala11a (talk) 20:50, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

There is nothing in the sources used to make this edit that states any conclution on the effects of different drug policies on inprisonment or vice versa. The whole section US comparison to other countries seems to be original research/synthesis. Steinberger (talk) 16:54, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

What conlution? The comparison of the incarnation rate is made by UNDP, the comparison of the drug use is made by UNODC so that is clearly no orginal research/synthesis. The text in the beginning of the article claim that there is a link between the number of imprisoned and the drug law. There is no orginal/syntesis in this section. Dala11a (talk) 23:19, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

I have explaind the synthesis rule for you many times now in different discussions. And the "US comparison to other countries" where an orignial synthesis typical of you. If you find one single report that states that the general link between drug policy and inprisonment is weak that is okay to use. But not a mulitude of sources giving separate bits witch you saw together to form a conclution like that. So I have deleted it. Steinberger (talk) 12:13, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

1)What you call a "violation of the synthesis rule" and "separate bits witch you saw together" has already been an issue between you an me an an issue for a third opinion review by Kevin Murray 21 May 2008 in Talk:Drug policy of Sweden.

I quote Kevin Murray:

3 In 2004 Sweden had 84 people per 100,000 in either prison or remand prison (in Swedish called häkte).(verified by note 14)

4This is clearly less than the average for OECD (132 persons per 100 000) and much less than in the US. (725 per 100 000).(verified by note 14)

Sentences 1 and 3 are verifiable. Sentence 4 is an observation from verifiable facts from the same source material without synthesis among data sources or studies, though the word "clearly" is a bit editorial."

The same article Drug policy of Sweden also include that Sweden has a zero tollerance policy for illicit drugs and a comparably low drug use. Kevin Murray did not support your view that the international comparison was a violation of the synthesis rule. So I made the conclusion that it do not violate any rule to have a similar comparison in the Drug policy of the United States

2) "Link" or "claimed": The source only support the word claim since if you add other sources, for ex. the statical facts from Japan, Sweden or other countries, is it clear that you the relation between drug laws and imprisonment is very complex . Japan and Sweden have restrictive drug laws and a low incarceration rate. The common view in Japan and Sweden is that the long term effect of a mix of many different actions and a restrictive drug laws is a low incarceration rate. You know that and you know that very well Dala11a (talk) 22:28, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Sticking to the point. 1) What Kevin Murray said in regard to including the imprisonment data on Sweden and an comparison towards other countries in the article on drug policy (and history) of Sweden is not applicable here. If we ignore what that article is about and so the context in witch that facts are stated (in this, I and Murray differ), it is not said to have anything to do with the drug policy of Sweden. 2) If I remember correctly, the source did explicitly state that the high incarceration rate in the US in part have to do with Nixon and his War on drugs. As the article text does not present the connection between drug policy and incarceration rate to be general, I can't understand your criticisms. Steinberger (talk) 23:12, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

MERGE War on Drugs and Drug policy of the United States

Note: Related thread at crosspost: Talk:War_on_Drugs#MERGE_War_on_Drugs_and_Drug_policy_of_the_United_States

It looks like someone has had the idea to merge War on Drugs and Drug policy of the United States. i SUPPORT this merge, since the "war" on drugs is the policy, and the us policy is the "war" on drugs. Perhaps the US will one day adopt a more compassionate and reasonable policy, and war on drugs will then be recreated as a retrospect. Badmachine (talk) 01:59, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

• Support: Because each country has a different policy there is no point in trying to present a worldwide view. I think relevant content should be moved to each country's drug policy page as they are developed and then this page deleted. I am surprised an article has been created with an obviously biased phrase "War on ..." which is just a nonsense phrase for a political ideology. - Shiftchange (talk) 12:08, 14 July 2008 (UTC)
• Reject:What's the point, I don't get it. The War on Drugs is a specific policy related to a certain time period; US drug policy begins with the establishment of the country, till present. LamaLoLeshLa (talk) 05:58, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
• Reject/partial merge Que? War on Drugs is so long that people should be talking about splits, not merges. That said, any content therein that predates Nixon or that is general enough to warrant inclusion here could be moved over (ie the timeline) - Again, though, a complete merge would be a mistake, and result in a gargantuan mess. MrZaius^talk 10:05, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

