# The War on Drugs? Or Glorified Gardening? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 9, 2006, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104 "2006-09-09T23:10:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Sweet\_Mercury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/49beb7/32.png) [@Sweet\_Mercury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sweet_Mercury)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2006, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/1 "2006-09-09T23:10:16Z")
According to [this](http://www.norml.org/index.cfm?Group_ID=7033) article on NORML, the Drug Enforcement Agency recently admitted that 98% of the marijuana confiscated and destroyed in the US is classified as “ditchweed.” Full stats available [here [Albany.edu]](http://www.albany.edu/sourcebook/pdf/t4382005.pdf). Ditchweed, or feral marijuana, is any marijuana that grows wild, and shows “no evidence of planting, fertilizing, or tending.” And, according to [The Dept. of Justice Drug Intelligence Center](http://www.usdoj.gov/ndic/pubs1/1052/marijuan.htm), “Ditchweed lacks sufficient levels of THC (tetrahydrocannabinol), the compound that gives marijuana its potency, to have value as an illicit drug; however, ditchweed is routinely harvested and mixed with higher-grade marijuana.” So, basically, it puffs up those joints, but would have _zero_ value without the cultivated, potent stuff that is the target of the “drug war.” 98%? I can’t find and reliable source for the percentage of the DEA budget that goes towards “fighting” marijuana, but I do know now that 98% of that budget is flushed down the fucking toilet—spent on eradicating a wild, naturally growing plant that has no commercial purpose other than to make ugly necklaces for hippies and suits for bad actors. Why? Why are we, as taxpayers, allowing this nonsense “war on drugs” to continue when it branches out into so many needless errors and wastes so much god-damned money, and turns over a million non-violent people with a legitimate medical issue into criminals? What are we going to find out next, that 90% of the DEA’s seizure of “domestic opiates” is in the form of bagels? To whom exactly are politicians pandering that they legislate such stupid programs? Full disclosure: for the record, I don’t, and have never, used the stuff. I think it’s disgusting and vulgar. However, I don’t see any point in spending countless billions of dollars on fighting what should ultimately be a personal decision. ---
**Author:** ![mike1dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@mike1dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mike1dog)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/2 "2006-09-10T00:15:24Z")
The answer is in your post: “Ditchweed lacks sufficient levels of THC (tetrahydrocannabinol), the compound that gives marijuana its potency, to have value as an illicit drug; however, ditchweed is routinely harvested and mixed with higher-grade marijuana.” Blame the dealers. Evidently they’re just stretching what they sell. ---
**Author:** ![diggleblop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ac91a4/32.png) [@diggleblop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/diggleblop)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/3 "2006-09-10T00:28:05Z")
Techincally we’ve been fighting the “war on drugs” since 1903 and the drug warriors still haven’t won. They won’t ever win. Per my thread on this subject the other day; I’m thoroughly convinced that the Government makes more money on drugs being illegal than them being legal. Other wise they would…well…be legal. Lot’s would argue otherwise, nor do I have proof of my claim, but hey, neither do they. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/4 "2006-09-10T00:34:13Z")
[QUOTE=mike1dog] The answer is in your post: “Ditchweed lacks sufficient levels of THC (tetrahydrocannabinol), the compound that gives marijuana its potency, to have value as an illicit drug; however, ditchweed is routinely harvested and mixed with higher-grade marijuana.” Blame the dealers. Evidently they’re just stretching what they sell. [/QUOTE] But…but…"“no evidence of planting, fertilizing, or tending.”! It’s not ganja that someone intends to harvest and sell, it’s schwag that grew where some kid was cleaning his weed and pitched the seeds out the window of his car! Being a hybrid, the seeds don’t breed true to the stuff he was smoking, and ditch weed grows instead. The stuff grows like, well, like a weed! ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/5 "2006-09-10T00:41:37Z")
[QUOTE=Sweet Mercury] Why? Why are we, as taxpayers, allowing this nonsense “war on drugs” to continue when it branches out into so many needless errors and wastes so much god-damned money, and turns over a million non-violent people with a legitimate medical issue into criminals? [/QUOTE] Because we’re dumb. ---
**Author:** ![Sweet\_Mercury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/49beb7/32.png) [@Sweet\_Mercury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sweet_Mercury)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/6 "2006-09-10T01:09:58Z")
[QUOTE=mike1dog] The answer is in your post: “Ditchweed lacks sufficient levels of THC (tetrahydrocannabinol), the compound that gives marijuana its potency, to have value as an illicit drug; however, ditchweed is routinely harvested and mixed with higher-grade marijuana.” Blame the dealers. Evidently they’re just stretching what they sell. [/QUOTE] But, like **WhyNot** said, it’s a plant that grows naturally. Like crabgrass. It has no use as a drug whatsoever. Plants like [Datura](http://www.totse.com/en/drugs/psychedelics/167743.html) are far more dangerous as drugs and we aren’t spending billions to hunt it down in the wild. If they really wanted to fight the war on drugs, they wouldnt waste time and money on ditchweed and focus their efforts on the cultivated, usable stuff. If theat wasn’t around, ditchweed would have no illegal use anyway. The dealers would have nothing to stretch. We are the only industrialized country with no commercial hemp industry, after all. ---
