| Comrade Tovya said:
You and I are pretty close on this issue really... You are right in your assertion that the drug war is a waste of money (just like the war in Iraq is valiant in principal, but has been severly mismanaged). The problem is not that either war is bad, but really that they not being managed properly. I think we have jacked around in both wars... I say, either go to war to win it, and go at it full blast, or don't go at all. Go into Iraq and wreak terror into the hearts of the terrorist, and strike fear into the soul of the cartel, or just don't bother at all. I think it's similar to the UN distribution of food and medicine to AIDS striken African nations. I love the concept, it's absolutely valiant and beautiful. But corruption and pussy-footing around makes .90$ out of every dollar a waste. So what's the point? If our goal is not to actually solve problems where they exist, what's the point? It's a waste of money and resources. |
I'd much rather send my money towards feeding starving people than fighting a war in any form, especially one as ill-executed and self-lacerating as the war on drugs.
I don't even really think the war on drugs is valiant in principle. I think the war on drugs is rooted in xenophobia at its core. You don't see a war against prescription medication, alcohol, or tobacco. All of those things have done enormous harm to our society, arguably more than all the illegal drugs combined. Alcohol and tobacco have certainly killed far more people.
In all honesty, the war on drugs is kind of an insult to Americans that we can't educate people about how to make informed choices. Its the difference between being afraid to kill someone because you will get punished and choosing not to kill someone because you know it is wrong. Its the right choice, but is it for the right reason?
We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers…Also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of beer, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls. The only thing that really worried me was the ether. There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge. –Raoul Duke
It is hard to shed anything but crocodile tears over White House speechwriter Patrick Buchanan's tragic analysis of the Nixon debacle. "It's like Sisyphus," he said. "We rolled the rock all the way up the mountain...and it rolled right back down on us...." Neither Sisyphus nor the commander of the Light Brigade nor Pat Buchanan had the time or any real inclination to question what they were doing...a martyr, to the bitter end, to a "flawed" cause and a narrow, atavistic concept of conservative politics that has done more damage to itself and the country in less than six years than its liberal enemies could have done in two or three decades. -Hunter S. Thompson
