Traverse City Record-Eagle

Opinion

June 14, 2012

Another View: Combat drug use with education

The Oakland Press ----

-- — While we compliment officials in Macomb and Oakland counties for moving quickly to curtail the dangerous use of K2, Spice and other so-called synthetic marijuana, we have to ask: why?

Why are our youngsters driven to use chemicals known to have dangerous health effects?

Why can’t our country — as others have done — keep up with outlawing the latest fad drugs, whether manufactured for other uses or purposely intended to sidestep criminal charges?

Why are parents — after their children suffer health problems or even death — prone to blaming others rather than facing the fact that it was their child who knowingly used a dangerous drug?

And lastly, why hasn’t America come to the realization that as a nation we have lost the so-called war on drugs?

It was June 1971 when President Richard Nixon officially declared a “war on drugs,” identifying drug abuse as “public enemy No. 1.” And since then, our government has spent hundreds of billions of dollars trying to stop drug abuse.

We arrested and jailed drug users under tougher penalties. We infiltrated foreign drug cartels and destroyed thousands of acres of drug-producing crops.

We sent millions upon millions of dollars to foreign countries to assist — in many cases corrupt governments — in reducing their own drug problems.

Yet, 50 years later the Global Commission on Drug Policy released a report in 2011 declaring, “The global war on drugs has failed, with devastating consequences for individuals and societies around the world.” Unlike that commission, however, we do not support a general legalization of drugs.

We do, however, think it is time our government officials look to education and prevention as the keys to controlling drug abuse.

Drug courts throughout Macomb and Oakland counties stress rehabilitation over punishment and are remarkably successful.

Educational programs, like the Fraser-based Families Against Narcotics, are helping hundreds of youngsters remain drug free.

As a nation we may have lost the war on drugs, but we can still win the battle against teenage drug abuse: one youngster at a time.

 

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