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Former Cops Agree: Legalization Is the Path to Controlling Drugs

Even the police see regulation as the way to control drugs

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Prohibition has no moral basis: I have no right to decide what you should ingest, and you have no right to decide what I ingest.

Prohibition wastes time, lives, and taxpayer resources. It destroys families and communities.

Prohibition corrupts public institutions and the individuals working within them. It erodes public faith in the police, the justice system, and government at all levels. It must end - before it puts an end to society.

Jerry Dorey 5:58PM July 09, 2012

Franklin,I hope one of your speakers remembers to corner Sabet on the governments attempt to switch from incarceration to rehab,,who pays for the rehab?

If it is the tax payer,,we lose,,if it is the drug user and he is not able to pay for probation/rehab/court costs,,do they continue filling our prisons?

I was really worried about my portfolio of prison stocks till I figured that one out.

claygooding of TX 5:01PM July 09, 2012

Yes very much agreed

Jess of NE 2:42PM July 09, 2012

Well put. I agree completely.

Rev. Gregory Lowrey of MI 1:49PM July 09, 2012

Should be easily seen as a social problem, not a criminal offense. Until prisons are not money makers, we won't see change though.

Steve Jokenocz of IL 1:14PM July 09, 2012

Agree! The "War on Drugs" is Public Enemy No. 1, putting more drugs uncontrolled and unregulated everywhere, and it is the heart of many other US problems.

We tell the kids not to use drugs and then slide a pot of gold next to the choice we tell them not to take. Too often, kids pursing the American Dream in a cockeyed, drug-war world join a gang, shoot each other fighting over drug turf, and innocents get shot in the crossfire. Because of prohibition violence and "Just say 'no'" intolerance, America has build prisons at the expense of schools, transforming the "Land of the Free" into the "Prison Capital of the World." Addicts cannot obtain the drug they need, except on the black market. Law enforcement authorities seize drugs by the ton and prosecute by the gram. Healthcare costs go through the roof aggravated by prohibition overdose cases, bullet holes in drug-slingers, and AIDS spread by dirty needles among injecting drug users. "Love that drug war."

Trade imbalance is aggravated by the import of foreign drugs to the US and export of US dollars in exchange, cops and kids are corrupted, terrorism is funded with drug profits, and medical marijuana patients denied their medicine... Oh, love that drug war.

Informant law-enforcement, forfeited drug-bounty commandeered by police and local governments... The Golden Rule was traded for a new, drug-war morality – “Save yourself, sacrifice someone else...” (“Where did you get these drugs?”)

The war on drugs, sponsored by the United Nations and metastasized through its three prohibitionist drug treaties, and sponsored by the US in bipartisan sickness, must end to alleviate this intolerant cancer on society. End the drug war, yes!

James E. Gierach of IL 1:03PM July 09, 2012

Drug prohibition empowers our terrorist enemies, enriches barbarous Latin cartels and gives more than 30,000 violent US gangs reason to exist. We derive nothing from this policy to offset such horrible blowback.

Those who support this, the first war declared for eternity are either steeped in ignorance or in cahoots with the drug barons and the bankers who launder the profits.

Dean Becker of TX 12:54PM July 09, 2012

The "War on Drugs" is Public Enemy No. 1, putting more drugs uncontrolled and unregulated everywhere, and it is the heart of many other US problems.

We tell the kids not to use drugs and then slide a pot of gold next to the choice we tell them not to take. Too often, kids pursing the American Dream in a cockeyed, drug-war world join a gang, shoot each other fighting over drug turf, and innocents get shot in the crossfire. Because of prohibition violence and "Just say 'no'" intolerance, America has build prisons at the expense of schools, transforming the "Land of the Free" into the "Prison Capital of the World." Addicts cannot obtain the drug they need, except on the black market. Law enforcement authorities seize drugs by the ton and prosecute by the gram. Healthcare costs go through the roof aggravated by prohibition overdose cases, bullet holes in drug-slingers, and AIDS spread by dirty needles among injecting drug users. "Love that drug war."

Trade imbalance is aggravated by the import of foreign drugs to the US and export of US dollars in exchange, cops and kids are corrupted, terrorism is funded with drug profits, and medical marijuana patients denied their medicine... Oh, love that drug war.

Informant law-enforcement, forfeited drug-bounty commandeered by police and local governments... The Golden Rule was traded for a new, drug-war morality – “Save yourself, sacrifice someone else...” (“Where did you get these drugs?”)

The war on drugs, sponsored by the United Nations and metastasized through its three prohibitionist drug treaties, and sponsored by the US in bipartisan sickness, must end to alleviate this intolerant cancer on society. End the drug war, YES!

James E. Gierach of IL 12:47PM July 09, 2012