180/180: How to Clean Up Chicago (Or Any Other City) in 180 Days or Less

With all of the talk about Chicago's crime wave (despite most crime being at or close to the lowest in decades nationwide), the national opioid epidemic, and the corresponding calls (mostly from the right-wing) to get "tough on crime" as well as to further reinvigorate the War on (people who use a few particular) Drugs, we at Twenty-One Debunked have decided to discuss an idea that our webmaster has been working on for almost a year now, that may one day become a full-length book.  In a similar vein as When Brute Force Fails:  How to Have Less Crime and Less Punishment by UCLA researcher Mark Kleiman, we have put together an evidence-based strategy called "180/180" (i.e. turning the crime and drug problem around 180 degrees in 180 days) that we feel jibes better with our movement.   While we borrow many ideas from Kleiman, we also reject a few of his ideas and have added several of our own as well, drawing from the vast experience of various cities, towns, and countries around the world.

Twenty-One Debunked believes that 1) the drinking age should be lowered to 18, 2) cannabis should be fully legalized for everyone 18 and older and treated no more stringently than alcohol or tobacco, and 3) all other currently illegal substances should be treated for the most part according to the Portuguese model of decriminalization of users, since full legalization of such substances (while we don't necessarily oppose doing so) is unlikely to be politically feasible at this time and could have unforseen consequences if not implemented properly.  Additionally, the True Spirit of America Party also supports abolishing (or at least greatly reducing) material poverty (which is, along with structural racism and economic inequality, one of the major root causes of both crime and substance abuse) via a Universal Basic Income Guarantee as well as a Humprey-Hawkins style Job Guarantee program.  In the long run, all of these things are likely to reduce crime and/or substance abuse overall.  But in the meantime, with or without the aforementioned measures in place, enter the 180/180 strategy to really take a bite out of crime in the near-term:

• Implement an all-ages curfew law for the first 90 days, albeit with exceptions for people traveling to or from work or school.  Similar to what Iceland did, except for all ages and for a limited period of time.  Set it at 9 pm Sunday-Thursday and 10 pm on Friday and Saturday in general (10 pm and midnight, respectively, in the summer when days are longer).  
• Implement a "dry law" (no alcohol can be sold, period) for the first 30 days of the strategy.
• Increase the number of police and the number of patrols conducted, while also being careful to maintain good relations overall between the police and the community.
• Raise the taxes significantly on all alcoholic beverages and/or set a price floor on such drinks. 
• Put a "sinking lid" on the number and density of alcohol outlets, especially liquor stores.
• Make simple possession of cannabis (and perhaps other drugs) and "underage" drinking the lowest law-enforcement priority (LLEP), similar to the San Francisco Miracle of the 1990s.
• Do a "low-arrest crackdown" on any hard-drug markets, as was done in High Point, NC.  Instead of the usual catch-as-catch-can, build a case against every drug dealer in town, with enough evidence to put them away for a long time.  Then call them all in for a meeting and give them an ultimatum: stop dealing now or go to prison.  The market will dry up very quickly, and likely remain as such for years.
• Implement Hawaii's HOPE program (for hard drugs) and South Dakota's 24/7 program (for alcohol) for probationers and parolees. 
• Implement the strategies of Operation Ceasefire, aka the Boston Miracle, as a proven way to defuse gang violence.
• Conduct an evaluation of the effectiveness after 180 days.  If serious crime has not dropped by at least half during that time, re-start both the curfew and dry law again, repeating as needed.  Otherwise, do not bring either one back, but maintain the other components of the strategy.

If the reader found the first two components to be a bit jarring, that was in fact the goal.  It SHOULD be very jarring to anyone who believes in individual rights.  Only by applying them to all ages would such measures really have any significant benefit, and should be short-term since they basically function like a tourniquet--good for stopping the bleeding, but once the bleeding has stopped, leaving them in place would do more harm than good on balance.  And doing them frivolously would also do more harm than good, so reserve the curfew and dry law for places with exceptionally high levels of crime and/or hardcore drug abuse.  Otherwise, the other components of the strategy can stand alone, which we like to call "180/180 Lite".

