In the past four decades, cars have grown significantly cleaner and more fuel efficient, but it’s been a bumpy road getting there. These are Jalopnik readers’ picks for the ten most expensive, inefficient measures to make cars “green.”

Welcome back to Answers of the Day — our daily Jalopnik feature where we take the best ten responses from the previous day’s Question of the Day and shine it up to show off. It’s by you and for you, the Jalopnik readers. Enjoy!

Photo Credit: GM

10.) Solar Power

Suggested By: 3pedalsgood

Why it failed: The Solar Car Challenge is a yearly competition for high schools to build and race a solar-powered car. It’s a fine idea for getting people involved with engineering. But solar-powered cars? Other than a limited use of solar for powering accessories in vehicles like the Fisker Karma, it’s not happening anytime soon.

Photo Credit: Pspatry.

9.) Cadillac V8-6-4

Suggested By: zacarious

Why it failed: Today, more and more engines employ cylinder deactivation. What the systems do is shut down a number of cylinders when the driver is just cruising on the highway, using very little throttle.

Back in 1981, when the technology was new, GM decided that Cadillac should try it out to make their big V8s more fuel efficient. The engines were completely crude, the shut-off was the opposite of smooth, and the cars broke down regularly. Oh, and it produced 140 horsepower out of six liters of displacement.

Photo Credit: Cadillac/Old Car Brochures.

8.) California’s Cool Cars Initiative

Suggested By: Buckus

Why it failed: California’s Air Resources Board has one of the least enviable jobs of a government agency: cleaning up the air in a smog-ridden state that loves cars. Some of their draconian rules about smog equipment and old car certification can be seen as necessary evils, but CARB’s “Cool Cars” plan of the late 2000s was a complete flop.

The idea was to reduce the amount of air conditioning people would use. Air conditioning uses engine power, which sucks gas. The regulation would require manufacturers to use reflective paints in their cars. First, people thought that CARB was banning black paint, and then they realized that most of the heat soak in cars was through the windows. Over fears that GPS systems, cellphones, and ankle monitors wouldn’t work, CARB gave up on the whole plan in early 2010.

Photo Credit: Hashem Akbari, Berkeley Lab.

7.) Arizona alternative fuel rebate

Suggested By: iowncalculus

Why it failed: Back in 2000, Arizona offered to pay half the cost of any alternative fuel vehicle, in an effort to promote clean cars and improve the state’s surprisingly bad air quality. People figured out that they could fit a one-gallon compressed natural gas tank to an SUV and get the state to pay half the price.

When Arizona realized they would be paying half the cost of $50,000 leather-lined Excursions at an estimated total cost of $600 million dollars (that was 10% of the state’s yearly budget) they quit the plan, leaving people to foot the bill on these CNG-equipped vehicles themselves.

Photo Credit: GMC.

6.) E85

Suggested By: Viperfan1

Why it failed: Corn ethanol seems to make sense – there’s too much corn in the Midwest, so why not make it into a fuel that’s got a higher octane rating than pump gas? Well, you can’t put it in a pipeline, so you have to truck it everywhere, and it cuts into your gas mileage. Biofuels are really fantastic, but E85 is not the way of the future.

Photo Credit: Getty Images.

5.) CAFE’s light truck loophole

Suggested By: KillerKoala

Why it failed: CAFE stands for Corporate Average Fuel Economy. It defines how fuel efficient a car manufacturer’s vehicles must be, and it is broken down into different categories based on size and weight. Each different kind of vehicle has a different standard.

CAFE started out in the 1970s with much lighter fuel economy standards for light trucks than full-size family cars. This seemed to make sense, as trucks were used for work, and businesses needed cheap, powerful engines. US carmakers, however, capitalized off the growing market for recreational trucks and started building SUVs intended for people to just drive around in. These SUVs were cheap to build ad they didn’t have to comply with the tough emissions and fuel economy standards of regular cars.

This loophole meant that Americans just switched from driving big, heavy sedans to big heavy SUVs, without effecting any real change in fuel economy.

Photo Credit: Ford.

4.) SUV hybrids

Suggested By: claiborne

Why it failed: The most egregious manifestation of the light trucks loophole are SUV hybrids. The worst offenders are the ones from GM and Chrysler that come with big “Hybrid” badges to show off their mileage numbers bested by just about any station wagon on the market. In cities where hybrids are allowed special privileges, like exemption from London’s inner-city congestion charge, they’re just insulting.

Photo Credit: Cadillac.

