June 8, 2021 • 47 mins
From the Opium Wars to prohibition and the modern drug trade, human civilization has been irreversibly influenced by wars over drugs. Has it worked? Could it ever? Find out in this classic episode.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is the war on drugs. Yes, this is your war.
This is your war on drugs. This is your brain
on the war on drugs. And this is our classic
episode on the War on drugs. You could you could
write a book about this. Many people have and some
of those books are very good. In this episode, we're
exploring not just the modern idea of the war on drugs,
(00:23):
but all the precedents that led us to the current situation.
And uh spoiler alert. You know, we don't really solve
the problem, I think, but we do build a case
for conspiracy. And you know what, there's not much else
to say. Let's jump right into it. From UFOs two
ghosts and government cover ups, histories writ with unexplained events.
(00:45):
You can turn back now or learn the stuff they
don't want me to now. Hello, and welcome back to
the show. My name is Matt and I'm Ben not
a cop Boland and over there is Noel Brown. Ladies
and gentlemen are famous super producer Noel Brown. Could we
(01:06):
get some sirens at the top of your mild? Perfect?
Oh why why are there cops here? Well, that's one
of the reasons why I said that I am not
a cop. But I'm not so sure about you. Met. Uh, Today,
we have some sirens and some imaginary police officers here
(01:27):
to help us out with a very sticky, controversial subject,
ladies and gentlemen, the war on drugs. Well, let's get
right into it. What the heck is it? Where did
it come from? How did it start? Oh? Yeah, okay,
So the phrase the war on drugs is actually not
that old. It goes back to nineteen seventy one. On
(01:51):
June the president of the time, Richard Nixon, held a
press conference, and this was the day after he had
given a special message to the Congress on drug abuse
Prevention and Control. So during this press conference, Matt he
says that drug abuse is public enemy number one, and
he says that he's going to devote more money to here.
(02:14):
Here's the first time he was ever said the war
on drugs. So this phrase the war on drugs really
just got taken up by the media and it was
used all over the place. Um, and the way we
think about the war on drugs now in at least
when we're putting this out, is a little different than
maybe the way it was presented at the time. In
(02:37):
the beginning, it was you know, about trying to help
people rehabilitate drug users. Uh, it was about preventing new
addicts from getting addicted. Um. But that kind of that message,
let's say, UM was kind of put in different places,
and we'll go maybe go over some of those other organizations,
(02:59):
but it was focused on just the word war focuses
you on like battle guns, like create all kinds of
crazy things. At least those images are are created in
your head when you hear that phrase, right, Yeah. And
it's also a war on an idea, which is what
(03:21):
what drug use. I guess you could argue that it's
a war on a specific thing, but I think it's
more a war on an activity, which is people using drugs.
And you make a very interesting point about portraying this
as a war sort of criminalize is that people who
are addicted, and in other countries addiction is often treated
like a disease. Right. Uh. But we know, as you said,
(03:47):
that the war on drugs has evolved from its rehabilitative
aims that that we're part of it. I mean, they
always wanted to criminalize drugs, but part of it was
rehab alitation and helping with community oriented solutions. But today guys,
the war on drugs in the United States takes an
(04:07):
estimated fifty one billion with a B dollars of the
US budget. That's according to the Drug Policy Alliance. And
for everybody who's listening now and saying, you, guys, don't
be shallow. The war on drugs didn't start in the seventies.
It goes way way back. Well, we know, we looked
into it. Oh absolutely, Uh. The US has always had
(04:31):
an adversarial relationship with drugs because you know, we we
think of drugs as a bad thing, an immoral thing
to do, at least in the moral code of let's
say Christianity, just as one yeah, as one example, um,
something you're not supposed to do. So the first drug
laws actually surfaced way back in the eighteen sixties. Yeah,
(04:55):
those books. Yeah, those were opium related, I think, um,
and those were local as well, right then. The first
law that restricted drugs on like a national level was
the Harrison Narcotics Act of nineteen fourteen, and that was
related to again opium, was trying to tax opium as
well as cocaine. Yeah, and at this time we see
(05:16):
cocaine being illegal unless you are an individual or a
company with a license now I have Uh, I have
no real idea and full disclosure, Matt Noel and I
are not drug dealers, nor to my knowledge, drug addicts. Well,
I got caffeine. I got a caffeine monkey. Yeah, I've
(05:38):
got several that are currently legal. Okay, all right, um,
but we know that, you know, the idea that an
individual could get a license got to be crazy, Like
that guy had the best pickup line at the bar, right,
It's like, oh here, let me show you my license.
I've got my opium license. Yeah. Yeah. So let's as
(06:00):
fast forward past alcohol prohibition, that huge debacle from nineteen
thirty three. Because it did not work. It did give
us several political dynasties that started out as criminals. Oh yeah,
tons of those, and fun little secret bars that are
really popular now, speakeasies that you can go to and
find a hidden door somewhere, the cottage industry of creative
(06:23):
people making moonshine, I mean prohibition. Uh, this is a
scary thing. It will come up later and many ways.
Prohibition was fantastic for parts of the U. S. Economy,
but at the same time it had a bloody history.
There were so many people died during prohibition. Uh, not
only from being shot by authorities or authorities being shot
(06:45):
by uh you know, moonshiners or whoever is trying to
make the stuff a bootleggers, people getting killed from poisoned
alcohol and yeah, rock gout alcohol that wasn't made correctly.
Yeah that because without going into all of the specifics
of how to create moonshine, um, which some which my
(07:07):
family knows about. Uh, we can point you to I
believe stuff you should know as an episode on moonshine,
and they do a great job explaining how to make
this uh strange, fantastic, potentially blinding drink. But we do
know that marijuana was also one of the things that
fell under the purview of drug laws, the Marijuana Transfer
(07:31):
Tax Act, And this thing has its own bunch of
conspiracy theories, right Matt, it passed in What were some
of the theories about why it's illegal. Well, there are
a couple of theories about hemp um and hemp production
and how that might take over other textile industries at
the time, cotton specifically. Yeah, I remember that at the time.
(07:53):
The the idea is that at the time William Randolph
Hurst newspaper tycoon. I love the word tycoon, get to
use it very often, but this guy was legit tycoon.
He there could have been a William Randolph Hurst tycoon
video game. Yeah. I wonder if they're going to come
out with a Simhurst or something. Uh. Anyhow, this so
(08:14):
this Hurst guy, as the story goes, and listeners most
of you already know this. As the story goes, this
guy owned acres acres and acres and acres of timber,
and with the invention of a new device, decourse Raider
or something himp, all of a sudden became a primary
(08:34):
competitor and was a more efficient plant for the creation
of paper right and other industrial products rope, et cetera. Uh.
And that the story goes that Hurst cooperated with some
of his other buddies in power to shut down the industry,
the burgeoning marijuana or himp industry, and one of the
(08:57):
ways they did that was to put out propaganda pieces
about the Remember the I think I think one of
the ones we ran in our marijuana video was the
devil weed weed. Yeah. It preyed upon these horrible, horrible
depictions of like, uh, the caricatures of people who were
(09:21):
Mexican and they were drawn as these like pseudo human
monsters that were, of course, you know, all after the
white women. And if yeah, and if if a young
lady of otherwise good moral standing was foolish enough to
smoke Reefer in a jazz club, oh man, you the
(09:44):
terrible things that would happen to her, It's the end
of America right there, right, yeah, it is. So we
know that this, um, we know that there are other
conspiracy theories that maybe this was something to do with
the depots and the invention of nylon and then wanted
to use that instead. Most of these conspiracy theories are
(10:05):
related to industrial competition, but have not been conclusively proven.
At this point, I think it's important to say that, yeah, absolutely,
there are holes in some of those stories. There are holes.
But you know, on the other side, they do point
to just the powerful trying to remain powerful. I mean,
somebody paid for those propaganda pieces, right of Marijuana Madness,
(10:29):
which is um. That reminds me of that that film
Reefer Madness. Always see that. Oh yeah, I have a
copy of it on my computer. Actually, I think that
you know, I'm not gonna name names, but one of
my extended family members watched this, and I don't think
they understood it was a comedy. Yeah yeah, I don't
know how you couldn't get it. Uh yeah, I guess
(10:51):
you're just if you don't have the right frame older
person to I mean, I felt like that had to
he said. But okay, So we have this history of
all these different attempts to um criminalize, prohibit, or completely
eradicate drugs and drug trades. Here's the million dollar question.
(11:12):
Has the war on drugs worked? Well? Listener, what do
you think since nine seventy one the drug war has
officially been on, It's been waged. We're in the middle
of it right now, front lines. Well not US, but
like the d hopefully not US, hopefully never US. No.
