Hooray! Radley Balko reports that another insurgent was gunned down in the struggle of our times, the War on Drugs War on Your Neighbor® Global Struggle Against Killer Weed®:
Police seized 2 ounces of marijuana at the home of Anthony Diotaiuto after shooting him 10 times, according to information on the drug raid released Tuesday.
Also Tuesday, while many friends and relatives of the 23-year-old bartender and student mourned him at a Davie funeral home, others appeared at a Sunrise City Commission meeting to demand an explanation for the fatal raid.
Unfortunately, patriots everywhere were upset that he was not “dragged out into the street and beaten slowly to death before a warmly applauding audience.” Like this guy:
Israeli Eden Natan Zada’s , hands bound, face bloodied, moments before being beaten to death in the street by an angry mob for killing four Palestinans.
Authorities have been instructed to make all future drug war killings public, slow, painful, and if at all possible, open for audience participation. To make a point about how bad drugs are, you see.
SomeCallMeTim
You’re forgetting about the close connection between buying drugs and funding terrorism, as first pointed out (IIRC) by the VP. So really, this is a story about the unfortunate death of someone helping Islamofascists make war on us. He was planning to try to kill Americans by lighting up a joint. No doubt you’ll try and label him an “insurgeant” helper.
Welcome to the world you wrought, John.
John Cole
Are you stoned or just plain stupid?
Jeff G
What the fuck is an “insurgeant”?
Bernard Yomtov
I think he’s being sarcastic, John.
John Cole
And anything I have written in this post is serious? See here.
Otto Man
Well, not all drugs are bad. If a major pharmaceutical company has the patent to it, then it’s AOK, right? If only pot growers had enough smarts to register their own lobbyists and buy their own politicians.
John S.
Good grief…in my own backyard, no less.
Thanks, Tricky Dick for starting this whole thing…
TallDave
You’re forgetting about the close connection between buying drugs and funding terrorism,
You’re forgetting about the fact our drug policies create the 100,000% profit margins that drive the drug trade and allow them to use those state-generated profits to fund terrorism.
TallDave
We tried making alcohol illegal. It’s time to admit it doesn’t make any more sense to do it for drugs.
Drug use does not have to be condoned by any profession, corporation or organization. No one wants to be operated on by a surgeon who just smoked an ounce of Maui Wowee, like in the anti-drug commercial — but then neither would you want one who’d just downed a fifth of Glenmorangie, which he can legally do.
The Drug Warriors could do a lot better by taking all that money they spend on incarceration and spending just a third of it on education (real education, not the commercials with the egg, the crazy woman, and the frying pan or the kid smoking a joint). There are a lot of drugs that are really bad for you, and people should know about them.
People are going to do stupid and self-destructive things regardless of what kind of laws we pass. As they say, you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make him drink.
metalgrid
You have to relialize how much employment the drug war provides, and not just for the drug trafficers. Things won’t get better until they get a lot worse.
tom scott
Tall Dave, are you implying that a doctor’s drinking is without consequences? I think if a patient reported a doctor with alcohol on his breath that the state medical board might intercede for some disciplinary action. Dependent on the seriousness of it the doctor may be forbidden to practice. You may view that as another casualty in the war on drugs. Others might see it as another patients life no longer in jeopardy.
Mike S
Maui Woowee? You’re showing your age.
Hubris
Nope, I think he’s saying that a doctor (or bus driver, etc) using the “wacky weed” (as I hear the young folks are a-callin’ it) could continue to lead to adverse consequences for the practicioner, without having the drug be illegal in all circumstances.
KC
TallDave makes a real good point. Just because it’s legal to hit the goofleaf at home, doesn’t mean employers are going to allow anyone to do it at work. It also doesn’t mean it will be allowed behind the wheel or even allowed in restaurants for that matter. Better investments in education, etc., would probably be far more constructive than a enlarged terror-drug war in preventing drug crime. Although, I still think if we’re going to start using the Patriot Act and related laws for drug crimes, the first subjects of investigation ought to be the college aged children of Congressmen. Busting a few of them would probably make a lot of people think twice about using drugs.
Bob
Wasn’t Duke Cunningham’s (R-San Diego) son busted flying in a planeload of marijuana from Mexico?
Davebo
TallDave
I can’t be 100% sure, but I’m fairly certain that my supplier is using the proceeds to purchase a new bass boat.
Now, should a bass boat be driven into a large office building causing it to fall killing hundreds… then you’ve got me.
ET
Bob – the answer is yes he son was arrested.
…his son Todd was arrested for helping to transport 400 pounds (181 kg) of marijuana from Massachusetts to California. At his son’s sentencing hearing, Cunningham fought back tears as he begged the judge for leniency (Todd was sentenced to two and a half years in prison, in part because he tested positive for cocaine three times while on bail).
SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randy_%22Duke%22_Cunningham
Zifnab
Well, so long as the legal system remains fair and balanced.
