Our Failed Drug War

"But are US vital interests more threatened by what happens in Anbar or Helmand than in the war raging along our southern border? ... For this is where the fate of our republic will be decided, as the fate of Europe will be decided by the millions streaming north from the Maghreb and the Middle East, sub-Sahara and South Asia. ... Add a collapsing global economy to a losing war with drug cartels, and Mexico is at grave risk of becoming a failed state, a narco-state, with a 2,000-mile border with the [US]. How does one win a drug war when millions of Americans who use recreational drugs are financing the cartels bribing, murdering and beheading to win the war and keep self-indulgent Americans supplied with drugs? There are two sure ways to end this war swiftly: Milton's way and Mao's way. Mao Zedong's communists killed users and suppliers alike, as social parasites. Milton Friedman's way is to decriminalize drugs and call of the war. ... Americans are never going to adopt the Maoist solution. ... Which is the greater evil? Legalized narcotics for America's young or a failed state of 110 million on our southern border", Pat Buchanan (PB), 6 March 2009 at http://www.vdare.com/buchanan/090305_mexico.htm.

"Conservatives tend to assume that, unlike dirty, treasonous liberals, they are on the side of truth, justice, liberty and the American way. This is not without reason, as most of the time, they are. However, for nearly 30 years, conservatives have been guilty of one of the greatest abuses of American liberties in American history, and have actively abetted the growth of central government by their thoughtless support for the war on drugs. ... There is nothing--absolutely nothing--conservative about the war on drugs. ... And, as everyone knows, the "coca' in Coca-Cola refers to the extract coca leaf that was once an ingredient in the popular drink. Coca-Cola was not entirely cocaine-free until 1929. ... Advocates for the drug war often hypothesize nightmare scenarios where the legalization of drugs will lead to chaos and toal social breakdown, constructing fantasies about legions of chemically addled criminals preying upon the helpless citizenry while in search of their next high. But, as has been seen in Colombia and more recently in Mexico, it is actually the illegalization of drugs that causes social devastation, as the drug war's efforts to interdict supply only increases the price of drugs and therefore the profit of the criminal gangs willing to trade in them. ... Americans should have learned their lesson from prohibition. ... Thus, I was encouraged to read Pat Buchanan's recent article on WorldNetDaily, in which one of America's leading conservatives finally recognized the stark choice that so many conservatives have sought to avoid facing for three decades. ... The fact that the Obama administration is now citing Mexico's narco war as an excuse to limit Second Amendment rights should suffice to prove to conservatives that the time has come to end the war on drugs. Yes, Mr, Buchanan, America must raise the white flag in the drug war", Vox Day, 9 March 2009, at: http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?pageId=91102.

Welcome aboard PB, you're just 40 years late. America can't adopt Mao's solution? Why? With over 200 million firearms in the US, it will be open season on cops. Millions of Americans will join the Mexican cartels. Few if any drug salesmen will be taken alive by policemen if each expects to be executed. The drug war is over.

I've said this for over 40 years. We passed the Harrison Act (HA) in 1914. Was every American a drug addict in 1914? The nightmare scenarios are a cover for religious influence. Drugs, like demon rum should be outlawed. Ask Carrie Nation. Many of the same people, like the Women's Christian Temperance Union pushed the HA. The US's highest percentage of opiate addicts was in 1865, following the Civil War. Think about why. Some of our drug war resulted from anti-Chinese animus. Those of you old enough to remember Paladin on television, 1957-63, may remember where "Hey Boy" was warned not to go: his uncle's opium den! San Francsico had opium dens in 1875? Yes.