'War on Drugs: Good for Teens?'
By Frosty Wooldridge (07/28/07)
After the first two interviews with my brother Police Officer and Detective Howard Wooldridge of Lansing, Michigan concerning the “War on Drugs”, a boat-load of responses caused me to interview him further. Many Americans bring heated emotion to this national tragedy. Brother Wooldridge brings reason coupled with logic!
If President Bush closed the borders with troops and fences to stop the $130 billion per year drug traffic, our country could pull itself out of this destructive drug dilemma. However, powerful people in high places facilitate continued drug trafficking at the expense of our children because those people make a lot of money. The DEA agency’s “War on Drugs” in the U.S. government exists simply to exist. It’s obvious the $70 billion paid the agency annually proves worthless. The agency wasted nearly a trillion dollars spent to stop drugs in the past 35 years.
President Bush himself used drugs and drank heavily until age 40. Whatever his reason for allowing this national travesty to continue, I don’t know. Since he won’t stop drugs flowing into the United States, you can take personal responsibility at the local level. For more information, please check out www.leap.cc for a totally new approach that will prove responsible when implemented.
Howard Wooldridge said, “Since its beginning in 1971, the war on drugs/drug prohibition has had one oft-repeated refrain: we have to keep this policy going in order to protect our kids from dangerous/deadly drugs. But is it? According to the DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration) our teens find illegal drugs “readily available” and at bargain basement prices compared to 36 years ago. As hundreds of thousands of kids join gangs in order to sell drugs, drug prohibition has created serious, dangerous, unintended consequences. Is it time to question the conventional wisdom that drug prohibition helps more teens than it kills?”
Ask yourself: what good is the “War on Drugs” when it proves a total failure? Ask yourself if President Bush has acted to protect your children by closing the borders in the past six years. The answer: no!
Wooldridge said, “Prohibition glamorizes the ten drugs. The forbidden fruit is often thought to taste better than all the rest. The young teen that tries cigarettes and alcohol thinks, “Hummm! Marijuana is illegal so it must be even more fun to use than beer.” So they try that, too! The good news is that a majority of teens and adults stop at marijuana; in effect it is the terminal drug for most. The bad news is that marijuana is especially harmful to a teen’s brain development rivaling the harm of alcohol in a developing mind.”
The most popular drug ‘education’ programs present emotional scare tactics that lump the effects of marijuana in with heroin. Teens leave these classes without a clue as to what to believe. Indeed the DEA reports in their literature: “Many teens see little danger in using illegal drugs.” Worse, federal studies have shown for over 20 years that teens find it easier to buy marijuana than beer. The combination of poor education, easy availability and the draw of the forbidden fruit have proven disastrous for teen users.
Wooldridge said, “Since the beginning of the crack cocaine sales in the mid 80s, youth have been on the front lines of the distribution and sale of drugs. Especially in the cities, teens were forced to join gangs to participate in drug sales. Gangs fight over selling areas or ‘turf’ and just like in the 1920s, gun fights broke out to take or control selling rights. In the late 80s the federal government and the various states enacted ‘mandatory minimums’ for the sale of any illegal drugs. This caused additional pressure to hire young teens to transport, distribute and sell the drugs. Teens were not subject to these 20 and 30 year sentences. Soon 15 year olds were being shot off their bicycles because their backpack contained $50,000 worth of illegal drugs.”
Today the scourge of youth gangs prove so bad the United States Congress debates legislation to make a dent in them. Any law they make will slam into the reality of the laws of economics. Criminal justice professionals know that drug dealers (including teens) accept as a condition of employment death and long terms in prison. Gang members often see someone shot or killed. It does not act as a deterrent. Neither the Congress nor any state legislator wants to discuss the original source of why gangs have become such a problem; namely drug prohibition. With 50,000 members in the U.S., MS-13 operates with impunity in 33 states while distributing $130 billion in drugs annually. Bush ‘watches/allows’ it happen from his White House windows. He’ll guard Korea’s borders with 37,000 troops but won’t guard our borders with a single soldier. He won’t build a fence and he won’t send enough Border Patrol. With dozens of sanctuary cities allowing illegal aliens easy access to our communities, our kids don’t stand a chance.
Wooldridge said, “Fortunately, this country has thousands of wonderful citizens who daily go to areas where there are neighborhoods controlled or even terrorized by gangs. They work long hours, encouraging preteens and others to stay in school, not to use drugs and not join gangs. However, they are burdened mightily by the presence of the negative role model of the drug dealer. Who else at 16 has $300 tennis shoes, lots of gold, nice car and a woman on each arm? This image doubles the work of concerned men and women who are helping. “Why should I study hard, go to school so I can make $25,000 as the assistant manager of a Taco Bell when I can make huge money as a drug dealer now?” is a question asked over and over. In a society ever more focusing on the short term, immediate gratification, it is ever tougher to answer such a question.”
If you have a drug horror story or situation in your community, please email me a letter so I might bring your story to the nation. Or email my brother Howard at www.leap.cc. Contact him at wooldridge@leap.cc. He speaks all over the country with a program to end prohibition and the “War on Drugs.”
Drug prohibition creates job options for teens which gets them killed or sucked into a life of crime. It creates a glamour factor as a forbidden fruit which causes many to try drugs. You can buy marijuana easier than beer because prohibition creates so many points of sale uncontrolled by state regulations. Teen drug dealers prove a powerful, negative role model for other teens in the cities across America. Do you think drug prohibition presents a positive policy for teens? Not!
Copyright ©2007 Frosty Wooldridge All Rights Reserved.
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