DEADLY WAR AGAINST DRUGS ISN'T WORTH THE HUMAN COST

The news that already this year more than 5,000 Mexicans across the
border have been murdered in the "Drug War" should compel us once
again to re-examine our dangerous, flawed policy of trying
Prohibition as a way of controlling the uncontrollable, insatiable
desire for a dangerous product. And we must take some or lots of the
blame for those murders since it is our failure to control our drug
lust, which is uncontrollable, but also our failure to control our
disastrous "Drug War," which we can control and terminate, which has
led to this. On Dec 5, we had the 75th anniversary of the repeal of
Prohibition, which had been a conspicuous failure. It had not
stopped bootlegging, which everyone, in contempt for the law, was
involved in. It was hugely counterproductive, but not as bad as the
"Drug War."

And Prohibition had fueled the development of a powerful,
underground set of crime gangs, the largest headed by Al Capone, who
controlled East Coast bootlegging from the Canadian border to the
tip of Florida. There were murders galore, bodies tossed out of
speeding automobiles, and the St. Valentine's Day Massacre with men
lined up against the wall and machine-gunned. We are headed back to
that, not only nationwide, but here in tiny Wilmington where
the number of shootings rivals that of Tombstone, Ariz., in the
quick draw 1880s.

We learned our lesson with Prohibition and Democrat Franklin Delano
Roosevelt campaigned with a promise to get a repeal of the 18th
amendment to our Constitution (which established Prohibition), and
he did it, supported by such staunch Republicans as the du
Ponts from Delaware, who recognized the national importance of
repeal. We have forgotten that lesson, and despite an estimated 70
percent support for repeal among the voters the legislators, afraid
of being called "soft on crime" have done nothing.

Meanwhile, despite an estimated cost among federal, state and local
governments of $30 billion (yes, billion, not million) annually,
despite murders everywhere, including a 5-year old child in a barber
chair sitting next to an assassination victim here in Wilmington,
despite the fact that nothing positive has been achieved in four
decades of "War on Drugs," and we still have substantially the same
amount of drugs being distributed every year, still we plod on
insanely, expecting different results from doing the same
thing, and not clearly seeing the tremendous damage we are doing by
driving the price for drugs high with our ineffective prohibition,
and thus making these gangs rich and able to corrupt officials in
Columbia, Turkey, Argentina and yes, the United States.

We should immediately decriminalize marijuana, which certainly has
not killed as many people as cigarettes. Marijuana should be handled
just like cigarettes are now, with restrictions to protect children,
with an appropriate tax perhaps on both the state and
federal level, and with a publicity campaign similar to
Surgeon General C.Everett Koop's highly successful campaign against
cigarettes.

If that step works, as it certainly will, we should move on to
stronger drugs, cocaine and heroin included. Perhaps we can follow
Switzerland's excellent example of providing drugs through
prescription for incurable addicts, with the administration of the
drugs taking place in a doctor's office, one group after another. It
works there; it will work here. The money for the gangs will be cut
off, and our drug problem will shrink to the 1920s model of perhaps
only a few hundred thousand addicts, receiving free treatment at a
tiny fraction of the cost of the failed "Drug War."

Tell your legislators to support this. It is more important than
that earmark they are trying to slip into the Budget Bill, and a
chance to make a valid reputation for themselves and their State.