Pubdate: Fri, 25 Sep 1998 Source: Rockford Register Star Contact: http://www.rrstar.com/ Fax: 1-815-987-1365 Author: M. Simon WASTEFUL DRUG WAR Editor President Clinton's drug war budget is way out of balance. We spend 17 billion a year on the drug war (official government figures). Sixty percent or a little over 10 billion is spent on drug supply interdiction. Estimates are that this rate of spending reduces the amount of drugs on the maket by 3 to 10%. Suppose the spending went up to the 80% congress wants. Suppose it was done today. That would mean almost 14 billion for interdiction. Suppose this money was spent as effectively as current money. We would then be collecting between 4% and 14 % of all the drugs flowing into the country. Not much improvement. Let us stop messing around. To stop all drug flows into the country we would have to spend between $100 billion and $300 billion a year ( the equivalent of a new Dept of Defence). If we can't spend it as effectively, then for $200 billion a year to $600 billion a year we could prevent drugs from coming in to the country. This would be in about the range of a Vietnam War. Fought in America. Continously. Forever. Why worry about where a piddling 9 million is going when there is real money at stake. If we are going to fight drugs taxes will have to go up. To keep them from going up too much we will have to reinstitute a draft. If this is a war lets get serious. If not lets quit. M. Simon Rockford, Illinois Opinions expressed herein are solely my own and may or may not reflect my opinion at this particular time or any other. - --- Checked-by: Patrick Henry