Former Drug Czar of the UK: Legalize all drugs

Bob Ainsworth, who was once responsible for drug policy as drugs minister in the UK, has declared prohibition to be counterproductive.

We need to take effective measures to rob the dealers of their markets and the only way that we can do that is by supplying addicts through the medical profession, through prescription. We cannot afford to be shy about being prepared to do that. . . It is far better they are going to a doctor, or going to a chemist and are getting their script [prescription] than turning tricks as a prostitute or robbing their mates.

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Medical marijuana is coming to DC

Law Enforcement Against Prohibition is reporting that Congress is giving the OK to medical marijuana in Washington DC. Who is LEAP?

A group of police and judges who want to legalize drugs pointed to new FBI numbers released today as evidence that the "war on drugs" is a failure that can never be won. The data, from the FBI's "Crime in the United States" report, shows that in 2008 there were 1,702,537 arrests for drug law violations, or one drug arrest every 18 seconds. "In our current economic climate, we simply cannot afford to keep arresting more than three people every minute in the failed 'war on drugs,'" said Jack Cole, a retired undercover narcotics detective who now heads the group Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP). "Plus, if we legalized and taxed drug sales, we could actually create new revenue in addition to the money we'd save from ending the cruel policy of arresting users."
LEAP's motto is that while drug use is bad, "The War on Drugs is Worse."

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The Economist: Stop the war on drugs

How is the war on drugs going, really? According to The Economist, things are not going well.

[T]he war on drugs has been a disaster, creating failed states in the developing world even as addiction has flourished in the rich world. By any sensible measure, this 100-year struggle has been illiberal, murderous and pointless. That is why The Economist continues to believe that the least bad policy is to legalise drugs.

How can one quantify this illiberal, murderous and pointless struggle?

The United States alone spends some $40 billion each year on trying to eliminate the supply of drugs. It arrests 1.5m of its citizens each year for drug offences, locking up half a million of them; tougher drug laws are the main reason why one in five black American men spend some time behind bars. In the developing world blood is being shed at an astonishing rate. In Mexico more than 800 policemen and soldiers have been killed since December 2006 (and the annual overall death toll is running at over 6,000) . . . [F]ar from reducing crime, prohibition has fostered gangsterism on a scale that the world has never seen before.

In this article, The Economist points out that it has maintained this same position for 20 years, and it is more evident than ever that the "drug war" is a disaster.

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