Should the United States End Drug Prohibition?The Federal Government, while trying to protect us from our human nature,developed harsh anti-drug policies with the hope of eradicating drugs. Atthe time, these policies seemed simple enough: we will impose penalties onthose who use substances illegally, we will intercept drugs coming fromother countries while ending all drug cultivation in the States, and we willeven try to prevent foreign governments from growing these substances. Theidea of the Drug Prohibition surely made sense: lower demand of drugs by lawenforcement, and reduce supply through domestic and international means. Unfortunately, the Drug Prohibition led to heavy costs, both financially andotherwise, while being ineffective, if not, at times, counterproductive.
Today, we can see the unforeseen costs of the “Drug Prohibition,” and weshould consider these costs before expanding the “War on Drugs. “First, among the costs of the “War on Drugs,” the most obvious is monetarycost. The direct cost of purchasing drugs for private use is $100 billion ayear. The federal government spends at least $10 billion a year on drugenforcement programs and spends many billions more on drug-related crimesand punishment.
The estimated cost to the United States for the “War onDrugs” is $200 billion a year or an outstanding $770 per person per year,and that figure does not include the money spent by state and localgovernment in this “war” (Evans and Berent, eds. xvii). The second cost of this “war” is something economist like to callopportunity costs. Here, we have two resources which are limited: prisoncells and law enforcement. When more drug crimes take up law enforcement’stime and when more drug criminals take up cells, less ability to fight othercrime exists.
This becomes significant when an estimated 35-40 millionAmericans use drugs per year. In 1994, law enforcement arrested some750,000 people on drug charges, and of those 750,000, 600,000 were chargedmerely with possession. Sixty percent of the prison population are drugoffenders (Wink). The police, therefore, most work to find these 35 million”criminals,” thereby exhausting their resources. Also, in major urbancenters, the number of drug offences brought to trial are outstanding. Forexample, in Washington in 1994, 52% of all indictments were drug related asopposed to 13% in 1981 (Evans and Berent, eds.
21). All aspects of ourlegal system are being exhausted on drugs when it could be used moreeffectively on other felonies or focused on preventing children from buyingdrugs. Another two legal aspects of Drug Prohibition are interesting since theyshow how the “Prohibition” is not only ineffective, but alsocounterproductive. The first of which is the fact that the illegality ofdrugs leads to huge profits for drug dealers and traffickers. Ironically,the Drug Prohibition benefits most the drug traffickers and dealers asprices are pushed well above cost (Evans and Berent, eds. 22).
The secondaspect of the “Drug Prohibition” that undermines law enforcement is the needfor drug users to commit personal property crimes. One-third of the peoplearrested for burglary and robbery said that they stole only to support theirhabit, and about 75% of personal property crimes were committed by drugabusers. Studies also suggest that these people, when placed on outpatientdrug therapy or sold drugs at a lower price commit much less crime (Duke). Even the DEA admits that, “Drug use was common among inmates serving timefor robbery, burglary, and drug offenses” (“Crime, Violence”). Drug Prohibition has been very costly, detrimental to our relations withother countries, and harmful to users and society alike.
All this whiletrying to battle an enemy who is not as dangerous as it is currentlybelieved by most of the American public. The unpleasantries of the historyof Drug Prohibition also show us how the public has been mislead throughProhibition. Many of these disagreeable acts were not circumstances of DrugProhibition, rather goals of it, whether it was understood or not. The United States’ image in Latin America has been precarious nearly fromits birth.
The image of the American intent on dominating the New Worldplays in the minds of our neighbors. Recently, though, the situation isinteresting since the countries involved are growing less and lesscomplacent to deal with the losses of sovereignty that they are incurring. Drug Prohibition not only plays out on the American stage, but is a focalpoint of US relations with the countries of Latin America. So, as each ofthese countries has to pay the costs of Yankee Imperialism, the tensionbetween neighbors is increasing. The first of the tensions comes from Colombia. Unfortunately, our crusadeagainst drugs has caused the famous cartels of South America and,especially, those of Colombia.
Many wonder if we are justified in puttingpressure on these countries just to slow the drug trade. The deaths ofthousands of innocent Colombians were the result of our actions in thesecountries (Evans and Berent, eds. 58). The growth of the cartels,especially the Cali cartel, has led to political corruption in that country. “The President Ernesto Samper was said to have taken money from drugtraffickers so that the government would stop other groups from exportingcocaine.
