...legalizing it and therefore taking away the drug cartels number one source of income. The U.S. Office of National Drug Control Policy ... says that more than 60 percent of the profits reaped by Mexican drug lords are derived from the exportation and sale of cannabis to the American market (Armentano2). It is ridiculous to think that the United States can put out a statistic like this and ignore the fact that if they legalized the drug there would be less violence because there would be no point for Mexican drug cartels to try and smuggle the drug into the U.S. In the article “Blame Prohibition, Not Pot Smokers for Violence in Mexico”, published by AlterNet.org, Tony Newman tells us how the people who run the “Just Say No” campaign against drugs have a new scheme in which they plan to blame people who smoke pot for the violence in Mexico. They are hoping to stop younger people from smoking marijuana if they associate it with the murder of people by the drug cartels in Mexico. There are a few problems with these campaigns: They are inaccurate in some cases, and downright dishonest in others.Office of National Drug Control Policy It is disingenuous to connect the average American's marijuana consumption to the horrific violence of Mexico's drug war. The average pot smoker's growing and purchasing of marijuana has no relationship to the violence along the border that is the result of large-scale drug trafficking. It isn’t hard to understand that the legalization of marijuana...
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...Position Paper Khadijah Shabazz CNSL 5203 Dr. Sampson Prairie View A&M University 9/20/2015 The legalization of drugs is one of the most controversial and debated topics of the 21st century. There are both negative and positive reasons to legalize them as well as negative and positive reasons to keep them prohibited. According to LEAP, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, drug prohibition is the true cause of much of the social and personal damage that has historically been attributed to drug use. It is prohibition that makes these drugs so valuable – while giving criminals a monopoly over their supply ("Why Legalize Drugs? | LEAP").LEAP goes on to say that criminal gangs are driven by the huge profits from this monopoly, criminal gangs bribe and kill each other, law enforcers, and children and as such their trade is unregulated and they are, therefore, beyond our control ("Why Legalize Drugs? | LEAP"). It is LEAP’s belief that by eliminating prohibition of all drugs for adults and establishing appropriate regulation and standards for distribution and use, law enforcement could focus more on crimes of violence, such as rape, aggravated assault, child abuse and murder, making our communities much safer ("Why Legalize Drugs? | LEAP"). Another positive aspect of the legalization of drugs is financial gains. According to the International Business Times in a study for the Cato Institute, Jeffrey A. Miron, senior lecturer on economics at Harvard University and a senior...
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... But there have always been varying ulterior motives. According to Baylor University Professor of Sociology, Dr. Diana Kendall, the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 was passed solely to criminalize marijuana by taxing it; this would dissuade migrant Mexican workers who smoked marijuana to seek employment elsewhere and not take jobs from U.S. citizens as the country struggled during the Great Depression (Kendall, 2010). Last year, voters in Colorado and Washington State approved legislation that supported the commercial growth, sale, possession and use of recreational marijuana. In response, United States Department of Justice, Deputy Attorney General James Cole, promulgated policy that established the posture for enforcing marijuana laws against people or organizations to that: Distribution of marijuana to minors; revenue from the sale of marijuana from going to criminal enterprises, gangs and cartels; the diversion of marijuana from states where it is legal under state law in some...
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...Global Politics: The feasibility of universal drug liberalization as an emerging phenomenon RWaterhouse Globalization & The War on Drugs: Assessing alternatives to criminalization The purpose of this paper is to address universal drug liberalization as a feasible alternative to the current drug control regime specifically in North America and potentially applicable elsewhere. With an in depth analysis of the historical regulation, implementation of law, and resulting consequences we will be able to see how nations are effected by complex drug politics and why there has been a global paradigm shift in looking spiritedly at the ideal of decriminalization. I argue in favor of liberalization by bringing to attention the violence associated with the commodification of illegal drugs, what the re-directed costs of control could mean for domestic investment into proactive drug awareness education, and finally recognizing Portugal’s success and weaknesses in the adoption of a compete legalization agenda. Following will be a discussion of concluding thoughts centered on the efficacy and feasibility of universal liberalization in today’s globalized world. Historical Context Libertarianism has almost always had position in political discourse but has been majorly popularized through public attention within the era of globalization. (article) Control of drug consumption has always been a contemporary ingredient in the political reform of Canada and the America’s and...
