> It allows the smugglers to move the maximum potency with the minimum risk and minimum quantity.
Mostly true but there's another factor: fentanyl is synthetic. There's no dealing with opium poppy crops, farmers, processing of crops (in places like Mexico and Afghanistan), transportation and as a result it's cheap.
> Legalizing opiates ...
I agree that the legalizing these drugs is better than prohibition but, by itself, is an insufficient solution.
As an aside, the US loves criminalizing things. Building prisons is jobs. Prisoners are slave labor. Felons count for the census but can't vote. Often you'll have private prisons thrown in there too. These are an abimination but still represent only a small minority of prisoners.
The Louisiana State Prison, known colloquially as "Angola", is basically a cotton plantation with slave labor.
People need access to their basic needs like housing, food and water. A lot of drug addiction comes out of homelessness as people self-medicate. A bunch of heroin addicts were originally on an opiate prescription. The American medical system compared to other countries hands out opiates like candy.
People need access to mental health care, have security and have hope and dignity in their lives. All of these things are substantially cheaper than our carceral state but there's no profit in it and nobody wants to live near "homeless" people.
At the core of this is the American belief in the myth of meritocracy because the other side of that coin is that homelessness, drug addiction and other awful circumstances are viewed as deserved or at least a personal moral failure. As such, such people almost deserve those outcomes.
So my point is that legalization just barely scratches the surface.
War on Drugs I was a failure. Time to declare a War on Drugs II, fought with counseling, mental health resources, government assistance programs for food, housing, jobs, hope.
Mostly true but there's another factor: fentanyl is synthetic. There's no dealing with opium poppy crops, farmers, processing of crops (in places like Mexico and Afghanistan), transportation and as a result it's cheap.
> Legalizing opiates ...
I agree that the legalizing these drugs is better than prohibition but, by itself, is an insufficient solution.
As an aside, the US loves criminalizing things. Building prisons is jobs. Prisoners are slave labor. Felons count for the census but can't vote. Often you'll have private prisons thrown in there too. These are an abimination but still represent only a small minority of prisoners.
The Louisiana State Prison, known colloquially as "Angola", is basically a cotton plantation with slave labor.
People need access to their basic needs like housing, food and water. A lot of drug addiction comes out of homelessness as people self-medicate. A bunch of heroin addicts were originally on an opiate prescription. The American medical system compared to other countries hands out opiates like candy.
People need access to mental health care, have security and have hope and dignity in their lives. All of these things are substantially cheaper than our carceral state but there's no profit in it and nobody wants to live near "homeless" people.
At the core of this is the American belief in the myth of meritocracy because the other side of that coin is that homelessness, drug addiction and other awful circumstances are viewed as deserved or at least a personal moral failure. As such, such people almost deserve those outcomes.
So my point is that legalization just barely scratches the surface.