The “War on Drugs” is the name given to the battle of prohibition that the United States has been fighting for over forty years. And it has been America’s longest war. The “war” was officially declared by President Richard Nixon in the 1970’s due to the abuse of illegitimate drugs. Nixon claimed it as “public enemy number one” and enacted laws to fight the importation of narcotics. The United States’ War on Drugs began in response to cocaine trafficking in the late 1980’s. As the war continues to go on, winning it hardly seems feasible. As stated by NewsHour, the National Office of Drug Control Policy spends approximately nineteen billion dollars a year trying to stop the drug trade. The expenses shoot up, indirectly, through crime, hospital stays and such. However, people spend approximately three times as much money buying drugs as the government spends fighting against them. How can this war be won when the government has to spend so much money combating in opposition to it?? On top of the ridiculous cost of all the factors of the war, the availability of the illegal drugs comp...
The War on Drugs has been a common phrase in the United States for many decades. What exactly does this mean and how does it shape U.S. foreign policy? The War on Drugs can be defined as the systematic and aggressive policy that is determined to undermine and stop the flow of illegal drugs into the United States. This policy is backed by several U.S. institutions including the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), U.S. Army, U.S. Coast Guard, and U.S. Customs. Also, included in this list are the numerous local law enforcement agencies across the country.
It is also very important for people to know about this topic because the issue is not only about drugs but also the growth of inequality between the rich and poor, black and white, upper class and lower class in this country. The war of drugs deals with issues about why they were passed through congress and if there were motives that deals connect directly to black communities. The issues where brought about in Dan Baum book entitled “Smoke and Mirrors” where John Erlichmann, the chief domestic affair advisor talk about how the Drug War fever has been escalated and manipulated from its modest beginnings at the start of the Nixon administration and clarifies the various interests which that escalation has served. He talks about the Drug War on “blacks” and “hippies” but politicians could not say that so had to say the War on “heroin” and “Marijuana”. He also said that “We knew drugs were not the health problem we were making it out to be, but there were political benefits to be gained." This shows that there is more to the war of drugs that the government is letting on.
A former director of the United States Drug Enforcement Agency’s Mexican office once stated:” The heroin market abhors a vacuum.” The truth in this statement can be extended to not only the heroin trade but also the trade of numerous other drugs of abuse; from cocaine to methamphetamines, the illicit drug trade has had a way of fluidity that allows insert itself into any societal weakness. Much like any traditional commodity good, illicit drugs have become not only an economy in and of themselves, they have transformed into an integral part of the legitimate global economy. Whether or not military or law enforcement action is the most prudent or expedient method of minimizing the ill-effects of the illicit drug trade is of little consequence to the understanding of the economic reality of its use in the United States ongoing “War on Drugs”. As it stands, not only has the illicit drug trade transformed itself into a self-sufficient global economy, so too has the drug-fighting trade. According to a CNN report in 2012, in the 40 years since the declaration of “The War on Drugs”, the United States Federal Government has spent approximately $1 trillion in the fight against illicit drugs. Additionally, a report in the New York Times in 1999 estimates that federal spending in the “War on Drugs” tops $19 billion a year and state and local government spending nears $16 billion a year. Given the sheer magnitude of federal, state, and local spending in the combat of the illicit drug trade, one would reasonably expect that the violence, death, and destruction that so often accompanies the epicenters of the drug economy would be expelled from the close proximity of the United States. While this expectation is completely reasonable to the ...
Making drugs legal will reduce massive amounts of money spent on enforcement every year. The MPP (Marijuana Policy Project) estimates that marijuana consumers cost taxpayers more than $7 billion dollars annually (MPP). Year after year, money is thrown away trying to stem the flow of illegal drugs into our country. When one drug lord is caught, two show up somewhere else to take their place. For every drug bust, four more make it through to the United States. For example, in his book Intoxication, Ronald K. Siegel talks about the very first significant international anti-drug campaign: Operation Intercept, the first major assault on marijuana use. This operation captured 493 drug runners at the Mexican border. Very few drugs were confiscated, and no change in marijuana use inside the United States was recorded (280). Today, billions of dollars are spent each year to combat drug use, but no real concise victories are evident. Drugs are still bought, sold, and used everyday. The National Household Survey on Drug Abuse found that the number of first-time marijuana users in 1998 was 2.3 million. This number increased significantly compared to 1.4 million in 1989 (DEA). These figurers alone show that money spent on enforcement has had no effect. President Ronald Reagan said it best, "Despite continuing expressions of determination, America's war on drugs seems nowhere close to success.
To fully understand the significance and the seriousness of a War one must first fully understand the reasons that caused it in the first place. In this specific case the solution begins with several important yet seemingly simple questions…What is marijuana? How is it used? And why is it so coveted and widely distributed in Jamaica as well as the rest of the world?… All these questions help clarify the reasoning behind the war on drugs and further investigation shows how Jamaica ends up being an important country in this puzzle as well. Lets begin with the first question, (What is marijuana), of course the dictionary definition is simply put,-a preparation of the hemp plant, Cannabis sativa, for use as an intoxicating hallucinogenic drug; applied to a crude preparation of the dried leaves, flowering tops, and stem of the plant that is generally smoked. However, beyond this explanation is what is commonly known as weed, which is simply an alternative to tobacco that results in sensational relaxed feeling that is described as high. This drugs origin can be traced back to ancient days when it was used as a healing supplement to cure several different medical conditions; its been used as a drink as well as an eliminator of menstrual pain and even more ironic marijuana has served as a religious connotation as well. However, the most commonly known usage of marijuana (after its being outlawed in the 1930’s) is as a drug and smoked or consumed by other means.
