The U.S. spends ~5 billion on treatment and education each year and ~10 billion on enforcement(Obama proposed a 15.5 billion dollar budget for this year, 2010 was a total of $15 billion). Considering that a third of all Americans smoked marijuana within a month of taking a survey in 2001(
whitehouse.gov recent-ish data on there) and only 4 percent of Americans reported smoking crack/cocaine in the same survey it seems fair to say a lot of the money spent on enforcement(and I guess to a lesser extent treatment...? lol) is spent on marijuana smokers.
So lets be fairly rosy here and say the total non-marijuana related yearly budget for the war on drugs is 10 billion a year (a third of the total costs removed)... that still seems like a lot.
But consider this, since their peak in 1979 non-marijuana drug use, although flucating throughout history, is actually down. Crack/cocain use at 4% in 2001 for example, is far below the 1979 peak of 15%... when the "war on drugs" started. This obviously isn't true for Marijuana, as use has flucuated throughout the years but there is no clear downward trend like in the case of Cocaine. So, despite the fact the marijuana prohibition has obviously failed... The broader war on drugs via enforcement, education and treatment has been fairly successful in preventing use of drugs like crack/cocaine.
Also, the economic costs to society from illicit drug use is estimated to have been
$180.8 billion in 2002, despite the successes in terms of reduced use in the two decades of the war on drugs... How big do you think this number would be if the war on drugs never took place? With costs to society approaching $193 billion for tobacco, and $235 billion for alcohol - both legal substances(and with much higher usage rates than cocaine) - I think it's fair to say that the $180 billion number could easily be twice as large... So being cautious with those numbers(I believe the figure could have been at least double, possibly triple assuming non-marijuana drug use has generally followed the same trend as cocaine, downwards) and claiming $150-200 billion in net saved economic activity(compared to without the funding for the war on drugs) doesn't sound bad at all when the cost to the taxpayers (excluding marijuana) would be a mere $10 billion.
But to get to what your main argument is, that we're deprived of the choice... Sure, you got me. You dont get a choice in the matter. You know why? Because we, as a society, have decided that the costs to society outweigh the individual "liberty" that you would otherwise be afforded. If you don't like it, you can try and change the law (ala the marijuana movement)... But to argue that cocaine is in the wrong camp (illegal drug) like marijuana is in the wrong camp is going to be much more difficult - and ultimately, you'll likely fail in your campaign.
). Junkies are often violent, most of the time they're theives, they dont consistently work or care for their children, they're leeches... Many of them sucking up as much tax dollars as they can to support their habit. Why would we want to say this is okay? Sure, it sounds nice to let everyone be big kids and do as they please - but in reality it just doesn't work.