3.) Cash for clunkers

Suggested By: My X-type is too a real Jaguar

Why it failed: The idea behind cash for clunkers was to get people out of smog-producing old cars and into new fuel-efficient ones. New car sales spiked only for a few months, used car prices have gone up and stayed up, and we’ve seen the death of all kinds of strange, beautiful old machines. It wasn’t worth it.

Photo Credit: Detroit Free Press.

2.) GM’s EV1

Suggested By: Wolc

Why it failed: Everyone loved the EV1. Everyone but GM. The car was doomed to slow sales, so GM cut the program early and crushed the cars. Ask anyone who owned one and they loved it. While Toyota was content to lose money for years developing the Prius, GM couldn’t stand a little bit of an investment in clean tech.

Photo Credit: Associated Press.

1.) 55 MPH speed limit

Suggested By: Irving Washington

Why it failed: In the year following the 1973 Oil Crisis, the Congress enacted the Emergency Highway Energy Conservation Act setting a national speed limit at 55. The double nickel was supposed to greatly cut fuel consumption and the ensuing pollution, as cars create significantly more drag at highway speeds. studies found it was a mere 22-45% as effective as anyone hoped.

This hellish restriction on the nation’s transportation network was finally fully repealed in 1995, after getting bumped up to 65 in December 1987. It was a dark time for this country.

Photo Credit: Associated Press.

Source: Jalopnik.

The sky is falling… sort of. Over the last 10 years, the height of clouds has been shrinking, according to new research.

The time frame is short, but if future observations show that clouds are truly getting lower, it could have an important effect on global climate change. Clouds that are lower in the atmosphere would allow Earth to cool more efficiently, potentially offsetting some of the warming caused by greenhouse gases.

“We don’t know exactly what causes the cloud heights to lower,” study researcher Roger Davies of the University of Auckland in New Zealand said in a statement. “But it must be due to a change in the circulation patterns that give rise to cloud formation at high altitude.”

CONTINUED at Live Science.

Look out your kitchen window. Your patio furniture is all wrecked to shit, isn’t it? I know, that last BBQ of yours got out of hand. Shots were fired. Enter the $3,500 bulletproof polo from Miguel Caballero’s Black Label Collection, just the thing you need to protect your neck* while flippin’ burgs or refilling the beer cooler. It may look like a regular-ass polo, but oh no — underneath that 100% cotton exterior comes three different levels of bullet protection. Me? I want the one that can stop a cannonball.

OPTION IIA: 9mm / 40 Smith and Wesson FMJOPTION II: 9mm / .357 Magnum / 38 Super / Mini Uzi submachine gun
OPTION IIIA: Uzi machine gun / MP5,MP9 submachine gun / 44 Magnum SJHP / Stab-proof

Haha — there’s even a stab-proof option! Unfortunately, all of them will only stop bullets from the most amateur of assassins. I’ve played Counter-Strike folks, I only aim for the head. “No you don’t.” Okay so maybe I flashbanged my whole team and got us all killed.

*Protection actually starts below the neck.

Source: Geekologie.

THE SIGN SAYS NO TOUCHING, LADY!

This was the coolest thing on display at the recent Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Granted I didn’t go, but I showed this video (and ONLY this video. Okay, plus a cat one) to a couple friends and they agreed. It’s a smart window from Samsung – basically a one-way window (people on the other side can’t see in) with a full-pane electronic touchscreen display where you can display info, roam the internet, watch adult films, etc., etc. It can even turn into virtual blinds!!!!!1 Just watch the video. The future, ladies and gentlemen — it’s really almost here!

Hit the jump for the worthwhile video. I know I’m a crappy describer but it really is pretty cool.

Thanks to lilco, who once watched a guy pick his teeth for two minutes straight in a mirrored window not realizing there people on the other side. OMG — what an idiot!

Source: Geekologie.

This is a lil hamster wheel powered submarine. It was made out of a 3-liter soda bottle and — wait. 3-LITER SODA BOTTLES?! Did anybody else not know about this? And, more importantly, do they come in red cream soda. Mmmm, love that shit. It’s way better than regular cream soda because it’s red. It’s the red that makes it so good. Like if Hawaiian Punch was clear that shit would suuuuuuck. Remember clear Pepsi? Of course you do, it SUCKED HARD. No hamsters were harmed in the making of this video. They did sink a battleship full of gerbils though.

Hit the jump for a short, crap-quality video and a link to the build page with more info.

Source: Geekologie.

*Taken from the Guardian.

Mongolia is to launch one of the world’s biggest ice-making experiments later this month in an attempt to combat the adverse affects of global warming and the urban heat island effect.

The geoengineering trial, that is being funded by the Ulan Bator government, aims to “store” freezing winter temperatures in a giant block of ice that will help to cool and water the city as it slowly melts during the summer.

