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From: steiny@scc.UUCP (Don Steiny)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Re: handgun control
Message-ID: <298@scc.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 5-Jan-85 13:45:17 EST
Article-I.D.: scc.298
Posted: Sat Jan  5 13:45:17 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 8-Jan-85 03:53:51 EST
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Organization: Personetics, Inc. - Santa Cruz, Calif.
Lines: 82

> 
>     I'm prepared to argue, Lauri, that we'd see a lot more junkies on the
>     street if heroin was legal and could be purchased legally at K-marts
>     and "sporting goods" stores...
> 
	Go for it!   It seems unlikely to me that this would be
the case.  Remember tobacco, is a *legal* drug and cocaine
is an *illegal* drug.  The use of cocaine is going *up* and the
use of tobacco going *down*.   If you want to make an analogy 
to drug use, the evidence would suggest that any program of
regulation would be ineffective, expensive, encroach on
personal liberties, and make the government look even more 
stupid.

	Further, you cannot site any statistics about drug
use that would be meaningful

From the San Francisco Chronicle, Saturday, November 24, 1984:

                   *U.S. Raising Pot Traffic Figures*

Washington

     Government experts said yesterday they are revising estimates of
the size of U.S.  marijuana traffic in view of the record 10,000 tons
sized and destroyed in northern Mexico.

     The seizures, made on five farms in an isolated section of
Chihuahua state, suggest a 70 percent increase in estimates that total
U.S. consumption was 13,000 to 14,000 tons in 1982.  Furthermore, the
seizures add up to nearly eight times the 1300 tons  that officials
had calculated Mexico produced in 1983.

     "When we look at this 10,000 ton bust, the amount is staggering,"
said Jon R. Thomas, assistant secretary of state for international
narcotics matters.  "It's so big that we start out self-
congradulating--but when we step back, we see we still don't know
what it means."

     He continued, "We don't know how long they've been growing it and
processing and selling it, or how much has been grown."

     The gap between official estimates  and reality disclosed by the
mexican raids is so great that officials are reviewing data to
determine whether they have seriously understated the extent of
marijuana use in this country.  If so, there is intrest in whether the
miscalculation results from failures in the survey techniques the
government uses to determine how much Americans abuse [sic] all drugs.

     The data are compiled by the National Institute on Drug Abuse, a
subsidiary of the National Health Service, on the basis of door-to-
door samplings in which people are asked to fill out and mail in
forms.

     The last survey, in which 5624 people were questioned, was made
in 1982, Adams said, and its validity was reviewed last year.  Another
survey, set for next year, will be based on 8000 interviews, he said,
but results will not become publically available until about six
months after the field work is done.

     David Hoover of the Drug Enforcement Administration reported that
marijuana price trends do not suggest oversupply.  In 1982, he said,
the DEA reported the street price of Mexican leaf at retail to be $40
to $50 per ounce, and in 1983 at $40 too $60  an ounce retail and $350
to #550 per pound wholesale.

                              Los Angeles Times

-----

	In short, the argument that gun control would limit
the use of guns the way that drug control limits the use
of drugs is saying that gun control will not limit guns.

-- 
scc!steiny
Don Steiny - Personetics @ (408) 425-0382
109 Torrey Pine Terr.
Santa Cruz, Calif. 95060
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