He promised in his campaign a fight against drugs, but nobody cantrust a President who took money from the cartels,” said David Casas, aresident of Cali, Colombia. This unnecessary death and corruption in othercountries due to United States’ drug policy sometimes lead to hostilitytoward us (Casas). Because of the problems South American countries havefaced because of Drug Prohibition, Colombia’s Nobel Prize winning authorGabriel Garca Mrquez has written a manifesto declaring the drug war as”useless” (15). Action abroad by the United States has also led to an increase insubversive organizations worldwide.
Civil war is currently being threatenedin Bolivia by a coca-growing union. The group, which feels that theBolivian government has been too open to challenges in sovereignty, isfighting “Yankee Imperialism” and control by the DEA of a coca-growingregion (Epstein 1). In Colombia and Peru, groups like the communist FuerzasArmadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia)and Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path), both Communist groups, that survive ondrug money lead such acts as kidnaping foreign visitors, leading bombings onAmerican buisnesses in the country, and attempting to destroy institutionsof governments friendly to the United States (Spiegel 480). This subversionof government can even reach our beauracracy as the CIA is rumored to haveallowed the Nicaraguan Contras to sell drugs in the US to fund theirrevolution against the Sandinistas (“CIA” 20).
Therefore, in South America, our persistence on Drug Prohibition has notonly been unable to prevent the further imports of drugs, but also couldlead to the installation of Communist regimes in the area. Since the othercosts of Drug Prohibition has its base domestically, the conversation willturn to rights and liberties which help to explain why the drug war is notAmerican and why it might not be effective. This requires a discussion onthe role of government. The ultimate end of government is to protect our rights. We’ve entered asocial contract with our governments: that we will give our obedience andtaxes in return for protection of our rights.
The United Nations classifiesthese rights in three “generations”: civil, socioeconomic, and solidarityrights (Peterson). Shielding our people from the dangers of a threateningworld, therefore, seems to be an appropriate use of the state’s power undersocioeconomic rights. The danger in thinking in this manner is that itoverlooks the individual’s contributions to the nation. Thesecontributions, either positive or negative, are generally difficult toregulate by broad legislation. In fact, at times, legislation can becounterproductive, trying zealously to protect one right by violating manyothers.
We saw in the former U. S. S. R.
what can happen when government begins toenforce positive liberty. Positive liberty is different from what weusually think of as liberty, which is negative liberty. A negative libertyis one like the First Amendment which keeps the government from doingsomething, namely limiting your rights to speech and religion. A positiveliberty is one which forces the government to provide some service to itscitizens. An example of a positive liberty is the government’sresponsibility to protect our inalienable rights. The danger with expandingpositive liberties is that it gives government a more active role inpeople’s rights.
For that reason most would believe that government shouldnot give itself too many positive liberties as did the Soviet Union(Peterson). Drug Prohibition is an example of a positive liberty because itgives the government the go ahead to do what it must to give us a drug-freeAmerica. However, we should ask the question: is it worth keeping DrugProhibition as a positive liberty when it infringes upon both our negativeand positive liberties, not the least of which are life and liberty? U. S. District Judge William W. Schwarzer helped explain this when he said endingdrug use is useless “if in the process we lose our soul” (Trebach andInciardi 29).
Today he might say “since” instead of “if” since theinjustice and the cost on society of Prohibition is already well ingrainedinto our society. There could be two possible explanations for Drug Prohibition: we mustprotect people from harming themselves, or we want people to avoid drugsbecause extensive drug use harms society. Proponents of Drug Prohibitionthink one or both of these reasons is adequate for continuing Prohibition. The first is based on the people’s right to life, and the second is based onthe right for pursuit of happiness. However, there are fallacies in bothstatements, as will be shown. Before we can admit that our reasoning for Drug Prohibition is wrong, wemust find a better alternative.
The solution proposed in this essay is oneof establishing free markets both internationally and domestically. Theproponents of drug decriminalization have basic assumptions about what wouldresult from a free market. For now, we will focus on what proponents ofdrug legalization think the implications of a free drug market would be forthe individual users. These assumptions are that illegal drugs are not asdangerous as currently legal drugs and that the decriminalization of drugswill not greatly increase the number of drug addicts. First, most illegal drugs are not as dangerous as believed, and those thatare truly dangerous will be avoided.