But but honestly, do you think the just sitting there
(11:36):
listening to this, do you think the availability of drugs
has increased or decreased since n Well, the answer is
it's increased a lot, depending on which drugs we're talking about. Right. Sure,
there are a couple of drugs that slipped through the cracks. Uh, Ludes,
(11:56):
Coludes were a prescription drugs. Good point, Yeah, I mean
because my example, um yeah, and we'll explore some uh,
some different arguments for against prohibition and whether or not
it is effective. Because any any law that criminalizes a drug, right,
whether it be caffeine, adderall, crack, cocaine, or coludes. Uh,
(12:21):
that is essentially prohibitive law. It's you cannot do something
versus a you must do something. So, so if we
ask has the war on drugs worked? Very interesting thing here,
my friends, because what we're really what we're really answering there, Uh,
it depends on who you are as whether or not
(12:42):
it's worked. So if the goal was to stop the
availability of drugs, as you said, then clearly that hasn't happened.
I mean, teenagers and multiple polls find it easier to
get marijuana or cocaine than it is to buy alcohol,
which is legal. You know. Yeah, you need an idea
to get alcohol, or you know at least somebody who
(13:03):
will go in there and get it for you, Yeah,
whereas you just need to go to the right like
fish concert to get spot yeah, or I mean just
college campus or wherever. I mean, it's it's it's terrifying. Yeah,
it's terrifying how available that's any of those drugs are, right,
because it shows that things don't work. But what if
(13:24):
the goal of US drug policy isn't about eradicating the
drug trade? What do you mean? Of course it is.
Here's where it gets crazy. After a word from our
sponsors and we are back. Okay, So we left off saying,
(13:50):
what if the US drug policy goals weren't necessarily oriented
towards eradicating the drug trade? What if they were more
towards managing it or using it to do something else, like, oh,
I don't know, increase budgets or police departments and federal
agencies across the board. Yeah, that's true. That's a definite
(14:11):
thing that has happened. If you if you think the
war on drugs is a failure, right, uh, then you
are like three out of four Americans in two thousand
and eight. How insane is that? Right? In democracies Now,
the US is a republic, but in a democratic system,
a number that high is supposed to be a clear message,
(14:34):
right yeah, um, depending upon who they're representing at the time.
We know that the war on drugs created soaring incarceration rates.
We've got some scary numbers about it. That's right. Then,
with just five percent of the total world population. The
US has twenty of the world's prisoners, so that means
(14:56):
that proportionately we lead the world just hugely, big time.
We live for people who use the word freedom so
often in conversations. I know how cynical this sounds. We
put a lot of people in jail, it doesn't matter
what your political stances. We put a lot of people
in jail. And then a lot of people are there
(15:17):
for drug offenses. And we don't do it for everybody.
Ben as most of us know, um, dis Disproportionately, these
laws end up in prisoning minorities like way more than
let's say, white people. Ah. Yes, So just for some
perspective here, in two thousand eight, Washington Post found that
(15:38):
of the one point five million Americans arrested each year
for drugs, half a million would be incarcerated five hundred
thousand a year. And of those five hundred thousand, uh,
the majority are going to be minorities, especially African Americans.
So this translates to one in five Black Americans uh.
(16:00):
In estimation, one in five Black Americans spending time behind
bars due to drug laws. And these kind of statistics
they're overwhelming, first of all, but they're also leading people, UH,
such as Michelle Alexander, who's a critic. She says that
mass in car incarceration is kind of the new Jim Crow, which,
(16:21):
if we remember the Jim Crow laws, they were meant
to I don't know a good way to say, it's
stifle the African American UH set of rights. Right. Yeah,
Jim Crow laws come in, UH, you know, in the
period between slavery and UH legalized quality thinks to civil rights.
Jim Crow laws were another way to repress and manage
(16:45):
the United States black population, UH through what was in
many ways systematized enslavement under a different name. I mean,
we're not talking a lot of people. They hear Jim
Crow law and they think separate water fountains, right, separate restrooms,
separate entrances. But this is also something like enforced work. Right.
(17:08):
You are locked up for an arbitrary reason and then
made to work for uh some of the same companies
and in early days, some of the same people who
thought it was a good idea to have slaves in
the first place. Yeah. It's interesting to use the word
management again, Ben, because it's something that we're finding throughout
this this series here just trying to manage manage populations
(17:31):
in this weird way without showing the hand of the
manager because the laws to meet are these rigid structures. Um,
they're faceless. Yeah, it's their ideas, so that I think
that's a really good point. Now I want to be
completely fair and point out that later on in the podcast,
we're going to talk about the arguments for this prohibition. Right,
(17:56):
and clearly, clearly not everyone thinks that there is some
overarching conspiracy to re enslave um the black population, minority populations.
So one of the questions there is, um, is this
disproportionate incarceration occurring on purpose or is it the culmination
(18:19):
of a bunch of short term decisions such as politicians
who want to be tough on crime. That's great for votes,
right and uh? And also a socioeconomic situation of vast
swass of a population. That's true. Yeah, So what what
is the cause? Is there and orchestrated cause here? And
(18:42):
are drug laws excuse me, our drug laws part of this?
You know, some drugs have been disproportionately legislated. And I'm
sure a lot of people are waiting for us to
get to this. Uh. The famous one hundred to one
sentencing disparity for possession of crack cocaine. Verse is powder cocaine? Uh?
That's crazy talk. Yeah, and what causes that? Why the
(19:06):
heck is that even a thing? Is it some kind
of media based panic, like a racial bias that's happening
in the media, um or even in the law enforcement system. Yeah,
that's a good question. Uh. I everything that I've heard
of crack sounds terrifying to me. It's one of those
it's one of those things where just I'm not passing
(19:27):
judgment on people met but it's one of those things
where I always wonder, like, what is the thought process
that makes you say, you know, what is a good
idea today? Crack cocaine? Yeah? I have some unfortunately personal experiences, uh,
dealing with somebody who's addicted to crack cocaine that I'm
not going to talk about right here, but I can
(19:48):
just say that it is pretty freaking horrendous and it's
definitely not you know, I just want to establish it's
it's not it's not you, it's not null. Wait is
it me? Did I black out and do some crack? So?
I mean, we're making light of a very serious thing,
but The truth of the matter is that for a
(20:09):
long time, this this sort of disparity in sentencing resulted
in a lot of people who had the same amount
of cocaine in a in a crack form going to
jail for much much longer if the cocaine possessor even
went to jail at all. Yeah, because the truth is
(20:30):
right that they found that there were demographics to drug
use and uh, people empower would probably not smoke crack,
but they might do cocaine, and they got lighter sentencing
until what two thousand ten, Yeah, and two thousands ten
Obama signed the Fair Sentencing Act to try at least
(20:52):
and reduce this disparity. We'll see if it works out.
So I want to go back to what you said
earlier because you made one of the biggest and best
points that I know a lot of people are waiting
for out there, which is a financial interest in the
drug war. The idea that the war on drugs is
a um a guaranteed boon or piece of the American economy.
(21:18):
I mean, what do you think. I absolutely believe that. Um.
I mean, the economy as a whole seems to churn
on a couple of different things. And one of them
is the drug trade because of the law enforcement angle
and the incarceration efforts. And think about the private prisons
now and the amount of money that goes into and
(21:40):
comes out of private prisons. I guess also it's a
it's a boon to the legislative industry or litical litigious industry. Yeah, well,
the drug a drug or drugs in general is a
great enemy to have to wage a war on, at
least from that endpoint, because like you said, it's nameless,
(22:02):
it's faceless, it doesn't really ever die. Like, how how
do you extinguish Druggs completely? I just can I go
on a right here. If we were to wage wars
on ideas, I would like to wage wars on things
like literacy, things like a war on uh, a war
on water contamination, a war on poverty would be a
(22:25):
great thing for a lot of Americans. And you're a
good hearted person. Well, I'd never be elected, but thank
you for saying so. And I think I think earlier
another US president did declare a war on poverty, but
it didn't carry as much attention. Yeah, there's not a
lot of money in stopping prop poverty. There's a lot
of money that comes out. Yeah, there's a lot of
(22:47):
money invested in arresting marijuana users. In two thousand nine
h the US spent and estimated seven billion dollars arresting
people for what I am at egine is I imagine
that's everything. So that's like possession, distribution growing, I guess too. Uh.
