I could add my voice to those disagreeing with Leo Knight's
rejection of "safe houses" for addicts and other drug
decriminalization measures, but I would prefer to add the voices
of William F. Buckley, Jr., and six other blue-ribbon American
conservatives.

To read their views, look up the Feb. 12, 1996, National Review
or point your Web browser to
http://www.townhall.com/nationalreview/12feb96/drug.html.

Drug war crusaders should pay special attention to the section
written by 35-year police veteran Joseph McNamara, who zeroes in
on the fundamental dynamic behind drug-related crime in his first
four words: "It's the money, stupid." Drug-related crime comes in
three basic forms: * robberies (and more serious crimes
associated with robberies) committed by addicts;

* crimes of violence and destruction committed by drug suppliers
fighting for control of a market area or a source of supply;

* and, as Mr. McNamara points out, corruption of law enforcement
officials who are trying to fight the "war on drugs."
Clearly, the prime motivation behind all these crimes is the high
price of drugs.

The addict steals because "normal" jobs do not generate enough
income to buy drugs; the suppliers fight to the death because
enormous profits are worth fighting for; and the enforcers are
corrupted because the criminals can afford large payoffs, or
because the enforcers themselves can make far more money by
turning criminal than by doing their jobs.

The prices are high, and the profits are enormous, primarily
because drugs are illegal.

By outlawing these substances, we have achieved two outcomes.
First, we have given organized crime a near-total monopoly over
the trade, a monopoly which is strengthened every time another
basement marijuana operation is "busted."

Second, our interceptions and seizures give the drug lords what
must be the most effective supply-management service in the
history of international trade.

Remember, OPEC ultimately failed to maintain high oil prices and
profits because it could not stop some of its members from
flooding the market with cheaper oil.

The drug lords need have no fear of this; it is law enforcement
effort, paid for by our tax money, which prevents the supply of
drugs at the end user level from growing enough to meet the
demand at a reasonable price.

Am I in favor of drugs? Of course not. Nor is Mr. Buckley, nor
are any of the other authors of the National Review article.
But whether anyone is in favor of them or not, they exist. There
is no way that I or Mr. Buckley (or Mr. Knight, for that matter)
can exercise enough control over the behavior of 300 million or
so North Americans to guarantee that 100% of them will be
non-users, as we are.

The experience of Prohibition should have taught Canada and the
U.S. that shutting down trade in psychoactive drugs is simply impossible.
The proper question, then, is which kind of trade provides the
most benefit for the most people: legalized, regulated
distribution of narcotics at low profits, or the existing
illegal, unregulated, and excessively profitable system.
The answer is clear.

The current system enriches organized crime (and justifies drug
warriors who build bureaucratic empires) at the direct expense of
everyone else: addicts, robbery victims, insurance companies and
their customers, innocent bystanders trapped in drug turf wars,
and taxpayers. In contrast, legalized distribution would enable
addicts to supply themselves without stealing, would reduce drug
profits to a level where organized crime would not even want to
participate in the trade, and would release a great deal of
police resources and tax money to serve other urgent public
priorities. Under any reasonable cost-benefit comparison,
legalization is the better choice by a gargantuan margin.
Remember: "It's the money, stupid."

Stephen Finlay
North Vancouver