Other, medium- to longer-term measures that ought to be included in a comprehensive strategy are:

• Get the Lead Out, and Take a Bite Out of Crime.  Numerous studies have shown a strong relationship between preschool lead exposure and later involvement in crime and other social ills during adolescence and adulthood.  (And take fluoride out of our drinking water as well, which worsens the leaching and effect of lead and is also neurotoxic in its own right.)
• Provide free birth control to anyone who wants it, and end the current assault on women's reproductive rights, yesterday.  (Fewer unwanted children will lead to fewer criminals in the long run, according to Freakonomics)
• Send nurses to visit the homes of first-time mothers who are poor and/or young.  According to Kleiman, this may be the most cost-effective crime-fighting program ever devised.
• Implement sensible gun control laws (while still respecting the Second Amendment), as well as putting a tax on bullets.
• For cities with very high crime rates, consider combining the controversial Project Exile (i.e. tougher enforcement of federal gun laws) with the aforementioned Operation Ceasefire, as was the case in the strategy known as Project Safe Neighborhoods. 
• Shift the school day (for middle and high school) to both start and end later.
• Raise the minimum wage.  (Yes, studies do show a correlation)
• Implement a "Housing First" approach to solving homelessness.
• Invest more in education in general, from pre-K through post-grad.
• Invest more in both mental health and substance abuse treatment programs, as well as substitution therapy (methadone, buprenorphine) for opioid addicts.
• Provide more opportunities for alternative forms of recreation, like Iceland did.
• If we find we must follow the "broken windows" theory, think James Q. Wilson (who invented it), NOT Rudy Giuliani.  Do NOT use racial profiling or police brutality, or anything else that violates anyone's civil or human rights, period.
• And for crime in general, we must always keep in mind that swiftness and certainty of punishment works better than random severity.  Punishment is a cost, not a benefit.

And of course, all of these things have social benefits that go way beyond simply fighting crime as well.  The evidence is overwhelming, so what are we waiting for?

We have been trying to get "tough on crime" for decades now.  It's time to get SMART on crime instead.

Lowering the Drinking Age: It's Not Just for the Left Anymore

Twenty-One Debunked, a subsidiary of the True Spirit of America Party, is generally on the political left, or more accurately, at the intersection of progressivism and libertarianism.  Or as we prefer to call ourselves, "progressive libertarian".  Thus, we are certainly not a right-wing organization.

But did you know that one can easily make a conservative case as well for lowering the drinking age, or even abolishing it entirely?  That is what British author Wayland Ellis argues in his new provocatively-titled book:  Abolish the Drinking Age:  The Conservative Case Against Alcohol Regulation.   His old-school conservative argument centers on the idea that the 21 drinking age is in fact a form of paternalism, as is alcohol regulation more generally as well.  And that paternalism is actually not right-wing, but rather left-wing or even socialist.  (Progressivism and even socialism need not be paternalistic, of course, but I digress.)  He certainly does not believe that the federal government has any business dictating to the states what the drinking age should be, and indeed his position does in fact jibe with old-school Republicans (not to be confused with the radical right, neocons, theocons, etc. that now control the party).  As for letting the states decide, he realizes the political infeasibility of abolishing the drinking age overnight, and would be fine with first lowering the drinking age to 18, then 16, and so on as pragmatism shall dictate.  As for other alcohol regulations, he is generally against them, with the notable exception of taxation--like us, he believes alcohol taxes should in fact be raised significantly.  But otherwise, he feels regulation does more harm than good for the most part.

Twenty-One Debunked, on the other hand, argues from a progressive libertarian and youth-rights perspective, that the 21 drinking age violates the guarantee of equal protection of the law.  There is no good reason for the legal drinking to be any higher than the age of majority, period. And while we are not actually opposed to lowering the drinking age further (say, to 16, or abolishing it entirely) after it has been successfully lowered to 18, we no longer consider such a goal to be worthwhile at least for the near-term.  It would be a LONG time before it would be politically possible to do, and doing it too quickly could indeed have unintended consequences.  But lower it to 18 we must, yesterday.  As for other alcohol regulations, we (unlike Ellis) generally do not oppose them as long as they are reasonable and not ageist or otherwise discriminatory.

Anyone reading this needs to show this to their conservative friends and family.   As unpalatable as it may be to form a "big-tent" coalition with conservatives over the issue of lowering the drinking age, it will most likely be our only hope in succeeding.   Even if we have to hold our noses.  For the same reason, we need to rely not just on libertarian or individualistic arguments for lowering the drinking age, but also on communitarian arguments as well.  Even "law and order" arguments can work in our favor as well, in fact.

So what are we waiting for?