Well.......given that there are states in America where juveniles can be sentenced to death I dont really think you have a leg to stand on on that one Onyx. How many teenagers have Georgia and Texas sentenced to die in the last ten years?

You're barking up the wrong tree, Dana. Onyx wants to kill 'em all! :D
(Does this mean you have internet access again, I hope?)

I just started Azar Nafisi's "Reading Lolita in Tehran". So far its fascinating being brought into this woman's living room and hearing about the revolution all mixed in with her study of Western literature. Anyone share an interest in this book?

22 juveniles have been executed since 1973. 227 have been sentenced in that period. 133 of those sentences have been either reversed of commuted.

Most of these "juveniles" were 17 years old. I strongly reccomend reading the listings describing the very adult crimes these legal "children" committed. These include multiple murder, rape and murder, robbery and murder. The list starts on page 24 of the linked .pdf document.

It's a very adult list. And a 17 year old can be held criminally responsible for their actions. The juvenile court system in the United States is typically set up to deal with petty crimes, and the kid's record is expunged at age 18, and the newly minted adult released from juvenile incarceration. (In some jurisdictions I think you can be held in a juvie facility up to age 21. The US has some confusion over what legally constitutes and "adult."

It's not clearly detailed in this brief study report but a lot of the crimes described are probably also drug-related.

What leg were you presuming I was standing on?

The Walton Family :p

ya know, I've been mulling this whole Iran thing over for quite some time, and overall my money for the next invasion is Syria... anyone want in on a bet? and I also wonder if bush has ever studied any military history... you it's almost impossible to fight a war on three fronts... okay world war two being the exception, but..

there's a post where someone said it much better than I can... lemme see if I can find it

oh well... it's gone.. in summation

if I were north korea or iran I would be rushing ahead as fast as possible with WMDs and nukes, 'cuz if america is going to invade me, I'm going to make it a bitter pill to swallow.

the concept of mutually assured destruction works...

That doesnt work, trust me.

Well, there were 13 15-year-olds on that "very adult list". As for kids using drugs - there are days when I almost don't blame them. Here are a few fun facts: Over 12 percent of the U. S. population lives in poverty—one in six children. Families with children are the fastest-growing segment of the homeless population in the US—40%. Thirty-six million people, including 14 million children, experience hunger.

But who cares about those kids, right? Their families are probably just a bunch of shiftless bums and deserve what they get. Let's get back to what's really important these days - finding excuses to invade sovereign third world nations.

drug use and other crimes are obviously a good way to lift yourself out of poverty. sorry, i don't buy that one. it's just another excuse to explain away a decision that should be pinned squarely on one's own weakness.

Probably the biggest factor pushing teens into drug use is peer pressure. If you are a 13 year old kid living on the streets or in the projects, what sort of peer group do you think that you're likely to have? How do you think you are going to feel about your chances in life when all around you see despair, homelessness, unemployment or underemlpoyment? Addiction is a disease. Get out of the middle ages. Yes, a person can make the choice to treat his disease of addiction by going into rehab, attending 12-step meetings, etc. The choice is theirs whether they fight it or give up. We need to give those kids hope and a belief that there is something positive they can do with their lives. Telling a kid that he is "less than" and commanding him to pull himself up by his own bootstraps when he's living in poverty is a thoughtless and heartless response.

Treating addiction as a disease rather than a decision doesn't accomplish anything.

Face it, it's a decision. You CHOOSE to pick up the pipe, the needle, or the bottle. Nobody every forced me to smoke a joint or take a drink. Neither has any of the couple thousand drug users or alcoholics that I've seen.

Telling a kid that he is "less than" and that he'll be living in poverty by providing a meager government handout doesn't serve him either.

I just wish we could get some kind of consistency. IMO, draft age, voting age, and drinking age should all be the same.

As far as legality, we tried to use Prohibition to solve alcoholism until we figure out how many people we would have to throw in jail if we strictly enforced the law.

I'm moving to an alcohol/tobacco stance on many drugs - no public intoxication or DUI and limited to adults. Tax it to fund treatment. Strictly enforce prohibitions on sales to minors.

From a common-sense conservative and liberal standpoint, spending $28,000 per year in taxpayer money times 10 years for some idiot with 3 grams of anything and no obvious intent to sell seems ridiculous.

I still don't know if any of the founding fathers used the hemp they grew for anything other than making rope or paper :fumette: , but it would be interesting to find out.

these are all fine examples of excuses. excuses that can be thrown out to explain away your own bad decisions. "oh, i'm poor because ____ is holding me down - i have no choice but to burn a rock." BULLSHIT. it is a decision.

don't start to lecture me about addiction from the wealth of knowledge you haven't yet forgotten. i know about addiction in a very close and personal way. addiction can be physical or mental and it is extremely difficult to overcome. and yes, in many cases it is rightly called a disease, but let me ask you - how does an individual become addicted to a substance? is Joe Schmo walking down the street one day, never having tried heroin in his life and just get a craving for it? in every case i've ever known, Joe Schmo made a conscious decision to start a behavior. whether he becomes addicted or not, it is his choice to tempt fate. to say it is someone else's fault is ridiculous. to suggest that it is understandable that so many people in economic hardship become addicts is appalling. these are the very individuals who should know better - they see the consequences every day of their lives.

here is an idea - if you look around you and all you see are people living shitty lives because of addictions and criminal actions... Don't follow in their footsteps! it is that effing simple.

Rich i agree with you completely. i don't really care who is smoking weed, running a line, or freebasing for that matter. where i start to care is how it affects the lives of those who aren't participating in the behavior. if the person can't keep a job because of their habit - F 'em no public assistance for that. and in cases of property or personal damage that can be traced back to drug or alcohol use - nail them to the wall in the most severe manner possible. i don't see the point in spending time and money on going after dealers - unless they are found selling to kids, then nail 'em. otherwise, they are simply providing a service. go after the addicts and cut the demand side out of the equation, if you want dealers to go away.

but in the end, quit making excuses for people who make bad choices. it is called personal responsibility and we don't have enough of it in this country anymore.