John Walters, former director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, turns in a rambling and at times incoherent defense of the current war on drugs in today’s WSJ. There are many points worth picking apart, but this line of reasoning, loosely speaking, was my favorite:

What is the alternative to the progress we are making? We have made the kind of compromises with alcohol that some suggest making with illegal drugs…

Today there is terrible violence in Mexico… The drug trade is a tool, not the cause of these violent criminal groups. Making it easier to produce and traffic drugs will strengthen, not weaken, these terrorists.

Right. Because we have all of these beer distributors and liquor-store owners running around the country kidnapping folks, killing judges, prosecutors, and journalist and generally terrorizing the populace.

I shudder to imagine the damage to our society were the illicit drug trade conducted in a strict regulatory framework reflective of our alcohol and medical supply distribution systems.