(23:08):
And we know that drugs are also pretty good source
of profit while they were illegal, right, oh yeah, because
inside this black market, the demand is never changed really
for drugs over time. There's always somebody, like a lot
of people who want drugs. And if you if you
control the market that you know, there aren't a lot
(23:30):
of competitors. You're making money. We're looking at profit margins
I mean over oh yeah, easily. And you know, there's
a question about whether drug cartels would want US drug
laws to change. You know, if it became legal, then
the people swooping in would be multinational corporations with one
(23:53):
hell of a war chest. Yeah, and taxes, I mean
tax money out of you. So yeah, there's a huge
incentive to perhaps that is that is weird, that's an
angle I've never thought about the incentive of the cartels
to maintain the drug war. Yeah, I wonder, I wonder
if it's true. Now. You know, we have some listeners
(24:15):
in our audience who are in law enforcement. And one
thing I think happens that is unfair that we should
talk about here is that a lot of the people
that you know, you will meet if you just are
on the street level, taking a street level look at crime. Right,
A lot of the people who are responsible for arresting someone, right,
(24:38):
they don't make the laws. It's their job. They have
to do it, you know, It's it's probably criminal for
them not to. And I think it's strange that these people,
these people who are on the front lines of the
war on drunks, right, Uh, they're the ones who get
so much of the criticism and so much of the flak.
And you know, it's the same aime with the street
(25:00):
level drug dealers, right, they get most of the prison time,
but not the guys at the top of the pyramid,
you know, on the other side. And you have to
wonder sometimes how often the tops of these two competing
pyramids talk, right, and if they work in unison. Uh,
that's you know, that's the bigcy that that's the that's
(25:24):
the big question. Um. So what I wanted to ask you, Matt,
is if we could talk a little bit about some
of the drug war stuff that we have covered in
our past videos. We have a whole bunch, right Um.
I'm trying to think just the numbers. I remember in
our original War on Drugs episode where we had the
(25:46):
little ticker in the side that shows how much money
is being spent by the US government on the war
on drugs. Yeah, real time while you're watching the video,
and it was it wasn't a huge amount. I think
it was five dollars a second. I think that's what
it was. I mean, when you hear that, it sounds
like a lot of money for you or I or
most of the people listening except for that one other
(26:07):
tycoon remember from the Bahamas. Yeah yeah, anyway, yeah, ready,
uh no, but okay, so it doesn't sound like that
much money. But then when you when you look at it,
you watch this video which is only three and a half,
I forget how many it is, but you just see
this massive number at the end, you realize, my god,
the amount of time it took me to watch this video,
(26:28):
a hundred thousand dollars which just spent. Well, here's let's
change directions a little bit then, because this leads us
to a great question arguments for against prohibition. Uh, do
you think that the current drug laws work or that
there I guess that the system in place is preferable
(26:51):
to other systems. Well, like you said, the system right
now arrests pawns, and it gets pawns, you know, and
and is a horrible way to look at it, but
pawns in the police department, the guys on the front lines,
the little man who's actually out there trying to fight
the war gets killed, you know, and the low level
(27:12):
drug dealer gets arrested or killed. I don't think that
works to solve anything. That just creates a perpetual pawn
death thing. So just a war of attrition, Yeah, war
progress to me, that's that's what I see. And you're
saying in your saying ponds completely and I'm not solely
in the chess game non interrogatory sense. I'm just you know,
(27:35):
you're sending your low level guys out to fight a war,
literally to fight a war, and you never get to
see the bishop make an entrance. Now you would say,
you know, it's interesting you say that because there are
there are people who say that prohibition in the United
States does work because a smaller amount of our population
(27:56):
uses opium, for instance, versus those who use something legal,
such as alcohol. So what what would you say to that.
I guess this is what I would do. I would
go into the argument about the health consequences of drug
X versus drug Y. Okay, I see, So maybe schedule
drugs based on that. Well, yeah, I mean, there are
(28:19):
a lot of things you could schedule them on. It's
just the way that drugs are currently scheduled. Even if
we just look I mean, honestly, let's just look at
marijuana versus alcohol. And this has been done so many times.
You've heard this over and over all your listeners. But
the known health effects of alcohol versus the known health
effects of marijuana are there's a huge disparity there where.
(28:43):
You know, with alcohol, you can if you consume enough,
get alcohol poisoning. If you consume enough and you drive
a vehicle or you know, use other heavy machinery, either
way it impairs you, you are most likely going to
hurt yourself or somebody else. Um, alcohol is legal. Alcohol
is good to go. On the other side, with marijuana,
a lot of the studies in there haven't been enough
(29:04):
studies yet at least that we can cite. But it
doesn't seem to have the same effects. You don't seem
to be able to overdose on it and die. Are
you saying those those posters from the thirties were wrong,
I'm saying they were propaganda? What no, I know, Come on, man, Jazz,
really that's true. So I'm just messing with you. But
(29:27):
but yeah, that's you know, that's a that's definitely a
valid argument that I see there. Um. I know that
when I've spoken to people who are law enforcement officers,
the vast majority of them would rather not have to
waste time and paperwork busting somebody with, you know, a
(29:50):
dime bag of pot or something. Because there are people
out there stealing cars, attacking the elderly, things like at
that should clearly be illegal. That's that's where I would
draw the line, right, And a lot of people in
the line of violent crime. Oh yeah, violent crime absolutely.
But that other thing you mentioned about cocaine versus crack picking, yeah,
(30:14):
oh my gosh. I mean there have been numerous exposees
about Washington, d c. And the amount of cocaine that
goes around that city, and you know, not for any
kind of miscreant, just running around on the south side
of town or the north side of town. You're talking
about the players, Yeah, yeah, the people in the houses
of power, whether corporate or governmental. You know, it's funny
(30:37):
because one of the things I learned we're looking at
this practice was that the human species at large seems
to go like nuts over cocaine. Were like that bird
in that Coco puffs, Uh, that Coco puffscot is like
cuckoo for Coco puffs or whatever. Yeah, people are cuckoo
for cocaine, you know. Uh. The Mayor Rob Ford was
(31:01):
in the news a lot for his use of crack cocaine,
so I assume that would be regular cocaine as well. Um.
There was a weird study that came out of a
few years back that said, um, I think there's some
towns in Italy where so many people use cocaine that
you can find trace amounts of it in the water. Uh.
(31:22):
And you know they're always those statistics people like to
whip out where they say, like of euros or dollars
have traces of drugs and fecal matter on them and
stuff so I don't know how how realistic that is.
But then again, I don't know how realistic it is
to try to ban something that's so many people indulge in.
(31:47):
The only kinds of prohibition that seemed to work for
a long time in human history are religious prohibitions, like
dietary restrictions, and it's because somebody's God has commanded them
not too Yeah, so it's voluntary, right, But I don't know,
I'm I'm ranting, I guess a little bit. It's just
it's just strange to me. We haven't even talked about
(32:09):
opium production in Afghanistan during the war, you know what.
Let's talk about that next. But first pausible word from
our sponsors. We're back. So the opium trade, the opium war,
(32:32):
and the Afghanistan war, let's talk about it, man, Okay. Well,
one thing that's interesting about the operations in Afghanistan, which
I think most of the American public was on the
same page this was these were operations to catch terrorists, right,
They were after terrorists, and they were hoping to stem
(32:57):
the flow of terrorism. Uh at the time, one one
unforeseen side effect, at least most of the American public
didn't see this coming was that opium production in Afghanistan increased.
Their their number of possible factors for this. Uh. People
who believe there's a conspiracy of foot will say that
(33:19):
UM intelligence agencies or private companies wanted to rest control
of this of the you know, one of the world's
prime opium sources and UH profit from it. But then
other people would say, well, that's that's a little bit crazy.
What's happening instead is that farmers in Afghanistan are finding
(33:41):
that is more profitable to grow poppies than it is
to grow you know, other products. Right, Oh, yeah, it's
it's hugely profitable. And you have to think the thought
of going into the opium fields the you know, and
we're talking this is one of the largest, if not
the largest opium deduction areas in the entire world, right
(34:02):
in Afghanistan. So the idea of going in there is
to stop that money that would be coming from the
profit of the sale of that product to fun terrorism.
And now you've got the soldiers in there, and in
theory they're protecting it and making sure you know, I
guess none gets sold or you I don't. I mean,
I I guess I just don't understand the operational like
(34:26):
what they're doing the goals. Yeah, you know, it's funny
because and this is a bit of a tangent. We
can do an entirely different series about wars. But uh,
one thing that was interesting to me is that UM,
before the United States became involved in Afghanistan, Uh, there
were some discoveries that you and I have talked about
(34:46):
about large amounts of what are called rare earth metals
or minerals, and some of these deposits rival those found
in Mongolia, which is a huge source of rare earth
materials UM and and rare earth material is sort of
a misnomer because it's relatively rare in earth right in
(35:09):
the natural world. But if you live in an industrialized society,
it is all around you in your smartphone and your microphone.
