California Decriminalizes Marijuana And So Should The Federal Government

The United States will spend about $50 billion dollars this year in the war on drugs.  When you add in the indirect costs including incarceration and countless other expenses, the United States has probably spent over a trillion dollars in the last thirty years in an attempt to eradicate drug use.  How’s that working out for you?  Marijuana is surely much less negatively impactful on society than alcohol yet its use is illegal.  It’s time to have a common sense review of drug policies in the U.S.   The state seeks to increase its relevance in solving every problem.  Arming our police forces with paramilitary weapons, sending military troops to other countries to fight drug wars, clogging our courts with drug cases  and packing our prisons with drug users is a failed strategy.  To me it is inconceivable anyone should be in prison for drug use.  Overuse of mind-altering drugs is a sign of an unhealthy mind, not of malicious intent or a crime. 

As we have remarked before, our banking system is a primary contributor to many social ills in the United States.  That includes rising drug use.  As a for-profit banking system’s effects have tied a tighter and tighter noose on society’s economic opportunity over the last thirty plus years, drug use has exploded.  And if you can’t tie the ever expanding lack of economic opportunity or the directly related lack of fulfillment of Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs to rising drug use, then you need to get a better grasp on the human condition and what is wrong with our country. 

The best medication and treatment for society’s emotional well-being is emotional safety, self-esteem, belonging or acceptance and self-actualization.  And the best recipe for achieving these emotional needs is achieved via a public banking system within a framework of an economic model embracing  democratic ideals.

Decriminalizing all drug use is a step in the right direction.  We can still make it a criminal offense to traffic certain drugs such as cocaine, heroine and certain prescription drugs.   The war on drugs is contributing to the bankrupting of our goverment and we need new policies of sanity and reason.