A WARMONGER EXCLUSIVE: THE FAILED WAR ON DRUGS AND THE CONSEQUENCES OF THEM

Let me start off by saying I am not a drug addict. I hate prescription pain killers, which is the worst drug scourge the country has, even though our DEA is much more interested in pot busts. What a waste of time and money that is? But what are the consequences of this stupid boondoggle being heaved upon us by greedy lobbyists who demand bigger drug busts to fill their coffers? Here is the story of someone I knew personally before drugs ruined his life.

Here are links to three stories connected with Dean LaChappelle, a 18 year old with a troubled past who got worse not better:

http://www.ctnow.com/news/connecticut/tolland/hc-coventry-lockdown-0405-20120404,0,3946995.story

http://www.wfsb.com/story/17348822/teen-runs-from-cops-gets-stuck-in-chimney

http://newlondon.patch.com/articles/suspected-burglar-catches-the-flue

Dean used to be a regular fixture at a friend's house, Chuck, who I see frequently. He is an older man with kids of a similar age and, realizing that Dean's home life sucked, invited him to stay at his place as it is quite large and he had the extra room. Chuck  taught him valuable skills like auto and home repair and even used him in his bait business. Other than a few mild run ins with the law, Dean seemed to be on the right path.

Then came the heroin use and everything changed. Chuck was forced to kick him out as he began to steal whatever he could to feed his habit. He went on to rip off others in town as well, making him a a pariah that many would have reacted very violently to seeing him.

I heard the stories about him as he life went severely downhill. He used to take money from suckers to "go buy drugs," and then disappear never to be seen again. He was breaking into house. He was getting arrested on a near regular basis. Dean's progress had reversed course and now he was headed for real trouble.

Running from the cops was not wise, and after crashing his parent's car, he fled, causing a lock down for some local school for many hours. He checked into a rehab clinic soon after but fled once cops arrived to serve him with a felony arrest warrant for yet another burglary. The funny part is that they were never actually going to arrest him, just serve him papers, and let him finish his rehab. But no, numnuts ran and got himself stuck in a chimney. Chuck had taught him how to clean chimneys in the past and he thought that one looked wide enough for him to fit through. He was wrong.

This is what drugs do to you. So why would I be for decriminalization and legalization? Because the alternative to having some dumb ass get stuck in a chimney is a government telling me and him and all of us that only the drugs they approve of are okay regardless of what any scientific data says. And that is far more dangerous than Dean's idiotic flight from the cops. Studies show that there is very little uptick whenever drugs are decriminalized as places like Holland and Portugal show us and the real savings of this trillion dollar sinkhole cannot be overemphasized.

Yes heroin ruined Dean's life, a life I and others hope he can get back. But if heroin were legal tomorrow, would any of you out there use it? I kind of doubt it. A substance being illegal may actually increase the likelihood that someone will use it not vice versa. We need to follow Europe's example and stop worrying about small amounts of drugs on people where almost all of the EU has decriminalization laws of some sort on the books and trust me, their drug use is far less than ours.

Call on your politicians to end the drug war today. It's money we cannot afford to spend anymore.