If it has a phone on it, then it probably
has or if there's electronics, I mean, if there's a motherboard,
just there's some rare earth elements. So I've heard some
people say that that was one of the actual aims
of US intervention there. But if you check out our
(35:31):
Great Game podcast, you will see how the Soviet Union
and the United States and the UK before it have
always fought over this part of the world, Eurasia, Central Asia.
UM has always been a a huge piece of the
(35:52):
global hegemonic pie that no one can seem to hold
for very long. Right. It's still really strange to me
that after all that and thinking about all those factors,
the fact is global opium production is at an all
time high. Yeah, it's increased. And we know that there
was a much earlier war on drugs, and we won't
(36:14):
talk too much about today because we have a video
series about this coming out that you guys should check
out if you're interested, and that is on the opium wars,
which don't get reported that much in Western textbooks nowadays.
Um maybe because it is such a a grossly unethical war.
(36:35):
UM Quick and Dirty reader's digest version here. Essentially, the
West wanted to do more trade with China at the time, right,
And the problem was that the West, specifically Britain the
United Kingdom, didn't have anything that China really wanted, right
(36:56):
except for opium because they still controlled that in the
British Empire. So they started trying to uh make trade
with opium right and get the population addicted. And China
had a problem with that and a war began because
of that. It was it was literally a drug war.
(37:18):
And you're going to find out a lot more about
that in the video series, so stay tuned and then
we will be making an audio podcast about that as well.
Yeah we probably should. Yeah, so I should stop talking
about there, So let's instead talk a little bit more
about conspiracy surrounding the war on drugs. Other criticisms are
that this creates a permanent underclass, that current drug policies,
(37:42):
in one way or another, accelerate inequality. Yeah, so now
you have a large part of the population that has
to I mean that there isn't really much of a
way out of their let's say situation then to be
low level criminal, low level per and selling drugs because
it's profitable enough in the short term to maybe get
(38:04):
you out of that that situation. Um. And then you've
also got and I don't know how to how to
put this, but you have a huge amount of job
openings for law enforcement, for low level law enforcement, um,
because you need people to fight the battle on the
other side. M it's interesting, Yeah, the the entry level
(38:25):
and just another thing, I don't know if you know
this or not, but police officers don't get paid very
well for the amount of risk they go through every day. Yeah,
that is absolutely true. That's a that's a huge problem.
I would say that teachers and police officers, e m
t s and firefighters are some of the most dramatically
(38:45):
underpaid people in US society. And while we're talking about
government jobs, Uh, let's go to one of your favorite
conspiracy theories, met and I guess in some cases it's
a conspiracy fact. Is it true, Matt, that government agencies
have participated in the illegal drug trade? Ah? This is
(39:10):
a difficult thing to prove with cold heart evidence. Although
if you if you know this one guy's name, you
might have a clue. Mr Gary Webb. Uh. He was
a journalist who stumbled upon a story that was probably
too big for him or for any other singular person
(39:31):
to take on. So Gary discovered that, at least allegedly
that the CIA was trafficking drugs, and uh he tried
to get the story out as much as he could.
He was largely discredited by a lot of his peers
for trying to go forward with the story. Um, I
(39:51):
don't want to spoil it. If you don't know what happened.
To Gary Webb. I guess this would be the place
to hear about it. But check out our video series
right yeah, check, We've made a video episode about this.
But also there is a film I believe still in
theaters called Killed the Messenger that is all about the
Gary web story. That's true, and I've heard good things
about it. I haven't seen it yet, um, just because
(40:15):
you know, we had we had looked into it so much.
I didn't want to be that guy in the movie
theater going what oh sure, because those people are annoying
and uh, and we also know there have been other
implications of governmental shenanigans involving turning a blind eye to
the drug trade. There's been uh, conspiracy theories about every
(40:35):
aspect of the drug trade, including the idea that the
c i A purposefully marketed crack cocaine to impoverished minorities,
especially there in California, as a way of sending out
the population or attempting to. And there are also allegations
(40:55):
that it was to be used to kind of break
up the Black Power movement. Um the because you know
they are they already kind of at least the FBI
worked on destroying the Black power movement by segmenting it up,
by turning all the different groups against each other, and
then you know, later on down the road to get
cracked and you kind of do the same thing when
(41:16):
you have gangs formed. You know. I would like to
hear from our listeners to hear if you guys think
that there is any proof to that um and we
are going to start heading out today. But I have
to ask you, Matt, if you were going to change
the US drug laws, what would you change and how?
Thanks Ben for that simple softball question. I'm just popping it.
(41:42):
It's it's so soft. It's like I'm tossing your kitten
to you and zero gravity. Alright, Well, Senator Frederick, would
uh would put forth legislation that would honestly, I would
probably want to. I mean, the best way to kill
a black market is to make it leagal, and I
(42:02):
think I think that's true currently Portugal. Huh like Portugal? Yeah, uh,
that's weird because they've They've become an often cited example.
But do you think that all drugs then would be legal?
Like would you want heroin to be legal? I would?
This is gosh, I sound I probably sound like an
(42:22):
idiot to many of you. But yeah, I would say
I would want heroin to be legal and it would
be on a shelf, and I wouldn't buy it the
same way. I wouldn't, you know, go in and try
and get xan X or something, or I wouldn't go
in and try and I don't know, get some other
high level drug that I don't need that's prescription right now. Um.
I would view it that way. And then if somebody
(42:44):
really needs heroin because they're going to die if they
don't get it, you know, from the reactions of not
having it, then it's there. Um. And then I would
also Senator Frederick would introduce legislation that would focus on
again rehabilitation, the idea that this looking at addiction differently,
(43:05):
not as a criminal activity, but as a chemical issue
with your body. I see, Yeah, that's that's pretty fair. Yeah.
I I don't know, I've been listening to too much
Russell Brand lately. He gets I mean, he he is
a has a really good insight into what it means
to be addicted to drugs. And you know, he is
a comedian and an actor, but he's lived for that life. Yeah,
(43:29):
and he's got a great show. We're actually pretty big fans. Yeah,
I watch it probably every day. Yeah, so we're actually
pretty big fansy years, Mr brand Uh, if you ever
want to hang out, let us let us know, please,
I don't know, if you ever happen to be down
this way down Atlanta way. Uh, you know what I
would like to try to do, Matt where I Senator Boland? Well,
(43:51):
I guess this wouldn't really work in a democracy and
need to be a dictator, umator. I mean sure all
dictators are like kind of benevolent during the honeymoon period. Right,
Here's the way I would do, just for like a
year or two, I would make everything illegal, everything, every
single thing, and turn the country into a prison. The
(44:14):
whole country. Everybody's under arrest. What did you do? Don't answer,
it was against the law. And then I'd slowly start
to make things legal again and let some people out
of this massive prisons. Everybody stays in the country in
or out. We're like Madagascar and pandemic and uh, you know,
slowly ease back into some things and then you know,
(44:36):
see which one is the trigger point? You go start
with walking outside is now legal again, and people can
walk outside only between three and four, because you gotta
start small, repeal all this stuff at once. Now, of course,
ladies and gentlemen, I hope you understand that I am
joking and that is a terrible, terrible form policy. If
(44:57):
there are any world leaders in the audience today, please please,
please please do not make everything illegal just to see
what would happen. Thank you for putting that idea into
their brains. Now, man, I look forward to in twenty
years when somebody goes, you know, let's do it. Why not,
why don't we just make everything illegal? Um? But then
(45:19):
there's a question, what would happen to the economy. For instance,
if if all drugs were legal in the United States, Uh,
there would be a massive shift in the economy. Um.
And that is something to consider. Also, quit plug for Freakonomics.
If you guys checked them out, they have this great
They have this great investigation of how much money a
(45:40):
drug dealer actually does or does not make, and they
equated it to something around minimum wage before minimum wage
got raised. Yeah, it's it's sobering and saddening. Then there's
the show called drug inc. That I watched a special
on not long ago, and it focused on Atlanta and
the molly trade or the ecstasy trade in Atlanta, and
(46:02):
it focused on some low level drug dealers, and that
was one of the main points was just how how
not lucrative it is for somebody who's actually in danger
of getting arrested and put in jail for years. Right, Yeah,
not to mention no health insurance, no benefits, none of that.
I guess you get cobroke. You had to ouch. So
(46:24):
on that note, listeners, we hope you enjoyed this episode
as much as we enjoyed making it, and we want
to hear your thoughts on the drug war. If you'd
like to check out our videos or our podcasts, go
to Stuff they Don't want you to Know dot com.
You can find every little thing we've ever done, I
think pretty much. You can also go to our YouTube
channel if you don't already do that on the RAG,
because you should. And that's the end of this classic episode.
(46:47):
If you have any thoughts or questions about this episode,
you can get into contact with us in a number
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(47:09):
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you listen to your favorite shows.