This is essential to the argument fordecriminalization since we do not wish to have a large number of people diefrom a policy. However, if we compare the number of people who die annuallyfrom “appropriate” drugs to that of the number of people who die annuallyfrom illicit drugs, we would be inconsistent to think of the illicit drugsas dangerous. For example, 60 million Americans have tried marijuana and notone of these 60 million have died of an overdose. If this is compared tothe 10,000 people who die annually from overdosing on alcohol, one canassume that marijuana is much less dangerous than alcohol. Also, many drugshave minor side-effects when compared to acceptable drugs.
One example,heroin, is highly addictive, but when used in a clean environment with cleanneedles, its worst side effect is constipation (Evans and Berent, eds. 24). Overall, while 35 million people use drugs each year in the United States,only 6,000 to 30,000 ever die of drug use; therefore, there is little reasonto consider illicit drugs as a great danger to the individual, consideringour opinions of alcohol and tobacco (Wink). Deaths Caused by Use of Alcohol, Illegal Drugs, and TobaccoDrugNumber of Users (per year)Number of Deaths Caused by Drug (peryear)deaths per 100,000 usersAlcohol 106 million150 thousand142Nicotine57 million 400 thousand702Illicit Drugs35 million118 thousand51Dataon number of users and number of deaths are from Walter Wink’sGetting Off Drugs: The Legalization Option except 1 which comes fromEvans and Berent, eds. Drug Legalization: For and Against p.
21. Deaths per100,000 users is derived from the number of deaths divided by number ofusers multiplied by 100,000. Another assumption of drug decriminalization is that there will not be alarge increase in the number of people who abuse drugs. If many people werelikely to become addicts, there would be good reason not to go through withdrug decriminalization. While both decriminalizationists andprohibitionists agree that the legalization of drugs will lead to morepeople using drugs, decriminalizationists believe that there would not be alarge increase in drug abuse. This belief stems from a study of thedifference between the drug use and abuse between poor urbans and well-offs.
The study states that the percentage of poor urbans using drugs is muchhigher than the percentage of well-offs who used drugs. To believe thatincreased use leads to increase abuse, the percentage of poor, urban addictsshould be higher than the percentage of well-off addicts. The result,however, was contrary to this belief, since the percentages of addicts inboth groups was almost equal. What this implies is that an increase inusers does not translate to an increase in addicts (Evans and Berent, eds. 239).
Thomas J. Gorman, Deputy Chief of the California Attorney General’s Bureauof Narcotic Enforcement, in his report “The Myths of Drug Legalization” usesoutlandish statistics from “experts” to scare the reader into believing thatlegalization “could lead to the downfall of the United States as we knowit. ” He uses Dr. H. Kelbrs assertion that legalization could lead to afivefold increase in drug use (Myths’).
Comparing this type of increasein drug use and the idea that 35 million people now use drugs, theconclusion would be that 165 million people would be drug users in theUnited States. Considering the United States has only 200 million peopleover age 12, believing that such a high number of people would use drugs ishard. Gorman’s report also includes Dr. Dupont’s projection that if drugswere legal 50 million people (1/4 the over 12 population) would usemarijuana regularly and that 60 million (nearly 1/3 the over twelvepopulation) would use cocaine regularly (Myths’). These statistics arescary, but they are just not possible and are not founded in the truth. They are not possible because they would imply that one out of every threepeople over age 12 walking down the street would become “regular cocaineusers.
” They are not founded in the truth because they use a statistic thatstates, without explanation, that 70-75% of illicit drug users becomeaddicted (Myths’). Only three percent of the users of cocaine, consideredone of the most addictive illicit drugs, that currently has 12. 2 millionusers annually, use cocaine once a week, and only 3. 7% of users said thatthey tried to quit, but couldn’t.
If we were to assume that all 200 millionAmericans over 12 in the United States would use cocaine if it were legal,then approximately 7. 4 million people could not quit if they wanted to(Berent and Evans, eds. 24). Many Prohibitionists point to experiments on rats which imply that manyrats, when allowed access to cocaine, would prefer to use the cocaine overeating. The problem with the experiment, however, was that the rats wereleft isolated in cages.