Drugs aren’t good for society when wrecklessly administered. But then the War on Drugs isn’t good either when wrecklessly administered.
Zifnab
oops. Wrong link.
Rome Again
Whatever gave you that idea? TallDave said:
Translated: an intoxicated doctor who is taking a LEGAL substance is at least just as dangerous as someone taking an ILLEGAL substance, maybe even more so because the legality is not in question.
I think that if the scenario TallDave describes (that of a surgeon drinking heavy amounts of alcohol before surgery) is what you’re addressing, the patient in question would have been under sedation before he came into contact with the doctor, and therefore would be unable to “smell his breath”.
Moreover, with sterile mouth covers, even the nurses and assisting doctors might not know, unless the doctor’s behavior became suspect.
As a child of a severe alcoholic myself (she’s deceased now), I can attest that some alcoholics can be pretty whacked out and still interact and perform their jobs pretty normally, mistakes may happen, but they may not be noticeable. My mother spent 16 years behind a desk with a vodka and orange juice constantly at her side (it was a home office, she had no one telling her she couldn’t). She could type contracts, hold phone conversations, pay bills, and keep accounts updated, all while heavily under the influence. It was only after the 5 pm hour that she started actually bouncing into walls (her intake increased after 4 o’clock).
slickdpdx
Please watch the video footage at the newssite linked in the balko post. You will hear a description of the circumstances surrounding the shooting which makes it quite likely that this “kid” thought his operation was being attacked by some other “kids” and that his first thought may well have been to make a show of force, not to hide his stash. Incidentally, people act seemingly counterintuitively all the time. They may be operating from a different set of assumptions and values than you do.
You may not have intended to do so, but I can’t understand why you endorse the idea the “kid” was killed as punishment for the crime of marijuana possession. The police, including these specific officers WHO HAD NEVER BEEN INVOLVED IN A SHOOTING, arrest people all the time without shooting them. Don’t you believe that something happened here to provoke this tragedy?
I wouldn’t be the one to wait and see what projectile the “kid’s” gun fired, would you?
BTW – flaw in your analysis: do you think the kid would be a legal marijuana dealer if mj was legal? Quite obviously unlikely, unless he was working at the liquor store or wherever you would buy legal pot. If he was willing to work a straight job, he wouldn’t be dealing.
Naked Ape
Quite the operation he must have had there, with two whole ounces of dope. Clearly he was a crime kingpin. I mean really, two whole ounces!!! That is like a sandwich bag nearly full of buds, what does that go for in Florida, about 300 bucks?
There is no one alive (other than the shooters themselves) who heard these fearsome drug warriors identify themselves. What makes you think that they did?
On a slightly different note, I keep hearing Americans say that they are allowed to own a weapon for home defence, and if that does not mean attempting to defend yourself against unidentified people who boot down your doors in the middle of the night, then what does ‘home defence’ mean anyways?
When persons unknown boot in your door and charge into your private space, are you to assume the position and hope that they are police? If bad people don’t ever kick down doors and raid peoples homes, then why do you need to have guns to defend against something that never happens?
Just wondering.
Defense Guy
This means nothing. He can think whatever he wants but he still must abide by the rules of the society in which he operates or he must be willing to pay the price for his failure to do so. No one gets a pass.
I think that in the end this was too high a price to pay.
slickdpdx
Naked Ape: How does the amount matter? Its not relevant.
slickdpdx
Naked Ape: Police are not always required to announce the execution of a warrant before they hit the door. However, they want to go home alive, so it behooves them to wear certain objects and yell certain things to get the point across that they are police when they enter.
I don’t know what happened here, but I am sure you don’t either.
TallDave
Sorry, would have responded earlier but work, work, work, work.
Yes, the later commenters had my intent right: people can abuse legal drugs just as dangerously as illegal ones.
Prohibition proved these “moral” crusades do more harm than good. It’s amazing we even have to debate it. The effects have included creeping totalitarianism (anyone old enough to remember when we had a functional 4th Amendment?), brutal $-fueled civil war in S. America, incredibly wealthy (and incredibly ruthless) drug dealers, and the consigment of those drug addicts who want to be productive to society’s dustbin.
People are going to do stupid things; all we can do is educate them about the real dangers drugs pose so they can make informed choices. You can’t make laws saying people aren’t allowed to hurt themselves. What if someone wants to hit himself in the head with a hammer? Doesn’t he have a legal right to do so? Would we call that a crime, and lock him up, or say he has a medical problem and treat him?
Other Lisa
Besides…oh, I’m sorry, can’t we just legalize pot already? I don’t smoke it any more but to be honest, I was really productive when I was a big ole’ pothead; I smoked it every night, held down a responsible job, wrote novels and music and worked out and never let my baby suffocate a la DRAGNET.
It’s such a waste of resources and lives.
But I’m sure, as others have commented, that there’s a lot of money tied up in the illegality of it all…the Drug Warriors need to get paid, after all…