Gracias amigos

Joaquín Guzmán

HuffPost:

Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán Loera, reported head of the Sinaloa cartel in Mexico, ranked 701st on Forbes' yearly report of the wealthiest men alive, and worth an estimated $1 billion, today officially thanked United States politicians for making sure that drugs remain illegal. According to one of his closest confidants, he said, "I couldn't have gotten so stinking rich without George Bush, George Bush Jr., Ronald Reagan, even El Presidente Obama, none of them have the cajones to stand up to all the big money that wants to keep this stuff illegal. From the bottom of my heart, I want to say, Gracias amigos, I owe my whole empire to you."

This is hearsay and suspiciously timely, but the sentiment makes sense. If you were the sort of ruthless person who ran a drug empire, wouldn't you be thankful for prohibition?

Recall "If you outlaw guns, only outlaws will have guns".... well if you outlaw a drug, only outlaws will deal that drug. And as we've seen they'll make enormous profits and cause a great deal of misery while doing so.

Even though I am such a strong believer in individual freedom that I am ideologically opposed to all prohibition -- and would legalize every single hard drug on the planet if everyone agreed to defer to my opinion -- I understand there are opposing views:

"The Drunkard's Progress", an iconic lithograph by Nathaniel Currier, exhibits the beliefs of the Temperance movement in the United States.

Such ideas are nobly intentioned, but misguided when enforced by the state.  Proposals for government bans would need to be carefully engaged and counterargued if prohibition worked. But it never has. It's a net failure on every front and has caused people to opt for much more dangerous alternatives like garage meth -- just as people were once poisoned by bad moonshine.

This is not difficult to understand. All you have to do is read some history about the consequences and aftermath of alcohol prohibition from 1919-1933 and compare it with the status quo.  It becomes even easier once you realize that marijuana is less dangerous than tobacco and alcohol.  There is simply no comparison between marijuana use and the amount of death, pain, and suffering the later two can cause when they get abused.

But the U.S. could no longer afford prohibition during the Great Depression, and it can ill afford it now.  Over the years the legal war on drugs has been very much like a real war in at least one sense: the world has paid a heavy price in blood and treasure for no net gain.