Pot times
War On Drugs Is A Failure
URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v05/n1074/a08.htmlNewshawk: chip
Pubdate: Mon, 04 Jul 2005 WAR ON DRUGS IS A FAILURE
Source: High Point Enterprise (NC)
Copyright: 2005 High Point Enterprise
Contact:
letterbox@hpe.com
Website: http://www.hpe.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/576
Author: Robert Sharpe
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/prison.htm
(Incarceration)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?199
(Mandatory Minimum Sentencing)
Emma Mieden is to be commended for an excellent column June 25. Support
for the drug war would end overnight if whites were incarcerated for drugs at
the same rate as minorities.
Racially disproportionate incarceration rates are not the only cause for alarm.
Children of inmates are at risk of educational failure, joblessness, addiction
and delinquency.
Incarcerating nonviolent drug offenders alongside hardened criminals is the
equivalent of providing them with a taxpayer-funded education in anti-social
behavior.
It's time to declare peace in the failed drug war and begin treating all
substance abuse, legal or otherwise, as the public health problem it is.
Tobacco use has declined considerably in recent years. Public education
efforts are paying off. Apparently mandatory minimum prison sentences,
civil asset forfeiture, random drug testing and racial profiling are not
necessarily the most cost-effective means of discouraging unhealthy choices.
Drug abuse is bad, but the drug war is worse.
ROBERT SHARPE
Arlington, Va.
The writer is a policy analyst for Common Sense for Drug Policy www.csdp.org
based in Washington, D.C.
