A video of Chris Christie making an emotional plea for better treatment for drug addicts has gone viral, racking up more than 4 million views on Facebook.
The New Jersey governor and 2016 Republican presidential candidate was filmed by the Huffington Post at a recent town hall in Belmont, New Hampshire. He compares drug addiction to his mother’s addition to nicotine from smoking, describing the many lengths she went through to quit.
When she was ultimately diagnosed with cancer, Christie said, “No one came to me and said, ‘Don’t treat her ’cause she got what she deserved.'”
“No one came to me and said, hey listen, ‘You know your mother was dumb. She started smoking when she was 16. Then after we told her it was bad for her, she kept doing it, so we’re not going to give her chemotherapy, we’re not gonna give her radiation, we’re not going to give her any of that stuff — you know why? ‘Cause she’s getting what she deserves.’ No one said that,” he said.
But when it comes to heroin, cocaine or alcohol, Christie said the response is all too often to say, “They’re getting what they deserve.”
“I’m pro-life, and I think that if you’re pro-life, that means you’ve gotta be pro-life for the whole life, not just the nine months they’re in the womb,” he said.
He went on to tell the story of a law school friend who began taking Percocet to treat a back injury, and ultimately became addicted. In spite of an intervention he and his friends held, the friend went in and out of rehab before he was found dead in a hotel room 10 years later with an empty bottle of Perocet and an empty quart of vodka.
“It can happen to anyone,” Christie said. “Every life is precious, every life is an individual gift from God,” Christie told the audience. “We have to stop judging and start giving them the tools they need to get better.”
Standing ovation for Chris Christie. Why is it that we have such distain for those with addictions? People don’t become addicts on purpose. That is what addiction is–powerless over a substance.
We must stop finding ways to punish those with addictions. We must start treating addictions. It doesn’t matter if the addiction is to legal or illegal substances.
I am a cigarette addict. I smoked many years. I have been smoke free for 8 years. I went cold turkey and it was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do. I also have some health issues because of it. How many people would deny me my inhalers? I use 2 different ones.
I am not going to get quite as religious as Christie because I have never claimed to know what God thinks. But, if non-sentient fetuses are sacred, what on earth is a wino out by the dumpster? What is a teen ager hooked on heroine? The wino and the heroin act are all part of the human race and not there because they want to be. The blame game has to stop.
It is very difficult to find addiction treatment centers, whether it is for alcohol, prescription drugs or illegal drugs. It’s even harder to find an affordable in-house facility. Most rehab/nursing homes won’t take someone who has just been through detox, even to get them back on their feet again physically. It truly is a national crime.
A state crime already exists. Don’t tell me you are pro-life when there are 400,000 uninsured Virginians who are costing the state several million dollars per day. Prevention saves money.
Don’t even tell me you are pro-life unless you have the courage to ask for more addiction treatment. You don’t really get to pick and choose.
Chris Christie gets it.
Moon,
I agree with both you and Christie on most points. Helping those with addictions is something a compassionate society does. Yes, it costs less to society in the long-run when drug-addicts get clean, tobacco-users quit, Alcoholics get sober, Food-addicts eat healthy, Gambling addicts quit gambling, Sex-addicts quit…well, I’m not sure “sex-addiction” is real, since the desire to procreate is hard-wired into every species…I think you get my point. What neither you nor Governor Christie mentioned is how we deal with those who resort to crime to feed those addictions. Someone who is willing to rob you or kill you because they need to “feed their habit”. Where we run the compassion-train off the rails is when we begin excusing criminal behavior because the perpetrator is an addict.
Look, some things happen to people, that they have absolutely no control over, and did little or nothing to contribute to their current, unfortunate circumstances. Individuals and families have a run of bad luck, and end up homeless. Someone is the victim of a freak accident that leaves them in constant pain, and unable to work.
There are others, who find themselves dealing with the consequences of one or more bad decisions. I am not saying they are undeserving of compassion, or help. Quite the contrary. Jesus told the Pharisee’s He came for all of the lost sheep, and that they are deserving of grace and compassion. The question is, who delivers the compassion? The individual, the faith-community, the private sector, or the Government?
I have no issue with there being publicly funded rehab for those who are incarcerated. They are under the total control of the state, and dependent upon the state for everything. If the ultimate objective of incarceration is to rehabilitate them, then by all means do so. I also don’t object in principle to medicaid covering rehab at some level.