The scientists behind the 1bn tugrik (£460,000) project hope the process will reduce energy demand from air conditioners and regulate drinking water and irrigation supplies. If successful, the model could be applied to other cities in the far north.

CONTINUED..

My Two Cents: Since when do presidential candidates hold press conferences in Staples? End Two Cents.

*Taken from the American Dream.

In the United States today, it is becoming increasingly fashionable to openly trash the U.S. Constitution.  Many among the elite are not even trying to hide how much they hate the U.S. Constitution anymore.  As the Patriot movement and the Tea Party movement call for a return to the principles that this nation was founded upon, many among the elite and in the mainstream media are responding by publicly dumping on the U.S. Constitution.  The level of vitriol that we are seeing for our founding fathers and for our Constitution is unprecedented.  It turns out that the U.S. Constitution does not fit very well with the benevolent futuristic “Big Brother” totalitarianism that they want to impose on all of us.  All of that talk about “freedom” and “liberty” in the Constitution does not exactly square with thecentralized global planning that the elite have in mind.  The ruling elite believe that the “rights of the individual” must be greatly restricted for the “good of society” and for the “good of the environment”.  Right now the “constitutional revival” that is happening in the United States is a direct threat to what the elite are trying to accomplish, so they are responding by openly attacking the Constitution.

At more than 90 percent of the law schools in the United States today, the U.S. Constitution is portrayed as a hopelessly outdated document that is in desperate need of revision or it is portrayed as a “living, breathing document” that we are free to alter as society “progresses”.  In law schools across the country, law students are being taught that our founding fathers were racist, sexist, homophobic bigots that did the best that they could at the time.

Keep in mind that a very large percentage of our politicians and all of our judges go through these law schools.  I personally sat in law school classes and listened to law professors trash the U.S. Constitution.  This is really happening.

CONTINUED..

*Written by Rob Rimes.

1. Introduction:

Nothing pisses me off as much as the goddamned Drug War. It is one of those issues that people seem to get super-sensative about because they don’t want their kids living a life addicted to a bunch of crap while destroying the very fabric of our society. If you believe that that is what is going on, then you are a clueless and helpless dolt that needs to kick a hole in your T.V. because you’ve listened to and accepted the bullshit hype and scare tactics that the moronic media has been shoving down your throat for years. People like you don’t have the ability to look at a problem, truly analyze it and find a reasonable solution. The solution that the masses seem to put their faith in is one that combats the problem only to magnify and fuel that very same problem. The current solution enables the problem and IS the problem, plain and fucking simple.

Stop listening to guys like O’Reilly while taking in their bullshit rhetoric as gospel. Because while you are clicking on stupid ass “Pinhead or Patriot” polls, there is a war going on that most of you don’t even understand. So with this article here, let’s talk about reality. Let’s talk about what’s real. The truth is harsh and hard for most people to swallow. If you’re a little bitch, go read something else. Maybe that copy of “Bold Fresh” you’ve been using as a paperweight is your cup of tea. Anyway, let’s move this bitch forward.

2. Prison & The Police State:

The Drug War is quite possibly the biggest waste of fucking money and resources that our government is thievishly pulling directly from our pockets. Hell, the War on Poverty is also a tyrannical project that rapes our paychecks but that topic is for another day. The War on Drugs is the fish to fry right now.

To start, our prisons are full of thousands upon thousands of small time drug offenders that did nothing but smoke a damn joint and didn’t hurt anyone else. In most cases, their actions didn’t even have a negative effect on anyone else except maybe themselves and that is debatable. Point is, prisons are overcrowded and cost a shit-fucking-load of money that comes out of our pockets. Personally, I don’t mind contributing to the prison system when it keeps a serial rapist away from society. However, I do have a serious fucking problem when I am paying for the prison sentence of some guy that was just selling a bit of weed to pay for his monstrous cost of tuition. Why should that guy be sitting in a cell with the serial rapist and be treated in the same way? Is the dude selling a few joints as evil as the guy who has forcibly raped dozens of women with a knife to their necks? The law says “yes”.

See, that is how this fucked up system works. Nixon’s bullshit War on Drugs destroys the lives of small time offenders and in some cases, the lives of their families and children as well. I am not condoning that a parent should be pushing chronic and blow but I am certainly not condoning a police state that kicks in doors, shoots the family dog and terrorizes small children all because they got a tip that the guy inside has a fucking joint. This may seem like an extreme case but it happened in Columbia, Missouri in February of 2010.

