American Governments War on Illegal Drugs
It is of worth wondering why these acts are increasing day by day, not only in America but in other parts of the world too. One should find the main causal root behind such dismal acts that result in huge losses whether material or life. Though there can be several reasons behind such misdemeanors, but one obvious reason that comes to mind is of drugs. The smuggling and usage of drugs has become widespread, even the teenagers are into it. Taking illegal drugs usually cause depression, despair, and frustration that causes a person to act in a violent manner against others. Same is the case in the United States where the usage of drugs is a major problem that causes harm to the society. The paper would discuss the problem of drugs, the measures taken by the U.S government for drug war, ways of stopping the drug problem, and would end with a conclusion incorporated with a few recommendations.
Thesis
Drugs are considered to be a curse over the U.S society that causes numerous issues. War against drug has been there for a long period of time, but many think it has failed in its mission.
Organization and Logical Progression
Drugs come in various forms such as, cocaine, marijuana, ecstasy, heroin, opium, and moreover they also include alcohol and whisky. Drug dealers are getting more into providing such drugs especially to the youth of the United States (justice.gov, 2010). Youth is being spoiled to a great extent by the drugs and often commit crimes openly. United states have been fighting the war against drugs for a long time, but no fruitful results are gained till today. The country has set up many rules, regulations, and policies to curb the production, provision, and usage of drugs and this is so since the year 1969 (Tony, 2006). United States introduced the first law in 1917 that was meant to restrict the supply and usage of illegal drugs, and that was Harrison Narcotics Tax Act. Similarly, a number of laws and acts came, but none could resist the circulation of drugs.
America has been fighting this war since decades, which has resulted in nothing but the sharp increase in the budgets allocated to it. There are several steps that were meant to control drug abuse, those measures include the shifting of resources into plans and programs that benefit. It means that government and law enforcement agencies have taken various steps such as, arresting the drug abusers, seizure the drugs, and incarceration of drug abusers. It is estimated that the two-third of the federal drug control budget continues to go to incarceration, interdiction and law enforcement programs (csdp.org, 2010). Providing mental and physical health treatment was another step that was taken by the government, but it resulted in nothing but lackluster response from the drug users.
Another technique that was used by the government was to train and make the youth aware about the drugs and their aftermaths. In spite of all that, the youth still engages in such activities that eventually results in the wastage of all the investment made by the government to curb the drug problem. Also, another failed strategy that has been adopted by the Americas law enforcement agencies and government was to arrest the low-level and non-violent drug abusers too. This results in the wastage of time of the police, courts, and filling up of the prisons by doing so, the resources are being lost over simple and low-level charges or crimes.
Not only this, the United States has been wasting its military resources that must not be spent lavishly over the drug control. The criminals or drug abusers cannot be controlled with strictness, but with providing them with rationality, awareness, and hope. As far as the justice is concerned, it has also worsened because of the prejudice or biasness that is there in the law enforcement agencies and their workers. While arresting or punishing the drug abusers or criminals, whites are usually favored and are given a leeway for their mistakes whereas, the minorities or blacks are given tough times. Several states of the country came up with new strategies and plans to curtail the drug production and supply, but those strategies were rejected by the federal government and hence were not implemented.
Examples and Evidence
Despite all uphill struggle done by the government and law enforcement agencies of the Untied States, there has been no significant improvement for the issue. Even the President of the United States said I think the War on Drugs has been an utter failure. I think we need to rethink and decriminalize our marijuana lawsWe are not doing a good job (Jackson, 2010). Thousands of dollars have been spent to bulldoze the production and circulation of drugs by Washington, but no success is there in making a bearish trend in the demand of drugs. According to a poll or research, around 44 of the population of America wants the drug Marijuana to be legalized. People who use marijuana for medical or health reasons in certain states cannot be arrested by the federal agents, because it is legal in such states such as Nevada, Michigan, Colorado, and Alaska.
The level of arresting rate can be understood by the statistic that shows that after every 38 seconds, someone in some part of America is arrested just for the reason of having or using marijuana. Even the puffers of or smokers of spliff are arrested and treated as if they are traffickers, furthermore this war against drugs has imprisoned and enslaved countless people ranging in millions of citizens of the United States, each year (Vulliamy, 2009).
Afghanistan is the major producer and supplier of opium through poppy, and in the year 2006, it broke all the records of exporting the drugs. United States is a very large country as compared to Afghanistan, therefore, calculated efforts are required to minimize the incoming supply of drugs from other parts of the world (Page, 2010).
Conclusion
Of all the evils and vices, drugs is considered to be a prominent one that encompasses the addiction to the illegal smoking, puffing, and drinking that are injurious to physical and as well as mental health. The vices and evils in the societies seem to be interconnected with each other, murder, rape, kidnapping, and robbery all are related to the using of drugs. The United States of America is facing the similar issue of high drug usage, especially by the youth. This obviously causes increased crime rate in the country, and to limit those crimes the government and the law enforcement agencies have embarked on the war against drugs long ago. They have wasted millions of dollars each year by arresting, punishing, imprisoning, filing law suits, and indulging the military in issues related to drug abusers. But no such success is attained by the government against the production and exchange of illicit drugs, even the problem is worsening day by day.
The government needs to work on the social aspects of the society by making them aware and providing them with alternatives of their health medications. Education is a very important aspect that needs to be considered especially at the lower level for the youth. Treatments must be limited to children and women and must be focused on those who are addicted to a large extent to drugs, not those who rarely use drugs. Moreover, law enforcement agencies should try to stop spending unnecessarily in the arresting or possession due to trivial charges, and military should not be allowed to indulge in this issue. Another measure that the government can take is to control or minimize the production of drugs by imposing heavy duties, levies, and taxes on the manufacturers. In this way, the manufacturers would automatically reduce the amount of drugs being produced. In short, the war is so far a failure, but it can be won to some extent if proper measures are taken with calculated risks.
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