If there’s commonly used data that would be good for indexing or filtering, you can take a few key values and keep them stored in their own fields.

There are also often functions that can parse structured text like XML or JSON so you can store data in blobs but not actually need to query all the blobs out to a client to use them on the database side and retrieve specific values. Another nice thing about blobs is the data can be somewhat flexible in structure. If i need to add a field to something that is a key/value pair inside a blob, i dont necessarily have to change a bunch of table schemas to get the functionality on the front end that I’m after. Just add a few keys inside the blob.

It’s still the same situation with illegal drugs, but America outsourced the production and supply chain largely underground (and to other countries as they are much easier to smuggle than alcohol.) So same problems and empowering gangs, but happening outside Americas borders, and thus not America’s problem. Most present day issues with drug cartels are a derivative of America trying to control peoples’ access to substances and driving them from the open market to the black market… seems to have done a lot more harm to the world and peoples lives than good (as an opinion).