In 2008, the police of Prince George’s County, Maryland were tipped off that there was marijuana at the home of Cheye Calvo. Apparently, a box of marijuana was accidentally sent to the residence during a half-assed drug smuggling operation. The cops then raided the house, scared the hell out of his family, shot his dogs and then arrested Mr. Calvo. It wasn’t until later that they realized that they made a huge mistake and that Mr. Calvo was actually the mayor of that very same town! After the incident, Mayor Calvo had this to say:

“When this first happened, I assumed it was just a terrible, terrible mistake but the more I looked into it, the more I realized (it was) business as usual that brought the police through our front door. This is just what they do. We just don’t hear about it. The only reason people heard about my story is that I happened to be a clean-cut white mayor.”

Another example of police state terrorism created by Nixon’s War on Drugs happened in Atlanta, Georgia back in 2006. A botched drug raid resulted in the murder of an innocent 92-year-old woman. Kathryn Johnson was shot to death by narco-cops during a warrant-issued “no knock” raid on her property. It was later revealed that the raid was based off of falsified evidence that claimed that illegal drugs were in the home. There were absolutely no drugs. This resulted in the Johnson family receiving a settlement of $2.9 million as well as a complete overhaul of the Atlanta drug unit. Three officers were also sentenced to prison after being exposed conspiring to cover-up the incident.

According to Reason Magazine’s statistics, there are over one-hundred police SWAT drug raids in the United States daily. 4,000 people are arrested every day for drug crimes in America. This is more people than those arrested for assault, burglary, vandalism, rape and murder combined! How many of these are legit raids and how many of them bring about terror and harm to those involved in the incident? How many are actually effective and justified? To put things into perspective, here is a map provided by the Cato Institute that shows where there have been botched raids or raids that have turned really ugly.

3. Drug Cartels, Terrorism & Organized Crime:

Are the risks and wasted resources really worth all the trouble? Is this war a war that can even be won? The fact of the matter is, this war has been going on for over 40 years and we have made no progress whatsoever. Sure, big arrests are made, massive stashes of drugs are found and turned over to authorities and here and there a life is saved but when one looks at the bigger picture, we are worse off today than we were during the Nixon era when it comes to drug crime.

Today, Mexican drug cartels terrorize our southern border and drug production funds the Taliban/Al-Qaeda network as well as other terrorist organizations. Two of our greatest threats have been created due to the existence of the counterproductive and incredibly destructive War on Drugs. What I am implying here may come across as completely fucking ludicrous but let’s look at facts, which in this case, disproves the logic used by the pro-Drug War masses.

For a pretty solid example, one has to look no further than alcohol prohibition. When alcohol was banned in the United States from 1920-1933, drinking became incredibly romanticized. The new law created a society where many more Americans were breaking the law because fuck the man, drinking was cool! When the Beltway suits made it illegal, they made it even cooler. Now one was truly living on the edge when they disregarded the new rules and decided to sneak into their local speakeasy to down fistfuls of bootlegged hooch. No one wanted to listen to Congress because no one wanted to be told what they can and cannot put into their own bodies. People chose to be rebels and to ignore the consequences of their actions. Many people were greatly fined and even jailed over sneaking sips of whiskey. However, that wasn’t even the worst part.

The prohibition of alcohol created large organized crime families in the United States. These families knew that the people wanted the freedom to drink and they provided them with that service. It was organized crime that created the speakeasies and made the moonshine the customers desired. Hell, the mob even snuck exotic types of alcohol into the country. This was done quite easily: bribing cops and killing anyone else who stood in their way. The prohibition of alcohol created a huge business opportunity for those who don’t have any respect for the law. You see, when you make an entire industry illegal, that industry will not cease to exist. Quite the contrary, it will go underground and exist in a way that causes a hell of a lot more harm than it did when it was left alone. This is exactly the problem we have today with the Mexican drug cartels and the Taliban.

With drugs being illegal, it is the darkest elements of society that will supply the rapidly growing demand. This creates the crime because if there is some sort of dispute in the illegal drug industry, that dispute can only be solved with violence as drug cartels and drug dealers can’t turn to law enforcement to help them sort out their problems. Just like during alcohol prohibition, rival gangs kill one another and if innocent people get caught in the crossfire, too bad for them! Prohibition doesn’t kill the dangerous product, it just makes it even more dangerous.

4. The Myth of the Risks:

There are also a lot of bullshit myths surrounding drugs that are manufactured and served on a silver platter to the nonintellectual masses. Many political pundits of the left and the right eat this crap up like the all-you-can-eat soft-serve ice cream at Sweet Tomatoes. All one has to do though, is look at the facts to see the mainstream media’s bullshit agenda in helping the easily duped plebeians support the War on Drugs. They’ve got to fight the nightmare and save the children!

