Drugs, More Drugs, More Criminals, More Prisons

"We are putting more and more money into a war that we are absolutely losing."
Governor Gary Johnson, New Mexico

New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson, who used drugs in college but not since, is the second governor to call the war on drugs a dismal failure. He told the Taos Chamber of Commerce, "We are putting more and more money into a war that we are absolutely losing." He suggests we legalize, control, regulate and tax it. This might actually produce a healthier society. David Boaz, executive vice president of the Cato Institute, a Washington, DC, think tank, in an editorial in The Philadelphia Inquirer, states that after spending $30 billion a year, arresting 1.5 million people a year, creating 60 percent of all federal prisoners (violent prisoners are only 12 percent), we haven't made much of a dent in the flow of dope. This, he feels, is why more and more thoughtful people have been questioning the war on drugs and calling for decriminalization. The Cato Institute suggests we have an honest debate on the subject. Congress should deal with drug prohibition as it dealt with alcohol prohibition. The 21st Amendment did not actually legalize the sale of alcohol; it simply repealed the federal prohibition and returned to the states the authority to set alcohol policies.

Thanks to Dr. John McCarthy of our own editorial committee for raising our consciousness on this subject in the pages of this journal over the last several years.

A high school patient told me it is harder for a teenager to obtain a can of beer than crack cocaine. It appears the state's alcohol control policies are more effective than federal drug policies. Could taxing drugs like we tax alcohol eliminate the income tax? But that would produce so much wealth that people could again afford private healthcare and HMOs might disappear. Organized medicine wouldn't have much left to do except become a professional organization once again, and we could again fill 20 tables at the Martinique Room at the Sacramento Inn the third Tuesday of every month.

delmeyer@healthcarecom.net            www.delmeyer.net