DRUG WAR HAS BEEN EXPENSIVE FAILURE

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Since President Richard Nixon launched the "war
on drugs" four decades ago, U.S. taxpayers have poured $1 trillion
into the crusade that is largely a flop.

Narcotics are more rampant in America now than ever. Numerous drug
murders and robberies happen daily. U.S. prisons and jails are
bursting with 2.5 million inmates, mostly drug-related. America has
the world's worst lockup rate, wrecking millions of families at
horrible public cost. A recent roadside survey found that one-sixth
of drivers tested positive for dope. Prescription pills are a rising
menace.

Drug gangs in Mexico have killed a reported 28,000 people in the past
five years, battling for control of the lucrative northbound trade.
Jamaica is under siege because a narcotics kingpin wanted for
supplying America is barricaded in a slum.

Asked about the U.S. war on drugs, President Obama's narcotics czar, Gil
Kerlikowske, told The Associated Press: "In the grand scheme, it has not
been successful. Forty years later, the concern about drugs and drug
problems is, if anything, magnified, intensified."

The bottom line: Prohibition causes as many evils as it cures.
America learned that dismal lesson in the 1920s when the historic ban
on alcohol spawned organized crime, illicit "speakeasies," bribery of
law officers, and sundry ills. The result was so ugly that
Prohibition was repealed. Crime related to bootlegging faded.

Finally, momentum is building to downgrade the war on drugs.
Californians will vote this fall on a proposal to legalize marijuana
sales for anyone over 21. Here's another example:

When alcohol was banned in the '20s, a legal loophole let drugstores
sell "medicinal" liquor -- and thousands of outlets flowered. Today,
medicinal marijuana has been legalized by 14 states, and more are
hopping on the bandwagon. "Pot shops" are popping. When government
imposes taboos, crafty people outwit taboo-enforcers.

President Obama also is shifting the U.S. focus. Last month, he
launched a "balanced" National Drug Control Strategy, which
spotlights prevention and treatment as well as police raids. We hope
this change reduces hostilities in the "war."

Criminalizing alcohol created a class of alcohol criminals -- who
vanished after alcohol became legal. Criminalizing drugs makes
millions of Americans criminals.

In a decade or so, pot probably will be legal in most of the United
States. Looking back, people will wonder why Americans in 2010 were
jailed for it.

We've always felt it's absurd for America to throw people in prison
for marijuana, while legalizing tobacco and booze, which do more
harm. Prohibition of alcohol was a fiasco. Prohibition of dope isn't
much better.