JO> I don't see where prohibition has ever worked.
RJT> No,  I don't think that they're going away,  and I see way too
RJT> much taxpayer money having been spent on the effort to make
RJT> them go away. And I see our freedoms getting eroded in the
RJT> name of that "war on drugs"...  :-(
A friend of mine says every time Clinton and gang declare a "War on
" they should call it what it really is...A war on
PEOPLE!  If we all lose rights in these "wars" then the war must be
against us all, right?
JO> And I don't have a problem with learning from that history...
RJT> One good thing that comes out of that,  people can observe
RJT> what it does to those few individuals,  and see what making
RJT> that choice gets you.
JO> Absolutely. Like my mother always says: Never say someone is
JO> "good for nothing", some people are good to serve as a bad
JO> example.
RJT> From what I understand this was pretty common with drinking at
RJT> one time,  before we were a society of car drivers so much,
RJT> and back when things like cocaine and other drugs were legal,
RJT> there were always a few you could point to as an example of
RJT> what happens when...
Right. Now it's so twisted up, you are looked down upon as dirt under
someone's feet if you have a drink or (Heaven forbid!) light up a
cigarette! OTOH, there are the ones that do coke, crack or whatever
until their brains rot...which of course will eventually land them in
jail...followed by tax-paid rehab, unemployment (or Workman's Comp
for "working" so hard to become braindead?), maybe even a spot on
Oprah...THOSE people get a standing ovation! 
There is something very wrong here. What happened to a sense of
propriety? Sometimes I feel like I'm really turning into my parents.
[snip]
JO> I even heard about them going in and stripping a church right
JO> down to the fixtures! I forget why, but honestly, a CHURCH??
JO> Crooked Bingo games, maybe?
RJT> This is the first I've heard of that one.  If you come across
RJT> any more info on it please feel free to pass it along.
I'll ask my mother. I think she was the one that told me. If she got
it from Reader's Digest (they do print a lot of stories like that) at
least I have the past year's issues, and then I could scan it.
RJT> Yep.  Or worse yet,  they don't *care* about guilt,  like the
RJT> lady I heard about whose 15-year-old son had some pot,  and
RJT> they took her *house*.  Just like that...
RJT> What the hell is this country coming to,  anyway?
Same thing happened to my friend's next door neighbor. Good Catholic
parents didn't want their 15-year old daughter hanging out with this
rowdy boy she liked. They wouldn't let her out of them house. So she
accused them of abuse and had them put in jail. While they were in
jail she and had the boyfriend over. He and some friends came over
and brought drugs. They were busted, and the house was confiscated.
So when the poor parents finally got the "abuse" charge straightened
out and were released--they had no home to go to!
JO> An example of what's happened with the huge flow of drugs is
JO> all the kids od'ing on heroin here in Plano. I don't know what
JO> the answer is. The school system is better than most here, so
JO> education didn't stop them. It's a well-to-do town (both
JO> parents usually work at very good jobs),
RJT> _Both_ parents working is no doubt part of the problem.
 JO> And they have to so they can pay the bills...and TAXES.
RJT> Bingo!
JO> so ultimately the kids probably have too much money, too much
JO> time to kill, and not enough parental guidance.
RJT> Yep.
RJT> Especially that last part.
They just finished a sting op in Plano this week (it's been going on
since 1996!) and they netted about 22-23 people, and all but 4 were
students. They then said that there weren't any more drugs there than
any place else. Kind of supports the idea that there is always that
small percentage that will do it no matter what...it only *seemed*
larger there because they had more deaths. It kinda makes sense that
an over-indulgance would likely be in a school where the kids have
more money and less guidance. It reminds me of how they come up with
the idea of gun control...A death always *sounds* bigger, and somehow
ends up being equated as higher incidence, even though it isn't.
JO> I may not be a parent, but if the parents throwing money at the
JO> problem doesn't work, I know darned good and well, it won't get
JO> any better when the government throws even more money at it.
RJT> They don't especially seem to want the responsibility,  they
RJT> just want the POWER.  That's what it all comes down to,  I
RJT> think.
And I think you are right. It isn't even *just* money, since they can
always get money, and then some, if they only have the power.
... X-generation:  A disarmed generation soon becomes an ex-generation.
___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12
* LAKOTA v1.5
--- Alexi/Mail 2.02b (#10000)
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