More Proof that the Drug War is a Failure

I've asserted here several times that the War on Drugs is a costly boondoggle and a bitter failure. Filling our prisons and clogging our court systems with non-violent drug offenders is the height of stupidity. Give these people treatment, not jail cells. Then hardcore drug usage might actually drop.

There is no better example of the insanity of the drug war than the case of the woman pictured in the mugshots above. Here is her story:

Sheriff's deputies arrived at a trailer on Monday and were shocked to find severely disfigured Heather Raybon there with another man, both surrounded by drug paraphernalia in the midst of a working meth lab, reported Fox10TV.com.

The 31-year-old had been permanently scarred when a drug den blew up in 2004 but even with her face left a distorted, melted mask she couldn't keep away from the addictive drug.

In the latest incident, narcotic detectives found materials and ingredients to cook up crystal meth, along with 13 grams of meth powder and 32 grams of meth oil. There was such a strong risk of explosion from the one-pot lab that police called the fire department to safely neutralize it.

Of all the illegal narcotics out there, crystal meth is arguably the worst. Cheap, easy to make, highly addictive and terribly destructive to the addict's health. You'll get no argument from me that it is not a scourge upon the earth.

And yet, what social good has come out of arresting the unfortunate Ms. Raybon four more times since that awful day when she melted her own face off? If that horrific experience wasn't enough to get her to quit, sticking her in a jail cell again certainly isn't going to do the trick. It is long past time for America to stop treating drug addiction as a crime, since doing so is nothing but counterproducutive and insanely expensive to boot.


Bonus: Crystal Meth really is as awful as this song is harrowing.