The Challenges in Handling Drug Related Issues

¶ … Failure of War on Drugs The issue of drug trafficking and drug use within the U.S. has been a concern for successive governments and administrations from the historical time to the present day. The well-known campaigns across the nation like the "Just Say No" were aimed at discouraging young children and teenagers in school and college from engaging in drug abuse and drug distribution.

To some extent there have been some levels of positive effect achieved by these initiatives, however, the rates of success are not up to the desired benchmarks. The lure of drugs and the social acceptance of drugs backed by the organized gangs that deal in drugs have made it a nightmare for the government and the relevant agencies to conclusively deal with the menace of drugs distribution and drug use. It is essential hence to look at the effectiveness of the war on drugs within the U.S.

and to what extent it has achieved or failed to meet the intended goal. One of the reasons why the war on drugs had a historic failure is due to the politicization of an issue that is more medical and social rather than political. In 1971 President Nixon initiated the first affront to drugs through the "war on drugs" and he significantly increased the size of drugs agencies and pushed through several laws and regulations on drugs.

However, the arrival of Jimmy Carter during campaigns started watering down these gains where he was elected with one of the basis being the decriminalization of marijuana which ultimately came to pass through the senate. There after arose the social concern and the acceptability of marijuana significantly reduced among parents in the following years. The ascending to power by President Reagan saw the drug hysteria hit the all time high rate and incarcerations due to drug use were heavy within the U.S.

This is the period that saw campaigns such as "just say no" by the first lady, DARE drug education program and harsher drug policies and the incarcerations soared. The coming of President Clinton did not make maters any different, despite campaigning on the basis of emphasis on drug rehabilitation rather than incarcerations (Drug Policy Alliance, 2015). The political approach to the drug use within the U.S.

made it hard to have policies and approaches to the menace that would see the rehabilitation and stoppage of further drug use particularly among the youth. This approaches led to failure to institute in good time the necessary structures that would help to effectively combat the menace of drug use. The above measures that spilled over to the President Bush administration meant that the prisons became excessively crowded since more people were arrested for possession of the drugs than for selling.

The counter effect of this was that the sentences had to be made shorter as a measure to handle the overcrowding. This meant that the drug users and peddlers who landed in prison would soon be back in the streets perpetuating their drug sale, leading to failure in the fight against drugs. The social ills and abject poverty within the U.S. has not made the war on drugs any easier.

There are many drug peddlers and users who engage in these ills simply because there is lack of a more beneficial activity to do, no recreation activities and no jobs to engage them throughout the day. This positions drug use and distribution not only as a social ill but also as a product of social ills and poverty driven in a way. The war on drugs has also achieved little success due to the lack of facilities.

Over the years the public facilities have been crowded and hence those drug users willing to join the public institutions to be rehabilitated were subjected to a long time waiting list. There is a general disregard for the fact that it is much cheaper to keep people in the treatment facilities than it is to keep them in prison and that these rehabilitated people have lesser likelihood of wasting away again. The justice system also indirectly perpetuated the failure of the war against drugs.

The prison sentences are generally much shorter than the treatment period hence many of the drug users would rather serve their full term in prison than go through the longer treatment period. The drug dealers are on average given an eight months sentence and yet the treatment option for the addicts and dealers would go up to two years, hence many opt for the shorter prison sentence and essentially get back to the same drug related activities, hence rolling back the gains made by drug war (Branson R., 2012).

The discriminative implementation of the anti-drug policies and laws also led to the resistance and disregard.