Tobacco addiction cheap for society?

Some really strange things get said on /. sometimes.

As I was originally starting to type this, there was an article (which I failed to record a link to and now can't be sure which it was) on Bitcoin being used in the black market for illicit drugs. Lots of people in that part of the conversation seem to want to make drugs generally legal in the US, and they cite the supposed failure of Prohibition.

(I thought I had blogged about the supposed failure of prohibition. Apparently not.

It did not fail, but we failed to do it wisely.

We should have specifically authorized the states and communities to prohibit and/or regulate intrastate commerce in alcohol and other substances with strong habit-forming properties and/or negative health consequences, and restricted the states from attempting to prohibit personal and private production and use of the same, except in cases where the production and/or use at private level presented legal issues in other areas. (Production facilities blowing up and/or threatening neighbor's property, health, etc. Also, allowing states and communities to attempt to deal with individuals who, when consuming or using such substances, would lose control and present a clear danger to others.)

And we should have authorized laws to be made regulating and/or prohibiting interstate commerce and transportation of such substances, particularly into states where such was regulated and/or prohibited.

This would have been in keeping with the spirit and letter of the Constitution.

Having failed to do that, we undid the prohibition amendment in a way that left us open to the FDA. That was a bigger failure than the way we originally did prohibition.)

Well, somebody brought up a concept that is apparently making the rounds in parts of Europe -- that tobacco is actually cheaper than euthanasia. Talk about false dilemma and strawman and, well, the whole basic gamut of false logic.

Dealing with the "problem" of an aging society by killing the old folks off with either explicit euthanasia or the implicit use of vice is just plain wrong on all levels.

Old people are valuable. For their experience, if nothing else. But for all sorts of other things, too.

If our economy does not allow us to recognize their value appropriately, then the economy is wrong. Fix the economy, don't fix the non-problem of a rising average age.