**Author:** ![Sweet\_Mercury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/49beb7/32.png) [@Sweet\_Mercury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sweet_Mercury)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/7 "2006-09-10T01:11:28Z")
[QUOTE=Miller] Because we’re dumb. [/QUOTE] 😃 I could live with that as an answer. ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/8 "2006-09-10T03:35:05Z")
I’ve never heard of anyone “stretching” dope by mixing it with ditchweed. Has anyone else? ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/9 "2006-09-10T03:46:25Z")
[QUOTE=DanBlather] I’ve never heard of anyone “stretching” dope by mixing it with ditchweed. Has anyone else? [/QUOTE] Now that you mention it, no. I’m pretty sure buyers would notice if half the bud in their bags was shake, or if some pieces looked very different from others. Even cheap marijuana is sold in clumps, not all broken up. Different varieties look different, but they’re not usually sold mixed together, in my hypothetical experience. ---
**Author:** ![Sweet\_Mercury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/49beb7/32.png) [@Sweet\_Mercury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sweet_Mercury)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/10 "2006-09-10T04:04:41Z")
[QUOTE=DanBlather] I’ve never heard of anyone “stretching” dope by mixing it with ditchweed. Has anyone else? [/QUOTE] Actually, I don’t know where they get that from. I would guess it works with the stupid suburban kids who are just happy to get their hands on something to pass time. If that is a rarety, though, then that’s just further justification that the DEA is only masterbating by wasting time rounding ditchweed up. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/11 "2006-09-10T04:36:29Z")
I’ve never heard of anyone blending with ditchweed either and I’ve had some extensive personal experience with marijuana subculture. For one thing the customers would know it immediately, it’s not like mixing powders or something. For another thing it wouldn’t be that easy r convenient to always have to go out and find wild growing plants and harvest them. Wild cannabis is not THAT ubiquitous. It sounds like a lot of work for little if any payoff. I suspect that it’s bullshit tossed out by the DEA as an excuse to destroy wild plants. Why they want to? Who knows? It probably helps to make it look like they’re doing something. ---
**Author:** ![RetroVertigo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b38774/32.png) [@RetroVertigo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RetroVertigo)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/12 "2006-09-10T05:20:54Z")
> [@WhyNot](#): > > it’s schwag that grew where some kid was cleaning his weed and pitched the seeds out the window of his car! Most of the feral cannabis growth at least where I live is descended from farm crops first grown in the depression. I live in a fairly urban area, but during the fall you can’t drive by a wooded or farmed area and not smell it growing. It is after asking my dad about the smell; that triggered my first anti-drug talk. > [@WhyNot](#): > > Being a hybrid, the seeds don’t breed true to the stuff he was smoking, and ditch weed grows instead. After years of being back and self-crossed these plants are pretty close to being pure breeding. It is the “mutations” or traits (such as smell, color, THC content) of hybrids that breeders\* of high-end marijuana are after. _slight hijack_ I find it depressing that these people couldn’t find a more helpful outlet for their obvious skill. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/13 "2006-09-10T05:38:26Z")
[QUOTE=Sweet Mercury] Why? [/QUOTE] Presumably to pump up the “X tons of Demon Weed With Roots In Hell Destroyed” statistic. I am reminded of the story of the Soviet chandelier factory. First, they were judged on the number of chandeliers produced, and cranked out lots of tiny useless ones. Then, they were judged on the total weight of chandeliers produced, and made them so big they pulled down ceilings. ---
**Author:** ![nano8track](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/8e8cbc/32.png) [@nano8track](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nano8track)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 8:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/14 "2006-09-10T08:33:09Z")
> [@](#): > > 98% of the marijuana confiscated and \*destroyed \* You have to be careful when reading statistics. Obviously they are confiscating all the marijuana they can find, but only destroying the ditchweed. They’re hanging on to the “good stuff”. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/15 "2006-09-10T15:25:59Z")
[QUOTE=RetroVertigo] Most of the feral cannabis growth at least where I live is descended from farm crops first grown in the depression. I live in a fairly urban area, but during the fall you can’t drive by a wooded or farmed area and not smell it growing. It is after asking my dad about the smell; that triggered my first anti-drug talk. [/QUOTE] Heh. I know I smelled a lot more “skunks” than I ever saw hanging around our subdivision! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2006, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/16 "2006-09-10T21:00:14Z")
I think cities like Detroit that have huge fiscal problems should quit wasting momey on drug enforcement. We have a lot of people in prison costing millions, a waste. ---
