The Decriminalization Of Drugs

Cartels all across the nation have a big influence on the raging war with drugs. By Mexico and Colombia trafficking drugs across the border by land, sea, and air, it adds fuel to the constant fire burning known as drug addicts. Not only do they affect society, but doctors assist in this habit by prescribing unnecessary narcotics to treat minor aches and pains. The most commonly traded drugs include marijuana and cocaine, shown as mostly popular among teens and young adults. Because of the number of fatalities that have occurred due to drug overdose and other contributing factors, drug abuse has proven to be the nation’s number one problem. People use marijuana as a party drug which, just as addicting as cigarettes, has even deadlier consequences.

Marijuana, placed in Schedule One, turned into the most prohibited category for drugs to be put in. Working on the decriminalization of marijuana became a long drawn out process. For the next 5 years, eleven states proceeded to decriminalize the possession of marijuana. Within just a few short years after that, the focus of the drug war shifted. Moves to decriminalize marijuana disappeared and parents started to raise their voices. They became overly concerned about the increased use of marijuana among

Talk about drug use being the nation’s number one problem was the main topic of conversation. “In 1985, the proportion of Americans polled who saw drug abuse as the nation’s ‘number one problem’ was just 2-6 percent. The figure grew through the remainder of the 1980s until, in September 1989, it reached a remarkable 64 percent […]” (2). The 21st century rolled around and a new president was voted into office. The constant remainder of unlawful drug use and the rising rate of overdose fatalities filled the minds of fellow Americans. Mexican drug cartels are influential in providing the surplus of drugs to America. Some of the most powerful Mexican cartels operate in the US and seven of them prove to be the source of the country’s drug problem. Heroin, cocaine, meth, and marijuana travel across borders and become for sell on the black market.
Deemed the most powerful and wealthiest cartel in Mexico and the world are the Sinaloa Cartel. New leadership rocked the foundation of the cartel in the 1990s. Chicago, the center of the drug trafficking and drug using, resulted as the source of income for the cartel. “In 2013, the DEA said that Guzmàn’s organization shipped ‘80% of the heroin, cocaine, marijuana and methamphetamine’ most of which flowed through the Chicago region each year, a supply with a value of $3 billion.” (Bender, Woody, Macias,