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Michael considered fate at 14:55   |   Permalink   |   Post a Comment

In light of my recent mention of William F. Buckley's anti-drugwar stance, and my affinity towards HBO's The Wire, I give you War on the Drug War, in which the writers of The Wire suggest a wire-esque grassroots approach to side-stepping the broken and bleeding war on drugs:

If asked to serve on a jury deliberating a violation of state or federal drug laws, we will vote to acquit, regardless of the evidence presented. Save for a prosecution in which acts of violence or intended violence are alleged, we will — to borrow Justice Harry Blackmun's manifesto against the death penalty — no longer tinker with the machinery of the drug war. No longer can we collaborate with a government that uses nonviolent drug offenses to fill prisons with its poorest, most damaged and most desperate citizens.

Jury nullification is American dissent, as old and as heralded as the 1735 trial of John Peter Zenger, who was acquitted of seditious libel against the royal governor of New York, and absent a government capable of repairing injustices, it is legitimate protest.

Unfortunately, we as a society show a certain amount of nepotism towards the drug war as if it were our golden child. Too many people - smart, intelligent, reasonable people even - see drugs as solely bad and therefore something to be stamped out and controlled. We're invested in this solution; we've dug deeply on this, and would like to think we can earn something positive out of it.

It seems worth recalling an old joke here, for discussions sake:

"Sir, What is the secret of your success?"

"Two words."

"And, sir, what are they?"

"Good decisions."

"And how do you make good decisions?"

"One word."

"And sir, what is that?"

"Experience."

"And how do you get Experience?"

"Two words."

"And, sir, what are they?"

"Bad decisions."