YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK IN 2007

If you're like most citizens, you've recently computed the amount of
tax you owe both Federal and local governments. Perhaps you're
getting a refund, or maybe you wrote a big check. Whether you're
wealthy, middle class, or poor, what you pay for is what you get,
including the War on Drugs. From the archives of the Media Awareness
Project, here are some things YOU bought with your tax dollars in 2007:

$42,000,000,000 for cannabis prohibition. "Why $42 billion? Because
that's what our current marijuana laws cost American taxpayers each
year, according to a new study by researcher Jon Gettman, Ph.D. --
$10.7 billion in direct law enforcement costs, and $31.1 billion in
lost tax revenues. Basing his calculations mainly on U.S. government
statistics, Gettman concludes that marijuana in the U.S. is a $113
billion dollar business. That's a huge chunk of economic activity
that is unregulated and untaxed because it's almost entirely off the
books." http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v07/n1157/a08.html

$1,400,000,000 for Mexican drug enforcement. "President Bush asked
Congress on Monday to approve a $1.4 billion aid package over the
next three years to help the Mexican government fight narcotics
traffickers. An additional $50 million would go to Central American
countries for the same purposes."
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v07/n1228/a09.html

$590,000,000 for Colombian drug enforcement and crop spraying. "About
three-quarters of the military aid is dedicated to supporting the
aerial crop spraying program, which uses an enhanced form of Roundup
weed killer, containing the chemical defoliant glyphosate. What's
next -- the 2008 budget. The Bush administration has asked Congress
for $590-million for Colombia in the Foreign Aid Bill. As in previous
years the majority of this money -- $450-million -- would be
dedicated to military support."
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v07/n780/a09.html

$158,000,000 for marijuana enforcement in Michigan. "Marijuana is
Michigan's third most valuable cash crop with an annual value of $350
million. Tax free. At the same time, we're spending $158 million to
enforce marijuana prohibition and make criminals out of people like
the Johnson's." http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v07/n1388/a02.html

$100,000,000 for expanded prisons in Connecticut. A study by the Drug
Policy Alliance, "recommended the state turn down the so-called
three-strikes law mandating automatic life sentences for defendants
convicted of a third violent felony . [such] proposals could cost the
state at least $100 million in annual prison expenses."
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v08/n398/a06.html

$10,450,000 for a wrongful death in New York. "The mother of an
unarmed man killed by an undercover police officer seven years ago
called on the Bronx district attorney's office yesterday to reopen a
criminal investigation after a jury awarded her $10.45 million for
the wrongful death of her son . including $7 million in punitive
damages and $3 million for pain and suffering."
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v07/n698/a06.html

$84,000 for drug dogs in Wisconsin. "It costs about $12,000 to buy
each dog and to train it and its handler. These are only seven dogs,
spread across 72 counties." http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v08/n406/a04.html

$50,000 for tracking devices and dogs in Indiana. Tippecanoe County,
IN. "About $50,000 has been brought in this year under prosecutor Pat
Harrington, who took office in January. 'We've now got a bomb dog and
four other canines,' Lendermon said of the sheriff's department.
About $6,300 was used in March and April to buy GPS tracking devices
for the state police and the Indiana Department of Natural Resources
for use in their vehicles." http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v07/n1431/a05.html

$5,900 or the return of marijuana seized from a California medical
patient. "At least one victory for medical marijuana was won over the
past year when Grover Beach police returned 20 grams of marijuana to
Ken Parson in January. Parson's prescription was allowed under state
law. Grover Beach police were required to return the marijuana to
Parsons or pay a $5,900 fee." http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v07/n1494/a02.html

The numbers and references above come from actual 2007 newspaper
reports that are stored permanently by volunteer activists in the
DrugSense DrugNews Archive ( http://www.drugnews.org/ ). This
information is available for FREE, but it isn't free to produce.
DrugSense, too, incurs Internet storage, bandwidth, and technical
support charges that must be covered so that we can bring the truth
about the cost of the War on Drugs to the media and public.

If you think that your tax dollars can be better spent, then you know
it's time to change drug policy. Won't you please devote just a few
of the equivalent dollars you pay in taxes to help end the drug war
once and for all time?

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