Another Lost Battle in the War on Drugs

If the mainstream media covered the War on Drugs the way they covered the Iraq War, they'd be citing the death of an FBI agent in the Pittsburgh area this week as another senseless death in pursuit of a failed policy. The young agent was shot and killed by the wife of an alleged drug dealer after a team of agents forcibly entered the home to execute a search warrant. The wife claims that she thought her home was being robbed while her two children were inside. I suspect she is telling the truth.

Although I consider myself to be a fairly ardent civil libertarian, my sympathies generally lie with the men and women who are tasked with the enforcement of our laws. They face off against violent criminals so that the rest of us don't have to. I tend to give them the benefit of the doubt when it comes to on-the-ground operational decisions. I do not give that same benefit of the doubt to law enforcement policy makers. The policy makers have allowed (or used) the War on Drugs to drive the militarization of domestic law enforcement. The media did a nice job of portraying the agent who was killed as a good family man and a top-notch law enforcement officer. I wish they would also ask the tough questions of the agent's superiors about the need for us to continue with what seems to be a risky and mostly failed strategy toward the War on Drugs.