DRUG LEGALIZATION PRIMER

(A Public Service Announcement from Suburra Publishing.)

Fact #7

Drug Criminalization Is the Lifeblood of Criminal Organizations

The more money that is poured into fighting the drug war the more profitable it will become. Marijuana is the largest cash crop grown in America. At the turn of the millennium, the international illicit drug business was generating roughly $400 billion in trade annually – 8% of all international trade. This is roughly the same percentage as tourism and the oil industry. All of the profits are unregulated, untaxed, and going to criminals.

In the United States this money makes ethnic gangs powerful organizations. Even worse is that it funds rebel and terrorist organizations worldwide. The power of domestic gangs’ is only visible in the open air drug markets where entire city blocks have been abandoned by police, but in other countries these organizations are more powerful than their governments and entire regions have fallen into anarchy, e.g. Afghanistan and Columbia.
 

Gang Tattoos – From upper left clockwise: Aryan Brotherhood, Mexican Mafia,

Gangster Disciples, and Mara Salvatrucha.

After the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the White House had the arrogance to spend $3.4 million to run two advertisements during the 2002 Super Bowl accusing America’s recreational drug users of supporting terrorism. This is the same government that in the year prior to 9/11 oversaw the arrest of 750,000 people for marijuana possession and the arrest of only one terrorist.
 

This is the same government that was warned by an FBI field agent a year prior to 9/11 that Osama bin Laden’s followers could be training in American flight schools. The agent proposed that information be compiled on the visa applications of foreign students seeking flight school admission. This was never done because FBI headquarters regarded it as a “sizable undertaking.”
 

Meanwhile the Super Bowl ads launched a $1.5 billion anti-drugs advertising campaign. When later evaluated by the Government Accountability Office it was discovered that this “sizable undertaking” had not reduced drug use, but instead convinced kids that illegal drug taking is normal.
 

THE MONEY TRAIN:

Organizations Financed Primarily by Drug Prohibition

* Umbrella organization with many affiliated gangs (sets).

All information taken from You Will Die: The Burden of Modern Taboos, Book I  by Robert R. Arthur. Detailed documentation of sources can be found therein.

Page last modified August 29, 2007.