Make it legal If it was legal you could do a better job to make sure this is not indirectly funding terrorists. You could also tax the hell out of it, and it would still be cheaper than if it was banned. That would be particularly true if you did that with hard drugs, like heroin, and cocaine. I would even boost tourism, from pathetic junkies who would come just to get their fix.

1) how do they know it is an increase could be that they are just getting better at catching them! 2) If you legalize the softer drugs like pot and allowed the state to tax sales of it, think of the large amounts of money added to the stae coffers, while removing the same money from the terrorist hands who sell the drugs in the first place.

Tobacco and alcohol are also toxic in the long run if people are careless with over-use, but they have been accepted in normal society for too long - and educating people about the risks is the best strategy. (these substances although legal and freely obtainable are also smuggled) It is immoral for a government to legalize "hard" drugs because they ruin addicts lives and damage their families. If not used under medical supervision, they are basically poisons.

David is right, society spends an awful lot of money on drug enforcement for to prevent something that almost all mamals, reptiles and insects even partake of: euphoric substances. The effect on teh life of a young person arrested for smoking hashish is far worse than the effects of teh drug itself. In the case of harder drugs that are often injected, the risk of spreading disease far outweighs the cost to register junkies and give them a clean supply and safe environment to do them, with the goal of counselling these people off their addictions at the same time. All in all a much cheaper solution than junkies committing crimes for their fix and the process of arrest and incarceration, which never cures an addict. It is long past time we took a long hard look at the recreational drug policies of our country and let the facts speak for themselves instead of hiding behind empty rhetoric that has long ago proven to not work.