Don, Corby was not one of the "Bali Nine"; hers was a separate matter involving a relatively small amount of cannabis, while theirs involved a large amount of heroin.

Also, the USA, or at least several of its constituent States, have legalised cannabis for both medical and recreational use.

I smoked cannabis, quite heavily at times, for about 25 years. I no longer do so, although I'm not militant about it and if offered a joint at a party would probably accept. When I was younger I tried several other recreational drugs, including LSD, psilocybin in the form of magic mushrooms, amphetamine and cocaine, but I was never tempted to try heroin or barbiturates and I never had a "habit" with any of the illegal drugs I used, which makes me very fortunate. On the other hand, I am somewhat habituated to having a nice cold beer or 6 of an afternoon and I was very much habituated to tobacco for about 15 years until I decided to stop, which I found fairly easy, although challenging.

Tanya Plibersek's speech in Parliament on the subject was excellent and her husband is to be commended for his willingness to use his own experience as an example.

I'm sympathetic to the plight of Chan and Sukumaran and feel for the pain and suffering of their families even more. It would be easy to make a facile argument about their culpability in producing sons who would make such a bad decision, but even if it were true, it would not change the fact that they are being punished for someone else's actions, which is and should be contrary to every principle of justice.

When the fact that the use of this penalty is not even effective at doing what it is purportedly intended for it is hard to imagine any purpose for it other than stupid macho political grandstanding.

Any serious criminality overseas should be repatriation to serve the relevant time in the jails of the home country if that country is willing to enforce sentencing. Death should not be an option.

Yes Don And right on every count!

The war on drugs is said to be around 80 years old, and in spite of that fact; and has cost more US lives than WWW 11, the use of illicit drugs seems to increase? That's not how you measure success!

And we're also told that up to 90% of many prison population are there because of some involvement with illicit drugs, using or pushing?

Due to prison privatization, keeping a prisoner incarcerated now costs some $70,000.00 plus PA per prisoner!

Addiction is a medical problem, and imprisonment is treating a medical problem with an entirely inappropriate response.

And all to often results in an ordinary Joe or addict, coming out a professional criminal! Should we say well done or money well spent.

In controlled and regulated doses, heroin, is even more efficacious as pain relief than morphine; and there's a very strong case for including medical marijuana, in our grab brag of pain relieving substances.

We can extract the useful alkaloid by a few weeks immersion in alcohol, which can then be evaporated off in a vacuum. It doesn't need to be smoked.

In light of all these facts and the fact that prohibition, even where a death penalty is applied, just doesn't work; and the endless and totally ineffective war on drugs just costs more and more lives and national treasure.

Surely it is time to say thus far and no further; that too many good people have sacrificed their very lives and for what!?

And let's not forget the thousands and thousands of innocents caught up in the crossfire and killed! If it were just politicians paying the collateral damage price, THE LAWS WOULD CHANGE TOMORROW!

We need to decriminalize drugs and reasonable personal possession.
Albeit, with the exception of ice and drug labs.

Ice only came to prominence with more recent heroin droughts; and with the drought ended, should fade into disuse?

Particularly if all the resources now used against marijuana, heroin and cocaine, is directed almost exclusively at it and contaminated impure killer ecstasy!
Rhrosty.

I too have an intellectual aversion to the death penalty, firstly as prefer to limit the power of state over the individual, secondly as its deterrent effect appears to be limited, and finally, executions are not reversible in the occasional event of wrongful conviction. I am glad that Australia as a first world country is taking all reasonable steps to get them clemency and a life sentence, and fully support the PM's and FM's efforts.

However, given the horrific effects that the trade in illegal drugs has on its victims and their families, I am not overwhelmed with sympathy for the ringleaders of the Bali nine, and view their "miraculous rehabilitation" with some skepticism. While I would prefer them to serve their natural lives behind bars, if they should meet the grim reaper, I won't lose much sleep.

Hi there Mr AITKIN...

Though I do not support Capital Punishment, if Messrs CHAN and SUKUMARAN are executed, it's not meant as a deterrent, rather a punishment ! Your last sentences summed up quite well I thought, the situation these two are now in, '...they gambled and lost...' ?

The writer quotes Roy Morgan as concluding that only “one in three support the death penalty for murder”. The relevance of that claim escapes me.

Last I looked, Roy Morgan on 27 January 2015 concluded 52% of Australians agree with executions of Australians convicted in foreign jurisdictions of drug crimes.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-02-05/triple-j-partly-to-blame-for-bali-nine-execution-campaigner-says/6072966

The writer goes on to say “I am opposed to the use of the death penalty for variety of reasons, one of them being that the judicial system can always be wrong”. Breaking news: in this case there never has been any doubt of or rebuttal to the evidence of the guilt of the two Australian drug runners.

Frankly I am aghast at the level of media interest in this matter and the hyperventilating by politicians with respect to how Indonesia should apply its laws.

And as for the joke that Australians will boycott travel to Bali if and when Indonesian justice is dispensed. Funny. The UAE often (unjustifiably to many)incarcerates foreigners who transgress its laws. It even sentenced one Australian, Matt Joyce for 10 years''on the evidence of a witness who was found by an Australian court to have lied''.

Guess what? Australians still go to work in the UAE. And thanks to Qantas getting into bed with Emirates, more Australians are transiting through Dubai on their way to Europe.

So much for people putting their money where their megaphone is.

Don, you ask what can any society do with substances that can do great harm to people, and then list a few of the half-hearted failed attempts that have been made. The "war on drugs" has been such a dismal failure, by any possible measure, that it makes one feel that the answer is obvious. We have lost the damn war, so let's throw in the towel and consider the most rational and cheapest response.
Legalise all drugs, but keep a government monopoly on the manufacture and distribution, thus taking away the exorbitant profit from the drug dealers, and the problem will almost certainly disappear.
Alcohol and nicotene are bigger problems by far, but we've learnt to live with them.
The war on drugs is tremendously expensive, probably of the order of revenue from the GST. Abbott is trying to balance the budget by taking money from those in society least able to pay, the same people who are bearing the brunt of this war. Rhosty, above, has listed only some of the costs that we are paying. We have stupidly thrown down the gauntlet and challenged the criminal element to pick it up, and they have responded, due to the enormous profits possible. Have we learnt nothing from Prohibition in the US.
Read "High Society" by Ben Elton, for a much clearer description of the problem, and it's solution. But get us out of this phoney war.