But let’s get something straight…the individual is ultimately responsible for their own conduct, and we as a society too often fall into the trap of excusing bad decisions, and the resulting consequences. Should the life-long alcoholic receive more compassion than the teetotaler for consideration on who gets the liver-transplant? Should government get involved and make sure that there are “livers for all” (scary idea there), because to deny the alcoholic in favor of the teetotaler shows a lack of compassion for the addict?
I get what you and the Governor are saying: Our society needs to be more compassionate. Of course it does, and I agree in both principle and practice. But let’s be realistic here. If someone is seeking help, they should receive help, within limits of resources and efficacy. If someone has been “in and out of rehab”, when does the individual’s decision to continue using negate the duty to be compassionate?
If people commit crimes then they are punished for the crimes they commit.
All too many times rehab is cut off and out of funding. It happened over at our jail within the past 5 years. The is being penny wise and pound foolish.
I don’t think if it comes down to livers that the teetotaler should get preferencial treatment. All sorts of things can cause a liver to blast out. Considerations like likelihood it will work, etc should be the criteria.
It can be very difficult to find affordable treatment for someone with addiction issues. For example, Medicare won’t pay for many rehab places.
@Moon-howler
“It can be very difficult to find affordable treatment for someone with addiction issues. For example, Medicare won’t pay for many rehab places.”
Nor will my insurance cover one of those “spa rehabs” that hollywood stars go to. Yet, rehab is available.
“don’t think if it comes down to livers that the teetotaler should get preferencial treatment. All sorts of things can cause a liver to blast out. Considerations like likelihood it will work, etc should be the criteria.”
True, but someone who has cirrhosis of the liver after years of alcohol abuse, shouldn’t come before the person who didn’t engage in self-destructive behavior.
So, if I am understanding you correctly, poor life-style choices, even in the face of known risks, shouldn’t be considered when deciding who gets treatment? Treatment shouldn’t be rationed when resources are limited?
It was certainly done to Mickey Mantle.
I guess if there was only one liver left and all the other issues were even, then the non drinker could get it. I really don’t like going down that slippery slope.
How about a heart transplant? Do we start evaluating who ate bacon and who didn’t in order to get the heart? I am just not comfortable with that kind of criteria.
I don’t think Medicare should pay for Hollywood type spa rehabs…whatever those are. I am speaking of plain old rehab centers that are like PT rehab centers except for substance abuse. Nothing luxurious.
I don’t place 100% blame for addiction on individuals. Other factors are in play:
1) The parents who passed on the propensity for addiction via DNA or lifestyle
2) Madison Avenue that encouraged people to engage in addictive behaviors.
3) Business owners that profited by trapping someone in an addictive state
4) Government who raises revenue by encouraging and taxing addictive products.
5) Medical community/Big Pharma that thrives on treating addictions (or creating them).
It is wiser to leave out the moralizing and just say that someone with alcoholism is a bad candidate for a liver transplant compared to someone who was injured by Tylenol overdose because the alcoholic is less healthy and therefore will get fewer years of additional life for the same investment in medical services. Triage by utilitarianism will usually end up at the same result without making it look like government is enforcing a cultural or religious norm.
I think I am going to semi agree with Ed on this one.
Someone still drinking should not get a transplant. Someone still smoking should not get a lung transplant either.
Let’s discuss the big elephant in the room….why are cigarettes still legal? Its all business. No one wants to go up against the tobacco industry.
I would agree with Ed on some points too. Someone who once was a smoker or a heavy drinker in their past, has quit and later develops some health problem should receive the same treatment and resources as everyone else.
Not sure I would agree with him on his 1-5 points though. Too much “victimology” sprinkled about in there.
As far as your “elephant”, Cigarettes are still legal because people want them, and history has proven that prohibition of that which was once legal does not work, and it only works marginally for that which has always been illegal. Call it Human Nature or Frailty, or “sin”. If Altria was forced to stop selling cigarettes tomorrow, people would find a way to get them, in the same way they get Marijuana today. I imagine the e-cigs or “vapes” will gradually replace cigarettes. But if you made cigarettes illegal, heck, if you outlawed tobacco tomorrow, organized crime would step in to fill the void. No question about it.
Both my parents were heavy smokers. My sister started smoking at age 12 or 13 and still smokes. I’ve never smoked a cigarette in my life. Dip was my vice, and I started at 18, and quit about 2 years ago when I found a non-tobacco/non-nicotine substitute.
I don’t want cigarettes illegal. I should have clarified it. But it does make a person wonder when the provable health risks have been known for at least 50 years. There are all sorts of ways the government could cut back on the harmful effects of tobacco without banning them all together.