Well, children today aren’t in as bad of shape as fucktard foundations like Drug Free America want you to think. Isn’t it NBC that uses their TV stars to pimp that whole “The More You Know” campaign? Well, they’re right. “The more you know” the more you will be able to see through the lies and deceit and falsified information.

When looking at things statistically, there are a lot of people that try marijuana and even harder drugs that don’t get addicted. The pro-Drug War foundations will lead you to believe that nearly everyone that tries anything will pretty much be instantly hooked. The truth is, very few people who try any of these drugs actually become hooked on them. It is much more common for someone to try something and decide that it isn’t for them. I’m not saying cases of instant addiction don’t happen but they are a lot less common than they would ever want you to know.

According to the federal government’s own data, 8 million people have tried crack yet there are only about 300,000 crack users. That means that only 3.75% of the people who have tried crack in the United States are regular users. That seems like an awfully small amount doesn’t it? Well, the DEA has the number at around 17% because they have to look like they are fighting an epidemic. Weird how the government’s data isn’t consistent with one of their own agencies, albeit the primary agency that is fighting this bullshit war. Anyway, crack isn’t the only example of these kind of shenanigans. The ratio of those who have tried to those who regularly use is virtually the same across the board with all the other drugs.

Another area where there is blatant misinformation and manufactured scare tactics is in the way that every couple of years or so the government announces that there is a new drug on the streets that is much stronger and much more highly addictive than anything we have ever seen. Beware and lock up your children otherwise they will become zombies whoring themselves out to greasy old men for quick fixes of this week’s new nightmare drug. Yeah, it’s fucking hogwash.

In the 20′s it was alcohol that was the target, in the 30′s it was all about “reefer madness”, then came opium and heroin and morphine and other “nightmare” drugs that they claimed were more potent and addictive than all the ones prior. In the 80′s it was cocaine and then crack. In the 90′s it was ecstasy and other “raver” drugs. Then it was crystal meth and a slew of others. There will be more in the future, trust me. The DEA and the Drug War cronies have to pimp their agenda and the only method that works is falsifying information, scaring the shit out of people and parading around with a few stashes and guns that they confiscated through a big raid here or there.

5. My Personal Experiences:

Now I am not going to sit here and try to preach that drugs aren’t addictive and aren’t harmful and aren’t a horrible thing to get involved in. There are those who can handle them and there are those who cannot. Word to the wise, it is best not to try and find out. However to act holier-than-thou and claim I am perfect would be a grave hypocrisy and it is something I cannot do. I have had my fair share of drug experiences: good ones and completely fucking devastating ones. The reason why I am sharing this is because I want you to understand that this opinion comes from someone who has experienced all the good and bad drugs can bring into one’s life.

In high school, I didn’t do many drugs. I would party and drink like a fucking pro and I would smoke some weed every now and then but as far as the hard shit and pills, I didn’t really partake in them. Well, at least not voluntarily anyway. I did have less than a handful of experiences were I came into contact with heavier stuff and inadvertently indulged in them.

On one occasion I noticed that my weed tasted a little odd. It also smelled different but my inquiries about it were met with “don’t worry man, it is just some really good shit.” That it was, because I came to find out that it was laced with cocaine. I was tweaking like a motherfucker and I quickly found out that cocaine makes me incredibly testy, if not just blatantly angry and incredibly destructive. On the car ride home, I found out that the guy driving was the one who laced the joint. Upon discovering this, I wailed on the asshole while he was driving. We were a couple of coked up violent forces of nature beating the shit out of each other. Actually, it was quite one sided, I was just hitting him and he was frantically trying to pull over before getting into an accident. He pulled over and jumped out of the car, it took three others to hold me back from killing the idiot. I got a ride home from someone else, calmed back down and eventually went to sleep. Cocaine was definitely not my cup of tea. The kid I tried to kill came over and apologized in person the next day. I had to respect him for that.

I also had other occasions were the weed I was smoking was laced with weird shit. One time it was laced with opium, which I loved. Another time it was laced with crack, which almost ended violently like the cocaine situation. I have even had weed that was laced with Raid. Yes, the bug killer. I was young and stupid and borderline suicidal. Actually, I was more genocidal I’d have to say. Anyway, after these adventures, opium became my drug of choice, at least when I could get it.

In my early twenties, I partied harder, went to raves, popped some pills here and there and tried to fuck as many chicks as I could. Ecstasy was fun and it made sex better, which didn’t help my sex addiction issues (which I later beat without drugs, therapy or any new age bullshit). When your cute girlfriend encourages you to do it just to have awesome sex while going out to find other chicks to join in the fun, your dick makes you listen. It makes you listen hard.

