There's the old saying that doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is the definition of insanity. There are few better places to apply that adage than the drug war. It's time to end it. It's time to restore peace and harmony to Latin America and the United States. It's time to end the failed war on drugs. It's time to legalize drugs.

For libertarians, freedom entails the right of people to live their lives any way they choose, so long as their conduct is peaceful. For conservatives, freedom entails the right of government to do just about anything it wants, even if its conduct is violent.

[T]ake the war on drugs. The average American says, "The war on drugs has been beneficial." The rest of us see reality. This war has destroyed thousands of Americans. It is also a pretext for government agents to rob innocent people in airports and on the highways - they seize and confiscate large amounts of cash and say to their victims: "Sue us if you don't like it." And more and more judges, politicians, intelligence agents, and law-enforcement officers are on the take - as dependent on the drug-war largess as the drug lords themselves.

The cult of the omnipotent state has millions of followers in the united States. Americans of today view their government in the same way as Christians view their God; they worship and adore the state and they render their lives and fortunes to it. Statists believe that their lives - their very being - are a privilege that the state has given to them. They believe that everything they do is - and should be - dependent on the consent of the government. Thus, statists support such devices as income taxation, licensing laws, regulations, passports, trade restrictions, and the like.

From the inception of our nation our American ancestors intended for the United States to operate under a precious-metals monetary system or, more specifically, under a monetary system in which people used gold and silver coins rather than paper money as the media of exchange.

[D]ecade after decade, through taxes and regulations, governments at all levels took ever-increasing control over people's lives, wealth, and property. The control grew exponentially, decade after decade. The rationale was that the control was necessary -- for society, for the poor, for the nation, even for freedom itself. Americans continued living their life of the lie: they continued believing that the more control government exercised over their lives and property, the freer they became.

Contrary to popular opinion, the Constitution was not - and is not - a grant of rights to the citizenry. Instead, the Constitution is a "barbed-wire entanglement" designed to interfere with, restrict, and impede government officials in the exercise of political power.