A FUTILE DRUG WAR

"The war against drugs provides us with something to say that offends
nobody, requires us to do nothing difficult, and allows us to
postpone, perhaps indefinitely, the more urgent questions about the
state of the nation's schools, housing, employment opportunities--the
conditions to which drug addiction speaks as a symptom, not a cause.
We remain safe in the knowledge that we might as well be denouncing
Satan, and so we can direct the voices of prerecorded blame at
metaphors and apparitions, wars and battles.

The war on drugs becomes a perfect war for people who would rather not
fight.It is a war in which we position ourselves to stand fearlessly
on the side of good. We need do nothing else but strike noble poses as
protectors of the people and defenders of the public trust. We
continue to lock up nonviolent offenders, we feel better and we
accomplish nothing.

We can not allow this to continue.

We currently have millions of non-violent drug-law violators behind
bars or on supervised release, Millions. We have become the world's
leading jailer becoming what was most despised about Soviet Russia
during the Cold War. We pressure the countries of the world to adopt
out failed policy or else . . . .

Many of our federal prisons are holding twice their capacity. Our
federal government alone operates 132 prisons and camps. Fifteen are
under construction right now with twelve more on the drawing board.
When these are open they will need 50 more, and then 70, and 90 after
that ...

In effect our federal government alone must build an 832-bed facility
every two weeks just to keep up with the punishment of non-violent
crime!

The cost in dollars is staggering; the cost in lives is
immeasurable.

Prison in America is not a place of rehabilitation. It is a place of
violence, humiliation, despair, and deprivation. All of this we
support in the name of justice. All of this human destruction in a
futile war against substances.

Inhuman lengths of incarceration have done nothing to stem the flow of
drugs. A recent study proved that it only increases it. Yet we
continue to build prisons instead of building schools, and places for
effective drug treatment. Why?

It is time to revisit and rethink our war on drugs. It has to include
a war against poverty, poor schools, underemployment, lack of
employment, teenage pregnancy, absent non-supporting parents and
homelessness.

Annette H. Lartigue

Trenton

The writer is a member of Trenton City Council.