George Soros gives big to drug rehab measure, California.

[AlCzervik]

Liberal billionaire George Soros is wading back into California’s drug and rehabilitation laws, donating $1 million to a proposed ballot measure that would relax penalties for nonviolent drug offenses.

The measure would expand California’s drug treatment program, modify the state’s parole laws as well as change possession of marijuana from a misdemeanor to an infraction, the legal equivalent of a traffic ticket.

Soros, a well-known Democratic financier who donated millions of his personal fortune to try to oust President Bush from office in 2004, is no stranger to California ballot measures. In 2000, the New York investor poured in more than $1 million of his own money to pass Proposition 36, California’s landmark drug treatment law.

That measure mandated drug treatment instead of incarceration for people arrested and convicted of being under the influence or in possession of drugs, including harder substances such as heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine.

Four years earlier, in 1996, he gave close to $500,000 to pass Proposition 215, the state’s medical marijuana initiative, according to news reports.

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[mrcheerful]

1. I don't mean to rain on anyones parade but there is one little problem with the Non-violent drug

dealer thing, it seems that everyone forgets that most drug dealers can be very violent just ask any addict that has had the nerve to get a front and then couldn't pay when it came due. Oh I agree drug sentences are to harsh and they help increase the levels of violence that dealers will go to to protect their profits. But the fact remains that when so called non violent drug offender is sentenced we do not know what acts of violence he has committed and got away with, addicts very rarely go to the police or testify against drug dealers. I know of one such person, he was caught selling crack and was labeled as non violent, yet I also know the person that got a front from said dealer, (the reason the guy got a front was because he was spending well over $3,000 every 2 weeks to said dealer) and I also saw the guy after the dealer got ahold of the guy. This is not a black & white issue, but the drug laws are not going away any time soon nor is the violence that goes unreported committed by drug dealers. If it had been just one incident I would tend to agree, but after 30 years of addiction, I can honestly saw I never met a drug dealer that wouldn't get violent if he didn't get paid, also I have seen dealers that would strong arm rob an addict just for the extra cash he could get from getting the cash and not selling anything.

I think we would be best served if drug laws were revoked and deal with the addicts the same way we deal with alcoholics in this country. But you will never get any of the powers that be nor the majority of main street voters to go along, they seek easy answers to complex problems as a rule with little to no thought on cost or what happens when we find we can no longer afford to keep people locked up.

Edited to add. Btw, 2 weeks ago my SO's son's friend got stabbed in the back by a drug dealer for telling the dealer he sold them some bull shit weed that wouldn't get a fly high. The friend then turned to walk away and the dealer stuck a knife in his shoulder blade. The dealer is sitting in jail now and the friend is doing ok. I got that from the cops when they paid a visit to SO's son, 12 people saw and heard what went down and it was the same story as SO's son said.