This is the war on drugs. Yes, this is your war.
This is your war on drugs. This is your brain
on the war on drugs. And this is our classic
episode on the War on drugs. You could you could
write a book about this. Many people have and some
of those books are very good. In this episode, we're
exploring not just the modern idea of the war on drugs,
(00:23):
but all the precedents that led us to the current situation.
And uh spoiler alert. You know, we don't really solve
the problem, I think, but we do build a case
for conspiracy. And you know what, there's not much else
to say. Let's jump right into it. From UFOs two
ghosts and government cover ups, histories writ with unexplained events.
(00:45):
You can turn back now or learn the stuff they
don't want me to now. Hello, and welcome back to
the show. My name is Matt and I'm Ben not
a cop Boland and over there is Noel Brown. Ladies
and gentlemen are famous super producer Noel Brown. Could we
(01:06):
get some sirens at the top of your mild? Perfect?
Oh why why are there cops here? Well, that's one
of the reasons why I said that I am not
a cop. But I'm not so sure about you. Met. Uh, Today,
we have some sirens and some imaginary police officers here
(01:27):
to help us out with a very sticky, controversial subject,
ladies and gentlemen, the war on drugs. Well, let's get
right into it. What the heck is it? Where did
it come from? How did it start? Oh? Yeah, okay,
So the phrase the war on drugs is actually not
that old. It goes back to nineteen seventy one. On
(01:51):
June the president of the time, Richard Nixon, held a
press conference, and this was the day after he had
given a special message to the Congress on drug abuse
Prevention and Control. So during this press conference, Matt he
says that drug abuse is public enemy number one, and
he says that he's going to devote more money to here.
(02:14):
Here's the first time he was ever said the war
on drugs. So this phrase the war on drugs really
just got taken up by the media and it was
used all over the place. Um, and the way we
think about the war on drugs now in at least
when we're putting this out, is a little different than
maybe the way it was presented at the time. In
(02:37):
the beginning, it was you know, about trying to help
people rehabilitate drug users. Uh, it was about preventing new
addicts from getting addicted. Um. But that kind of that message,
let's say, UM was kind of put in different places,
and we'll go maybe go over some of those other organizations,
(02:59):
but it was focused on just the word war focuses
you on like battle guns, like create all kinds of
crazy things. At least those images are are created in
your head when you hear that phrase, right, Yeah. And
it's also a war on an idea, which is what
(03:21):
what drug use. I guess you could argue that it's
a war on a specific thing, but I think it's
more a war on an activity, which is people using drugs.
And you make a very interesting point about portraying this
as a war sort of criminalize is that people who
are addicted, and in other countries addiction is often treated
like a disease. Right. Uh. But we know, as you said,
(03:47):
that the war on drugs has evolved from its rehabilitative
aims that that we're part of it. I mean, they
always wanted to criminalize drugs, but part of it was
rehab alitation and helping with community oriented solutions. But today guys,
the war on drugs in the United States takes an
(04:07):
estimated fifty one billion with a B dollars of the
US budget. That's according to the Drug Policy Alliance. And
for everybody who's listening now and saying, you, guys, don't
be shallow. The war on drugs didn't start in the seventies.
It goes way way back. Well, we know, we looked
into it. Oh absolutely, Uh. The US has always had
(04:31):
an adversarial relationship with drugs because you know, we we
think of drugs as a bad thing, an immoral thing
to do, at least in the moral code of let's
say Christianity, just as one yeah, as one example, um,
something you're not supposed to do. So the first drug
laws actually surfaced way back in the eighteen sixties. Yeah,
(04:55):
those books. Yeah, those were opium related, I think, um,
and those were local as well, right then. The first
law that restricted drugs on like a national level was
the Harrison Narcotics Act of nineteen fourteen, and that was
related to again opium, was trying to tax opium as
well as cocaine. Yeah, and at this time we see
(05:16):
cocaine being illegal unless you are an individual or a
company with a license now I have Uh, I have
no real idea and full disclosure, Matt Noel and I
are not drug dealers, nor to my knowledge, drug addicts. Well,
I got caffeine. I got a caffeine monkey. Yeah, I've
(05:38):
got several that are currently legal. Okay, all right, um,
but we know that, you know, the idea that an
individual could get a license got to be crazy, Like
that guy had the best pickup line at the bar, right,
It's like, oh here, let me show you my license.
I've got my opium license. Yeah. Yeah. So let's as
(06:00):
fast forward past alcohol prohibition, that huge debacle from nineteen
thirty three. Because it did not work. It did give
us several political dynasties that started out as criminals. Oh yeah,
tons of those, and fun little secret bars that are
really popular now, speakeasies that you can go to and
find a hidden door somewhere, the cottage industry of creative
(06:23):
people making moonshine, I mean prohibition. Uh, this is a
scary thing. It will come up later and many ways.
Prohibition was fantastic for parts of the U. S. Economy,
but at the same time it had a bloody history.
There were so many people died during prohibition. Uh, not
only from being shot by authorities or authorities being shot
(06:45):
by uh you know, moonshiners or whoever is trying to
make the stuff a bootleggers, people getting killed from poisoned
alcohol and yeah, rock gout alcohol that wasn't made correctly.
Yeah that because without going into all of the specifics
of how to create moonshine, um, which some which my
(07:07):
family knows about. Uh, we can point you to I
believe stuff you should know as an episode on moonshine,
and they do a great job explaining how to make
this uh strange, fantastic, potentially blinding drink. But we do
know that marijuana was also one of the things that
fell under the purview of drug laws, the Marijuana Transfer
(07:31):
Tax Act, And this thing has its own bunch of
conspiracy theories, right Matt, it passed in What were some
of the theories about why it's illegal. Well, there are
a couple of theories about hemp um and hemp production
and how that might take over other textile industries at
the time, cotton specifically. Yeah, I remember that at the time.
(07:53):
The the idea is that at the time William Randolph
Hurst newspaper tycoon. I love the word tycoon, get to
use it very often, but this guy was legit tycoon.
He there could have been a William Randolph Hurst tycoon
video game. Yeah. I wonder if they're going to come
out with a Simhurst or something. Uh. Anyhow, this so
(08:14):
this Hurst guy, as the story goes, and listeners most
of you already know this. As the story goes, this
guy owned acres acres and acres and acres of timber,
and with the invention of a new device, decourse Raider
or something himp, all of a sudden became a primary
(08:34):
competitor and was a more efficient plant for the creation
of paper right and other industrial products rope, et cetera. Uh.
And that the story goes that Hurst cooperated with some
of his other buddies in power to shut down the industry,
the burgeoning marijuana or himp industry, and one of the
(08:57):
ways they did that was to put out propaganda pieces
about the Remember the I think I think one of
the ones we ran in our marijuana video was the
devil weed weed. Yeah. It preyed upon these horrible, horrible
depictions of like, uh, the caricatures of people who were
(09:21):
Mexican and they were drawn as these like pseudo human
monsters that were, of course, you know, all after the
white women. And if yeah, and if if a young
lady of otherwise good moral standing was foolish enough to
smoke Reefer in a jazz club, oh man, you the
(09:44):
terrible things that would happen to her, It's the end
of America right there, right, yeah, it is. So we
know that this, um, we know that there are other
conspiracy theories that maybe this was something to do with
the depots and the invention of nylon and then wanted
to use that instead. Most of these conspiracy theories are
(10:05):
related to industrial competition, but have not been conclusively proven.
At this point, I think it's important to say that, yeah, absolutely,
there are holes in some of those stories. There are holes.
But you know, on the other side, they do point
to just the powerful trying to remain powerful. I mean,
somebody paid for those propaganda pieces, right of Marijuana Madness,
(10:29):
which is um. That reminds me of that that film
Reefer Madness. Always see that. Oh yeah, I have a
copy of it on my computer. Actually, I think that
you know, I'm not gonna name names, but one of
my extended family members watched this, and I don't think
they understood it was a comedy. Yeah yeah, I don't
know how you couldn't get it. Uh yeah, I guess
(10:51):
you're just if you don't have the right frame older
person to I mean, I felt like that had to
he said. But okay, So we have this history of
all these different attempts to um criminalize, prohibit, or completely
eradicate drugs and drug trades. Here's the million dollar question.
(11:12):
Has the war on drugs worked? Well? Listener, what do
you think since nine seventy one the drug war has
officially been on, It's been waged. We're in the middle
of it right now, front lines. Well not US, but
like the d hopefully not US, hopefully never US. No.
