Is there any real way to win the "war" on Drugs?

Question

The amount of time, money and effort spent to eradicate the illegal drug trade seems to have been wasted. We have so much of our resources tied up on this one problem. Is there any way to reduce our drug problem other than through law enforcement?

Answer 1

Legalize them. The drug lords will tear each other apart fighting for business.

Answer 2

1st off normwiselwc sounds like a great DEMOCRAT.
Have we learned nothing? In between the 18th and the 21st amendments we learned that making alcohol (the most lethal drug) illegal was a waste of time, money, blood, sweat and tears.
We made organized crime and racketeering what it is today.
We should legalize and control. As long as drugs are sold in back alleys and crack houses etc., etc. there will be deaths, OD's and all the other goodies that come with illicit drug sales and use. WE WILL NEVER rid the streets of drugs. Never! That's a fantasy. In fact..as science marches forward and synthetic drugs start to slide more and more into the mainstream..there might be a time when the need to ship drugs in from south america, aisa et al will erode and one of the ways of controlling drugs in this country (ie stopping it before it gets in) will be gone. Then what? Meth labs in this country are just the temporary tip of the iceberg. In 5-10 years there will be labs pumping out all sorts of crap that'll replace, to some extent, the need for naturally occuring opiates. THEN the fun will really begin. If you think it's bad now..hold onto your seats. Oh...and as in any good business..the further uses of synthentics will drive the cost of manufactring down and this will be passed onto the consumer. Short story...more available for cheaper. Not good.

Answer 3

The U.S. government can't control the mass amount of illegal aliens crossing the boarder let alone control the mass amounts of illegal drugs smuggled into the country. Legalizing illegal drugs will not make for a better society. It won’t necessarily eradicate crime. Criminals are criminals; while they won’t be fighting over drug selling territories, they will just find some other mischief to get into. Also, I’m sure that like alcohol and cigarettes, it would be illegal for minors to partake in these legal drugs. The criminals could just change their strategy to the focus of the underage market. Furthermore, it will just create more drug addicted individual as you have more access to the drugs.

The law enforcement agencies needs to track down, eliminate, a put away for a long time, growers of pot and keepers of meth labs here in the U.S. As for the out of state smuggling, perhaps when the government finds a way to protect the borders/coasts from illegal entering the country, they may come up with a bright idea for keeping the drug smugglers out also.

But in the end, the all mighty dollar will win out, I’m sure.

Answer 4

Like terrorisism, what is the alternative if you don't attempt to keep criminal activity in check. Legalize drugs so every yahoo on the street tempted will be high as a kite on crack. As ineffective as the "war" is the consequences of do nothing would be devastating. Should the government regroup and try different tactics, probably. Until something new or exciting happens, I think we are stuck with the old way of dealing with problems, throw money at it and hope it will all go away!

Answer 5

Is there any real way to win the "war" on Drugs?
The war on drugs is ongoing, not only in the US but worldwide. There is a constant war on various other criminal activities, murder, extortion, counterfeiting money, embezzlement, bribery, etc. Legalizing them doesn't make society better.

The amount of time, money and effort spent to eradicate the illegal drug trade seems to have been wasted.
This is a blanket statement. As law enforcement has cracked down on mainly gangs and organized crime groups, neighborhood safety has improved in areas where gang activity has been broken up.
It's an ongoing battle as the attraction to trafficking drugs is its high-profitability.

We have so much of our resources tied up on this one problem. Is there any way to reduce our drug problem other than through law enforcement?
Although supply reduction is the main focus of many law enforcement agencies, there are many demand reduction programs. Real demand reduction starts in the home with the parent or parents telling their children about the dangers of drug use.

Answer 6

Legalize it. This would end drive by shootings and gang warfare, because there would be no more profit. Let the government distribute it, and use the money for education, so future generations don't take drugs. Basically, this generation would get hurt by the availability of drugs, but future generations would learn from their mistakes. Take smoking for example. In our society, because of education, people don't smoke anymore, and if they do, they smoke the light brands. The same would happen if we legalized drugs. And while we are at it, let's make gun illegal. American society is so ****** up because of these two issues. America is not a civil society in my opinion because of our policies on these two issues.

