Attorney General Eric Holder said that the United States should reinstitute the Clinton-era “assault weapons” ban on the sale of arbitrarily selected semiautomatic guns in order (at least in fantasy land) to reduce the violence of Mexican drug gangs.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton added, “I feel very strongly we have a co-responsibility. Our insatiable demand for illegal drugs fuels the drug trade. Our inability to prevent weapons from being illegally smuggled across the border to arm these criminals causes the deaths of police officers, soldiers and civilians.”
Clinton is right about one thing: the United States does “have a co-responsibility” for drug-related Mexican violence. The United States wages a war on drugs at home and abroad while encouraging the Mexican government to follow suit, a policy primarily responsible for drug-related violence.
We know perfectly well how to end drug-trade-related violence both in Mexico and in the United States. End the war on drugs. But few politicians have the courage or integrity to state this simple fact, at least in public.
This is yet another example of how drug prohibition promotes gun prohibition, a topic I discussed in 2000 (though I no longer endorse the Libertarians).
Gun-rights advocates who endorse drug prohibition act as destroyers of their own cause.
Having been involved with treatment of drug users since 1968 and named to the team of Nixon’s first declaration of war in June, 1971, the supposed ‘cure’ has become worse than the disease. We created a new private prison industry, we have incarcerated more of a percentage of our citizens than any other country in the world, we have surrendered our civil rights, and tagged too many young people with a criminal label for life. Come on folks! We don’t need a ‘War on Drugs’ we need common sense.