or Falling On Hard Times
Bob and Liddy Dole, former GOP presidential tag team contenders and proponents of the federal War on Drugs, have endorsed and admitted to regularly using a chemical substance for excitement, recreation and pleasure. The drug is Viagra, and its use is being championed by the same generation and socioeconomic clique that demands criminal penalties for those who express different preferences in pharmaceutical stimulation.
To claim that Viagra is a legally prescribed treatment for a medical condition is to miss the point, for the impaired ability to get it up is neither crippling nor life-threatening. And, because this hardship (or lack thereof) is more prevalent among seniors than among those of breeding age, it's fair to conclude that most men taking Viagra engage in sex for recreation rather than procreation.
As with many street drugs, Viagra delivers a physiological response that wears off after each use, requiring habitual dependency and chronic reapplication to restore its effects. But it does not carry the stigma associated with other recreational drugs, in no small part because Viagra junkies are high-end, "respectable" customers. Still, unlike marijuana, but similar to some of the more hard core prohibited substances, Viagra has been associated with a statistically significant increase in heart attacks and deaths among its users-many who are willing to risk the odds for just one more high.
Yet it is from this pool of artificially turgid and privileged notables that the hue and cry against unsanctioned drug use is the loudest. These, more often than not, are the same folks who would throw a cancer patient like Todd McCormick or Steve Kubby in jail for smoking pot to alleviate the ravages of their illnesses and the side effects of treatment. Or put an inner-city addict away for daring to obtain his release from an officially unapproved chemical compound.
Does the word "hypocrisy" begin to suggest itself here?
Maybe we're going the wrong way with this. Perhaps instead of pushing drug dependency in nationally televised commercials, Bob Dole should swear off the stuff, admit that he and Liddy pulled a boner in ever allowing themselves to get hooked in the first place, and encourage Americans to "just say 'no.'"
Perhaps it's time to ban Viagra. Then let's see if its users defy the law and create an underground market. Let's watch the street price soar. Let's find out if the quality of an illegal fix meets dosage and purity standards, or if seniors will be having seizures or dropping dead from black market pills cut with God-knows-what. Let's demand that something be done about the violent crime endemic to the illegal Viagra trade (maybe another gun control law?).
Let's declare a War on Viagra and appoint a federal "czar" (perhaps a reformed Mr. Dole?) to mastermind the assault against this insidious threat! Let's thrill to Ninja-clad government shock troops breaking down some WWII vet's door and, if he's lucky, only dragging the old boy off in shackles. And perhaps, once he sees his house and life savings seized without benefit of due process, and the realization sinks in that he's probably going to die in prison and leave his wife destitute and broken, the thought might dawn on him:
"How did this happen? This is supposed to be America."
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[I wrote this a few years back. I felt it appropriate to resurrect it here. --DC]
Bob and Liddy Dole, former GOP presidential tag team contenders and proponents of the federal War on Drugs, have endorsed and admitted to regularly using a chemical substance for excitement, recreation and pleasure. The drug is Viagra, and its use is being championed by the same generation and socioeconomic clique that demands criminal penalties for those who express different preferences in pharmaceutical stimulation.
To claim that Viagra is a legally prescribed treatment for a medical condition is to miss the point, for the impaired ability to get it up is neither crippling nor life-threatening. And, because this hardship (or lack thereof) is more prevalent among seniors than among those of breeding age, it's fair to conclude that most men taking Viagra engage in sex for recreation rather than procreation.
As with many street drugs, Viagra delivers a physiological response that wears off after each use, requiring habitual dependency and chronic reapplication to restore its effects. But it does not carry the stigma associated with other recreational drugs, in no small part because Viagra junkies are high-end, "respectable" customers. Still, unlike marijuana, but similar to some of the more hard core prohibited substances, Viagra has been associated with a statistically significant increase in heart attacks and deaths among its users-many who are willing to risk the odds for just one more high.
Yet it is from this pool of artificially turgid and privileged notables that the hue and cry against unsanctioned drug use is the loudest. These, more often than not, are the same folks who would throw a cancer patient like Todd McCormick or Steve Kubby in jail for smoking pot to alleviate the ravages of their illnesses and the side effects of treatment. Or put an inner-city addict away for daring to obtain his release from an officially unapproved chemical compound.
Does the word "hypocrisy" begin to suggest itself here?
Maybe we're going the wrong way with this. Perhaps instead of pushing drug dependency in nationally televised commercials, Bob Dole should swear off the stuff, admit that he and Liddy pulled a boner in ever allowing themselves to get hooked in the first place, and encourage Americans to "just say 'no.'"
Perhaps it's time to ban Viagra. Then let's see if its users defy the law and create an underground market. Let's watch the street price soar. Let's find out if the quality of an illegal fix meets dosage and purity standards, or if seniors will be having seizures or dropping dead from black market pills cut with God-knows-what. Let's demand that something be done about the violent crime endemic to the illegal Viagra trade (maybe another gun control law?).
Let's declare a War on Viagra and appoint a federal "czar" (perhaps a reformed Mr. Dole?) to mastermind the assault against this insidious threat! Let's thrill to Ninja-clad government shock troops breaking down some WWII vet's door and, if he's lucky, only dragging the old boy off in shackles. And perhaps, once he sees his house and life savings seized without benefit of due process, and the realization sinks in that he's probably going to die in prison and leave his wife destitute and broken, the thought might dawn on him:
"How did this happen? This is supposed to be America."
------------------------------------------------------
[I wrote this a few years back. I felt it appropriate to resurrect it here. --DC]