What other arguments have been given? Alcohol is the only major drug to have been re-legalized after being banned in America.
"Can we say that the social ill-effects are completely imaginary"
What social ill-effects can you cite in the case of cocaine-infused soda?
"The article seems to be suggesting this, but stops short of saying "let's start drinking cocaine again". Is the journalist ultimately unconvinced by his own arguments?"
It is politically incorrect to argue against the war on drugs, regardless of the damage it has caused to society (much greater than any damage the drugs themselves cause). We are trained from an early age to assume that drugs are bad, and to assume without question that drugs should be illegal (naturally, "medicine" is in a different category). It makes no difference whether or not the war on drugs has been productive, effective at solving any constructive goal, or in any way beneficial when everyone is fed DARE-style propaganda from age 5.
The reality is that in today's world, we should be more afraid of the DEA than of the drugs they "regulate," since their form of "regulation" involves assault rifles, grenades, and tanks (yes, really, surplus military vehicles including tanks and helicopters are routinely transferred to law enforcement agencies). The DEA, like the FBI, has amassed so much signals intelligence power that they are considered to be part of the US intelligence community. The DEA can and does recycle the proceeds from seized property into its own budget -- a practice that was authorized in the 1980s. The DEA can declare drugs to be illegal, without congressional action, for a year -- and prosecute people for possessing or distributing those drugs. The DEA can override congressional recommendations on drug regulation, as they infamously did with MDMA (ecstasy).
Meanwhile, with only two major exceptions, we are getting no tax revenue from recreational drug sales, there is no regulation on the purity or safety of recreational drugs, doctors have no idea what drugs their patients actually ingested, there is no age limit that drug merchants respect (high schoolers can buy cocaine just as easily as working adults), and criminals have access to a massive, steady, and enormous market. There is no time that would be "too soon" to end the war on drugs, develop useful regulations on recreational drugs, and restore our democracy.
What social ill effects can you cite for not distributing bath salts with every hot meal lunch to grade schoolers? I don't believe that specific combination has been done recently (or ever) so we have no evidence it's bad. Let's do it! </sarcasm>
Constructively speaking, perhaps we should do the research first, and put cocaine in soda after.
The entire point of the article was that we did put cocaine in soda at one time, and that did not stop because of the social problems that ensued. Just like the people of Andes have not stopped drinking their coca tea because of some hypothetical social problems it causes. A coca-infused soft drink need not have enough cocaine to cause any sort of "high," any more than a caffeine-infused software drink has enough caffeine to cause a high or a therapeutic amphetamine dose has enough amphetamine to cause a high.
Don't let US government propaganda sway you when it comes to drugs. Cocaine is not the cause of social problems, not in the United States and not in countries where it is widely used. Cocaine prohibition causes more social problems than the drug itself (not that the DEA or ONDCP people would ever admit it).
Cocaine isn't any worse than caffeine, which is to say that it's not bad at all. It's actually better in many ways, e.g. it's much less harmful to unborn children. As far as I know there aren't any health or social harms from cocaine, at least at the dosage and ingestion method we're talking about here.
The two best sources would be
- The Consumer Union's Guide To Licit and Illicit Substances: http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/studies/cu/cumen... (Written by the same non-profit that writes consumer reports)
- The WHO report on cocaine: http://transform-drugs.blogspot.com/2009/06/report-they-didn...
"My impression is that cocaine is significantly more addictive than caffeine, which seems like a very large negative."
It's not, the addictive potential is almost identical to that of caffeine. The page you're linking to is wrong, they're comparing people snorting (or smoking) cocaine with people drinking caffeine. They're also not comparing the harms caused by the drugs, but rather the harms caused to users. This might sound pedantic, but it's actually really important because the most hardcore drug addicts are drawn to the drugs that have the reputations of being the most hardcore. Which means that cocaine users on average have more health problems that caffeine users, but that doesn't mean that cocaine is any more dangerous.
It's perhaps a little UK-centric, but I found it well argued and the author is eminently credible.