Other Views

DRUG PLAGUE IS NATION'S LOOMING SOCIAL DISASTER

The type and amount of assistance the United States is providing to the
disaster ravaged areas of Indonesia is fantastic. The fact that we are able
to so quickly respond to such disasters is truly astounding.

Many people deserve accolades for their ability and dedication toward
helping others in need. Having folks with these abilities, and matching
them with the freedom to demonstrate those abilities, is in my opinion what
makes our country the most sought after country in the world in which to live.

Where I take issue is with the fact that apparently not enough people in
our country are willing to admit that we have an ongoing "social" disaster.
This is not a one-time disaster that suddenly came out of nowhere. This is
a disaster that started slowly about 40 or 50 years ago, and has continued
to grow for many years. The social disaster of which I speak is fed by the
permissiveness of our political and judicial systems.

When communities and politicians all around the United States are expending
so much energy and money determining whether or not you can smoke in a
restaurant, we are still allowing illegal drug manufacturers and sellers
and child abusers to go free because we can't afford to keep them
incarcerated, if we're lucky enough in the first place to even get them to
prison.

All too often these folks are allowed to remain free due to technicalities.
These technicalities are where the judicial permissiveness comes into play.
Because we as a society have been mollycoddling criminals for so long, it
appears they at this point have more lawyers fighting for the criminals'
rights, than are fighting for law-abiding citizens' rights.

Since we are so able to quickly and efficiently mobilize to assist cities,
counties, states and even other countries in times of need, maybe it's time
to place a similar effort toward fighting illegal drug manufacturers,
transporters and sellers.

I don't think it's a secret that if you beat the drug issues in our
country, you in turn will significantly reduce the violent crime rates as
well. Reducing these crime rates in turn means reducing the cost to arrest,
bring to trial and incarcerate violent criminals. It means positively
affecting many social programs. It also means simply allowing our citizens
to rightfully feel a much stronger sense of security.

I challenge state and federal elected authorities to take a true stand on
delivering the sort of resource and dollar support to education, law
enforcement, judicial system and prison reform as we do for disaster
related issues.

This does not mean just pouring more dollars into everything on an ongoing
basis, although that is certainly a big part of it. It may mean drilling
down better into identifying certain types of criminals that don't require
confinement in prison; it may mean better training for border patrol
employees; or it may mean a better public education concerning how all of
us can help to identify and report certain activities to the authorities.

The long and short of it is, we are spending an astronomical amount of
public money and not seeing nearly enough progress toward restoring a safer
environment for our citizens. We should force some of our professional
politicians into not lining their own and their friends' pockets so much,
but instead into devoting energy and money toward resolving our social issues.

As Gov. John Hoeven stated many times Tuesday in Bismarck, "Our time is
now!" Gov. Hoeven was speaking specifically of North Dakota; however his
sentiment also certainly fits our entire country's situation.