The war on drugs

I really wish we'd stop this stupid AND harmful "war on drugs". Please go read the article about it on Alternet. Here's how it gets started:

Prohibition has failed -- again. Instead of treating the demand for illegal drugs as a market, and addicts as patients, policymakers the world over have boosted the profits of drug lords and fostered narcostates that would frighten Al Capone. Finally, a smarter drug control regime that values reality over rhetoric is rising to replace the "war" on drugs.

"The Global War on Drugs can Be Won"

No, it can't. A "drug-free world," which the United Nations describes as a realistic goal, is no more attainable than an "alcohol-free world" -- and no one has talked about that with a straight face since the repeal of Prohibition in the United States in 1933. Yet futile rhetoric about winning a "war on drugs" persists, despite mountains of evidence documenting its moral and ideological bankruptcy. When the U.N. General Assembly Special Session on drugs convened in 1998, it committed to "eliminating or significantly reducing the illicit cultivation of the coca bush, the cannabis plant and the opium poppy by the year 2008" and to "achieving significant and measurable results in the field of demand reduction." But today, global production and consumption of those drugs are roughly the same as they were a decade ago; meanwhile, many producers have become more efficient, and cocaine and heroin have become purer and cheaper.

If you read the article you'll come across the concept of "reduce harm" rather than reduce supply or demand. We need to help people maintain their health whether they use drugs or not. For God's sake, we need needle exchange programs. And I can't believe that drug stores won't sell needles and syringes without a doctor's prescription or proof of insulin use. What? Do they think people will say, "Oh, all right. I just won't use drugs then"???? No, they will simply use someone else's dirty needle and pick up HIV that way.