War on Drugs Pros & Cons
D.A. Ridgely on Jan 30th 2008
Sure, the War on Drugs is an abysmal failure if success is defined in terms of keeping illegal drugs out of the U.S or even seriously reducing the supply. And, yes, admittedly it’s astronomically expensive and, on any rational sort of bang-for-buck basis the single most wasteful domestic program in a vast field of wasteful government domestic programs. Okay, so it also has led to an entrenched Drug Warrior bureaucracy that thinks nothing of promulgating lies and propaganda and attempting to suppress any speech or advocacy contrary to the War. Oh, and to the creation of storm trooper like SWAT teams throughout the nation, all decked out with (federally funded) high powered firearms and body armor brandishing no-knock search warrants as they swoop into our homes in the dead of night. And admittedly they often get the wrong street address and every once in a while some citizen is stupid enough to think that maybe it isn’t the government who is breaking in and who tries to defend himself with a perfectly legal firearm and who is then shot to death or arrested and tried for assault or even murder. And we should probably acknowledge that the reason the U.S. is head and shoulders ahead of most other industrialized nations in its incarceration rates is because of the massive numbers of non violent drug criminals swelling our prisons. Okay, so maybe also it’s true that the continued illegalization of recreational drugs perpetuates criminal cartels both overseas and in the U.S., some of whom have ties to international terrorism and some of whom probably also covertly fund the Drug Warriors’ opposition to legalization. And, yeah, if forced to admit it we’d have to say that the same illegal drug market also helps to perpetuate a culture of alienation and poverty in the inner city and that, until fairly recently, drug sentencing laws were racially discriminatory in their effect if not in their intent.
On the other hand, it’s for the children.
Filed in The Bureau
Exactly. A war on an idea (poverty, drugs, terror) cannot be won, but a lot of people can spend tax dollars “fighting” whatever it is. I’m against this far more now as a taxpayer than I was twenty years ago as a user.
The “War on Drugs” isn’t “for the children”. It may have started out that way, but it has long since turned into a way for tax money to be flipped around until it lands in a senator or congressman’s pocket.
Oh, and don’t forget lost tax revenue on legal recreational drugs.
which could pay for treatment of addictive ones
Please show me any country that has won the war on drugs. All governments owe a huge apology to their own citizens having put the distribution of illegal drugs in the hands of indiscriminate dealers.
Dealers have no problem selling drugs to yours & my children. If drugs had been legalised in the beginning you could have had a responsible distribution through the correct channels.
Why discriminate between one drug or another such as alcohol, it only cements the concept that the whole war on drugs has been misconstrued to suit individuals in government.
More important the tax on recreational illegal drugs could pay for the disadvantaged population in dire need of proper health care.
Shame on you America
[...] A great comment from this PL post that was recently featured at Stumbleupon: Please show me any country that has won the war on drugs. All governments owe a huge apology to their own citizens having put the distribution of illegal drugs in the hands of indiscriminate dealers. [...]
Whoa whoa whoa… hold your horses! A government forming policies based on logic and common sense? A government for the people and by the people founded in the tradition of an age of enlightenment and scientific reasoning. What do you think this is? The United States of America? Oh wait.
:*(
Twenty years ago I was one of the warriors fighting the war on drugs.
1985 Columbia we were ordered to selectively hit different drug labs and to leave others completely alone. We didn’t question the orders at the time, but after witnessing American helicopters with government employees (known company personal) at the off-limits sites and filming the activities and reporting them up the chain of command; my whole team was reassigned back to our original units. I never saw any of my team members again and my srb was scrubbed clean as a whistle. I even had two citations removed and the warrants collected, like it never happened. The war on drugs is a farce , a fake . If they have a G in front of their pay grade , the G stands for GONNA FU__ SOMEONE OVER.
You should add “For the children often just put on Ritalin and Risperdal by the same people.”
And read Blaming The Brain, By Elliot Valenstein.