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More About This Textbook
Overview
The war on drugs is a war on ordinary people. Using that premise, historian Richard Lawrence Miller analyzes America's drug war with passion seldom encountered in scholarly writing. Miller presents numerous examples of drug law enforcement gone amok, as police and courts threaten the happiness, property, and even lives of victims—some of whom are never charged with a drug crime, let alone convicted of one. Miller not only argues that criminal justice zealots are harming the democracy they are sworn to protect, but that authoritarians unfriendly to democracy are stoking public fear in order to convince citizens to relinquish traditional legal rights. Those are the very rights that thwart implementation of an agenda of social control through government power. Miller contends that an imaginary drug crisis has been manufactured by authoritarians in order to mask their war on democracy. He not only examines numerous civil rights sacrificed in the name of drugs, but demonstrates how their loss harms ordinary Americans in their everyday lives. Showing how the war on drug users fits into a destruction process that can lead to mass murder, Miller calls for an end to the war before it proceeds deeper into the destruction process.
This is a book for anyone who wonders about the value of civil liberties, and for anyone who wonders why people seek to destroy their neighbors. Using voluminous examples of drug law enforcement victimizing blameless people, this book demonstrates how the loss of civil liberties in the name of drugs threatens law-abiding Americans at work and at home.
Editorial Reviews
Library Journal
Independent researcher Miller continues the argument he began in The Case for Legalizing Drugs (LJ 4/15/91). Drawing on his latest book, Nazi Justiz (Praeger, 1995), he makes an extended analogy between Germany repressing the Jews and America repressing drug users. In chapters on identification, ostracism, confiscation, concentration, and annihilation, he shows that democracy, privacy, and family life can be lost in our society just as they were when these policies were applied to the Jews. Because of "bureaucratic thrust," the criminalization aimed at one group consumes the entire society. In contrast, Miller thinks drug use is normal and should be regarded as such; he marshals convincing evidence that it can be mature and responsible. If drugs are abused, he does not think criminalization or medical force are solutions, any more than they would be solutions to unemployment. Although many will find Miller's case overstated, it is thoughtful and thought-provoking. Recommended for most libraries.Janice Dunham, John Jay Coll. Lib., New YorkBooknews
Miller (an independent scholar) argues that America's "war on drugs" promotes public fear in order to convince citizens to relinquish their civil liberties. The author presents cases of drug law enforcement agencies sacrificing civil rights without just cause, victimizing blameless people, and promoting an authoritarian conspiracy to undermine democracy which, he believes, will lead to mass murder. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)Product Details
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Meet the Author
RICHARD LAWRENCE MILLER is an independent scholar.
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