Our Drug-Stuffed Prisons

It’s not that I disagree with this post by Blair Gibbs, nor that I don’t think he makes a number of reasonable points. There’s clearly a problem with drugs in prison even if it it’s not, one supposes, on anything like the same level as the Cousins’ difficulties in that area. Nevertheless, surely the most obvious point to make is that if we cannot keep illegal drugs out of prison at what point do even prohibitionists recognise that the War on Drugs can’t be won*?

Ah, they say, sure, perhaps it can’t be, you know, won but that doesn’t mean it’s not worth fighting! Maybe. But at what point is reality allowed to intrude upon this fantastical approach to serious public policy?

The second most obvious thing to say is that, despite the impression given by the press, the near-insatiable desire for illegal drugs inside prisons is evidence that prison-life is not a soft-touch and is actually pretty grim.