U.S. DRUG PROHIBITION IS BAD POLICY

What does our drug policy have in common with a gigantic dam under construction in China? Both are monuments to failure. Both respond to problems of our own making. Both are government enterprises.

In China, the unfortunate population that is the supposed beneficiary of the Three Gorges Dam would be far better served by a repeal of centralized economic planning. For almost 50 years, government planners there have presided over and administered economic hardship.

Similarly, the American population, which supposedly benefits from drug prohibition, would be far better served by a repeal of that policy, rather than by ever more Draconian, costly and futile expansions of it. Drug prohibition has not solved the drug problem, but has merely transformed and exacerbated it.

Before 1914, the drug problem was limited to addicts. Now, in addition to drug addicts, drug prohibition has created underground drug economies that fuel organized crime and street gangs. Central cities are depopulated. Prison construction and inmate population are booming. Civil rights are being eroded.

In both the case of the Three Gorges Dam and American drug prohibition, the validity of underlying policy, past or present, is not examined. To debate policy is considered unpatriotic. Instead, failures are an excuse for expanding bad programs and for extending the reach of government.

Jim Rosenbaum,

Whitefish Bay