re: Police arrest more people for marijuana use than for all violent crimes combined

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Should it matter? Should one crime compound the sentencing of another? Is robbing someone worse if you do it with a joint in your pocket? What about someone who was convicted of assault from a bar fight when they were 18, is that person now a violent offender? I'm not disagreeing with you, I'm just trying to follow the logic

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I think it's important due to the fact that the article essentially frames it as possession being sole factor for arrest, which I think is unlikely. Frankly, I think that article is dishonestly lacking. It bugs me when people look at end results but never look at the factors leading to the results.

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One thing we do know is Nixon domestic policy chief John Ehrlichman admitted that harsh drug sentencing was created because they could not make being black or being anti war illegal. Black people and hippies were the biggest hurdle for the Nixon campaign in the 1960's so they targeted those groups via mandatory minimum drug sentencing. This much we know as fact.

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Yeah, I think that's where we really started going off the rails. The fact that the DEA recently decided to keep MJ on the Schedule I list is a complete travesty.