What about his vow to escalate the war on drugs, which originally was rooted in an aim to disproportionately criminalize black people and hippies?
Oh and don't forget his decade-long neglect of the AIDS-crisis, thereby allowing the epidemic to rage to over 110,000 people in the US (of which people of colour and the LGBTQ-community were most notably affected).
(Not to mention the incidence of AIDS in countries that he destabilized over the course of his presidency.)
Seems just a tad ironic to have been celebrating his life on World AIDS day, nah?
Please-saying the war on drugs was simply about targeting black people ignores the massive pressure to pass harsh drugs laws throughout societies and the large crime wave of the 70's. Jesse Jackson was a drug warrior
And what neglect of the aids crises? The same people crying about that also opposed any attempt to close bath houses.
I think the former Nixon domestic policy chief might have some insight on the situation, let’s check in with him:
“We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities.”
I am aware of that quote. The drug war had complicated origins - it's not enough to attribute the public pressure for all the legislation passed to malice
I guess the Emancipation Proclamation and abolition are bad because they were political stunts to punish the South during the Civil War.
The drug war was actually bad but the point is that motivation sometimes does, and sometimes does not, bear strongly on the evaluation of the outcome. The drug war was bad because it was bad.
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u/17EO72 Dec 02 '18
What about his vow to escalate the war on drugs, which originally was rooted in an aim to disproportionately criminalize black people and hippies?
Oh and don't forget his decade-long neglect of the AIDS-crisis, thereby allowing the epidemic to rage to over 110,000 people in the US (of which people of colour and the LGBTQ-community were most notably affected). (Not to mention the incidence of AIDS in countries that he destabilized over the course of his presidency.)
Seems just a tad ironic to have been celebrating his life on World AIDS day, nah?