Andrew Looney
www.wunderland.com/Andy
| Supporting the Drug War Supports Terrorism | |
| By Andrew Looney |
3/14/2 |
I'm bothered by the latest round of anti-drug propaganda being paid for (at huge expense) by our tax dollars. These ads assert that terrorists are funded by the sale of illegal drugs. The apparent point of these ads is to seek support for the drug war by connecting it with the war on terrorism.
However, if terrorists really are funded by black market drug sales, then it seems to me the best way to hinder them would be to destroy the black market they profit from, rather than continuing to perpetuate it. And the only way to do that is to legalize drugs.
Radical thinkers have been urging legalization for decades. The idea is no longer radical. The War on Drugs, like Prohibition before it, has been a total failure. It must now be put to rest. If we're serious about winning the war on terrorism, we can no longer afford the luxury of imagining we can win the fight against substance abuse by putting people in jail.
We must accept reality: people will use drugs (and alcohol), no matter how harshly we punish them. It's time to end that war, and instead let the government regulate, control, and tax the sale of currently-illegal drugs. Only then will terrorists (and other gangsters) be unable to profit from them.
Those who get paid to perpetuate the drug war want us to believe that supporting it will help end terrorism. I say the exact opposite: supporting the continuance of a black market that funds terrorism is indirectly supporting terrorism, not fighting it.
Sincerely Yours,
Andrew Looney
www.wunderland.com/Andy