I did get through that phase pretty much unscathed and without disease or children (thank fuck). However, I did have an incident after that era of my life that started to change my outlook. Essentially, I died. If it wasn’t for my girlfriend reviving me in my bed, where I wasn’t breathing and my heart wasn’t beating, I would have been dead at 23. Instead, I got up, like a second wind hit me, I told her to leave the house and I woke my mum up and had her drive me to the ER. In the hospital I flatlined and had to be revived again. This nightmarish fiasco ended with yours truly being locked up in the psych ward on the 4th floor of Naples Community Hospital for nearly two weeks. I spent the first anniversary of 9/11 sitting around the television set with a bunch of addicts eating oatmeal, quoting the Bible and telling me how to live my life. I’m assuming most of them have returned there for several visits, I however have never been back.

That was the turning point. I woke the fuck up, started giving a shit and even though I knew I would be homeless shortly after that (a situation that I talked about in the article “Free to Lose: A Personal Statement on Socialism“), I refused to have to give in and not fight for something better. I chose to no longer escape. Luckily for me, I never became addicted to the substances I was using. I just liked them and was able to easily walk away from it all. Seeing the destruction I created around me, couldn’t prepare me for the heartbreak and hell I would feel when someone I truly loved died of drugs a few years later.

Further down the timeline, I had a very close intimate friend who I planned to marry. She and I talked about it quite often and it really started out as a joke that we would get married. As the years went on, the joke became a little more serious and there were feelings developing between us that were much more than friendship. There was a point, just before her death, where we were inseparable. I knew she had gotten into drugs pretty heavily but I didn’t realize how bad until it was too late. It was something I talked to her about but couldn’t truly put my foot down because of how I was in the past and the fact that she had witnessed a lot of it. Back during my hardcore party days she was the voice of reason that I ignored. When the roles were reversed, I felt like too much of a hypocrite to really put a stop to it and realistically, she would’ve done what she wanted anyway.

She died a few days after my 27th birthday from an overdose. I was devastated and it took about 2 years before I could get my wits together and even function like a normal human being again. In my mourning, I started experimenting again because a part of me wanted to join her. Luckily, I found my way out of the abyss and became much stronger for having lived through that devastating process.

The point of all this, is that even after going through everything I have experienced with drugs, I still do not want the fucking government having that control over me or my body. I chose the path I took and so did all of the friends that I lost. We knew the risks and there was no one that could have made us stop until we were ready to stop. The law being against us just made the act of complete disobedience even more justified. We all wanted to be rebels and even though we were killing ourselves, our actions were a big “fuck you” to the system. Sure, it sounds stupid now but one doesn’t think like a 32-year-old when one is 20. Especially when one is 20 and high.

Hell, it isn’t even about just control over our bodies, the War on Drugs just doesn’t work. All it does is make drugs look cooler to the users while creating criminal empires to supply those users. With alcohol being legal, you don’t see gang wars over who is going to import the bordeaux. In Amsterdam where drugs are legal, marijuana use by teens is much smaller than it is in the United States. Why? Because the Dutch made drugs boring.

6. Conclusion:

When one truly understands the War on Drugs, common sense should take over and tell you that it is a horrible monstrosity that must be abolished at all costs. I understand the dangers of drugs but as long as those who use them don’t harm anyone else or threaten their liberty, than whose business is it? If you want to smoke a joint in your home while watching a movie, you should be able to. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t punish those who get behind the wheel of a car but we have that system in place and if someone gets pulled over for being under the influence of drugs, it should be treated exactly the same way as if they were drunk. Actually, it is treated this way already. However, even though drug addicts get high and get behind a wheel now, there would be fewer addicts driving in a society without drug prohibition. As the numbers of users would go down, so would the number of users behind the wheel. Fact is, everywhere drug prohibition has been lifted, drug use has gone down and so has drug related crime. God forbid the DEA lets that cat out of the bag.

The War on Drugs, like most aspects of life that are plagued with government intervention, needs to be reanalyzed and looked at with reason and common sense. It has been proven ineffective yet the government still pushes it on us and convinces most of us that they are getting the job done. Apart from the War on Poverty, this is the longest running war in United States history. It is time to end this war. Shit, the effects that it would have on the economy would be fucking amazing. In 40 years, the War on Drugs has cost more than one trillion dollars! It would be nice to really cut government spending by cutting this cancerous growth out of our economy. Don’t expect the fiscal conservatives to do anything about it.