I go back to the fact that no one really wants to take on the tobacco industry—at least not in Virginia. That is one reason our taxes on cigarettes are so low.
Now Elena is not on this blog, I will just say it…there is more than one way to skin a cat.
For what it’s worth, I probably would have smoked if I had to spend my last dime on a pack of cigarettes.
Dip has its risks also.
Based on that logic, then the children should be aborted because the parents are poor. For their own good.
Love that guy!!!! Christie governs. He understands the word and he applies it. And he’s a rarity. I don’t agree with everything he says and does but I believe his intentions are for the whole. I’ve said that about him for years. I’d vote for him.
And he’s right that in Gods eyes we are ALL his children made in his image and likeness. If you’re TRULY pro life is exactly that – all life. I’ve been involved with the pro life community for 40+ years since college and believe me there are a few sub-groups. The most condescending righteous religious among us don’t understand how profound the concept pro life is. They’ve missed the spiritual boat and jumped on judgement and hate – still can’t reconcile that with the mission. I just watch them and hope for them.
Dont be overcome by evil, overcome evil by good – Romans I think.
Excellent post, Lyssa. I appreciate you spelling out your point of view. I spoke with a lady yesterday who had been accosted several years ago by a local politician. He got in her face and practically spat out that she was a pro abortion democrat. In fact, she is not “pro abortion” (who really is?) She is almost the opposite, she just isn’t going to make that determination for anyone else. She was highly offended. (No, the politician was NOT Bob Marshall.)
I was impressed with Christie’s words. Like you, I certainly don’t always agree with him. Walking the walk and talking the talk isn’t always the party line. It goes much deeper. I always think of Marty and Kris Nohe when I think of those who walk the walk in addition to talking the talk.
@Moon-howler
“But it does make a person wonder when the provable health risks have been known for at least 50 years.”
Same could be said about sky-diving, or riding a motorcycle.
“There are all sorts of ways the government could cut back on the harmful effects of tobacco without banning them all together.”
Is that really the government’s job? First it was alcohol. Then tobacco. Then sugar. Then fat. Then transfat. More and more, the government telling the individual what they can and cannot purchase, own, or consume.
No one howls at all that the government bans drugs it considers dangerous. No one howls at all if the government creates laws that force companies to clean up certain toxic effect of some legal drugs. No one howls if the government forces warning labels on booze, cigarettes, drugs, etc.
“No one” is not correct. Let’s try the word “many.”
Cargo,
Wasn’t that Margret Sanger’s main argument?
Margaret Sangor never advocated for abortion. In fact, she was opposed to it because of its supposed relative danger to women. It was illegal and women often died from non-physician types performing it.
@Cargosquid
Based on what logic? I don’t see any logic in that statement. You are really cheapening the issues that women go through when they decide to have an abortion.
Whether you agree or disagree, there are serious economic issues that women alone are saddled with. Sorry, you will never face them. You just aren’t the right gender.
You know where this is going…..
@Steve Thomas
I can’t leave it alone….back to Margaret Sanger. Margaret Sanger was very pro contraception, not abortion. she felt that repeated pregnancies economically and physically destroyed women. Her own mother died from simply being worn out from giving birth too many times.
Giving birth is hard, brutal work. Been there, done that–twice. Wouldn’t want to do it again.
Go to old grave yards and look at the tomb stones. There are many young women in there, often with a few “days old” young.
Margaret Sanger is a hero of mine. She is a much maligned character on the American and European stage who has probably saved as many lives as Clara Barton, if not more. Every time I need a little inspiration, I pick up my kindle with her autobiography on it.
“I can’t leave it alone….back to Margaret Sanger.”
Of course you can’t, no more than I can let a 2nd Amendment debate alone.
“Margaret Sanger was very pro contraception, not abortion.”
If you want to call voluntary and involuntary sterilization “contraception”, ok. I will stipulate that Sanger was pro-contraception. In her early days, when she was advocating for the use of contraceptives (as they existed at the time), along with “self-control” weren’t all that different from my views on the subject. Where she went wrong, in my humble opinion, and lost the moral high-ground, was when she became wrapped up in the eugenics movement. She testified to Congress in 1916, on this very subject. It’s in the public record. Her words, “Segregation, Sterilization” of “tainted progeny” and the establishment of a “population congress”.
Where the organization she founded ran off the rails was when they were willing to go beyond “the pill”.
You can make a saint out of her, but she was a racist and a segregationist too. Wonder how she felt about the Irish?