But but honestly, do you think the just sitting there
(11:36):
listening to this, do you think the availability of drugs
has increased or decreased since n Well, the answer is
it's increased a lot, depending on which drugs we're talking about. Right. Sure,
there are a couple of drugs that slipped through the cracks. Uh, Ludes,
(11:56):
Coludes were a prescription drugs. Good point, Yeah, I mean
because my example, um yeah, and we'll explore some uh,
some different arguments for against prohibition and whether or not
it is effective. Because any any law that criminalizes a drug, right,
whether it be caffeine, adderall, crack, cocaine, or coludes. Uh,
(12:21):
that is essentially prohibitive law. It's you cannot do something
versus a you must do something. So, so if we
ask has the war on drugs worked? Very interesting thing here,
my friends, because what we're really what we're really answering there, Uh,
it depends on who you are as whether or not
(12:42):
it's worked. So if the goal was to stop the
availability of drugs, as you said, then clearly that hasn't happened.
I mean, teenagers and multiple polls find it easier to
get marijuana or cocaine than it is to buy alcohol,
which is legal. You know. Yeah, you need an idea
to get alcohol, or you know at least somebody who
(13:03):
will go in there and get it for you, Yeah,
whereas you just need to go to the right like
fish concert to get spot yeah, or I mean just
college campus or wherever. I mean, it's it's it's terrifying. Yeah,
it's terrifying how available that's any of those drugs are, right,
because it shows that things don't work. But what if
(13:24):
the goal of US drug policy isn't about eradicating the
drug trade? What do you mean? Of course it is.
Here's where it gets crazy. After a word from our
sponsors and we are back. Okay, So we left off saying,
(13:50):
what if the US drug policy goals weren't necessarily oriented
towards eradicating the drug trade? What if they were more
towards managing it or using it to do something else, like, oh,
I don't know, increase budgets or police departments and federal
agencies across the board. Yeah, that's true. That's a definite
(14:11):
thing that has happened. If you if you think the
war on drugs is a failure, right, uh, then you
are like three out of four Americans in two thousand
and eight. How insane is that? Right? In democracies Now,
the US is a republic, but in a democratic system,
a number that high is supposed to be a clear message,
(14:34):
right yeah, um, depending upon who they're representing at the time.
We know that the war on drugs created soaring incarceration rates.
We've got some scary numbers about it. That's right. Then,
with just five percent of the total world population. The
US has twenty of the world's prisoners, so that means
(14:56):
that proportionately we lead the world just hugely, big time.
We live for people who use the word freedom so
often in conversations. I know how cynical this sounds. We
put a lot of people in jail, it doesn't matter
what your political stances. We put a lot of people
in jail. And then a lot of people are there
(15:17):
for drug offenses. And we don't do it for everybody.
Ben as most of us know, um, dis Disproportionately, these
laws end up in prisoning minorities like way more than
let's say, white people. Ah. Yes, So just for some
perspective here, in two thousand eight, Washington Post found that
(15:38):
of the one point five million Americans arrested each year
for drugs, half a million would be incarcerated five hundred
thousand a year. And of those five hundred thousand, uh,
the majority are going to be minorities, especially African Americans.
So this translates to one in five Black Americans uh.
(16:00):
In estimation, one in five Black Americans spending time behind
bars due to drug laws. And these kind of statistics
they're overwhelming, first of all, but they're also leading people, UH,
such as Michelle Alexander, who's a critic. She says that
mass in car incarceration is kind of the new Jim Crow, which,
(16:21):
if we remember the Jim Crow laws, they were meant
to I don't know a good way to say, it's
stifle the African American UH set of rights. Right. Yeah,
Jim Crow laws come in, UH, you know, in the
period between slavery and UH legalized quality thinks to civil rights.
Jim Crow laws were another way to repress and manage
(16:45):
the United States black population, UH through what was in
many ways systematized enslavement under a different name. I mean,
we're not talking a lot of people. They hear Jim
Crow law and they think separate water fountains, right, separate restrooms,
separate entrances. But this is also something like enforced work. Right.
(17:08):
You are locked up for an arbitrary reason and then
made to work for uh some of the same companies
and in early days, some of the same people who
thought it was a good idea to have slaves in
the first place. Yeah. It's interesting to use the word
management again, Ben, because it's something that we're finding throughout
this this series here just trying to manage manage populations
(17:31):
in this weird way without showing the hand of the
manager because the laws to meet are these rigid structures. Um,
they're faceless. Yeah, it's their ideas, so that I think
that's a really good point. Now I want to be
completely fair and point out that later on in the podcast,
we're going to talk about the arguments for this prohibition. Right,
(17:56):
and clearly, clearly not everyone thinks that there is some
overarching conspiracy to re enslave um the black population, minority populations.
So one of the questions there is, um, is this
disproportionate incarceration occurring on purpose or is it the culmination
(18:19):
of a bunch of short term decisions such as politicians
who want to be tough on crime. That's great for votes,
right and uh? And also a socioeconomic situation of vast
swass of a population. That's true. Yeah, So what what
is the cause? Is there and orchestrated cause here? And
(18:42):
are drug laws excuse me, our drug laws part of this?
You know, some drugs have been disproportionately legislated. And I'm
sure a lot of people are waiting for us to
get to this. Uh. The famous one hundred to one
sentencing disparity for possession of crack cocaine. Verse is powder cocaine? Uh?
That's crazy talk. Yeah, and what causes that? Why the
(19:06):
heck is that even a thing? Is it some kind
of media based panic, like a racial bias that's happening
in the media, um or even in the law enforcement system. Yeah,
that's a good question. Uh. I everything that I've heard
of crack sounds terrifying to me. It's one of those
it's one of those things where just I'm not passing
(19:27):
judgment on people met but it's one of those things
where I always wonder, like, what is the thought process
that makes you say, you know, what is a good
idea today? Crack cocaine? Yeah? I have some unfortunately personal experiences, uh,
dealing with somebody who's addicted to crack cocaine that I'm
not going to talk about right here, but I can
(19:48):
just say that it is pretty freaking horrendous and it's
definitely not you know, I just want to establish it's
it's not it's not you, it's not null. Wait is
it me? Did I black out and do some crack? So?
I mean, we're making light of a very serious thing,
but The truth of the matter is that for a
(20:09):
long time, this this sort of disparity in sentencing resulted
in a lot of people who had the same amount
of cocaine in a in a crack form going to
jail for much much longer if the cocaine possessor even
went to jail at all. Yeah, because the truth is
(20:30):
right that they found that there were demographics to drug
use and uh, people empower would probably not smoke crack,
but they might do cocaine, and they got lighter sentencing
until what two thousand ten, Yeah, and two thousands ten
Obama signed the Fair Sentencing Act to try at least
(20:52):
and reduce this disparity. We'll see if it works out.
So I want to go back to what you said
earlier because you made one of the biggest and best
points that I know a lot of people are waiting
for out there, which is a financial interest in the
drug war. The idea that the war on drugs is
a um a guaranteed boon or piece of the American economy.
(21:18):
I mean, what do you think. I absolutely believe that. Um.
I mean, the economy as a whole seems to churn
on a couple of different things. And one of them
is the drug trade because of the law enforcement angle
and the incarceration efforts. And think about the private prisons
now and the amount of money that goes into and
(21:40):
comes out of private prisons. I guess also it's a
it's a boon to the legislative industry or litical litigious industry. Yeah, well,
the drug a drug or drugs in general is a
great enemy to have to wage a war on, at
least from that endpoint, because like you said, it's nameless,
(22:02):
it's faceless, it doesn't really ever die. Like, how how
do you extinguish Druggs completely? I just can I go
on a right here. If we were to wage wars
on ideas, I would like to wage wars on things
like literacy, things like a war on uh, a war
on water contamination, a war on poverty would be a
(22:25):
great thing for a lot of Americans. And you're a
good hearted person. Well, I'd never be elected, but thank
you for saying so. And I think I think earlier
another US president did declare a war on poverty, but
it didn't carry as much attention. Yeah, there's not a
lot of money in stopping prop poverty. There's a lot
of money that comes out. Yeah, there's a lot of
(22:47):
money invested in arresting marijuana users. In two thousand nine
h the US spent and estimated seven billion dollars arresting
people for what I am at egine is I imagine
that's everything. So that's like possession, distribution growing, I guess too. Uh.