• Removed the merge template. See WP:LENGTH. That said, though, a partial merge of some content would be appropriate, as the War on Drugs article does stray substantially off message. Merged in the Timeline & Effects sections for a start. MrZaius^talk 10:15, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

• Spin out many articles. I now think that there should be many spinout articles from Drug policy of the United States and War on Drugs. See WP:SPINOUT and Wikipedia:Article size. War on Drugs is only one phrase used in the history of the insane U.S. drug policy. Nixon latched onto that phrase, but it is a phrase, and not an official drug policy. In my opinion most of War on Drugs should be in separate articles, and the only thing remaining should deal specifically with how that notable phrase was used. There are many federal drug policies, laws, and institutions over time. States have a variety of drug policies over time, too. So do cities. They all overlap and diverge in many ways. So there can be many Wikipedia articles dealing with those notable policies, laws, institutions, people, histories, etc.. --Timeshifter (talk) 14:01, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Quite, but a good starting point would be to just separate the points that are distinct from those related to War on Drugs into a cleaner article that can be forked off. Also, please remember WP:NPOV - Matters more in mainspace, but it is important to maintain a level of distance from the topic at hand, much as you would if you were studying it in an academic environment. MrZaius^talk 15:25, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I suggest being bold and moving more stuff to this article here. Also, people can start new articles, too. And of course everybody should honor WP:NPOV in the text of articles concerning the insane U.S. drug war. --Timeshifter (talk) 17:09, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

• Reject/Oppose -- The War on Drugs is basically U.S. antinarcotics activity/policy/propaganda since 1969, when Nixon declared a "War on Drugs". Drug policy of the United States should cover current U.S. drug policy -- that is, laws and official positions on drugs. War on Drugs should cover the actions that the United States has undertaken since 1969 in it's so-called "War on Drugs". These two things are not at all the same, and should by no means be merged. Jrtayloriv (talk) 19:19, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

Needs to be expanded significantly

As of now it is just a short, random list of information with no real structure. Needs way more info. yonnie (talk) 17:06, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

Yep, this article is currently worthless. Drug use is higher than before prohibition? Is that per capita? Where is the detail about the jurisdictions of the state and federal governments? Ninahexan (talk) 00:42, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

POV

I don't have to say this often, but this article is very slanted. To put it bluntly, it looks like it was written by a bunch of potheads.

• Why does the introduction talk about "War on Drugs" rather than a general introduction to US drug policy and comparison to other countries?
• What is the part about "making room for drug inmates" doing in the introduction?
• "Drug use has increased in all categories since prohibition" is the first sentence in the Effects section.
• Both the figures have a clear slant.
• "Regardless of public opinion, marijuana could be the single most targeted drug in the drug war."
• The NRC study appears to be cherry-picked to support the editors opinions.

--Apoc2400 (talk) 15:01, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I've started to rework this article -- I've removed some of the unsourced statements you mentioned above, and have moved most of the content into more appropriate articles. This article needs a heavy re-write. It should actually cover drug policy -- laws, official statements, sentencing laws, etc. Jrtayloriv (talk) 19:21, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

It still feels very slanted, it shouldn't be an opinion piece. —Preceding unsigned comment added by The Rukh (talk • contribs) 15:10, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

I don't know why the section was called "Effects." Is it effects of drug policy or overview of dug policy? I think it's an overview, at least right now. Policydude (talk) 21:12, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