Answer 7

I don't want to say legalize drugs.The mere thought is absurb.
But,I think the Gvernment should take control by becoming a
major distributor.Make drugs available to drug addicts with a few
restrictions.Like community service work.And incarcerations for
Drug dealers with automatic sentencing guidelines.i.e. No atty.
needed. YOU sell drugs you go to jail & stay no exceptions.
No probation/no parole. By doing it this way, the Gov. will be the
only source for the drugs.And the drugs would be administered
by medical professionals,so the Addict can't sell or trade the drugs.
The drugs would dosed out,& the addict's primary goal is to
become drug-free.No excuses. Any drug addict who fails to
comply with the Gov. program would be regarded as the Drug
dealer with NO mercy.
Eventually, no one would want to get drugs via Gov. too much
of a hassle. No one has access except via Gov. Addicts dry out.

Answer 8

The war on drugs. Where to start. The so called war on drugs started in the 1920's. until then you could buy herion or coke out of the sears catalog. It got so bad that congress decided to make it illegal. and so it started, beeeeeen going on for over 60 years, the gov. has spent enough money to almost wipe out the national det & yet we still have the problem. thats our gov in action. spend a lot of our money for nothing. kinda makes you think that someone in washington is getting a piece of the action don't it?

Answer 9

Yes the best way to win this problem is educating the kids and to make them understand how danger es are this substance, the only problem that I see in all this is adults we think we know what are we doing and 95% of the time we are just guessing, or is some people that don't care who's live they are destroying as long they make profit. and we need stronger punishment.

Answer 10

Yes there is but society would have to be willing to pay the price. First, we would have to develop an effective education process beginning in kindergarden that would about the ill effects of drugs. We would have to sell the advantages of having a drug free life.

We would also have to develop a stronger ethical conscience about the abuse of alcohol and not glorify getting drunk in our media. It is hard to on the one hand promote a war on drugs when we have one legal drug - alcohol - in which its abuse except when driving is seen as the main way to "unwind" and have "fun" with friends at parties. There is a mixed message here that has to resolved since it seems we say "yes" and "no" as a culture about using drugs destructively.

We also need to require that every student public schools be given a drug test weekly. Society has a responsibility to provide a drug free environment for its children. All teachers and administrators also need to be tested weekly. Students failing the test need to be put in drug rehab programs and the families provided counseling. Any teacher failing a drug test would be fired.

We also need to provide $10,000 rewards for the arrest and conviction of anyone selling drugs. For drug lords and significant suppliers we could put out a $1,000,000 dollar reward. Making it profitable to put these people out of business and recruiting help among the poor communities where these criminals prey would be helpful.

We must also provide a $50,000 to every high school student who has been able to go through their entire high school education without ever failing a weekly drug test. Or provide them a free four year college degree provided they continue to take weekly drug tests and maintain a drug free life. This means that those who stay off drugs will have a potential to also escape from poverty.

Conviction on selling drugs needs to be treated the same a sex offenders are currently treated. Tracking devices need to be placed on the person for the rest of their lives, neighborhoods made aware of where they live, they need to be prohibited from living nears schools, and their names and pictures placed on the internet so that everyone knows they are a drug dealer.

Schools need to organize and sponser weekly parties every week end where in a safe environment students can have "fun" in a drug free place. There must be a healthy and fun alternative given to the parties where the abuse of drugs and alcohol are the main aspects of entertainment. Society must provide a heathy alternative to the destructive escape into drug addiction.

Clearly allowing schools to teach again about the larger philosophical issues such as "having a purpose for life" and ethics would help. Our fear of losing the division between "church and state" has caused us to become crippled in not being able to tansfer sane values to our children. Assigning each student a "life coach" who would really help them clarify their values, develop their principles, and guide them towards attaining their goals would provide hope for many hopeless children. People who have purpose rarely abuse drugs. We could also have every high school student trained in the 12 steps of recovery and use them to prevent addiction instead of overcoming it. This could be a mandatory small group for everyone in public schools.

The real question is however do we really want to win this war? We could if it became our priority as a nation. It seems we want to contain the problem but not eliminate it. That is a sad truth. But if we released our most creative efforts we could take the profit out of drugs and create a culture that rejected the use of drugs to deal with the struggles, boredom, and abuses of life.