Editor’s Note: This is the first column in a two-part series aboutthe United States’ involvement in the war on drugs. The secondinstallment will run on Wednesday, March 27.

Thetime has come for all the nonsense to stop. It may have seemed like agood idea back in the 1980s, but the war on drugs has turned into amiserable embarrassment. In the last few decades, our Europeancounterparts have adopted sensible drug policies, yet we continue toabide by an archaic, idiotic system that does nothing except crowdour prisons.

I’m not talking about the legalization of marijuana (everybodyknows that pot should be legalized); I’m talking about ending thegovernment’s war on its own citizens. By treating drugs as a policeproblem rather than a medical problem, our government is ignoring allintelligent and rational solutions to the drug situation in thiscountry.

When I was 15 years old, my best friend from childhood waskidnapped, shot in the head three times, and left in a ditch untilsomeone found his body three days later. His father was a drugaddict, and he owed quite a bit of money to a methamphetamine dealer.When the money never showed, the dealer kidnapped and murdered myfriend in retaliation. In the neighborhood where I grew up, thiswasn’t all that uncommon, but it was the first time someone I readabout in the newspaper was a friend of mine.

The war on drugs creates situations like this all the time –addicts who will do anything for their drug of choice, and dealerswho are able to make a fortune and be powerful simply because drugsare illegal. Addicts are faced with two choices: continue to get highor go to prison. According to Bush’s new budget, our country willspend more in one year on interdiction efforts than it does in fiveyears on treatment. Every major study in the last 30-plus years, fromthe Rockefeller University to the University of San Francisco, to theNational Institute on Drug Abuse has shown that treatment andeducation are the keys to curbing drug use.

Yet we continue to lock people away.

Europe realized that prison is not the answer to addiction quitesome time ago. With relaxed laws, more social services and moremedical options, every country in Europe has fewer addicts per capitathan the United States. These facts are not speculated; they comefrom our own government’s studies. Violent crimes that stem from drugabuse (robbery, battery, murder, etc.) simply do not happen as oftenin Europe as they happen here. By criminalizing them, we have createda drug market with prices that are artificially high, and power isput in the hands of those who can supply drugs to addicts. Addictionis far from cheap, and with lackluster education and treatmentprograms, those who are addicted have no way out but to raise fundsby any means possible.

There is one other angle to look at the hypocrisy of the war ondrugs, and that is to look at what is legal. Alcohol and tobacco areperfectly legal; in fact, tobacco companies are given federal fundsto advertise in foreign countries in the hope that tobacco sales willboost our national economy. But if you took all the deaths fromillegal drugs, alcohol and tobacco in a typical year, the resultswould show the hypocrisy our government abides by. The deaths fromillegal drugs would only equal one percent of the deaths from alcoholand tobacco. In fact, tobacco kills more people every year thanillegal drugs have killed in the last century! Again, thisinformation comes from our own government, more specifically theNational Institute on Drug Abuse.

All of this is just the tip of the iceberg. Tomorrow, in part two,I’ll take a look at addiction, the costs of our ridiculous war ondrugs and investigate some of the racial disparities that cannot beignored. Hopefully you’ll read along.

–Blaine Sullivan is a philosophy junior.

–This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of TheDaily Aztec. Send e-mail to letters@thedailyaztec.com.Anonymous letters will not be printed — include your full name,major and year in school.