At http://www.indymedia.org/en/2011/05/948461.shtml is an article claiming that "The reversal of the onus of proof in drug-possession cases is incompatible with the rule of law and is therefore automatically and irredeemably unconstitutional in all jurisdictions." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.180.158.2 (talk) 23:52, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Raising POV and calling people potheads in the same breath is ridiculous, and does nothing to advance the page.Ninahexan (talk) 00:44, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Fixed the Grammar errors

• I cleaned up the atrocious grammar in this little mess, and even threw in a few links and facts; however, the info in this article in my opinion, would be more appropriate as a "Chapter" in an article named: "Federal drug policy of the United States". The article doesn't tell you anything about the Federal drug policy of the USA; it's just ramblings, and random facts that are at least now readable and make some grammatical sense, but still Ramblings just the same. I helped it out a bit, but I'm not the man to write the article. I don't have enough knowledge resource on the subject to pull it off. Pocketthis (talk) 23:24, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

When this article went south

In further review, it would seem to me that the article had merit at one time; not withstanding it's obvious Grammar horrors. However, they could have been fixed. Instead some editor removed over 22,000 characters from this article without any Bot or member stepping in to revert it. Here is a C&P of the edits in question:

(cur | prev) 08:39, 6 February 2010‎ Jrtayloriv (talk | contribs)‎ . . (4,596 bytes) (-1,192)‎ . . (moving to War on Drugs -- these are not "policies" -- they are statistics on the War on Drugs) (undo) (cur | prev) 08:36, 6 February 2010‎ Jrtayloriv (talk | contribs)‎ . . (5,788 bytes) (-370)‎ . . (remove stupid comment about how only mexicans and jazz musicians used marijuana) (undo) (cur | prev) 08:27, 6 February 2010‎ Jrtayloriv (talk | contribs)‎ . . (6,158 bytes) (-896)‎ . . (remove unsourced statements) (undo) (cur | prev) 08:07, 6 February 2010‎ AnomieBOT (talk | contribs)‎ . . (7,054 bytes) (+144)‎ . . (Rescuing orphaned refs ("dupoint" from rev 342256064)) (undo) (cur | prev) 07:56, 6 February 2010‎ Jrtayloriv (talk | contribs)‎ . . (6,910 bytes) (-12,357)‎ . . (moved timeline to History of United States drug prohibition) (undo) (cur | prev) 07:48, 6 February 2010‎ Jrtayloriv (talk | contribs)‎ . . (19,267 bytes) (-1,850)‎ . . (already covered in War on Drugs, and fall within the time period of that article's scope ... doing cleanup here, before rewriting article to cover current policy in the U.S.) (undo) (cur | prev) 07:41, 6 February 2010‎ Jrtayloriv (talk | contribs)‎ . . (21,117 bytes) (-2,256)‎ . . (this is already covered in "War on Drugs" and is related exclusively to programs that are part of that -- removing) (undo) (cur | prev) 07:13, 6 February 2010‎ Jrtayloriv (talk | contribs)‎ . . (23,373 bytes) (-1,034)‎ . . (removing irrelevant commentary on War on Drugs ... if everyone is so adamant that these two terms are different (see talk), then why is most of the lead on "war on drugs") (undo) (cur | prev) 07:07, 6 February 2010‎ Jrtayloriv (talk | contribs)‎ . . (24,407 bytes) (-859)‎ . . (remove uncited paragraph -- this article needs MAJOR revamp ...) (undo) (cur | prev) 07:03, 6 February 2010‎ Jrtayloriv (talk | contribs)‎ . . (25,266 bytes) (-596)‎ . . (remove uncited comments) (undo)

The removed items were the body and soul of the article. I'm not saying it was vandalism per-say, but it sure didn't show much respect for the time the author spent putting this together and referencing everything. His only sin........He had no clue as to proper grammar and wording; and I think he may have gotten a bit emotional with his POV a bit too often. However, it was savable. Pocketthis (talk) 23:53, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

Serious Bias

This article suffers from severe anti-federal and anti-drug bias. IT needs a lot more references! Boilingorangejuice (talk) 23:35, 25 July 2016 (UTC)