She was Irish. I guess that’s ok.
She wasn’t really a racist, or at least no more so than most people of her time. If you go deeply into her own writings, she felt that black women and families would be helped by limiting the number of children. She actually approached the some of the black ministers to ask how she could best approach this subject with black women. Awkward, I agree.
Forced sterilization and forced lobotomizing have been banned. However, back in the day, that’s just how things were done. It is now seen today as the ultimate in taking away someone’s right to choose. I don’t mind the eugenics part because I understand it in its historical context. I think people tend to forget how many of the retardations that people don’t even see today were caused by nutritional deficiencies. PKU seems to pop into my head. There were just many debilitating, deforming diseases that existed, especially in the south, that were a result of extreme poverty.
Something I didn’t say to Cargo…so I will say it here…he talks like she wanted to round people up and do away with them. That was not part of her program.
People dealt with things at the turn of that century that we don’t see nowadays. We live in modern times and even the worst nutrition is light years beyond what poor nutrition was 100 years ago. It’s hard to even discuss it.
I understand your point about Planned Parenthood going beyond contraception into abortion. I just don’t agree with it. What I do advocate is really stepping up contraception so abortion is less needed. Ending unwanted pregnancy is the best way I know to stop abortion.
One more thing …in my most Jobian voice…is that I firmly support any woman or family’s right to terminate a pregnancy when a fetal anomaly is involved. I think that would have been the ultimate goal of Sanger. People who chose not to terminate, that is their choice also. People are more fortunate today, there are all sorts of systems in place to help families with special needs kids. We all chip in to help out with that.
@Moon-howler
““Organized charity itself is the symptom of a malignant social disease…Instead of decreasing and aiming to eliminate the stocks [of people] that are most detrimental to the future of the race and the world, it tends to render them to a menacing degree dominant.”— Margaret Sanger, Pivot of Civilization, Chapter V, “Cruelty of Charity”
Kind of flies in the face of your argument in the top-post. “Compassion” is a “malignant social disease”…and eliminating “stocks….detrimental to the race and world” is compassion.
Now who else said this sort of thing? It’ll come to me in a minute….someone help me out here…what was the name of that Austrian artist with the funny mustache and lederhosen?
I think her point, based on what I know about her, is the whole give a man a fish, you feed him. Teach a man to fish….and he has food for life.
Margaret Sanger was a progressive in the early 20th century. is she really very different than some folks in your own party who want to eliminate the welfare system? To put it very bluntly, she wants to slap people on birth control who are going to produce children who are going to be dependent on society for their entire lives.
Poverty and malnutrition in those days could cause retardation and physical problems. You should have heard the old people who were still alive when I was a kid talk about when they cleaned out the mountain people when the Skyline Drive went in. Many of the people were brought to those towns along both sides of the Blue Ridge and educated, cleaned up, given some health care.
I believe I am speaking of congenital deformities and the like. Many of those conditions existed in the south. You don’t hear much about them today. We speak of generational poverty today. Nutrition is so much better today, even in the poorest of families, that you can’t compare it to conditions a century ago.
It’s going to be hard to shock me over Margaret Sanger. We both know a little too much about history to fool each other. I confess I am more into social history than military history though. I don’t know jack about military history. I can’t even make it happen in my own mind.
Its
““Birth control itself, often denounced as a violation of natural law, is nothing more or less than the facilitation of the process of weeding out the unfit, of preventing the birth of defectives or of those who will become defective.” –Margaret Sanger, “Women and the New Race” Chapter 18”
Yes…this was all about saving women from physical and economic hardship. Clearly I am misreading her intentions.
I really don’t have a problem with this. Pulling out quotes from Sanger, putting them in today’s context, just doesn’t really tell what she was all about. It’s sort of like pulling out quotes from Lincoln…he sounds like a racist when he clearly isn’t.
People of the early 20th century, especially those who wanted to make society better, wanted to eliminate diseases, both mental and physical, that were making people “defective.” Remember that many conditions were brought about by malnutrition and general poor conditions. Even things like hemophelia were considered defects.
It sounds harsh by today’s political correctness but in reality, her mission was clearly to make healthier generations. If you read more about her, you will find this to be true. Today we do the same thing but in kinder terms. What is the WIC program for? Healthier mothers and babies. Why do we have PKU tests? Remember also that I am an old psych major. Many of the retardations and physical conditions were still on the books and were caused by horrible nutrition and mineral deficiencies.