A similar experiment in which they placed rats inmore social environments found that rats consumed 16 times less cocaine thanthe solitary rats. Also, the rats wouldn’t use the cocaine at all until thescientists made it very sweet with sugar, a taste rats cannot resist(Trebach and Inciardi 37-38). Also, Prohibitionists argue that before drugswere criminalized that 4. 59 per 1,000 US citizens were addicts. Thisimplies two things: that when addiction was worst in the United States 99.
6percent of the people were not addicted to a drug, and that if we wouldexpect a return to these rates of addictions if drug Prohibition wererepealed, then about one million people would be addicted, a clearcontradiction to the claim that 70-75% of drug users become addicted(Trebach and Inciardi 49). Prohibition does not prevent a large number of people from harmingthemselves, but while not helping users, the health of these individuals isput in jeopardy. First, the illegalities of drugs make the drugs themselvesmore unsafe. For example, marijuana is laced with unsafe fertilizers. Also, when cocaine and heroin users receive an unexpected potent dose, theymay kill themselves when the same amount of a regulated dose would havegiven the desired effect (Evans and Berent, eds. 22).
This is what happenedto the Mia Wallace character in Pulp Fiction when she snorted cocaine thatwas so potent that it nearly killed her (Pulp Fiction). Another outcome ofprohibition on the individual could also be considered a concern of societysince the spread of AIDS affects both groups. The transfer of AIDS throughneedles needed most commonly during the use of heroin has become the mostcommon manner in which the disease currently spreads. The treatment andprevention of the people who get AIDS from heroin use cannot be effective solong as users are being persecuted by law enforcement (Trebach and Inciardi35-36).
The implications of these two beliefs of proponents of decriminalizationare imperative to defense of the individual. “Defense of the individual”means the protection of users and abusers from themselves. If drugs are notas dangerous as currently legal drugs, addiction does not significantlyincrease and the health of the users suffers, then proponents of DrugProhibition have no grounds on which to say that legalization would lead tomillions of deaths and addictions inflicted on drug users by themselves. The United States needs to reconsider its view of drugs as leading to theunavoidable downfall of the individual and instead as the choice of peoplewith social problems to avoid them. In contrast with the defense of the individual, how Drug Prohibition doesnot protect society, but instead harms it will complete the chain offallacies that plague proponents’ arguments.
To protect society, it shouldbe that its citizens should somehow be better off. This is not true as themost expensive cost of the “Drug Prohibition” is the personal cost carriedby the citizens. In the cities, these costs are manifested in murders over”turf” or “business,” fear of walking the streets, robberies, and mothersleaving children to pursue their expensive addictions (Wink). Proponents of”Drug Prohibition” must ask themselves this question: “Would you be willingto sacrifice your son (daughter, best friend) to keep drug users fromhurting themselves?” The reason I would have them to think of this is thattheir children are not the ones dying on the street from adrive-by-shooting. A famous economist Milton Friedman once said of the DrugProhibition, “While both groups of victims are to be pitied, the innocentvictims surely have a far better claim to our sympathy than the self-chosenvictims” (Evans and Berent, eds.
58). By examining the world around themopponents of Drug Prohibition believe legalization will lead to less crimeand violent behavior, less racism, and the end of the infringement ofcertain rights. It is clear that Prohibition has a hand in each of these societal problems. We would greatly reduce crime, for example, which repeatedly appears high onsurveys on the biggest problem America faces, if legalization were tohappen.
Much of the concern about drugs and crime is that the use of drugssomehow causes crime. These studies are usually faulted by the attempt tolabel a cause on correlative data. While it is true that people who commitcrimes often use drugs as well, it cannot be said that the use of drugscauses the crime. To use a less controversial example, I could notice thatevery time my roommate puts on a certain shirt, his girlfriend comes over. It would be silly to say that she comes over because he puts on the shirt. In fact, we might say the opposite: that he puts on the shirt because hisgirlfriend comes over.
Saying either without having other knowledge wouldbe incorrect. Similarly, saying that drug use causes crime on this kind ofcorrelative data is not appropriate (Miller 61). Instead, many expertsclaim that much of what is labeled “drug-related” crime is instead due tocriminality. This criminality of drugs is a causal factor in crime because of the highcosts to consumers and high profits for suppliers.