(23:08):
And we know that drugs are also pretty good source
of profit while they were illegal, right, oh yeah, because
inside this black market, the demand is never changed really
for drugs over time. There's always somebody, like a lot
of people who want drugs. And if you if you
control the market that you know, there aren't a lot
(23:30):
of competitors. You're making money. We're looking at profit margins
I mean over oh yeah, easily. And you know, there's
a question about whether drug cartels would want US drug
laws to change. You know, if it became legal, then
the people swooping in would be multinational corporations with one
(23:53):
hell of a war chest. Yeah, and taxes, I mean
tax money out of you. So yeah, there's a huge
incentive to perhaps that is that is weird, that's an
angle I've never thought about the incentive of the cartels
to maintain the drug war. Yeah, I wonder, I wonder
if it's true. Now. You know, we have some listeners
(24:15):
in our audience who are in law enforcement. And one
thing I think happens that is unfair that we should
talk about here is that a lot of the people
that you know, you will meet if you just are
on the street level, taking a street level look at crime. Right,
A lot of the people who are responsible for arresting someone, right,
(24:38):
they don't make the laws. It's their job. They have
to do it, you know, It's it's probably criminal for
them not to. And I think it's strange that these people,
these people who are on the front lines of the
war on drunks, right, Uh, they're the ones who get
so much of the criticism and so much of the flak.
And you know, it's the same aime with the street
(25:00):
level drug dealers, right, they get most of the prison time,
but not the guys at the top of the pyramid,
you know, on the other side. And you have to
wonder sometimes how often the tops of these two competing
pyramids talk, right, and if they work in unison. Uh,
that's you know, that's the bigcy that that's the that's
(25:24):
the big question. Um. So what I wanted to ask you, Matt,
is if we could talk a little bit about some
of the drug war stuff that we have covered in
our past videos. We have a whole bunch, right Um.
I'm trying to think just the numbers. I remember in
our original War on Drugs episode where we had the
(25:46):
little ticker in the side that shows how much money
is being spent by the US government on the war
on drugs. Yeah, real time while you're watching the video,
and it was it wasn't a huge amount. I think
it was five dollars a second. I think that's what
it was. I mean, when you hear that, it sounds
like a lot of money for you or I or
most of the people listening except for that one other
(26:07):
tycoon remember from the Bahamas. Yeah yeah, anyway, yeah, ready,
uh no, but okay, so it doesn't sound like that
much money. But then when you when you look at it,
you watch this video which is only three and a half,
I forget how many it is, but you just see
this massive number at the end, you realize, my god,
the amount of time it took me to watch this video,
(26:28):
a hundred thousand dollars which just spent. Well, here's let's
change directions a little bit then, because this leads us
to a great question arguments for against prohibition. Uh, do
you think that the current drug laws work or that
there I guess that the system in place is preferable
(26:51):
to other systems. Well, like you said, the system right
now arrests pawns, and it gets pawns, you know, and
and is a horrible way to look at it, but
pawns in the police department, the guys on the front lines,
the little man who's actually out there trying to fight
the war gets killed, you know, and the low level
(27:12):
drug dealer gets arrested or killed. I don't think that
works to solve anything. That just creates a perpetual pawn
death thing. So just a war of attrition, Yeah, war
progress to me, that's that's what I see. And you're
saying in your saying ponds completely and I'm not solely
in the chess game non interrogatory sense. I'm just you know,
(27:35):
you're sending your low level guys out to fight a war,
literally to fight a war, and you never get to
see the bishop make an entrance. Now you would say,
you know, it's interesting you say that because there are
there are people who say that prohibition in the United
States does work because a smaller amount of our population
(27:56):
uses opium, for instance, versus those who use something legal,
such as alcohol. So what what would you say to that.
I guess this is what I would do. I would
go into the argument about the health consequences of drug
X versus drug Y. Okay, I see, So maybe schedule
drugs based on that. Well, yeah, I mean, there are
(28:19):
a lot of things you could schedule them on. It's
just the way that drugs are currently scheduled. Even if
we just look I mean, honestly, let's just look at
marijuana versus alcohol. And this has been done so many times.
You've heard this over and over all your listeners. But
the known health effects of alcohol versus the known health
effects of marijuana are there's a huge disparity there where.
(28:43):
You know, with alcohol, you can if you consume enough,
get alcohol poisoning. If you consume enough and you drive
a vehicle or you know, use other heavy machinery, either
way it impairs you, you are most likely going to
hurt yourself or somebody else. Um, alcohol is legal. Alcohol
is good to go. On the other side, with marijuana,
a lot of the studies in there haven't been enough
(29:04):
studies yet at least that we can cite. But it
doesn't seem to have the same effects. You don't seem
to be able to overdose on it and die. Are
you saying those those posters from the thirties were wrong,
I'm saying they were propaganda? What no, I know, Come on, man, Jazz,
really that's true. So I'm just messing with you. But
(29:27):
but yeah, that's you know, that's a that's definitely a
valid argument that I see there. Um. I know that
when I've spoken to people who are law enforcement officers,
the vast majority of them would rather not have to
waste time and paperwork busting somebody with, you know, a
(29:50):
dime bag of pot or something. Because there are people
out there stealing cars, attacking the elderly, things like at
that should clearly be illegal. That's that's where I would
draw the line, right, And a lot of people in
the line of violent crime. Oh yeah, violent crime absolutely.
But that other thing you mentioned about cocaine versus crack picking, yeah,
(30:14):
oh my gosh. I mean there have been numerous exposees
about Washington, d c. And the amount of cocaine that
goes around that city, and you know, not for any
kind of miscreant, just running around on the south side
of town or the north side of town. You're talking
about the players, Yeah, yeah, the people in the houses
of power, whether corporate or governmental. You know, it's funny
(30:37):
because one of the things I learned we're looking at
this practice was that the human species at large seems
to go like nuts over cocaine. Were like that bird
in that Coco puffs, Uh, that Coco puffscot is like
cuckoo for Coco puffs or whatever. Yeah, people are cuckoo
for cocaine, you know. Uh. The Mayor Rob Ford was
(31:01):
in the news a lot for his use of crack cocaine,
so I assume that would be regular cocaine as well. Um.
There was a weird study that came out of a
few years back that said, um, I think there's some
towns in Italy where so many people use cocaine that
you can find trace amounts of it in the water. Uh.
(31:22):
And you know they're always those statistics people like to
whip out where they say, like of euros or dollars
have traces of drugs and fecal matter on them and
stuff so I don't know how how realistic that is.
But then again, I don't know how realistic it is
to try to ban something that's so many people indulge in.
(31:47):
The only kinds of prohibition that seemed to work for
a long time in human history are religious prohibitions, like
dietary restrictions, and it's because somebody's God has commanded them
not too Yeah, so it's voluntary, right, But I don't know,
I'm I'm ranting, I guess a little bit. It's just
it's just strange to me. We haven't even talked about
(32:09):
opium production in Afghanistan during the war, you know what.
Let's talk about that next. But first pausible word from
our sponsors. We're back. So the opium trade, the opium war,
(32:32):
and the Afghanistan war, let's talk about it, man, Okay. Well,
one thing that's interesting about the operations in Afghanistan, which
I think most of the American public was on the
same page this was these were operations to catch terrorists, right,
They were after terrorists, and they were hoping to stem
(32:57):
the flow of terrorism. Uh at the time, one one
unforeseen side effect, at least most of the American public
didn't see this coming was that opium production in Afghanistan increased.
Their their number of possible factors for this. Uh. People
who believe there's a conspiracy of foot will say that
(33:19):
UM intelligence agencies or private companies wanted to rest control
of this of the you know, one of the world's
prime opium sources and UH profit from it. But then
other people would say, well, that's that's a little bit crazy.
What's happening instead is that farmers in Afghanistan are finding
(33:41):
that is more profitable to grow poppies than it is
to grow you know, other products. Right, Oh, yeah, it's
it's hugely profitable. And you have to think the thought
of going into the opium fields the you know, and
we're talking this is one of the largest, if not
the largest opium deduction areas in the entire world, right
(34:02):
in Afghanistan. So the idea of going in there is
to stop that money that would be coming from the
profit of the sale of that product to fun terrorism.
And now you've got the soldiers in there, and in
theory they're protecting it and making sure you know, I
guess none gets sold or you I don't. I mean,
I I guess I just don't understand the operational like
(34:26):
what they're doing the goals. Yeah, you know, it's funny
because and this is a bit of a tangent. We
can do an entirely different series about wars. But uh,
one thing that was interesting to me is that UM,
before the United States became involved in Afghanistan, Uh, there
were some discoveries that you and I have talked about
(34:46):
about large amounts of what are called rare earth metals
or minerals, and some of these deposits rival those found
in Mongolia, which is a huge source of rare earth
materials UM and and rare earth material is sort of
a misnomer because it's relatively rare in earth right in
(35:09):
the natural world. But if you live in an industrialized society,
it is all around you in your smartphone and your microphone.
If it has a phone on it, then it probably
has or if there's electronics, I mean, if there's a motherboard,
just there's some rare earth elements. So I've heard some
people say that that was one of the actual aims
of US intervention there. But if you check out our
(35:31):
Great Game podcast, you will see how the Soviet Union
and the United States and the UK before it have
always fought over this part of the world, Eurasia, Central Asia.