You were actually misreading her intentions. I see nothing wrong with advocating for a healthier populations. She was just shocking in her day because she talked about things “nice women” didn’t talk about.
““Birth control itself, often denounced as a violation of natural law, is nothing more or less than the facilitation of the process of weeding out the unfit, of preventing the birth of defectives or of those who will become defective.” –Margaret Sanger, “Women and the New Race” Chapter 18”
Yes…this was all about saving women from physical and economic hardship. Clearly I am misreading her intentions.
Wait…I seem to recall a whole bunch of folks campaigning and actually passing marijuana legalization and decriminalization…and others are advocating for the decriminalization of all recreational narcotics.
And regulating the manufacture and dispensing of pharmaceuticals is clearly in the public interest. I am not arguing otherwise.
I don’t have a problem with warning labels in general, or requiring the disclosure of possible side-effects in principle, but think we’ve taken it to the extreme. I’m looking at the warning on a bottle of crazy-glue. Not for internal consumption? Damn…and I thought it looked delicious. “Rapid polymerization may occur upon contact with water or alkaline substance”…okay…it’s super-glue…isn’t it supposed to “polymerize on contact with things? I mean…that’s what glue does.
Drawing smoke into one’s lungs isn’t healthy, whether the source of that smoke is burning tobacco, marijuana, crack, meth, your house, the kingsford charcoal burning in your Webber grill, or the chicken in your pan. We need the government to remind us of this?
Hey, I know drinking 5 big-gulps a day isn’t healthy…but the government wants to limit the size I can purchase in one cup…so instead I buy two. How about we limit the number of six-packs I can purchase in a week too, since if I drink too many, my health might suffer, or I might drive.
You aren’t actually going to get an argument from me. Remember, I don’t want to outlaw cigarettes. I still get a great deal of enjoyment from inhaling second hand smoke I follow smokers just to inhale. I tell myself it doesn’t count.
Super glue: I do think the warning : “bonds skin” is a good one. Otherwise, how do you know?
The bottom line is, you simply can’t be liable because you didn’t outguess how stupid the human race can be.
Creating a “healthier” human was the goal of ALL eugenicists. They did so by removing what they considered to be subhuman or, at least, undesirable humans. Sanger was a eugenicist. One of her goals was to reduce the number of undesirables.
And my logic is sound about my statement. Complaining that someone is not “pro-life” if they don’t cough up money through social programs to “help” the cause du jour….complaining that someone isn’t pro-life because the baby will be born poor and the parents are poor….and so its better to abort the child instead of having that baby be a “burden” on society…..is straight out of the eugenics playbook.
Cargo, you either care about all life or you aren’t really pro life. This isn’t a cherry picking situation. If you start weighing in and judging people too much, then you are assuming the role of Whom? No one mentioned coughing up money.
Let’s discuss eugenics for a moment. Yes, it was a movement in the first part of the 20th century. Yes, the dude who founded population zero was an old eugencist who later founded one of the anti immigration groups. I can’t remember all the names now.
Do you think we don’t practice eugenics now? How about your genetic testing? How about all the various nutritional programs? How about the various vaccines that prevent many of the diseases that used to wipe out half the kids born?
what the earlier eugenicists used to advocate was fairly primitive compared to now. We absolutely want healthier, happier babies now and even read what to eat while we are pregnant. I suppose this is where I tell you to stop being naïve and to stop playing politics.
I really admire Margaret Sanger and her advocacy for birth control. I also admire her rudimentary call for healthier human beings. You really cannot fairly evaluate her mission in modern terms. She has to be placed in her historical context.
@Moon-howler
“Super glue: I do think the warning : “bonds skin” is a good one. Otherwise, how do you know?”
Because it’s glue. That’s what glue does. Super Glue does it in Super Fashion. But without a Chemistry class or two, how does ““Rapid polymerization may occur upon contact with water or alkaline substance” tell you not to glue your fingers, lips or eyelids together?
“She was just shocking in her day because she talked about things “nice women” didn’t talk about.”
So she was just a product of the society of her time? Fair enough.
Which is one of the main reasons why when secular-progressives want to belittle my faith, I can tell them to “go in peace, but go.” Eugenics was “society meets science” back in that day, and today its “Climate Change and Social Justice”. Pure BUNK. I’ll take my worldview based on an the unchanging teachings of 2000 year-old Jewish carpenter, and the writings of some enlightened english colonists over their ever-changing egghead clap-trap any day of the week, and all day on Sunday…especially Sunday
@Moon-howler
“Cargo, you either care about all life or you aren’t really pro life.”