The market prices formarijuana, cocaine, and heroin are about 100 times what the price would bein a free market. This means crime results from consumers trying to fundtheir artificially-expensive habit and suppliers trying to protect theirextremely high profits. Drug users committed about 75% of robberies,thefts, and burglaries. These criminals’ do not commit as many crimes whendrugs are available to them at lower prices. On the other hand, one in fourmurders and assaults involve suppliers protecting turf, settling disputes,or stealing drugs (Duke).
PCP, one of the most feared drugs, does notincite aggressiveness or violent behavior, as previously believed (Miller57). Dr. Lawrence Kolb, assistant surgeon general of the United States inthe 1920s said after a study of 225 addicted prisoners, “No opiate everdirectly influenced addicts to commit crime. ” He continued:No addict who receives an adequate supply of opium and has money enough tolive is converted into a liar or thief by the direct result of the drugitself.
The direct effect is to remove the irritability and unrest socharacteristic of psychopathic individuals. The soothing effect of opiatesin such cases is so striking and universally characteristic that one is tobelieve that violent crime would be much less prevalent if all habitualcriminals were addicts who could obtain sufficient morphine or heroin tokeep themselves fully charged with one of these drugs at all times. (Trebachand Inciardi 57)Violent crime by drug users is rare. A low percentage (7. 5%) of homicidesinvolving drugs were classified in a way that implied that the drugs haddriven the user to murder. The other 92.
5% of violent crime by drug userscould be expected to disappear once drugs were legalized and the casesinvolved in the 7. 5% would be expected to become more common as drug useincreased (Trebach and Inciardi 120). Nevertheless, for there to be anequivalent number of drug-related homicides, the number of people driven bydrugs to commit murder would have to increase by tenfold. One example isNew York City, where about of six of 414 studied murders were caused by druguse (see attached graph) (Miller 58). Two social problems people tie together are crime and racism.
Therefore,Drug Prohibition must play a role in racism since it plays a key role incrime. Researchers can show that the more efficient the “War on Drugs”gets, the more racism that incurs. Black males 15- 24 had a homicide ratenine times higher than white males in the same group. This high rate ofblack-on-black crime has two unfortunate results: first, the black victims,of course, and second, the fear of blacks by many whites. A racist personwould point to this large discrepancy between black and white homicide ratesas some sort of an inferiority (Trebach and Inciardi 34). The sad realityis that Prohibition has created much of this discrepancy.
The analogybetween selling drugs and stealing diamonds shows why this difference mightexist. If the death penalty were applied to people who stole diamonds, itwould discourage people from stealing diamonds since the value of thediamonds did not increase. However, if the death penalty were applied todrug dealers, there would still be an incentive to sell drugs since theability to receive profit from dealing drugs would increase. The differencewould then be that the people who had very little to lose have even moreincentive to deal drugs. These people who have little to lose aredisproportionally blacks or Hispanics. These forces drive many people intothe most despised positions of society (Trebach and Inciardi 35).
Also, the drug laws in the past have been and continue to be tools ofracism. In 1930, before the government had implemented many of the tools ofDrug Prohibition, a Colorado newspaper editor wrote, “I wish I could showyou what a small marihuana cigaret sic can do to one of our degenerateSpanish-speaking residents. ” However, more of the resentment of Mexicansseemed to be because Mexican labor was willing to work for lower wagesthereby producing fear in Anglos over their pocketbooks. The only tool theycould use to keep Mexican labor out of the market was the drug laws (Miller98-99). During the 1950s, many places had laws against addiction.
Due tothe nature of addiction, police could and did use this as an excuse toharass African-Americans and Hispanics (Miller 101). This similarlyhappened to the Chinese and opium, a drug previously used by many Anglos(Miller 104). One could see how this could transfer into today as manyminorities complain about selective prosecution, which is understandableconsidering the racial undertones of the original Drug Prohibition. Since the inner cities receive a far greater share of the crime and racisminvolved with Drug Prohibition, it is much more difficult for a ruralcitizen to understand what these regulations do to the cities, but oneaspect of the Drug Prohibition that does harm to all of us by violatingour civil liberties. A government which calls 35 million of its citizenscriminals for actions which are within the scope of civil liberties is,thereby, violating civil liberties.
