Mexican Politicians are Smarter than as Stupid as American Politicians

Mexico has just passed a bill decriminalizing the possession of "personal-use" quantities of all recreational drugs.

5 grams of marijuana, 5 grams of opium, 25 milligrams of heroin or 500 milligrams of cocaine, 2.2 pounds of peyote, 2 pills of ecstasy, MDA, LSD and methamphatime were all mentioned.

This is golden opportunity to prove to the world that decriminalization is far more intelligent a policy than prohibition, but I'm scared shitless that it is going to get fucked up by any of a number of mechanisms.

First of all, our government can't be happy about this, and I'm sure they will do whatever they can to make sure the Mexican president doesn't sign the bill in to law, and if the president does sign it into law, the US will try to put pressure on Mexico to have the law repealed. We'll need to keep our eyes open to be sure we know what the US government is doing on this front and be sure we apply pressure as needed, to ensure Mexico's new bill becomes a law and stays that way.

Second of all, American drug tourism to Mexico is going to increase, for certain. I fear that a few people are going to go down there and flip out on meth and start acting like irresponsible assholes, annoying just enough of the voting Mexican population to re-instate prohibition. This golden opportunity could easily be abused and squandered, and if it is, it will set the decriminalization movement in this country back by decades. All the DEA and the ONDCP (office of national drug control policy) will have to say is, "decriminalzation in America? Are you crazy, don't you know what happened in Mexico?" And they will largely be right.

I can also imagine that the ONDCP and the DEA will be finding sneaky ways to encourage certain annoying, irresponsible, American assholes to go to Mexico to use drugs, just to piss off Mexican voters. Those of us who are anti-prohibition in this country need to organize a massive public education project aimed at Americans thinking about going to Mexico to use drugs. we need to make it clear to Americans that they need to respect this new Mexican law and be responsible drug users, as you would be if you were a guest in any of your friends' homes.

As I said, I'm scared that this will get screwed up. Mexico has done a very bold and special thing, and the world will be looking to them to see how thier experiment turns out. Let's make sure it turns out for the best.

Update:

Fox news has the total quatities allowable for the newly decriminalized drugs. This is a good step for Mexico, but in real-world terms, these are tiny amounts, even for personal use.

— opium (raw, to be smoked) 5 grams
— heroin, 25 mg
— marijuana 5 grams
— cocaine 500 mg
— LSD .015 mg
— MDA 200 mg
— MDMA (Ecstasy) 200 mg
— mescaline: 1 g
— peyote: 1 kg
— psilocybin (concentrate, pure, active ingredient) 100 mg
— hallucinogenic mushrooms (raw, off the farm): 250 mg
— amphetamines: 100 mg
— dexamphetamines: 40 mg
— Phencyclidine (PCP, or Angel Dust) 7 mg
— methamphetamines: 200 mg
— Nalbuphine (synthetic opiate): 10 mg

Update2: Under US pressure, Mexican President reverses position, now says will not sign bill into law.

Oil Prices

There's been a bunch of talk about oil prices lately. Demand for oil is going up and supply is not. People hear about the oil companies' record profits and they wonder why these companies don't pass some of the windfall on to consumers, thus lowering fuel prices. So-called economists get on the air and dogmatically spout out "supply and demand" as if that actually explains the situtation to 95% of the public who hasn't taken an economics class.

Having had some real world experience with this just from working in industry, here's how the mechanics of supply and demand work in this particular situtation.

Supply of oil is flat. Maybe it's because we haven't built any oil refineries, or maybe it's becasue the wells in Saudi Arabia are drying up, or maybe it's because we haven't opened up Alaska to drilling, or maybe it's because we still burn a shitload of oil for electricity production rather than using nuclear, or maybe all of those things, I don't know. But I am accepting it as a fact that supply of oil is not growing. Demand however is growing, and when a flat supply meets a growing demand, one of two things can happen. Either you do nothing, allowing shortages to occur leaving millions of people stranded, waiting in gas lines, or you figure out a way to slow down demand for your product enough so that it is in line with supply.

Let's see, what is the best way to decrease demand for a product? Could you lower its quality? Gasoline standards are very tight, and so no, you couldn't lower quality, there are laws against that. Could you spur competition to increase supply? Yes, and in fact, that is happening to an extent with alternative fuels and new nuclear plant construction. But that is a long term fix, and is useless for short term increases in demand (like the current summer driving season). The last option available to you then, is to raise prices. Making the same product more expensive lowers demand for that product, forcing people not to use it as much, but also preventing shortages of the product.

Its almost like the oil companies can't help but make a huge profit.

Holy Crap

State Legislators to initiate impeachment proceedings versus Bush

Mike Teavee

Is it just me, or does this techno DJ bear more than a passing resemblance to Mike Teavee from the recent re-make of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory?


A certain DJ


Mike Teavee

Mike Teavee is realy into video games and thinks that "candy" is waste of time (get it?)

You decide.

(Chris insisted that I point out she noticed this creepy similarity first)

Orange Core

Everyone go check out the skinny on the world's coolest new band, Orange Core.

Feeling Lazy

I have this huge list of things I've given myself to do today, but I all I feel like doing is laying on the couch and watching birds come to the feeder.

The List:

-stop by work and make sure the thing I set up friday is still running.
-install a hybrid cable/telephone jack in the bedroom, buy extension cord
-spread fertilizer on the back lawn
-set up the new dsl modem
-scrub off some more of the graffiti that Verizon left on my driveway last month, when they were laying FiOS lines
-install the shelves I made for the new bookcase
-find HDMI adaptor for DVR-to-TV HDMI cable.

It's a tough life I live, isn't it?

CD of the Month

"Are You Ready" by Theory in Motion.

Bad-ass, bassy, slow breaks. No divas, just breaks.

Update 4/14/06: Just so everyone knows, it was my whiny friend Joe who introduced this CD to me.

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to my wife Chris and our friend Jen. I'm really liking this pattern we've adopted of a big social every few weeks. We need to keep it going!

PS: To those who haven't seen me in a while, note the red-bearded guy in some of the pix who looks just like me.

I have a secret

I'm almost ashamed to admit it. It started a few years ago and I haven't been able to stop since. Usually I do it on weekends, but sometimes you'll see me at it after work, or sometimes before, hell I've even skipped work on occasion to do it.

I love lawncare.

Really. I get worked up about spreading grass-seed and fertilizer, raking leaves and checking the soil pH. I fucking love it, but I'm afriad to talk about it, with anyone. Everytime I try, I notice that people get that, "this guy is a nutjob" look on thier face. Well I'm tired of hiding it, dammit! I just wish it was something I could actually talk about in casual conversation, instead of hiding it. I'm seriously considering buying a pick-up or an SUV so I can take my lawncare to the next level. That translates to cutting down trees and renting industrial landscaping gear.

I love my lawn and I want the world to know!