Morton Downey Show: Ron Paul (1988)

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Source:Real Life Journal

Morton Downey Jr. who died from overuse of tobacco in 2001, tobacco being an illegal narcotic drug in America and yet he was in favor of the War on Drugs. Here debating U.S. Representative Ron Paul on the War on Drugs. Well actually the War on Illegal Drugs, drugs that are seen by the U.S. Government as too dangerous for personal use and personal choice. Well that is Washington speak for “drugs that do not have a strong enough lobbying operation to lobby Congress and the White House for legalization."

You want to know why marijuana is illegal in America? (Well I’ll tell you anyway) It is because they do not have the back pockets of enough Representatives and Senators in Congress. They haven’t bought off enough members of Congress to get their drug legalize. Besides alcohol and tobacco, soft drinks and junk food have already beat marijuana to the punch as far as getting their products legal and keeping them legal with very few regulations. While keeping marijuana illegal. What Representative Paul is saying is that legal drugs are the main problem in America when it comes to drugs. And locking people up for what they do to themselves is simply not working.

I'm not for legalizing all current illegal narcotics in America. I stop at legalization and regulation of marijuana, but then I would decriminalize the others simply because locking people up and sending them to prison for what they do to themselves. Which is has simply not worked as we now have over forty-years of evidence and experience to know. So I'm closer to Representative Ron Paul here than I'm with Mort Downey, who died for over consumption of a legal narcotic and that being tobacco. You get people to not make bad decisions with their own lives by showing them and convincing them why that would be wrong. Not by punishing people for what they do to themselves.