At even the national level, the “war on drugs” was just as detrimental. Reagan's narcotics policy had doubled both drug arrests and the prison population in the US. Under him, the media propaganda helped ignite public concern – sometimes bordering hysteria – which effectively created “a mandate for a massive campaign against drugs –an intensified federal enforcement effort, harsher prison sentences, and omnipresent narcotics surveillance of ordinary Americans.” Bush's “war on drugs”, an
In his article “Numbers Tell of Failure in Drug War”, Eduardo Porter, economic journalist for the New York Times, argues that despite the billions of dollars spent and countless number of lives lost, the War on Drugs has been a complete failure. Porter particularly wants us to review the methods used by the American government regarding drug control, in order to more successfully protect United States citizens and their health. He writes that the last thirty years has been spent fighting a war that cannot be won. Porter points out that in those 30 years, general use of hard drugs, as well as use of illegal drugs by teenagers, has not declined, but actually increased. Additionally, Americans on average don’t think drug use is even much of
The war on drugs has been going on for some time. The war on drugs refers to the government’s attempts to stop the circulation of drugs. This includes the production, selling, and transport of illegal drugs, in order to reduce drug abuse. This war has been going on since the 1900’s. The bureau of justice reported that fifty five percent of federal prisoners and twenty one percent of state level prisoners are incarcerated on the basis of drug related offenses( ). That amounts to about half a million people for scale that’s more people than live in Wyoming. The war on drugs has been going on for thirty years now. The war has made a significant impact on society, the economy and has made a lot of history gaining spotlight time along the
The war on drugs is a good idea if people do not mind losing their job or even suffering, but who do shape the world we live in today. If paying for a war in another country is the only way to get the point across then it has to be done. People do not realize how society is greatly impacted by drugs because most of society is involved with them or help make them or even sell them. Sure war is costly and there are positives and negatives, but America has come to a point where everything that involves evil or the hurting of others is based on question and most likely gotten rid of, all America needs is to set an example not only as a powerful country, but a leader for all their countries to follow.
being corrupted and molded from birth into an adult the had not choice but to become, it becomes abundantly clear that the “war on drugs” is simply a variable in the problem, not the problem itself. Critics may shout the exact opposite, facts are facts, though. The United states has been struggling for a very long time, with the debt that it owes to other countries, with civil unrest, racial disparities, extreme poverty, drugs, and much more. The U.S. is sick, and those that are fighting only certain issues must understand that it is futile to fight the symptoms of a disease when those efforts could instead be focused on developing a cure to fix the problem in its
The drug policy “War on Drugs” implemented by the criminal justice system the in United States has failed to address the war with the use of drugs in America. The United States of America has fought for over a century, and four presidents have staged this war that has yet to produce significant results. It is a war that the US was losing and drug abusers were all over hospitals, courts, and prisons. The use of drugs has ended in violent crimes that have always resulted into damaging neighborhoods in this country, and many children have been lost and abandoned due to drug abuse (Friman, 2008).
As the common person may know, drugs are very expensive. Prescription drugs, although still expensive, are one of the cheaper routes to go. However it can also be dangerous, because it’s easier for doctors to notice the abuse. It is said that Americans pay more for prescription drugs than any other country in the world (Brym and Lie). Other routes a drug addicted person can go is through the illegal drug trade, otherwise known as the black market. For example, cocaine can go for around $1500 per kilo in Colombia, which is around two pounds. Often times the price of cocaine in America can go for a retail price of around $66,000. These prices even for just cocaine are what keep the drug cartel’s ...
The war on drugs has been going on for over forty years, and it is a war that cannot be won. Drugs will continue to be an ongoing issue in society, some people depend on drugs for many reasons which is why we cannot get rid of drugs altogether. The U.S. has established harsh sentencing on individuals found with drugs such as marijuana, crack cocaine, and heroine, but that can only do so much. The war on drugs has caused the prison population to grow, in an article it states: “Given the widespread acceptance of the centrality of the drug war to prison growth, it is not surprising that recent efforts by state and federal governments to rein in prison growth have focused on drug enforcement. New York State, for example, has weakened its notorious
Since the 1970’s the United States has been waging an ever expanding and seemingly never ending war on drugs. The United States has spent trillions of dollars to rid the streets of illegal drugs, but too little effect. On the contrary drug use is higher today than during the 70’s when the drug war was officially declared by the Nixon Administration. Not only has the war on drugs failed to limit the drug trade, it has also damaged the black and Latino community. Women and lower class citizens have also been affected by our drug policies. The war on drugs is rooted in racist ideology and as consequence has disproportionately affected lower class communities of color. This war on drugs will continue until the people decide to take action towards a better and more reasonable policy.
In the end the war on drugs is not a war to be won or lost, it’s with in the people, rather if they want to do drugs or not. The importation of illicit substances into the United States is an impossibility. There’s over 2,000 miles of border along the Mexican border and the coastal areas, thousands of miles; there is no possible way to stop the importation of drugs into this country.