Blog 7

1. What's Wrong With the Drug War? Drug Policy Alliance Network. 12 July 2009 .

This article gives brief summary of what the Drug Policy Alliance Networks is about and gives the reader a brief synopsis of the current drug war. The article connects to the reader by saying “The war on drugs has become a war on families, a war on public health and a war on our constitutional rights.” The main purpose of the article is to connect the war on drugs to every person in America. With states like the previous one I listed this is accomplished very well. The article goes on to relate to the general public by talking about infectious disease, the cost of the “war on drugs” and the amount of incarcerations due to drug related crime. Overall this source is logical in its argument and provides a decent amount of evidence to back up its points of view. I fully intend on using some of the information in this article in my literature review.

2. Hicks, Jeremy. "War on drugs puts the fight in peaceful exchange." Mustang Daily [San Luis Obispo] 19 May 2009, 26th ed.: 10.

Hicks relates the war on drugs to fighting an inanimate object. He uses the analogy of men fighting for control of the hill but never literally fighting the hill. I originally read this article in my school newspaper approximately a couple months ago and went through my small stack of mustang daily’s to find it. Hicks is founder of the Libertarian Club at Cal Poly SLO and a columnist that until June 2009 wrote a column every Wednesday. Jeremy writes from the point of view of “[defending] the right of people to engage in peaceful exchange to acquire goods which they desire, regardless what those items might be.” Hicks thoroughly goes through his fighting an inanimate object theory as to why a person would fight something that can’t move. Though Jeremy may be just another opinionated college student after reading his column for the year I’m fully confident that his article is well reasoned and of good quality.

3. National Youth Anti-drug Media Campaign. Free Vibe. 12 July 2009 .

Free Vibe is a website that is decidedly anti-drug. As the site provides information and how to help others, I find it better to annotate the site than just any particular article lying within. In particular I find like to go into depth on the homepage of the website. Pointedly placed at the center of the page is a link to help a friend. Free Vibe wants to establish themselves as a link between you and your alcoholic/drug abusing friends and how to get them to stop. The website features many quick facts about drugs. The first fact in Bold is that the drug can kill you. The website wants to instill in its readers that every drug is either addicting or lethal. Then from the first bold fact come a few facts that relate to how the drug will physically alter your body. All of the pictures on Free Vibe features teens, which is the sites, clear target audience. Using the theme colors as black and red portrays drug/alcohol in a negative connotation to the reader.

Being that National Youth Anti-drug Media Campaign publishes this site, the facts and quality can equal the drug policy site. Both of these sites have a vested interest in the issue at hand but their not substantial evidence to say that one is more credible than the other.