In closing, drugs are definitely bad but that doesn’t mean that it is the federal government’s job to regulate and prohibit them. Prohibition has never worked. Luckily for the citizens of the United States during alcohol prohibition, the government realized the folly of their ways in just over a decade and rectified the situation before it became much worse. The government doesn’t seem to be as smart as they used to be. Really though, they know what is going on. They know it doesn’t work. They just don’t give a fuck. Their stubbornness has been responsible for the incarceration of thousand upon thousands, if not millions, of people for minor drug crimes: people who may have been caught with a couple of joints or who may have just been trying to make a quick buck off of their buddies. Prison overpopulation wouldn’t even be an issue if the government could just effectively do their job and at the end of the day, do what is right.

The War on Drugs will probably never end. For it to end, the United States government would have to admit that they were wrong. There are way too many egos in Washington for that to ever happen, let’s be real. Look how much senseless bloodshed went on for over a dozen years in Vietnam before Congress finally pulled us out against the wishes of the stubborn president, who at that time was the idiot Gerald Ford. Unlike Vietnam though, we are not pulling out due to bloodshed. Quite the contrary, we are continuing to fight as the bloodshed is sold to us an effect of the drugs themselves, when in fact it is not. What it really is, is an effect of the Drug War. The federal government is victimizing all of us by trying to prevent others from victimizing themselves. So we all have to suffer to save the few who don’t even care and who most likely don’t want our help. But hey! That’s pretty much American policy on anything.

Milton Friedman talks about drugs:

Bill Cosby talks about people on drugs:

My Two Cents: Taken from one of the greatest sites on the Interwebs. This is my favorite blog apart from my own. Every true swashbuckler and man needs to take this seriously, it’s pretty much fucking gospel. End Two Cents.

*Taken from the Art of Manliness.

Dealing with criticism is a skill every well-adjusted man should possess. We give and take criticism among our co-workers, our friends, and our family. Criticism is an important part of our personal self improvement, for it is other people who can point out mistakes and shortcomings that we can’t see because we lack objectivity. Unfortunately, many young men today don’t know how to offer and accept criticism like a man. Instead they handle criticism like little boys. When giving criticism, they opt only to give snide, cutting jabs that do nothing to improve the situation. When receiving criticism, they sulk, make excuses, and argue with the person criticizing them. Ask any teacher who has the nerve of giving a student a poor grade. Today’s students will cry and whine their way to a better one. Or worst of all, have their parents intervene. They simply don’t know how to respectfully accept criticism.

Because we all face situations every day that require us to give or take criticism, we provide the following guidelines on how to make the process more constructive.

How to Give Effective Criticism

Go in cool, calm, and collected. Before you begin to give criticism, make sure you have your emotions in check. This is particularly important if the person did something that really ticked you off. If you go in yelling and banging your fist on desks, you’ll probably get the problem fixed in the short term. However, when you don’t take the time to have a cool and reasoned discussion, you miss out on an opportunity to solve underlying problems.

Be specific. If there’s one thing you remember from this post, let it be this: be as specific as you can in your critiques. Don’t just tell the person, “This sucks,” or “This could be better.” Explain exactly why their work or action is subpar. A blanket criticism will put the person on the defensive, and they’ll never be able to correct their problem.

Criticize the action, not the person. Try to keep the person as separated from their mistakes as possible by criticizing their action and not them. It makes the criticism less hurtful and much more effective. So don’t say things like, “Jeez Louise you must be an idiot! Look at all these mistakes you made in this report!” Just because someone makes a mistake, that doesn’t make the person a pinhead. We all have bad days.

Be a diplomat. When giving your specific criticism, it sometimes helps to use diplomatic words. Our old friend Benjamin Franklin was a master at this (which is why he was probably such a successful diplomat). In his autobiography, Franklin said this about using diplomatic language in discussion:

When I advance anything that may possibly be disputed, [I never use] the words certainly,undoubtedly, or any others that give the air of positiveness to an opinion; but rather say, I conceive or apprehend a thing to be so and so; it appears to me, or I should think it so or so, for such and such reasons; or I imagine it to be so; or it is so, if I am not mistaken.

This can help take the sharp edge off of criticism. Sometimes, however, people need that edge to spur them to action. Use your discretion in deciding whether a harsher approach would be more appropriate.

Make specific suggestions for improvement. The goal of criticism should be to help someone make improvements. While specifically pointing out the problem is the first step to correction, if a person doesn’t know what they can do to improve, knowing their mistakes won’t help them one bit. Don’t just tell people what’s wrong with their work, give them specific suggestions on how they can improve it. The key word, once again, is “specific.”

