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Are We Winning The War On Drugs?
Do I even have to ask?
And did you know that marijuana is becoming the biggest cash crop in the US?
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8 Responses to “Are We Winning The War On Drugs?”
Think about this one. If things had been done differently in Iraq from the very beginning we could have won that war. The “War on Drugs” was never winnable and we’ve wasted even more money on it and done more damage to our country than the after-effects of Iraq will do to us.
Unfortunately, the War on Drugs will never end. Too many people and organizations have a vested interest in its continuation. First, you have the criminal organizations making billions and billions on what is essentially a commodity that should ONLY cost pennies. They don’t want it legal since it cuts out their profits. Second, the law enforcement community and government have budgets to protect and jobs to keep. If the War on Drugs were ended and lets say, weed for instance, were legalized, there would be a drop in that part of the population currently in prison on non-violent possession charges. Crime wouldn’t be eradicated but would drop for certain, limiting the amount of law enforcement needed to an extent. Just those two views that I presented are probably good reasons why the War on Drugs is still ongoing. Too many vested parties in its continuation.
One thing to consider when proposing to legalize marijuana (or other drugs) is the money. If we don’t have to hire as many law enforcement officials, we can afford to train and pay them better. Just because one area of crime drops sharply doesn’t mean we need to completely overhaul the department or reduce funding, we could just redistribute the money and the manpower.
Also, and this is just a personal opinion, keeping drugs illegal because it means wardens and guards and drug dealers get to keep their jobs seems like a pretty stupid piece of logic.
Does that logic have to be intelligent to be true? I think not. A lot of people want to maintain the status quo due to vested interests in that. It’s a part of human nature. We’ll just have to agree to disagree on that point.
No.
No to what, nic?
No to what, nic?
No, we’re not winning the War on Drugs (that was Justin’s question, afterall).
The War on Methamphetamine
Radley Balko, who is a senior editor for Reason Magazine and blogger over at The Agitator, has written a column for Fox News in which he criticizes our government’s war against methamphetamine.
While Mr. Balko acknowledges the very real dangers our methamphetamine, he argues that the government’s response has led to the erosion of civil liberties and unfortunate unintended consequences. To illustrate:
- He points to “meth stings” in Georgia that led to the arrests of 49 convenience store clerks. Their crime: selling combinations of ingredients that together, can be used to make meth, but that are perfectly legal if bought separately. The vast majority of those arrested were foreigners who spoke very little English and had no idea that selling such combinations of products were illegal.
- In some states, every day cold medicines are no longer being sold over-the-counter.
- The meth laws were tacked onto the PATRIOT Act (just one of the many ways that the government has used the War on Terrorism as an excuse to ramp up its War on Drugs).
- In response to the meth laws cracking down on drug store clerks selling impure forms of meth, the country has experienced a surge in more potent forms of meth brough into this country by international drug smugglers.
- The anti-meth craze in the media has led Pfizer to get rid of pseudephedrine-containing nasal decongestants in favor of phenylephrine-containing nasal decongestants. The problem: apparently phenylephrine-containing decongestants don’t work as well.
But for all the ills that the government’s war on methamphetamine has caused, it wouldn’t be much of a scandal unless some greedy corporation wasn’t making some money off it if.
Sadly, that has happened. Mr. Balko explains:
But don’t feel too bad for Pfizer. Given all the abuse the drug companies were taking for what was a blatant, unintended misuse of their product, you could almost forgive them for putting the new product on the shelves, even if they knew it was useless — almost.
What’s not forgivable is that according to the Wall Street Journal, once Pfizer’s new product was ready to go, the company switched sides, and began to lobby in favor of laws to put pseudoephedrine cold medicine behind the counter. Because the company had a non-pseudoephedrine alternative, the new laws basically cleared the shelves of Pfizer’s competitors.
So Americans’ access to cold medicine has been restricted, we’ve embarked on questionable sting operations that likely ensnare innocent people, and the FDA is allowing a useless medication to be sold to U.S. consumers. And to what end? Meth is more available and more potent than it ever was.
So wrong. So very wrong.
Disclaimer: This comment was cross-posted over at The Coming Realignment.