Drug War Cost Could Go a Shockingly Long Way if Spent on Education

Sometimes it's difficult to picture the huge amount of money we are spending on the failed war on drugs.  This article takes just one line item from the cost of the drug war and shows how shockingly far that money would go if it were spent on education instead...

In a June 2010 report entitled "The High Cost Of Incarceration," (the link to this PDF is below,) the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) found that there are 561,526 NON-VIOLENT drug users incarcerated in the U.S.  The cost to tax payers is $26,000 a year (or $2166.67 a month) per inmate.  This means that we are spending $1.2+ billion ($1,216,639,666.67) every month to incarcerate non-violent drug users.  Of course, this is just the cost of incarceration alone.  It does not include the costs incurred by law enforcement or the courts to convict these people.

Now let's take a look at the population of school children in America.  According to childstats.gov, (whose link is also included here,) there are approximately 50 million school-aged children (age 6-17) in 2013...

SO WHAT ELSE COULD BE DONE WITH THIS MONEY?

* After only 5.75 months, we could buy a $140 computer tablet for every schoolchild age 6-17!!!

The ONLY Road to Liberty is Tolerance Avenue

Some believe that tolerance is just an "excuse to promote liberal agendas". However, as Americans, we have a RESPONSIBILITY to show the rest of the world that liberty cannot exist where there is tyranny and that tyranny is born in intolerance.

Should Marijuana Money Go To Tax Revenues or Drug Cartels?

Those are the only two choices.

Perhaps one of the reasons the issue of marijuana is so contentious is because there is no perfect solution to the question.

For many, however, the bottom line of the issue is the bottom line of the finances.  Here, we have only two choices:  Either marijuana revenue will go to law-abiding companies and tax receipts; or, THE MONEY WILL GO TO THE DRUG CARTELS!

Some anti-pot pundits will quickly point out that it is nonsense to think that the drug cartels will disappear if MJ is legalized.  This is probably true.  However, after four decades, it's clear that the Drug War won't stop the drug cartels either!

How ironic!  Those who espouse that the drug cartels would certainly survive marijuana legalization are half-way to realizing and admitting that the Drug War itself is a continuing failure.