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December 13, 2011
Bad Ideas and their Consequences
The “War on Drugs.” is a monumental failure, yet it remains one of the few policies nearly all the squabbling nations of our divided and overcrowded planet can agree upon. Not that it's being rigorously observed. Rather; it's openly violated by a variety of rogue nations: for example Somalia, which has become a pirate haven because it lacks a functional government, North Korea, a family-operated dictatorship masquerading as a nation, Mexico and Colombia, both poor nations claiming to support UN drug policy while turning blind eyes to illegal drug production and extensive smuggling operations from within their borders. In Asia, both Myanmar, and Afghanistan have been well known sources of heroin for decades. The list goes on.One of the themes of this blog has been that for the only surviving cognitive species to perpetuate such obvious folly while also failing to agree on a plethora of existential threats (global warming is just one) is a sign of serious trouble. Not that I claim to have a solution; only that when serious problems are ignored, they are unlikely to be solved.
On Sunday, Rupert Murdoch’s NAT GEO aired hours of unwitting evidence in support of that contention: several propaganda videos featuring drug war failures in which all were portrayed as valiant attempts by law enforcement agencies to identify and arrest drug criminals or-at the very least- keep their products "off the street." All included glaring, but time-honored lies and exaggerated claims about the dangerous products produced by drug criminals. Because I've spent the last fifteen years gathering evidence exposing the underlying hoax NAT GEO supports, I was disappointed that such claims could still be aired and angry that they are still widely believed.
I quickly realized, however, I was the one out of step; the drug war is more supported than ever, precisely because a majority of living humans have no other choice and many of those who do are either too frightened to speak up or too busy participating in the bonanza the drug war creates. In other words, America's 40 year drug folly, has evolved along the lines of the basic Nazi model, but has thus far avoided the fatal errors that brought down the Third Reich and its Japanese allies in 1945. Perhaps the most important reason it is still tolerated is that it claims to oppose an idea rather than a human population. Originally, the idea was "addiction;" later the designated enemy was morphed into the drugs themselves. When the CSA was passed in 1970, it went beyond Hitler's infamous Nuremberg laws by giving the US Attorney General sole authority to add new "drugs of abuse" (thus victimizing their users) to the list of absolutely forbidden items.
Despite the support- verbal and monetary- of national governments, organized religions, and most "leading" human institutions, the drug war rests on one enormous vulnerability: its implicit contention that a policy of criminal prohibition can succeed.
If that notion were to be exposed for the failure it has always been, the drug war could come crashing down at least as quickly as Joe Paterno's public image.
Doctor Tom
Despite the support- verbal and monetary- of national governments, organized religions, and most "leading" human institutions, the drug war rests on one enormous vulnerability: its implicit contention that a policy of criminal prohibition can succeed.
If that notion were to be exposed for the failure it has always been, the drug war could come crashing down at least as quickly as Joe Paterno's public image.
Doctor Tom
Posted by tjeffo at December 13, 2011 06:16 PM