DevelopingStorm

Pete Guither over at DrugWarRant.com collected a bunch of interesting reactions to the Missouri SWAT raid where the family dog was shot (I stole his title). My favorite is Megan McArdle writing for The Atlantic ; she summed her feelings thusly:  Short of multiple homicide, I'm having trouble coming up with anything that justifies that kind of police action.  And you know, I doubt the police could either.  But they weren't busy trying to figure out if they were maximizing the welfare of their larger society. They were, in that most terrifying of phrases, just doing their jobs. And in the end, that is our shame, not theirs.

Culture 11 has a couple of excellent articles condemning drug prohibition: War on Drugs: The Price Tag by Anita Bartholomew and War On Drugs: The Collateral Damage by Radley Balko . There's also a pro prohibition article called Keeps Drugs Illegal! but I found the arguments contained within very weak. The best part was a quip in the comments regarding the contention that legalization wont diminish the violence associated with the black market but I'll save you the trouble of looking it up. "This is why I often see executives from Jack Daniels executing drive-by shootings at Jim Beam corporate headquarters. Wait... I don't see that at all." Don't take me wrong, I do agree with most people that many drugs are dangerous and all should be kept away from children. I also agree that drug abuse is a problem. Where I disagree is in how we approach the problem. The current 'drug war' approach is attempting to eliminate the problem by forcefully curtaili...