For example, the coca plant from which cocaine is derived grows in abundance in many geographical regions of northern South America and in Central America, where growers make huge profits as compared to efforts to force farmers and peasants to grow legal crops which inevitably do not produce enough profits in order to survive.
Of course, over the last twenty years or so, the U.S. federal government has done much and at great expense to attempt to eradicate the growing of coca but these efforts have also failed miserably. As Nadelmann relates, even if foreign supplies of coca and other drugs like heroin could be cut off, "the drug abuse problem in the U.S. would scarcely abate," due to the fact that much if not most of the drugs like marijuana, amphetamines and hallucinogens (LSD) are made in the U.S. Thus, if cocaine and heroin supplies were eliminated, drug users "would quickly substitute other drugs" in place of cocaine and heroin, thus creating a never-ending cycle of drug substitution and a system wherein new types of drugs are invented to replace the old ones (1998, p. 113).
Nadelmann also points out that any drug control initiative which relies upon...
"As a case in point we may take the known fact of the prevalence of reefer and dope addiction in Negro areas. This is essentially explained in terms of poverty, slum living, and broken families, yet it would be easy to show the lack of drug addiction among other ethnic groups where the same conditions apply." Inciardi 248() Socio-economic effects Legalizing drugs has been deemed to have many socio-economic effects. A study
Alcohol Prohibition from 1920 to 1933 did not work. There are many parallels from this failed effort and the current laws prohibiting drugs in the United States. Alcohol prohibition was undertaken to reduce crime and corruption, solve social problems, reduce the tax burden created by prisons and poorhouses, and improve the health of Americans. According to research, alcohol consumption of alcohol fell at the beginning of Prohibition, but then it
Columbian Drug Trade If Americans know nothing else about Colombia, they know that it is a place where people grow and package cocaine for use on the world market. This is, of course, a highly biased view of the country because Colombians do many things other than make and sell drugs and most Colombians are not involved in the drug trade at all. However, it remains true that much of the world's
Legalization of Marijuana Marijuana or Cannabis is actually a plant, which has the scientific name 'cannabis sativa' and was originally used for ordinary purposes such as for fabric making and cloth weaving. Some are of the view that it was also used as sails when shipping industry had not become technologically sophisticated. The plant was also once used for the treatment of psychiatric conditions but after it was banned in the
Many unintended consequences have resulted from this "war." Research on legitimate medical uses of banned substances, such as marijuana, have been hampered by legal road blocks. Violence stemming from drug-trade disputes has become an international problem. The onset of the AIDS in the 1980s hit addicts who injected illegal drugs particularity hard since the virus it passed through bodily fluids. Some governments were moved to initiate needle exchange programs in
Bakalar, JD, 'Marijuana as Medicine: a Plea for Reconsideration', 1876 Journal of the America Medical Association, June 21, 1995 - Vol. 273, No. 23, at http://www.calyx.com/~olsen/MEDICAL/lester.html Policy Analysis: Thinking About Drug Legalization," at http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa121.html Alternatives to the War on Drugs," at http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/4727/alt-wod-faq.html Frequently Asked Questions," at http://www.paranoia.com/drugs/marijuana/hemp/FAQ-alt.hemp Americans for Compassionate Use," at http://www.acu.org/~acu/ Ethan a. Nadelmann, "Thinking seriously about alternatives to the drug prohibition," Daedalus v.123:3, at http://www.calyx.com/~mariolap/debate/ethan1.html NASRO Issue Brief, Spring 1995 vol. 1, no.1,"Rethinking
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