WHAT GOOD HAS THE WAR ON DRUGS REALLY DONE?

Not a day goes by that I don't read the Daily News and every day there
are numerous people with their names listed in it because they
committed various drug offenses.

My question to all the drug war proponents is what good has the drug
war really done?

It has managed to cost the taxpayers billions of dollars of
hard-earned money with no real benefit.

If the drug war ended today, we would see a drastic drop in crime,
from theft by drug addicts who no longer would have to pay a small
fortune to obtain their drugs to murders that only happened because of
a drug deal gone bad.

The drugs would be in the marketplace where black marketers couldn't
use them to take advantage of others. It is easy to see that the drug
laws have been more much harmful than the drugs themselves.

Otherwise law-abiding citizens can lose their jobs, thus lose their
livelihood all because they smoked a little pot and highly dangerous
drugs like methamphetamine have been developed only after less
dangerous drugs like cocaine became a little harder to come by.

The prohibition of drugs hasn't stopped anyone from being able to get
drugs; all it has managed to do is take money out of taxpayers'
pockets and give jobs to more and more bureaucrats.

People should have a right in a "free society" to do as they wish with
their own bodies but for some reason politicians have made laws that
imply that you don't own your body, they do. Is this really right? If
we want a better way of life, then the drug war must end.

Greg Ryan

Bowling Green