DRUG POLICY TOO HARSH TO BE EFFECTIVE

I concur with Matthew Neff, Tyler Thompson and Macy Hanson that U.S.
drug policy is broken.

As long as asset forfeiture exists, drug offenders will never be
treated as other criminals.

Convicting a meth king would bring in a substantial paycheck to the
police, unlike a serial rapist. This is why police love to find drug
addicts. We pick them up, collect our money and lock them behind the
iron bars of "justice," while we let the homeless, wife-beating bike
thief attend anger management classes.

What about addiction management classes? Only a minute amount of
convicted drug offenders get the opportunity to attend a class
because we as Americans think of drug use as the deadliest of sins.

Yet, parents drug their kids with amphetamines and stimulants because
of a disorder referred to as attention deficit disorder. It should be
no surprise that these kids grow up to try and abuse other substances.

We should focus more on prevention all together. Let's stop building
prisons and build better communities so fewer people will turn to
drugs, and in turn, we will be saving lives rather than throwing them away.

We're running out of room for prisons. I wonder when the first U.S.
prison outside of America will be built. At the rate we're going, we
can expect to see construction beginning in Mexico in 2030.

Tim Gomez

SOPHOMORE