And I refuse to accept your premise that if I don’t care about life in the way that you feel is appropriate, then I must not be “pro-life.”
Bull crap.
The logic presented is that babies born to the poor will be a burden on society and if the evil GOP doesn’t pay for all the programs, then they aren’t pro-life….and that because the babies will be a burden on society due to perceptions of poverty….. those babies should be aborted to save costs. That those lives have no intrinsic value.
Every child that has risen from poor beginnings puts a lie to that idea.
Do you not see how evil your ideas are? You are advocating that poverty…or perceptions thereof…. are a reason to end a life. That if a political party or a government refuse to pay for their support, those children should not be allowed to live…to be born. That logic does not put a single limit on abortion or even infanticide.
You want to support a “right to choose?” You think that supporting a right of a woman to choose whether the fetus lives or dies…whether the fetus is born….is a good thing?
Fine.
Be aware that your statements show that you support abortion for a whim, if that is why the woman desires it. Be aware that your statements show that you support abortion because it costs SOCIETY too much to support a child. That SOCIETY now has a say in whether you should be born because taxes will be used to support you…that your ideas state that the existence of some social program will decide whether or not that fetus should live.
That is the logic you are advocating.
You may not think so. But you are saying that if the GOP would only support all those social programs ad infinitum….no abortions would have to happen. That being pro-life is providing government support for all. Well….if the gov’t is paying for it all, then the gov’t gets to decide if it wants to pay for it AT ALL. And if it doesn’t, then…..oh look….abortions should happen.
1. I am not discussing abortion.
2. Margaret Sanger did not advocate for aborton.
3. There is no logic being presented. I am not discussing abortion.
Did you even hear what Chris Christie said? Did you feel his pain talking about his friend? Would you go tell some woman she had to deliver a baby yet not help Christie’s friend with addiction problems, physical problems and emotional problems? Do you just think that is throwing money at democratic causes?
So lets talk about abortion now since I am so evil. You have put more words in my mouth than I can even address. What I have said is that having children you aren’t ready to have can put a woman into a cycle of poverty from which she might not be able to extricate herself. Prove me wrong. You can’t.
I have never said babies or fetuses as I like to call them at that stage should be aborted to save costs.
I do support first trimester abortion. You betcha. You have lied about my position intentionally and you have presented your argument like some hysterical old lady. Shame on you. I don’t recall mentioning Republicans or Democrats. might that be your own guilty conscience?
The government might be a head of the game if it used some common sense about treating some of these issues.
You are off the tracks on this one. Let’s discuss the topic and stop projecting about my evilness. I really can’t participate in a rambling conversation based on what you think I think.
No.
We do not practice eugenics today.
Eugenics advocates the removal of people based upon their race or other classification, usually by well off bigoted white people, for the good of the human race.
Sanger was a bigot that supported the removal of the subhuman races.
She did not advocate any such thing. That is an ignorant thing to say.
That isn’t even what eugenics is about. How would you classify these practices:
1.Artificial insemination by donor.(according to attributes selected by the parent(s))
2.Egg donation.
3.Prenatal diagnosis of genetic disorders and pregnancy terminations of defective fetuses.
4.Embryo selection.
5. WIC
6. post natal testing for genetic defects.
All of these practices are to form a better, healthier human race.
Some people undergoing artificial insemination even pick out characteristics of the Y chromosome that they feel are desirable: handsome, tall, intelligent, musical, athletic, etc. What is this other than more refined eugenics without the pall of discrimination on it.
If you want to discuss someone still alive and kicking who has been involved in zero population growth, some eugenics ideas, and anti immigration, lets talk about John Taunton. He seems to have dabbled in all these areas.
What Christie is hitting on is that the current drug of choice – Heroin is coming back in every income level because it is relatively easy to get and cheap. Many people become hooked on Oxycontin (and other drugs) and then lead themselves down a path to Heroin. Our society has tried several things (incarceration, drug stings, etc) that has not worked to reduce the usage not the illegal sale of illegal drugs.
I say do something radical – legalize it. Educate everybody that it is not good for you, but by legalizing it you can tax it and more regulate it. The illegal drugs are often laced with some not so good drugs. We cannot police everyone on everything that they do.
Rehab for drugs and alcohol are usually the first funds cut here at the jail. We are dismissive about it rather than looking at the problems substance abuse has caused in society. It also is a gateway to crime. Bad checks, Rx forgeries, burglary for your drugs, etc.