I heard today on NPR that the global drug trade is worth more than the entire global auto industry.
It struck me that while we here in the states can’t get a law passed to raise the fuel economy on cars (and the EPA just denied a waiver to California, blocking that states efforts to go it alone), we’ve got a war on drugs.
Let’s replay that: we can’t nudge a legal industry to raise fuel economy standards without triggering a mountain of legal and lobbying challenges, despite everyone knowing that reducing our reliance on energy is good from a national security standpoint as well as an environmental one (even if you don’t believe in global warming, it’s hard to argue against stretching our use of a finite resource), yet we have a war on drugs, which is a bigger, more entrenched industry that is totally unregulated, bound by none of the rules of the land (indeed, its very existence flouts them), and which supports, directly or indirectly, countless jobs on both the illicit side of the fence as well as the legal one (think government officials who get elected in part by being tough on crime, police officers, and everyone employed by the DEA).
We can’t move the auto industry despite a combination of savvy, cunning, and brute force, but we think we can take on the illicit drug industry in a fist fight. Is there a Washington think tank telling the President that if we can just think of a public service announcement that makes people think twice before lighting up, that we’ll all just be OK? Because otherwise, for the life of me I can’t figure this one out.
If I hadn’t already trademarked How to Self-Destruct(TM), there is no question that today would have had me filing the papers. How to Self-Destruct(TM): Making the Least of Public Policy is now only a matter of time.
