"People like William F. Buckley, George Shultz, Thomas Sowell, Milton Friedman, and Walter Williams. These are people who understand Public Choice theory, they understand what the great Nobel laureate F.A. Hayek called the fatal conceit -- the mistaken notion that government can effectively engineer social arrangements -- they understand the power of the forces of supply and demand, they understand the unintended consequences that invariably accompany federal intervention, and, not least, they understand the need to take the Constitution seriously.
In the name of the War on Drugs, due process is thrown to the wind and private property confiscated under so-called forfeiture laws that make a mockery of the very concept of private property. In the name of the War on Drugs financial privacy and internet privacy are under constant assault. In the name of the War on Drugs Latin American nations become pawns of U.S. domestic policy. In the name of the War on Drugs police forces throughout the nation become corrupt, and in the name of the War on Drugs some of the best and the brightest of our inner-city young people get drawn into a criminal subculture that affects their attitudes on not just drugs, but education, the family, civility itself.
Hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars have been spent on the War on Drugs and yet, drugs are available everywhere. Across the street from the White House. Across the street from the Cato Institute. Even in prisons. Interdiction is a joke. If they can't keep drugs out of the prisons, how in the world do they propose doing so in civil society, short of creating a police state?
Original URL: CATO