Simon Heffer today. Milton Friedman 16 years ago. One of them’s right and it ain’t Heffer.
Heffer and Friedman
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4 responses
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I don’t see that they’re in disagreement; Heffer thinks that a totalitarian state could solve its drug problem and he’s probably right; Vietnam also managed to convert itself from the heroin capital of Asia to one of its few drug-free states, also by a policy of massive executions and creating a police state. Friedman doesn’t directly address this point but I’m pretty sure he’d agree it’s true. Heffer’s other point appears to be that drug addiction leads to prostitution, which is also not directly addressed by Friedman, but since he was in favour of legalising prostitution too he would probably not disagree (and the empirical evidence of Iran and Indochina between the 20s and the war does suggest that legal heroin and widespread prostitution and related social problems do go together).
I wish that it was possible to have a sensible debate about this, but that would involve talking about the role of intelligence services and then everyone starts making the funny noises and the tin hat jokes. It is nevertheless a fact that our mates the spooks have been very helpful to the drug dealers over the years; almost invariably, when given a choice between developing an ally who is a drug dealer and one who isn’t, they pick the one who is.
Tim adds: OK, you’re probably right at the top there. Friedman’s point I take to be that a totalitarian state isn’t worth the candle, something I wholly agree with. -
A large sign up at Heathrow Airport (and other ports of entry into the UK) saying that anyone found guilty of bringing in hard drugs to Britain could face execution, would concentrate the mind of prospective drug smugglers wonderfully Tim.
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The solution to the UK’s heroin problem is wasting Afghanistan from end to end with napalm.
A good short sharp shock would have them growing turnips in a jiff. -
Neil, you seem to have accidentally written “concentrate the mind of prospective drug smugglers wonderfully”, when you meant to write “make no difference to drug smuggling rates or to drug bosses, but lead to the execution of lots of vulnerable dupes”.
Not sure I agree wholeheartedly with Dan here either – China is demonstrably unable to control its heroin problem *despite* being totalitarian and executing people at all points across the drug supply chain.
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