UM has always been a a huge piece of the
(35:52):
global hegemonic pie that no one can seem to hold
for very long. Right. It's still really strange to me
that after all that and thinking about all those factors,
the fact is global opium production is at an all
time high. Yeah, it's increased. And we know that there
was a much earlier war on drugs, and we won't
(36:14):
talk too much about today because we have a video
series about this coming out that you guys should check
out if you're interested, and that is on the opium wars,
which don't get reported that much in Western textbooks nowadays.
Um maybe because it is such a a grossly unethical war.
(36:35):
UM Quick and Dirty reader's digest version here. Essentially, the
West wanted to do more trade with China at the time, right,
And the problem was that the West, specifically Britain the
United Kingdom, didn't have anything that China really wanted, right
(36:56):
except for opium because they still controlled that in the
British Empire. So they started trying to uh make trade
with opium right and get the population addicted. And China
had a problem with that and a war began because
of that. It was it was literally a drug war.
(37:18):
And you're going to find out a lot more about
that in the video series, so stay tuned and then
we will be making an audio podcast about that as well.
Yeah we probably should. Yeah, so I should stop talking
about there, So let's instead talk a little bit more
about conspiracy surrounding the war on drugs. Other criticisms are
that this creates a permanent underclass, that current drug policies,
(37:42):
in one way or another, accelerate inequality. Yeah, so now
you have a large part of the population that has
to I mean that there isn't really much of a
way out of their let's say situation then to be
low level criminal, low level per and selling drugs because
it's profitable enough in the short term to maybe get
(38:04):
you out of that that situation. Um. And then you've
also got and I don't know how to how to
put this, but you have a huge amount of job
openings for law enforcement, for low level law enforcement, um,
because you need people to fight the battle on the
other side. M it's interesting, Yeah, the the entry level
(38:25):
and just another thing, I don't know if you know
this or not, but police officers don't get paid very
well for the amount of risk they go through every day. Yeah,
that is absolutely true. That's a that's a huge problem.
I would say that teachers and police officers, e m
t s and firefighters are some of the most dramatically
(38:45):
underpaid people in US society. And while we're talking about
government jobs, Uh, let's go to one of your favorite
conspiracy theories, met and I guess in some cases it's
a conspiracy fact. Is it true, Matt, that government agencies
have participated in the illegal drug trade? Ah? This is
(39:10):
a difficult thing to prove with cold heart evidence. Although
if you if you know this one guy's name, you
might have a clue. Mr Gary Webb. Uh. He was
a journalist who stumbled upon a story that was probably
too big for him or for any other singular person
(39:31):
to take on. So Gary discovered that, at least allegedly
that the CIA was trafficking drugs, and uh he tried
to get the story out as much as he could.
He was largely discredited by a lot of his peers
for trying to go forward with the story. Um, I
(39:51):
don't want to spoil it. If you don't know what happened.
To Gary Webb. I guess this would be the place
to hear about it. But check out our video series
right yeah, check, We've made a video episode about this.
But also there is a film I believe still in
theaters called Killed the Messenger that is all about the
Gary web story. That's true, and I've heard good things
about it. I haven't seen it yet, um, just because
(40:15):
you know, we had we had looked into it so much.
I didn't want to be that guy in the movie
theater going what oh sure, because those people are annoying
and uh, and we also know there have been other
implications of governmental shenanigans involving turning a blind eye to
the drug trade. There's been uh, conspiracy theories about every
(40:35):
aspect of the drug trade, including the idea that the
c i A purposefully marketed crack cocaine to impoverished minorities,
especially there in California, as a way of sending out
the population or attempting to. And there are also allegations
(40:55):
that it was to be used to kind of break
up the Black Power movement. Um the because you know
they are they already kind of at least the FBI
worked on destroying the Black power movement by segmenting it up,
by turning all the different groups against each other, and
then you know, later on down the road to get
cracked and you kind of do the same thing when
(41:16):
you have gangs formed. You know. I would like to
hear from our listeners to hear if you guys think
that there is any proof to that um and we
are going to start heading out today. But I have
to ask you, Matt, if you were going to change
the US drug laws, what would you change and how?
Thanks Ben for that simple softball question. I'm just popping it.
(41:42):
It's it's so soft. It's like I'm tossing your kitten
to you and zero gravity. Alright, Well, Senator Frederick, would
uh would put forth legislation that would honestly, I would
probably want to. I mean, the best way to kill
a black market is to make it leagal, and I
(42:02):
think I think that's true currently Portugal. Huh like Portugal? Yeah, uh,
that's weird because they've They've become an often cited example.
But do you think that all drugs then would be legal?
Like would you want heroin to be legal? I would?
This is gosh, I sound I probably sound like an
(42:22):
idiot to many of you. But yeah, I would say
I would want heroin to be legal and it would
be on a shelf, and I wouldn't buy it the
same way. I wouldn't, you know, go in and try
and get xan X or something, or I wouldn't go
in and try and I don't know, get some other
high level drug that I don't need that's prescription right now. Um.
I would view it that way. And then if somebody
(42:44):
really needs heroin because they're going to die if they
don't get it, you know, from the reactions of not
having it, then it's there. Um. And then I would
also Senator Frederick would introduce legislation that would focus on
again rehabilitation, the idea that this looking at addiction differently,
(43:05):
not as a criminal activity, but as a chemical issue
with your body. I see, Yeah, that's that's pretty fair. Yeah.
I I don't know, I've been listening to too much
Russell Brand lately. He gets I mean, he he is
a has a really good insight into what it means
to be addicted to drugs. And you know, he is
a comedian and an actor, but he's lived for that life. Yeah,
(43:29):
and he's got a great show. We're actually pretty big fans. Yeah,
I watch it probably every day. Yeah, so we're actually
pretty big fansy years, Mr brand Uh, if you ever
want to hang out, let us let us know, please,
I don't know, if you ever happen to be down
this way down Atlanta way. Uh, you know what I
would like to try to do, Matt where I Senator Boland? Well,
(43:51):
I guess this wouldn't really work in a democracy and
need to be a dictator, umator. I mean sure all
dictators are like kind of benevolent during the honeymoon period. Right,
Here's the way I would do, just for like a
year or two, I would make everything illegal, everything, every
single thing, and turn the country into a prison. The
(44:14):
whole country. Everybody's under arrest. What did you do? Don't answer,
it was against the law. And then I'd slowly start
to make things legal again and let some people out
of this massive prisons. Everybody stays in the country in
or out. We're like Madagascar and pandemic and uh, you know,
slowly ease back into some things and then you know,
(44:36):
see which one is the trigger point? You go start
with walking outside is now legal again, and people can
walk outside only between three and four, because you gotta
start small, repeal all this stuff at once. Now, of course,
ladies and gentlemen, I hope you understand that I am
joking and that is a terrible, terrible form policy. If
(44:57):
there are any world leaders in the audience today, please please,
please please do not make everything illegal just to see
what would happen. Thank you for putting that idea into
their brains. Now, man, I look forward to in twenty
years when somebody goes, you know, let's do it. Why not,
why don't we just make everything illegal? Um? But then
(45:19):
there's a question, what would happen to the economy. For instance,
if if all drugs were legal in the United States, Uh,
there would be a massive shift in the economy. Um.
And that is something to consider. Also, quit plug for Freakonomics.
If you guys checked them out, they have this great
They have this great investigation of how much money a
(45:40):
drug dealer actually does or does not make, and they
equated it to something around minimum wage before minimum wage
got raised. Yeah, it's it's sobering and saddening. Then there's
the show called drug inc. That I watched a special
on not long ago, and it focused on Atlanta and
the molly trade or the ecstasy trade in Atlanta, and
(46:02):
it focused on some low level drug dealers, and that
was one of the main points was just how how
not lucrative it is for somebody who's actually in danger
of getting arrested and put in jail for years. Right, Yeah,
not to mention no health insurance, no benefits, none of that.
I guess you get cobroke. You had to ouch. So
(46:24):
on that note, listeners, we hope you enjoyed this episode
as much as we enjoyed making it, and we want
to hear your thoughts on the drug war. If you'd
like to check out our videos or our podcasts, go
to Stuff they Don't want you to Know dot com.
You can find every little thing we've ever done, I
think pretty much. You can also go to our YouTube
channel if you don't already do that on the RAG,
because you should. And that's the end of this classic episode.
(46:47):
If you have any thoughts or questions about this episode,
you can get into contact with us in a number
of different ways. One of the best is to give
us a call. Our number is one eight three three
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We are conspiracy at i heart radio dot com. Stuff
(47:09):
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