Interesting jihadist/FARC connection. "US arrests three Africans in 'al-Qaeda cocaine sting,'" from the BBC, December 19 (thanks to Sr. Soph):
A court in the US has for the first time charged suspected members of al-Qaeda with plotting to traffic cocaine in order to fund terrorism.The three suspects, who are believed to be from Mali, were extradited to New York from Ghana.
They were arrested this week in an operation involving informants posing as Colombian leftist rebels.
The suspects allegedly offered al-Qaeda protection for moving cocaine from West Africa through the Sahara to Spain.
They arrived in the US on Friday and were ordered to be held without bail after a brief court appearance. They did not enter pleas to charges of narco-terrorism conspiracy and conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists, US officials said....
The US authorities say the men are associates of al-Qaeda's North African branch and had told US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) informants that al-Qaeda could protect major shipments of cocaine in the region, driving the drugs by lorry through the Sahara desert.
All in their 30s, the suspects were named as Oumar Issa, Harouna Toure and Idriss Abelrahman.
Unsealed court papers say Mr Toure and Mr Abelrahman at one point claimed the profits from the drug business would "go to their people to support the fight for 'the cause'".
The DEA infiltrated the group by using informants posing as supporters of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or Farc.
In particular, the DEA used a French-speaking informant posing as "a Lebanese radical committed to opposing the interests of the United States, Israel, and, more broadly, the West and its ideals", court papers say.
The informant claimed in secretly taped conversations that the Farc were looking for a secure means of smuggling drugs through western and northern Africa on the way to Europe. ...
Well, one sure is tempted to say here that this is what prohibition brings ...
Really, it would make more sense to take trade in non-alcoholic non-tobacco recreational drugs out of the hands of gangsters and into government/business hands, as we have done with alcohol and tobacco (yes, I know there's still bootlegging in both, but that's usually triggered by unfairly high sin taxes.)
Prohibition doesn't stop anyone who wants to get, and the high prices it incurs on the street only encourage criminals to sell. However, if other rec-drugs were put in the same realm as alcohol and tobacco, at least it would be better regulated as to who gets it. Minors aren't allowed into liquor stores or bars (or aren't here, anyway), and aren't allowed to buy or possess tobacco. Street dealers don't do ID checks. Also, legit businesses don't accept stolen goods or weapons in trade; street dealers often do (and around here, at least, it's usually how and why they get caught.)
There are already laws against being intoxicated in public, and against intoxicated driving (which includes prescription drugs.)
Yes, addiction is a public heath problem, but we already face that, and not just with drugs, but with gambling, sex, food, and pretty much anything under the sun taht people can take to liking way too much. No, I don't think it would increase usage rates - how many people here who are not inclined to do so now, would buy crack just because you can go into a store and get it? There are already campaigns in schools to teach kids to NOT do these things; their efficacy (or not) would not be dependent on whether or not something is legal (DARE also includes alcohol and tobacco on its naughty list - in fact, iirc, DARE itself stands for Drug and ALCOHOL Resistance Education).
There will always be hopeless cases to turn to substances to make them feel better, fill a hole in their soul, etc, but this must be addressed by other means, through education and training opportunities and things like that, perhaps through opportunities not available now in some places (like deferred tuition for those who qualify grade-wise etc. High tuition and other post-secondary costs keep a lot of otherwise bright young people out of fields that they would be good at and enjoy doing; they wind up in McJobs, miserable, in the wage-slavery trap. Some of them might be able to lift themselves up from there, but many simply continue to go downhill in frustration.)
As for it being "immoral" to get high for fun, well, that argument is not really any different from Islamist bans against alcohol, and doesn't hold water for the non-believer.
And they were brought to the US because? They should be tried in somewhere else with strict drug laws, like China
Two months ago the DEA/US special forces suffered 19 casualties while serving a search warrant in western Afghanistan. 3 agents and 8 soldiers died in a helicopter crash after successfully clearing a suspected compound and killing 12 militants. Exactly what they were doing wasn't reported but three days later Obama and Eric Holder were saluting their caskets at Dover AFB.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/10/26/afghanistan.chopper.crashes/index.html
Spirit Wolf states: "There will always be hopeless cases to turn to substances to make them feel better..."
Would that include out last "three" presidents?
There are plenty of addicts who are doctors, lawyers, politicians, actors, Wall St. brokers, CEO's, Veterans - the list is endless. The better clinics cost $10,000 a week, no insurance plan covers that, and have waiting lists. Hardly hopeless cases. Addiction is classless.
What's really ironic about this story is that an obscure group of people are caught trafficking drugs to support an illegitimate military campaign - that's the CIA's domain.