Legalizing Drugs

We are currently facing a large debate on the issue of drugs. That is whether drugs should remain illegal or be legalized within the United States. It has come to be a war; a war which is being fought against our own citizens and against other countries. It’s a war which has taken many lives and will not cease in its toll. The justification behind the drug war is human health and wellbeing, but it doesn’t always happen that way. There is no way to have a happy prohibition, as there is no way to have a happy legalization. Having a form of regulated legalization of drugs would be a tolerant middle ground that recognizes the inevitability of drug use and strives to make it as safe as possible.

The book “Drugs: Case for Legalizing Marijuana” supports the decision of legalizing drugs. In it Gore Vidal stresses the idea that honesty when we have the legalization is what will help us. He states that we should “Simply make all drugs available and sell them at cost. [we should] Label each drug with a precise description of what effect--good and bad--the drug will have on whoever takes it.” By doing this it ensures that the public have an informed opinion on whether they will take it or not. He recognizes that there will be disbelievers claiming that legalization will ruin everything, making us, for lack of better wording, dumb, and addicted zombies. Yet he also mentions the prohibition of alcohol comparing it to our current battle with drugs, and how prohibition turned out to be such a disaster.

An analysis made about our drug situation by Meaghan Cussen, and Walter Block provides us with benefits available to us with the legalization of drugs. Among them they state that this would “prevent our civil liberties from being threatened any further, it would reduce crime rates, reverse the potency effect, improve the quality of life in the inner cities, prevent the spread of disease, save the taxpayer money, and generally benefit both individuals and the community as a whole.” They believe that the legalization of drugs will improve our society as a whole making us more aware and even increasing our liberties.

We then experience the opinion of a retired policeman who supports the legalization of drugs. In a self interview Norm Stamper tells us how he was a cop for 34 years and how his experiences ultimatly shaped his decision on this issue. He tells us that “[he has] witnessed the devastating effects of open-air drug markets in residential neighborhoods: children recruited as runners, mules and lookouts; dedicated narcotics officers tortured and killed in the line of duty; drug-related foreign policies that foster political instability, wreak health and environmental disasters, and make life even tougher for indigenous subsistence farmers [etc.] All because we like our drugs вЂ" and can't have them without breaking the law.” He goes on to explain how legalization would work, and the possible outcomes it could have. Lastly he explains to us the reasons that legalization hasn’t