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...The so-called “War on Drugs,” as declared by the Nixon administration in the signing of the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970, marked the beginning of the current era of mandatory minimum sentencing, racism, privatized prisons, and a powerful constituency that profits as a result of the prohibition of drugs. Psychoactive substances have been apart of the human experience as long as humans have walked the earth. There is little hope that drug production will ever be curtailed, so long as there is a demand; a demand that has remained steady even though it has been forty years since the beginning of said war. As Judge James P. Gray from the Superior Court of Orange County has so plainly put it: “Where did this policy come from? Unfortunately I have conducted an inquiry into this and I have determined that drug prohibition laws came for reasons of racism, empire building, and ignorance.”(Booth) The War on Drugs is politically motivated as a means of profiting. One may ask them self how government can financially benefit from such policies. In fact, they benefit in a myriad of ways. The government spends an exorbitant amount of money in an attempt to combat drug production and drug usage. The U.S. government has spent over a trillion—that’s right a trillion—dollars in its attempt to eradicate the drug problem. With so much time, effort and money there should be something to show, right? Wrong. Today drugs are more prevalent, more potent and cheaper than...
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...editorial from The Washington Post titled “The NSA must disclose more to make it case”. This article touches on a sensitive topic which has spark out a debate across the country. The article says “the bulk collection of phone ‘metadata’ and call records is a potentially powerful tool that could reveal sensitive facts about nearly every American’s life if abused, and according to the article this practice was disclosed by the NSA’s former contractor Edward Snowden who demands extensive checks to guard against misuse (Washington Post, 2013). According to the article, a taskforce was formed and was to submit a report to President Obama, in their report they would like to see a higher legal standard applied in accessing phone records by government. The report proposed an end to the bulk collection of records, calling on the NSA to approach phone companies and ask for records as when investigators need them on a case-by-case basis. Government officials seemed to open in considering this arrangement but voiced concern that investigative speed may be lost in the interest of privacy protection (Washington Post, 2013) The article argued that for the NSA to make a strong case, it must demonstrate the national security benefit to the program. It further did mentioned of the U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon who issued an injunction to prevent the bulk collection of the data. His actions gives the government a chance to appeal and he ruled that the NSA phone-records database collection is likely...
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...Summer of 2013 a former National Security Agency contractor by the name of Edward Snowden disclosed classified information from the National Security Agency (NSA). The root of the data that was leaked was regarding the way the United States Government was gathering browsing habits and personal data of citizens. Basically, their ability to monitor the average citizen without their knowledge. Snowden’s feeling was that our privacies and liberties did not need to be crumpled upon to secure the nation. As a result, this was weakening our nation and causing mistrust by the government instead of securing it. The very popular debate was born, people’s right to data privacy versus the necessity for appropriate intelligence gathering. In this paper...
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...Hayden argued in the debate that many people who argue against surveillance don’t know the true nature of it or the reasoning, and that they need to know the past of surveillance before they can judge the current day surveillance in our country, and he points out that nobody complained when the NSA was intercepting Soviet communications long ago to support that idea (Hayden Does State Spying Make Us Safer 6-8). Next up to speak was Alexis Ohanian, who opens his argument by comparing Canada, the location where the debate was being held, to the United States, and says how they both try to balance security and privacy, but how that has led to a powerful surveillance state in the United States. Ohanian argues that surveillance is dangerous because the United States is losing money due to lack of interest from foreign tech companies due to surveillance, the fact that the internet is now in danger because some countries are threatening to make the networks of their countries private because of surveillance...
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...into cellphones, and often they do. This has caused plenty of controversy about the values of the Fourth Amendment that prohibits unreasonable search and seizure and which additionally requires a judicially issued warrant. There are many arguments against cellphone tapping or “tower dumping,” due to it being an invasion of privacy. Furthermore, that hasn’t been the only strong argument against tower dumping; this act has raised question regarding what is done with all information gathered and who specifically are authorities are targeting. It’s no doubt devices serving the purpose to tap into cellphones...
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...Since the invention of radio, intelligence-gathering organizations have been developing and using eavesdropping techniques to intercept and review wireless communications. Initially, these capabilities were solely used to spy on hostile nations, and particularly for military purposes. Human operators had to manually review each transmission, and cryptanalysts pored over military ciphers in an attempt to decode important messages. As wireless communication has become an integral part of commercial and individual existence, and potential threats to security are increasingly found in peacetime and on home ground, the scope of this intelligence gathering has likewise broadened. One of the most controversial eavesdropping systems in existence is a classified project known as ‘Echelon.’ Its use of computer hardware and software to filter communications from all over the world brings up many ethical issues related to the impact of computers on privacy. Overview of Echelon Most of the evidence for Echelon is circumstantial, though a few facts have been established. The participating organizations (notably the US Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency) have neither confirmed nor denied its existence. In lieu of a discussion of the ethical issues, a brief summary of the current knowledge follows. How it Works Echelon is the product of Cold War efforts to monitor wireless communications in the USSR. It traces its roots back to the clandestine UKUSA...
