WAR ON DRUGS: WE'RE LOSING, SAYS KERLIKOWSKE

U.S. drug czar Gil Kerlikowske says our strategy to combat illegal
drugs hasn't worked -- for 40 years.

It's difficult to argue otherwise.

Countless numbers of schools have proclaimed to be "Drug-Free Zones."
We've all seen those words woven with crepe paper on school-yard
chain-link fences -- for years.

We spent countless millions of dollars to educate ourselves on the
evils and the harm illegal drugs pose.

Yet, it appears, we never left Square One. We've spent $1 trillion
and hundreds of thousands of lives have been lost, according to an
Associated Press report.

But we're amid the worst drug epidemic ever in this country. "Forty
years later, the concern about drugs and drug problems is, if
anything, magnified, intensified," Kerlikowske said.

Obviously, there doesn't seem to be an answer to solving the problem.

Some think legalizing drugs, especially marijuana, would crack the
backs of the drug cartels that make billions of dollars a year
selling to Americans.

Last week, President Obama announced a new policy he says treats drug
use more as a public-health issue; it focuses on prevention and
treatment, The AP said. Haven't we been doing that already?

Unfortunately, it appears we're a long way from solving the problem
that has caused more than 17,000 drug-war murders in Mexico as
cartels fight to control who sells illegal drugs to us.

And so many Americans' lives have been ruined by drug use.

We're still glued to Square One.