Government is supposed to allow us todo what we wish if we do not interfere with others (Evans and Berent, eds. 58). With drugs, many proponents of drug decriminalization claim that fewusers when allowed to use drugs in a free market would harm anyone. Thegovernment has also gone beyond this violation of civil liberties into theviolating the democratic process by silencing discussion of the issue. Forexample, no commission has ever been held on the issue.
Since thegovernment does not investigate the issue, this suggests that the governmentwishes to remain unaware of the issue (Evans and Berent, eds. 202). Also,many pieces of legislation such as H. R. 135 are very undemocratic.
The billasks that “no department or agency of the United States Government shallconduct or finance, in whole or in part, any study or research involving thelegalization of drugs” (H. R. 135). This kind of legislation banningresearch of the issue is, at least, scary.
If the fact that enforcementbreeds poor international relations, undue cost on public health, crime, andracism is bad, the fact that the government is infringing our rights everyday because of Drug Prohibition is atrocious and threatens our freedom. Drug users are not the only ones crying out for their rights in this war. Even Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall called many polices “the drugexception to the Constitution. ” For example, one drug policy is thatcustoms officials can detain people for no less than 24 hours and notrelease them until they agree to deficate in the examiners presence, theyallow the feces to be examinated, and no traces of drug appear. Thesesearches can be done without reason to believe guilt even without anyevidence at all (Trebach and Inciardi 26).
Enforcing Drug Prohibition requires invasions into the home since drug useis generally something done in the home (Trebach and Inciardi 26). Inanother case in Illinois, a couple was going on vacation to Florida. Aninformant told the police department that they were going to Florida to buydrugs. The problem was that this was not the usual informant that thepolice picks up from time to time. This informant was totally anonymous,even unknown to the detectives. The conviction was upheld though most theevidence sprouted from the anonymous, invisible informant we associated withthe Soviet Union (Trebach and Inciardi 28-29).
Finally, the act offorfeiture is extremely heinous. If, for example, two kids were smokingmarijuana on your property, the police could take all your property. Evenif no charges are brought up against you, you must go to court and proveyour complete innocence (not just reasonable doubt) to reclaim your propertyfrom the government. In fact, half of all people who forfeit their propertynever get charged (Trebach and Inciardi 32). How Drug Prohibition has not been beneficial to society now having beendemonstrated completes the long string of problems that have stemmed fromDrug Prohibition in the realms of international relations and public healthshow where the costs appeared without any consideration having been given tobenefits. In contrast, when the benefits were considered, as was the caseon the issues concerning the drug user and society, the benefits did not panout or were not as important in the first place as the costs that haveresulted have been.
Clearly, Drug Prohibition harms international relations. However, one maynot be so willing to accept that it has the profound effects on publichealth and societal problems. If we look back upon Alcohol Prohibition,alcohol was considered as the worst evil, as we think of drugs now. In bothcases, the fear about the denegration of society was not well founded.
Thehealth of the users suffered as they would drink stronger and strongeralcohol as to keep the volume transported. Also, the unregulatedcontraband was more dangerous than it would have been. Alcohol Prohibitionalso created crime as Drug Prohibition does as we can see in the appearanceof the mafias like Al Capone which turned Chicago into a city troubled withcrime. The same cries for protection of rights were being heard as the FBIwas seen as invading our rights. Our history demonstrates the evils of prohibition.
One should wonder whywe would be willing to fight the righteous fight again when it is neitherrighteous nor possible. Also, public opinion is peculiar given some facts. First, Alcohol Prohibition was dissolved by popular opinion because ofcrime, yet people continue to support Drug Prohibition although it createssimilar crime. Second, that we continue to support politicans who supportProhibition eventhough not one has given a creative solution, or at least,one we have not tried before. Finally, it is strange that people cannot seethrough the problems associated with drugs and not see they are due toProhibition and not use itself.
If the drugs were sold at what would be themarket price, the people who steal and rob would not have any reason tosteal, or at least would have to steal less often to support their nowcheaper habit. The people who have become the “evil welfare mothers” whowaste all their government money on drugs instead of caring for theirchildren could not squander all their precious money on drugs because theywould be so cheap their would be no reason to. All of these terribleproblems I’ve discussed, if not created by Prohibition, were greatlyintensified by Prohibition. The end of drug laws would mark a never beforeseen improvement in the lives of every citizen. It is unfortunate that ourpoliticans, and even ourselves are too stuborn to even consider it.
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