Pubdate: Fri, 22 Jul 2005
Source: Casper Star-Tribune (WY)
Copyright: 2005 Casper Star-Tribune
Contact:  http://www.casperstartribune.net/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/765
Author: Rhonda Abitbol

DRUG WAR MISAPPROPRIATES

Editor:

America will never win the "War on Drugs." Do not believe for one
minute that this great country of ours is fighting a losing battle
with meth, or any other drug for that matter.

Drugs are big business ... a staple of our economy. Could you imagine
the ramifications of winning the War on Drugs? Do you realize how many
jobs this war creates? The unemployment rate would soar.

Since private industry is now in the business of corrections,
corporations could go bankrupt! What about the treatment centers and
the "trained" professionals (don't try this at home) themselves? Why,
the market would be oversaturated with therapists, and not enough
addicts to go around. Too many cops and not enough criminals, entire
task forces and departments and drug courts would cease to exist.
Where would these people find work?

What about all the prisons we are fiendishly building? We could turn
them into low-income housing and homeless shelters, 'cause God knows
we are spending billions of dollars to create felons and very few
dollars to aid our hungry, needy and homeless neighbors.

The Drug Enforcement Agency ... hmmm ... the DEA, seems to me that if
the function of this agency was to rid us of drugs, then it could be
called the Drug Eradication Agency. No, I'm thinking that the job of
the DEA is just that -- to enforce drugs. It's up to them to allow how
much is allowed across the border -- because I'm sure other
governments' economies depend on the DEA as well -- how much is
distributed, etc. I would go into more detail, but hopefully by now
you are getting my drift. Really, there is so much money pumped in and
out of this machine, this scam called the War on Drugs, and it's a
bunch of government propaganda!

Meanwhile, while we are all concentrating on this, we are also being
disarmed, disrespected and disillusioned. But fear not, because at the
rate we are going we'll all be felons sitting in a brand new cell with
two or three other uncitizens, pondering how in the heck we allowed
this to happen to ourselves.

Rhonda Abitbol

Inmate, NCDC

Casper
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