THE TRUTH BEHIND ANTI-DRUG COMMERCIALS

There is no denying it; if you purchase drugs nowadays, you support
terrorism. As recent advertisements have taught us, 12 of the world's 28
known terror organizations are involved in the drug trade. And all are
linked in mutually beneficial relationships with drug cartels. That means
that any terrorist group can make a few hundred million dollars a year
selling mind-altering substances to the United States.

In the year 2000 alone, Americans bought roughly $10.5 billion worth of
marijuana. In 2000, Afghanistan was responsible for more than 70 percent of
the world's opium trade. Those who don't want people using drugs are very
clever. They are well aware that nobody agrees with terrorism, and take
advantage of its link with prohibited substances to get people to stop.

So who are these people who don't want others to alter their consciousness?
Well, some of them are wonderful, caring parents, and others have made a
living selling nicotine to kids. I was introduced to this fact by Bill
Maher, when he said, "'The Partnership for a Drug Free America' - Ha, make
me laugh and gag with that title. Please, they are a lobbying arm for the
tobacco and alcohol industries. They don't want to see a drug free America.
They want to see an America free of the drugs that are their competition."

What I find funny about these anti-drug commercials is that we know who
armed, funded and trained the Taliban, Al Qaeda and Sadaam Hussein. And
they are not potheads, or maybe they are; I don't know.

It was the CIA and when I say "armed, funded, and trained," I mean it
literally. The CIA put guns in the hands of terrorists and taught them how
to shoot. This is not to be mistaken for the fact that the United States
prohibited drugs, which made it possible for these groups to get very rich
and fund their terrorist activities - although they did that as well.

What's equally ironic is that, unwittingly, the Partnership for a Drug Free
America is making the most convincing argument against drug prohibition
I've ever heard with their commercials. Drug use benefiting terrorism has
nothing to do with drugs or drug users. What terrorists really benefit from
is prohibition.

Whatever we prohibit, terrorists will profit from. If tomorrow we decided
to prohibit Nutri-Grain bars, it wouldn't take long for nefarious groups to
make huge profits selling Nutri-Grain bars at inflated prices to those
people that still wanted their delicious oats and grains. At which point,
Balance Bars, the competition of Nutri-Grain, would put out ads saying,
"Nutri-Grain eaters may think they aren't harming anyone, but every time
they sink their teeth into a chewy Nutri-Grain morsel, they hand money to
terrorists so they can kill children."

This is the same logic that defeated the prohibition of alcohol. The
government saw that the unnecessary power and independence given to
mobsters like Al Capone - along with the decrease in government
credibility, the increase in corruption, law enforcement spending,
incarceration, and crime rates caused by prohibition - wasn't worth the
ability to say that the United States sent a strong message that alcohol
was not "OK."

Anti-drug commercials have opened my eyes to new possibilities. That the
worst thing we can do is to adopt a prohibitive stance towards a natural
demand. That the legalization of mind-altering substances would strengthen
our nation and cripple terror groups. That prohibition and peace are
mutually exclusive propositions.

I'm sure that this isn't what the anti-drug advertisers had in mind, but I
have only them to thank for my new anti-prohibition stance.