DRUG POLICY INSANE, STUPID

To the editor:

I'm writing about: "Drug task force celebrates accomplishments on T-shirt"
(9-07-05).

Drug task forces are just government bureaucracies. And like all government
bureaucracies -- guaranteed to expand. Why? Because heads of the
bureaucracies get paid in direct proportion to how many employees work
under them, not according to how well they perform their mission.

Throwing more and more money at our drug problem is not the answer. We have
been doing this for more than 35 years. The net results are that illegal
drugs are just as available today as they were in 1969. The only thing that
changes is the name of the evil drug du jour.

Today the evil drug du jour is meth. A few years ago it was crack cocaine
and before that something else.

I'd like to add that in 1969 the U.S. federal drug enforcement budget was
$65 million. Last year it was $19.2 billion. (These figures don't include
the cost of incarceration nor the state and local costs.)

The $19.2 billion is greater than a 29,500 percent increase. If the price
of coffee which sold for 25 cents a cup in 1969 had increased at the same
rate, we would now be paying almost $75 for a cup of coffee. More than $75
with sales tax.

One definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and
expecting a different result. It's also a good definition of stupidity.

Our nation's drug policy has been both insane and stupid. It's time to do
something different -- substantially different.

Kirk Muse

Mesa, AZ