Personalize your approach. Consider a person’s disposition when deciding how to approach the delivery of your criticism. In general, you can be harsher with a man than with a woman. Case in point: at my high school there was an assistant football coach that tore his players up and down for their mistakes. His philosophy was to “tear them down and then build them up.” He then became the girls basketball coach and continued the same uber-harsh tough love approach to coaching. The girls did not respond as the football players had; instead, they broke down and cried and became so nervous before practice that some would throw up. Of course, some women want to hear it like it is, and some dudes are dainty. So think about who you’re dealing with before you lay into them.

Point out positives. When criticizing someone, it’s always good to point out the positives in their work or actions as well. Two benefits exist from this exercise. First, it makes the criticism easier to swallow and reminds the person they’re not a complete screw up. Second, it shows the person what they’re doing right and gives them a reference point on which to base their future work. When beginning a conversations with someone, start with the compliments first. Then transition into your criticism by saying something like, “There is just one area I thought could use improvement……”

Follow up. Always, always make sure to follow up after giving constructive criticism. Your criticism won’t do any good if the person doesn’t put into practice your suggestions. Schedule a follow up with the person you’re criticizing. Say something like, “How about we talk to each other next week to see how your changes are coming and to answer any new questions you might have?” By letting the person know you’ll be following up with them, they’re more likely to get their butt in gear and make the needed corrections.

How to Take Criticism

Consider the source. You’re going to receive criticism from thousands of people in your lifetime. It’s important to remember that not all criticism is created equal. Determining the source of the criticism and the motivations behind it will help you know how to handle it. For example, Kate and I sometimes get criticism from people who read the Art of Manliness. Much of the criticism consists of “You are stupid” or “This is gay” or “I’m unsubscribing!” We just ignore this drivel. It’s not worth our time or energy to get upset that some random dude from the internet thinks we suck. However, if we get an email from a long time reader who has contributed to the comments on the blog, we’ll definitely consider their criticism.

If you think the source of your criticism isn’t genuinely interested helping your improve, take their criticism with a grain of salt. At the same time, be sure to honestly assess your critic’s point. Some people are too quick to write off criticism by saying, “They’re just jealous!” Maybe so, but be sure to thoughtfully evaluate the feedback before dismissing it.

Shut your trap and listen. Fight the urge to argue with the person or explain your mistake, and just listen to your critic. You’d be surprised what you can learn if you simply soak it in.

Don’t take it personally. Don’t take the criticism as a personal attack on you. Try to detach yourself as much as possible from your actions or work when receiving criticism so you can look at it objectively. This can be hard to do, particularly if you put a lot of time and effort into something. But trust me, if you make this a habit when receiving criticism, you’ll save yourself from a bruised ego.

Stay calm (even if the other person is being a complete d-bag). The goal in criticism is to keep as much of your emotions out of it as possible. Once you allow your passions to flare up, any hope of making the criticism constructive goes flying out the window. If your critic is being a complete jerk, staying calm can be hard to do. But be the better man. Let the other person do all their ranting and raving, while you sit there looking cool as a cucumber. When they’re done, kill them with kindness. Let them know you understand their concern and thank them for taking the time for bringing it to your attention.

Ask clarifying questions. Make sure you’re on the same page with your critic by asking clarifying questions. Clarifying questions are particularly important if your critic is giving vague or ambiguous criticism. For example, if your critic tells you your report isn’t clear, ask them where things start to get murky and suggestions on how it can be improved. By asking questions, you create dialogue between you and your critic, which in turns fosters co-operation and an atmosphere for mutual improvement.

Take ownership of your mistake. When someone brings a legitimate mistake to your attention, don’t get on the defensive and start making excuses for it. Take responsibility for your actions. Many young men today don’t want to own up to their mistakes. They’re always putting the blame on something or someone else. These men will be stuck in eternal mediocrity because they will never accept their need for improvement. While denying your mistakes can keep the heat off for a moment, it will greatly impede your personal progress in the long run.

Change your perspective on criticism. Instead of seeing criticism as humiliating or embarrassing, view it as an opportunity to improve yourself. Winston Churchill had this to say about criticism:

Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfills the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.

Instead of avoiding criticism, seek for opportunities to be criticized. You’ll find that getting feedback from an outside source will stretch your talents and abilities.

Thank your critic (even when they handed your butt to you). Always thank your critic. This can be difficult. No one seriously wants to say, “Thanks for showing me that I was wrong!” But swallow your pride and sincerely thank your critic. They took the time to sit down with you and point out areas where you can improve. The least you can do is say thanks.

Take action and follow up. After you’ve received your criticism, take action immediately. After you’ve taken action, make sure to follow up with your critic and let them know how you’ve rectified the problem. This shows that you actually listened to the criticism and respected what the person had to say.