<p>Affidavits with the names of those arrested were revealed at 11 a.m. and include the following student-athletes arrested for selling marijunana</p>
<p>Complete waste of police resources.</p>
<p>It’s a great question, and a fair one, without a clear answer. The moving of the drinking age to 21, for example had a huge, positive effect on rates of high school (and junior high school) drinking, primarily because 18-year-olds were less likely to purchase booze for 15-year-olds. There have been very large drops in drinking among those under 18 as a result.</p>
<p>I joke sometimes that legalization for adults means that we leave the kids’ market to the drug dealers. Fortunately, there is a difference between legalization and decriminalization. Portugal did not legalize drug use or sale.</p>
<p>“It is also true that I think our nation’s drinking laws are insane, and have done much to encourage binge drinking among adolescents and associated risky behaviors.”</p>
<p>There is absolutely overwhelming evidence to the contrary. A good argument can be made that drinking laws are a bad idea because it doesn’t provide the level of freedom we might prefer. But as a public health matter, the raising of the drinking age was one of the most successful public health interventions of the 20th Century, and has saved tens of thousands of lives (and a huge amount of morbidity.)</p>
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So how does it work? Is it still a crime to sell the illegal drugs? Do the sellers till go to jail sometimes?</p>
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The state I lived in during HS (Colorado) had the same thing. I think it was 3.2 beer and wine at age 18 and then everything else at 21. I don’t know if it had a positive effect or not - there were still HS kids who’d go out and get drunk but I wasn’t one of them. The state where I currently live has the graduated driving privileges as you describe. I think it’s a good thing for driving.</p>
<p>Totally anecdotal - but I’ve been to Europe a lot and boy, do they drink! It seems to be a big part of the culture and there seems to be a lot of drinking to excess. I don’t know that their more permissive laws really do much to reduce drinking or alcohol related problems. ‘Mini’ probably knows.</p>
<p>Regardless of any of the above, the (alleged) drug sellers and buyers at TCU no doubt knew it was illegal whether they agreed whether it s/b or not, made some poor decisions to be involved with it anyway, took the risks, and got caught. It was pretty dumb on their part regardless of the current drug laws.</p>
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<p>One of the major sports anchors on local DFW news stated he was going to do an “unplugged” opinion piece on the scandal at the 10:00 news. This anchor is known for being fearless in expressing (often) contrary opinions. He hinted that he will address the very point you have brought up above about the presumption of innocence and lack of same being shown by TCU administration. It should be an interesting segment.</p>
<p>I remain intrigued (especially since nobody responded the first time) that just weeks and a few months ago, many of the posters here were casting stones already on a multitude of individuals at Penn State, Syracuse, etc and yet NOT ONE person has been found guilty yet. Then today, when this breaks, everybody wants to mention how “innocent until proven guilty” comes into play…</p>
<p>And if a “sting operation” was conducted and these students were caught selling the drugs straight to the law enforcement, I think you’d have a hard time arguing innocence BTW…</p>
<p>^^^^I would think they would have either audio or video recordings?</p>
<p>The player’s names have already been removed from the football roster.</p>
<p>hops, I was one quick to condemn Paterno and haven’t weighed in on this, but, yeah, I imagine they’re likely guilty. There’s got to be video evidence in a drug sting.</p>
<p>And let’s also remember that TCU is a private institution… they can essentially get rid of students for whatever reason they want! Violation of university rules? See ya!</p>
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<p>Hops, you really have to try a bit harder to avoid terms such as NOBODY and EVERYBODY. </p>
<p>While I have not dissected every post in this thread for accuracy as you might have done, I have to admit that I have failed to see anyone using the “innocent until proven guilty” for those students. The story seemed quite compelling that the guilt of the students was a fait accompli. </p>
<p>I am afraid that you are confusing a discussion about decriminalizing certain elements of the drug trade and consumption with an attempt to discuss the guilt or innocence of the students. </p>
<p>And, for the record, I see absolutely no parallels between this story and the sordid cover-up at Penn State.</p>
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<p>Not sure how you missed the second post in the thread…</p>
<p>@xiggi…Very surreal that you discussed/provided CNN link to Vicente Fox’s stance on legalizing certain drugs. Low and behold, guess who was actually **AT TCU today<a href=“shortly%20after%20the%20arrests”>/b</a> and gave a lecture along with the former Canadian Prime Minister?! Fox talked about Mexico’s drug problems along with numerous other current issues. The forum was part of his TCU lecture series. I didn’t agree with a lot of what was said, but found it interesting nonetheless.</p>
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hops, if you take a look at my posts in the Paterno thread, you might want to amend your use of “everybody” as well.</p>
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<p>The connection is big-time collegiate sports programs and the cover they provide for people who have no serious interest in the real business of higher education.</p>
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<p>I’m not sure of the details of the decrease in drug abuse in Portugal. It certainly is intriguing. However, it is possible that the effectiveness of the policy may depend on the culture in which it is implemented. In other words, decriminalization may not be effective in the U.S. even though it works in Europe.</p>
<p>Recently, I saw a news special on how they got rid of all street signs in one place in the Netherlands. It was very effective, as people started to become more safety-conscious as they needed to use their judgement rather than dumbly following signs. However effective, I doubt this would work in New York City. Different city. Different culture.</p>
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<p>I still don’t see a huge connection. Yes, the TCU thing brought down some athletes in a program that had been considered clean, but the football program was not a “cover” and non-athletes were involved as well.</p>
<p>My understanding is that the focus in Portugal is also on enabling heroin users to continue to be productive members of society: hold jobs, not get HIV, etc. Apparently it works better than our approach.</p>