A lot of major cities are doing this now, and it's working. People are going to get drugs theres nothing you can do about it, but what you can do is keep them in one area where there are medics and police at to prevent overdose.

Still the most brilliant strategy. The problem with the drug trade wasn’t the drugs … it was the violent crime that comes with the business and the territory war. Moving it all to one space had an Arkham City vibe, sure, but it cleaned up the streets of violent crime. It solved the problem nicely.

Rawls was the only higher-ups that figured it out. And Burrell didn't have a clue. 😂

This actually became true

Awesome -future global élite guys for sure!

The big problem with that approach is the drug dealers were promised an area that won't be touched by cops, so if the cops now enforce drugs in the designated no cop zone it will mean breaking their word and all hell will pay. It also means if drug dealing goes back to the corners, the citizens will retaliate . This is a loose loose situation.

Positives of drug legalization? I actually thought there were some until I visited Portland, Seattle, and San Francisco. 🤮

His plan was actually a genius way to handle it.

Bunny was my favorite character and Season 3 was my favorite season because of his experiment.

Rawls for President dammit!!!!!

To be honest with you that wasn't a bad idea keeping the drug sales away from kids And decent hard working people in Baltimore and keeping it far away from the local citizens , I don't think the war president Reagen started against drugs is a winnable war, so instead of having innocent people caught in the crossfire they eliminate for a short time, it's crazy but I believe something like that would get shutdown because the cities crime would faltef and it would make the streets safer and we can't leave that!!!

Rawls doesn’t give a fuck about anything but those numbers.

“I do t know how to put this…” Lol right as he’s about to drop a sledgehammer on the room!

12 years ago on TV. And now here we are today with several west coast cites understanding they lost the war long ago and are moving on. This show was pivotal in every way.

Look at that. They take Bunny's letters, mock him for using those as a shield, and then run to city hall and use said letters as a shield. Bunny just gave them more wiggle room, at the expense of his own ass.

Funny how they're outraged that Bunny seemingly legalised drugs yet just a moment prior, Rawls was asking where the Baltimore city drug trade was like it was something legal🤯🤯🤯

The drug war was lost decades ago. We've spent billions, maybe even trillions "fighting" it, and ultimately the cartels are stronger than ever, the drugs are stronger than ever, and the crime. and murder connected to it all is sky high. When is the western world going to realise we lost this war and actually try a different approach with it.

Colvin is an awesome example of chaotic good

watching this scene with no dog in the fight it seems like what he did was perfectly reasonable

Natural Selection

Legalize and regulate. Lots of people aren't fans of big pharma, but you don't see Pfizer reps doing drive-bys at AstraZeneca facilities, and Oxycontin pills aren't being adulterated with fentynal.

This isn't legalization of drugs, because those drugs were still prohibited under law. It's decriminalization, which is the act of ceasing to treat something that is illegal or criminal. Police and Prosecutors have the discretion to decriminalize illegal acts by using their discretion (police powers) to ignore crimes by failing to make an arrest or prosecute a crime. A DA can decide to cut a deal to not prosecute a murderer in exchange for that person's testimony against an accomplice by agreeing to a plea deal.

How "illegal" is this though? I mean, if it cooked meth in the desert, then smoked it, and made sure it never left the desert or made it to the city ir in the hands of child, would it really be a priority. Obviously im breaking the law, but would that be a high enough priority to chase? Should it be when officers can then spend time going after murders, grapist and thieves?

Funny thing is Bunny would have gotten away with it had it not been for Burrell at the very end

He should've just lied and said he increased Police presence in the dangerous neighborhoods and reduced it in the "calm" areas. The dealers, sick of being harassed, decided to sell in quiet places and magically moved there... THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN CRÈME FUCKING BRULÉE !

But i bet it would never work. It would at least grow the drug trade on a big amount, like all junkies from everywhere would come around. Plus could you really keep the peace?

