Daily Archives: August 31, 2004


Who Will the Cartels Support?

Via Eugene Volokh I see that Jesse Walker at Reason picked up on the absurdity of hastert’s fantasy about George Soros:

In addition to being baseless, Hastert’s accusation doesn’t even make sense. Drug prohibition acts as a price support and a barrier to entry; it helps the cartels maintain their market position. They’re about as likely to fund a legalization campaign as they are to give Denny Hastert an all-expenses-paid vacation in Bermuda or — as long as we’re throwing around groundless insinuations — a free sex tour in Thailand.
Well, on this latter point Jesse misses the mark. The cartels are quite likely to include these types of gifts in their funding, direct or otherwise, of those congress critters who support their market position, i.e., who support ongoing drug prohibition.
Update (9/3): I see that Mark Kleiman picked up on this thought from one of his readers.