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...Brother eliminates personal freedom and thought. There is much argument about whether or not the world in his novel ties in with our own world. Do we have enough privacy or are we constantly under surveillance? The argument on personal privacy is far from a new debate. Some people argue that the government has too much access to what we do, while others say that the government’s intrusion is fine. In our age, the digital age, everything is online and private information is available to the government. The so called “Big Brother”, or, our government and algorithms, is watching over US citizens in illegal and inappropriate ways. Private companies like Facebook or Google have access to what one searches on those sites, but the video “What Google and Facebook Are Hiding” demonstrates how those sites save and...
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...searches and tapping into phone lines of the American populace. Sometimes the government uses warrantless wiretapping without proper authorization and it exposes telecommunications companies to legal and financial ramifications. What I will argue in this paper is that warrantless wiretapping is unlawful and not ethical, as it harms citizens and violates their privacy. My position is that it is not violation of personal liberties and is immoral for the NSA to have access data when your average citizen is not a threat. Not completely following this law pertaining to wiretapping deviates from the natural check and balance system of the federal government. The failure to procure a warrant when wiretapping violates the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution, and provokes media criticism. The National Security Administration (NSA) and other government agencies are required to wiretap only with the direct written authority of the FISA-assembled courts through a signed warrant. In rare cases, however, such as an imminent terror plot, against the government should it be allowed to intervene. The law-abiding system of gathering warrants before wiretapping functioned well from 1978 until the 2000s, due in part to company policies that willingly followed the guidelines set by the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA). Letters to the FCC demonstrate that most companies have comprehensive systems to brief employees and establish company policies that uphold...
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...United States, and all calls made to the United States from other countries. The data the NSA received, provided information on the phone number the call was made to and from, the call’s duration, the date of the call, and the time of day. No Financial data, nor content of the calls, were ever obtained by NSA. This action proceeded without a warrant for any of the information provided. In addition, there was no individual suspicion since this was considered “meta-data” or “bulk data collection” of phone records. The vast majority of the data was analyzed by computer programs and never looked at by NSA personnel. Before we delve into an analysis of the court’s decision in this case, it is prudent we first address an important point. Prior to the September 11, 2001 terror attacks, few American’s contemplated a threat to homeland security. Today, the fear of terrorism is ingrained in our daily thoughts. Following the events of 9/11, American’s sense of safety nearly vanished, and the direction, and scope of national security were forever changed. The National Security Administration (NSA), a key governmental counterterrorism agency, is responsible for ensuring national security. With this in mind, we believe that a reasonable person would consider the data obtained through these phone records to be of use to the NSA in stopping future terrorist attacks before they occur. Further, if the NSA were to obtain a warrant based on probable cause to wiretap a phone, the...
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...Edmund Chu Dr. Reed ENG 110 May 11, 2015 Assignment #2: Argument Paper The Fourth Amendment guarantees “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” The NSA’s surveillance programs violates the Fourth Amendment by collecting telecommunication data and storing it in a database. The US PATRIOT Act and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act allows the NSA to continue to run these controversial surveillance program today. The United States should end or reform...
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...The Ethics of the NSA Mass-Surveillance Program University Name Student Name Course Number/Name Professor Name Date Introduction One of the most explosive scandals of the 21st century was involved the National Security Agency (NSA), and the revelations that the agency had set up a robust, warrantless mass surveillance program in the years after the 9/11 attacks. Designed to pick up bits of intelligence that could be used in order to thwart future 9/11 attacks, critics of the program argued that not only was it unconstitutional given the lack of warrants obtained prior to engaging in the program, but that it was ineffective at stopping any kind of real terrorism. Supporters pushed back that the program was an essential tool for fighting terrorists who had become more advanced digitally, often using the internet in order to communicate with each other. Much of the discussion on the program related to the ethical appropriateness of the NSA’s activities. This paper will summarize the NSA’s surveillance program and discuss it from the perspective of utilitarianism and Kantian ethics; in addition, the paper will discuss the author’s personal viewpoint of the program. Summary of the Program The NSA spying program, named the “Terrorist Surveillance Program” by the New York Times, focused on monitoring the communications of between 500 and 1000 people within the United States with suspected ties to Al-Qaeda (Dunn, 2015). Many of these individuals were American citizens,...
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