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The Non-Sense
of the Senate Blame the Drug War -- not guns -- for child killings Arlington, Virginia - On Wednesday, the U.S. Senate, pressured by the Million
Mom March and the overwhelming desire to act as though the Senators knew what to
do, passed a pair of non-binding "Sense of the Senate" resolutions.
"The Democrats stated their strong support for further restricting
Americans' Second Amendment rights and the Republicans countered with their
continued support for 20,000 bad gun laws," declared Harry Browne,
Libertarian candidate for President in 2000. Even though the resolutions were non-binding, the debate was characterized as
procedural hardball. And it yielded a surprising admission by Senator Larry
Craig of Idaho (quoting from a Reuters report) that young people who die of
gun-related causes each year are not little children but older teens, many of
whom "are caught in the cross-fire of a drug war in the streets of
America." The solution to that, he said, lies in ending the War on Drugs,
not in starting a War on Guns. "I have never met anyone who believes we're winning the insane War on
Drugs. But politicians love to pretend that we are," said Harry Browne, the
Libertarians' 1996 nominee for President. "Perhaps Senator Craig is finally
realizing what millions of Americans already know - that the Drug War is a cruel
and brutal failure." Browne noted that "The National Rifle Association (NRA) and Republican
politicians have recently urged that today's 20,000 gun-control laws be enforced
-- no matter how bad those laws. Libertarians know that those laws are, at best,
useless -- and, at worst, highly dangerous." Senator Craig is on the Board
of Directors of the NRA, and is one of 69 Republicans who voted for the
resolution calling for stricter enforcement of gun-control laws. "Instead," urged Browne, "we need to recognize that those
20,000 laws are a principal cause of the current violence in society. They have
made people much less safe -- by disarming innocent citizens and thereby
encouraging armed criminals to take advantage of us." Browne pointed out that many of those armed criminals are drug dealers.
"Only Libertarians want to end the nightmare of Prohibition - with its
criminal gangs and drive-by shootings." "Besides," argued Browne, "the Drug War has led to the
trampling of the Bill of Rights. And that's the central issue with both guns and
drugs: the U.S. Senate has no business violating your constitutional rights, no
matter how noble the cause." Browne concluded, "On my first day in office, I will pardon all federal,
non-violent drug and gun offenders. And during my term, I will lead the fight to
end the insane War on Drugs, and to remove federal gun-control laws from the
books." Harry Browne is running for President of the
United States as a Libertarian candidate in 2000. More of his articles can
be found at http://www.HarryBrowne.org |
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