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Counterpoint: https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/ https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/ Nixon's Chief Domestic Advisor, quote:

Counterpoint: https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/ https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/ Nixon's Chief Domestic Advisor, quote: “You want to know what this was really all about?” he asked with the bluntness of a man who, after public disgrace and a stretch in federal prison, had little left to protect. “The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? 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. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.” This is not the only thing the government did, or continues to do, to destroy various peoples' faith in it.

awinder 10y ago
Not to mention direct action against leaders like MLK, which, I don't think, was done under the cover of drugs
arkades 10y ago
As I understand it, this "quote" was provided second-hand decades after it happened, and only after Ehrlichman was no longer in a position to deny its accuracy (read: dead and in the ground). Harpers is probably one of the few places where that sort of thing that could get past editorial scrutiny. (Or, maybe not, maybe I'm just being insufficiently cynical.) And yet between here and reddit, I think I see this pop up every other week.
- PostOnce 10y ago
  Even if it turns out to be untrue, what does it say that it sounds so plausible/believable, so many people are quoting it? Either way, it seems people don't have a lot of faith in the government, and there are plausible examples of things the government has done to put itself in this situation. Another example from the same era, gulf of tonkin incident. It doesn't matter what it costs the people at the bottom if the people at the top get what they want, that's the impression I think many of us are left with.
  - tdb7893 10y ago
    To play devil's advocate the thing that could make it sound so plausible is confirmation bias.
  - internaut 10y ago
    > what does it say that it sounds so plausible/believable, so many people are quoting it? I think you know the answer to this. There's lots of things I'd like to believe, but don't because they are not true. Outside of HN and other geek outposts, a great many people, maybe most have a flaky relationship to the truth on almost everything. We're not immune to that of course but I at least know with fellow geeks they will admit the possibility of being wrong instead of relying exclusively on waving their hands and feels. Geeks will change minds when presented with data. Often slowly and grudgingly, but still they are able to do it, it is in them, their identity is looser. One thing I suspect most of us have very wrong about people is that being 'scientific' is strongly connected to personality, and so appeals to logic and reason are simply not going to resound with everybody in totality. It is not meaningful to them. The World is my anecdotal evidence for that.

awinder 10y ago

Not to mention direct action against leaders like MLK, which, I don't think, was done under the cover of drugs

arkades 10y ago

As I understand it, this "quote" was provided second-hand decades after it happened, and only after Ehrlichman was no longer in a position to deny its accuracy (read: dead and in the ground). Harpers is probably one of the few places where that sort of thing that could get past editorial scrutiny. (Or, maybe not, maybe I'm just being insufficiently cynical.) And yet between here and reddit, I think I see this pop up every other week.

PostOnce 10y ago
Even if it turns out to be untrue, what does it say that it sounds so plausible/believable, so many people are quoting it? Either way, it seems people don't have a lot of faith in the government, and there are plausible examples of things the government has done to put itself in this situation. Another example from the same era, gulf of tonkin incident. It doesn't matter what it costs the people at the bottom if the people at the top get what they want, that's the impression I think many of us are left with.
- tdb7893 10y ago
  To play devil's advocate the thing that could make it sound so plausible is confirmation bias.
- internaut 10y ago
  > what does it say that it sounds so plausible/believable, so many people are quoting it? I think you know the answer to this. There's lots of things I'd like to believe, but don't because they are not true. Outside of HN and other geek outposts, a great many people, maybe most have a flaky relationship to the truth on almost everything. We're not immune to that of course but I at least know with fellow geeks they will admit the possibility of being wrong instead of relying exclusively on waving their hands and feels. Geeks will change minds when presented with data. Often slowly and grudgingly, but still they are able to do it, it is in them, their identity is looser. One thing I suspect most of us have very wrong about people is that being 'scientific' is strongly connected to personality, and so appeals to logic and reason are simply not going to resound with everybody in totality. It is not meaningful to them. The World is my anecdotal evidence for that.