CONSERVATIVE NONSENSE IN THE WAR ON DRUGS

Conservatives never cease to fascinate me, given their professed
devotion to "freedom, free enterprise, and limited government" and
their ardent support of policies that violate that principle. One of
the most prominent examples is the drug war. In fact, if you're ever
wondering whether a person is a conservative or a libertarian, a good
litmus-test question is, How do you feel about the war on drugs? The
conservative will respond, "Even though I believe in freedom, free
enterprise, and limited government, we've got to continue waging the
war on drugs." The libertarian will respond, "End it. It is an
immoral and destructive violation of the principles of freedom, free
enterprise, and limited government."

The most recent example of conservative drug-war nonsense is an
article entitled "Winning the Drug War," by Jonathan V. Last in the
current issue of The Weekly Standard, one of the premier conservative
publications in the country. In his article, Last cites statistics
showing that drug usage among certain groups of Americans has
diminished and that supplies of certain drugs have decreased. He says
that all this is evidence that the war on drugs is finally succeeding
and that we just need to keep waging it for some indeterminate time
into the future, when presumably U.S. officials will finally be able
to declare "victory."

Of course, we've heard this type of "positive" drug-war nonsense for
the past several decades, at least since Richard Nixon declared war
on drugs back in the 1970s. What conservatives never tell us is how
final "victory" will ultimately be measured. Like all other drug
warriors for the past several decades, Last doesn't say, "The
statistics are so good that the drug war has now been won and
therefore we can now end it," but rather, "Victory is right around
the corner. The statistics are getting better. Let's keep going."

Last failed to mention what is happening to the people of Nuevo
Laredo, Mexico, where drug lords compete violently to export illegal
drugs into the United States to reap the financial benefits of
exorbitant black-market prices and profits that the drug war has
produced. Recently drug gangs fired high-powered weapons and a
grenade into the newsroom of La Manana, killing Jaime Orozco Tey, a
40-year-old father of three. Several other journalists have been
killed in retaliation for their stories on the drug war, and
newspapers are now self-censoring in fear of the drug lords. There
are also political killings in Nuevo Laredo arising out of the drug
war, including the city's mayor after he had served the grand total
of nine hours in office. According to the New York Times, "In Nuevo
Laredo, the federal police say average citizens live in terror of
drug dealers. Drug-related killings have become commonplace." The
New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists says that the
U.S.-Mexico border region is now one of the world's most dangerous
places for reporters.

Not surprisingly, Last did not mention these statistics in his "We're
winning the drug war" article.

During Prohibition, there were undoubtedly people such as Last
claiming, "Booze consumption is down. We're winning the war on
booze. Al Capone is in jail. We've got to keep on waging the war on
booze until we can declare final victory."

Fortunately, Americans living at that time finally saw through such
nonsense, especially given the massive Prohibition-related violent
crime that the war on booze had spawned. They were right to finally
legalize the manufacture and sale of alcohol and treat alcohol
consumption as a social issue, not a criminal-justice problem.

Both conservatives and liberals have waged their war on drugs for
decades, and they have reaped nothing but drug gangs, drug lords,
robberies, thefts, muggings, murders, dirty needles, overcrowded
prisons, decimated families, record drug busts, government
corruption, infringements on civil liberties, violations of financial
privacy, massive federal spending, and, of course, ever-glowing
statistics reflecting drug-war "progress."

Americans would be wise to reject, once and for all, the war on
drugs, and cast drug prohibition, like booze prohibition, into the
ashcan of history.