Notice how rawls picks up on it first

He did the most effective thing 6 generations of public safety has done

the look on rawls' face when colvin corrects "we" to "I" is great

Has anyone picked up on the interactions between Rawls and Colvin throughout the whole series? In a nutshell it seems as if they knew each other so well, possibly starting together and working their way up. I would assume Rawls became more notable in his position while Colvin who is accomplished as well chose to be lower key. Case in point, season 2 in their first scene together, Rawls gives Colvin a little grief for being at a police conference when a kid was shot in his unit's neighborhood but he does it in a respectful way and doesn't berate him like he does others. Colvin responds as if they indeed go a long way back with putting in work together by saying, "he knows the drill." In season 3, Colvin gets to be the smartass with Rawls when he asks, "how can you hide a dead body?" Normally Rawls would give someone a piece of his mind, yet all he does in that scene as just stares at Colvin as if he is asking, "so you f__ing with me now?" But he doesn't say anything and again, he stares with some sort of respect (he would have berated others). Even Burrell doesn't go too hard on Bunny's comment when he steps in to mediate (like all three of them go back). Again...just my observations. I know a season 6 is out the question but I think they would do well to create prequels to tell many of the backstories of various characters.

Even though the higher ups saw the net good of this, they're all afraid of the institutional pushback and they'd all essentially be replaced if need be. The Wire reminds us it's the system and its institutions that are the problem these people are players in them. It's all in the game.

"Actually, I elected to ignore them" such an underrated line. 😆

One thing that pisses me off is that the letters from the community leaders not mattering. How is that not a rock solid expression of the will of the people.

Nothing more important than saving your own behind.

He’s legalized drugs!

1:58 Burrell needs it spelled out for him.

"Bunny you cocksucker" hahahahaha

Okay, something needs to be brought up here. The real reason everyone was so horrified at what Colvin did isn't because they're terribly invested in the Drug War, it's because the "War on Drugs" was a Federal Initiative and not some State or Municipal thing. By doing what he did, he violated Federal Laws that superseded everyone in Baltimore. The Commissioner, the Mayor and the Governor of Maryland. If the Federal Government found out what had happened, they'd have used it as the excuse to basically try and take control of the City and probably take a swipe at the Governor too. Now really, with how poorly Baltimore is run maybe this wouldn't be a bad thing, but everyone who had something to lose would be desperate to stop that from happening. So yeah, this went far beyond Colvin just doing a crazy thing. His actions potentially could have terminated Baltimore as a city.

I like how Colvin, Rawls and Burrell all saw the letters differently: Colvin saw them as evidence that Hamsterdam was working at genuinely improving the community. Burrell saw them as nothing more than a way of “saving their asses”, showing that any part of him that once wanted to do good police work vanished long ago. Meanwhile, Rawls is morally right in between the two. He understands and respects the career suicide of Hamsterdam, but he still looks over the letters because there’s still some part of him that wants to do good police work for the city.

The best part of this is Burrell when he says “YOU, in my office… NOW!”

I never understood why they didn't just use the hamsterdam area to convict every major trafficker. Hell they could now easily identify who is selling the most and who is giving them the package and just follow the ladder up the fucking line so you see a street dealer moving weight now you figure out who he's getting his shit from and then you figure out who that guy's getting their shit from they may be out of the Amsterdam area buying it but there's probably only four or five major distributors in the entire fucking City within less than 6 months you can fucking lock up everyone

Howard "Bunny" Colvin is the Frank Sobotka is season 3. Both are truly selfless men who gave everything to try and do their job in their broken system as best they could to help others and do some real good.

Cable shows just try to excuse profanity and shit.

What’s the name of the guy next to Burrell? I never could figure that out

2:38 "fu***kin shame it going to end our careers" Sums up the hole "drug war"

City officials trying to get. This k

Bunny, have you lost for fuckin mind.

All these years, this still gives me thrill

A man of high intellect can never truly strive in the system he understood you can't stop crime you can only control when and where it happens

The genius of The Wire is all they did here was take the well established drug enforcement policies of Western European countries and put it on display for an American audience. This shows just how backwards and pointless our so called war on drugs actually is.