**Author:** ![Sweet\_Mercury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/49beb7/32.png) [@Sweet\_Mercury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sweet_Mercury)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2006, 7:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/17 "2006-09-11T07:42:47Z")
[QUOTE=Steve MB] Presumably to pump up the “X tons of Demon Weed With Roots In Hell Destroyed” statistic. I am reminded of the story of the Soviet chandelier factory. First, they were judged on the number of chandeliers produced, and cranked out lots of tiny useless ones. Then, they were judged on the total weight of chandeliers produced, and made them so big they pulled down ceilings. [/QUOTE] I never heard that story about the Soviets, but I think everyone who has read enough dystopian totalitarian fiction can get the gist of this. Unless it’s pointed out to them—and often even after it’s pointed out to them—people won’t realize that grandiose statistics of government accomplishments are just a bunch of fluff to justify the program in the minds of the “voting” public. I do wonder what’s next though? Will be getting any reports about Floating Fortresses being built or record number of razors being produced? We are at war with Iraq, and we have always been at war with Iraq, right? :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Stringer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Stringer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stringer)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2006, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/18 "2006-09-11T17:00:30Z")
[QUOTE=diggleblop] I’m thoroughly convinced that the Government makes more money on drugs being illegal than them being legal. Other wise they would…well…be legal. [/QUOTE] How does the government make _any_ money from the drug war, let alone enough to justify it being illegal? 😕 ---
**Author:** ![II\_Gyan\_II](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/bbe5ce/32.png) [@II\_Gyan\_II](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/II_Gyan_II)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2006, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/19 "2006-09-11T17:48:48Z")
[QUOTE=micahjn] How does the government make _any_ money from the drug war, let alone enough to justify it being illegal? 😕 [/QUOTE] Generally, it’s a matter of power, not just money. In 1970, President Nixon appointed a commission to investigate drug abuse, headed by former Pennsylvania Governor Raymond Shafer. According to its final report in 1973, > [@](#): > > Because of the intensity of the public concern and the emotionalism surrounding the topic of drugs, all levels of government have been pressured into action with little time for planning. The political pressures involved in this governmental effort have resulted in a concentration of public energy on the most immediate aspects of drug use and a reaction along the paths of least political resistance. The recent result has been the creation of ever larger bureaucracies, ever increasing expenditures of monies, and an outpouring of publicity so that the public will know that “something” is being done. > > Perhaps the major consequence of this ad hoc policy planning hag been the creation, at the federal, state and community levels, of a vested interest in the perpetuation of the problem among those dispensing and receiving funds. Infrastructures are created, job descriptions are standardized, “experts” are created and ways of doing business routinized and established along bureaucratic channels. During the last several years, drug programming has become a multi-billion dollar industry, one administering to its own needs as well as to those of its drug-using clientele. In the course of well-meaning efforts to do something about drug use, this society may have inadvertently institutionalized it as a never-ending project. At the federal, state and local levels, roughly $70 billion is spent annually on drug war costs, divided among hundreds of agencies. ---
**Author:** ![slaphead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9bcb4/32.png) [@slaphead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slaphead)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2006, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104/20 "2006-09-12T16:42:38Z")
[QUOTE=Sweet Mercury] I never heard that story about the Soviets, but I think everyone who has read enough dystopian totalitarian fiction can get the gist of this. Unless it’s pointed out to them—and often even after it’s pointed out to them—people won’t realize that grandiose statistics of government accomplishments are just a bunch of fluff to justify the program in the minds of the “voting” public. [/QUOTE] It’s basically a direct quote from Kruschev, as referenced [here](http://www.vdare.com/roberts/soviet_economy.htm) amongst other places. The rest of it should sound familiar too… > [@](#): > > The Soviet Union wasted its resources because the success indicator for Soviet managers allowed them to be successful even though their output was poorly related to the needs of users. Soviet output basically satisfied no one but the statistician measuring it. > > The Soviet manager’s success indicator was a measure of gross output, such as weight, quantity, square feet, or surface area. Gross output indicators played havoc with assortments, sizes, quality, and so on. Nikita Khrushchev complained of chandeliers so heavy “that they pull the ceilings down on our heads” (qtd. in Roberts and LaFollette 1990, 8). A famous Soviet cartoon depicted the manager of a nail factory being given the Order of Lenin for exceeding his tonnage. Two giant cranes were pictured holding up one giant nail. Feel free to compare and contrast with whatever other statistics the government pumps out… 😉 [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-war-on-drugs-or-glorified-gardening/372104.md?page=2)