Reflection

While doing this research project I have become a better student it has made me more responsible and help a lot with my researching skills. It has taught me a lot about the real world and how college is more or less going to, what I can expect in the up coming years. It has taught me how to use tools I didn't even know where out there that became really useful, because I will probably use more then on this research project.
This semester I really improved on my reading and writing skills I feel like I can move on to the next level if that what I chose to do. Even though, I did struggle with some types of writing I am confident enough that with doing this research I can can handle them. If not I have the tools to figure out what they mean.
Something that really has stuck with me through out this research project is that there is this big war going on in our own country that I didn't even know existed, that shows how sheltered we are here in this small town of ours. Another thing that really stuck with me was the amount of money that the U.S. spends each year on this war, and how long this war has been going on for. This has stuck with me because out of all the research that I did I did not see anything that showed major improvement which really makes me wonder. I will definitely keep up with this information as time goes on this topic has really engrossed me through the past months. At the Begin of this project I wasn't really too excited about it,and even though sometimes I felt like giving up I'm really glad I stuck with it because I really enjoyed it.

Book Review

Smoke and Mirrors

For this assignment I read the book, “Smoke and Mirrors: The War on Drugs and The Failed Politics of Failure.”  Written by Dan Baum a writer for big time newspapers.  This book was to inform more than anything, about how bad this war is failing.  It was laid out in chapters, but also as a timeline.  For the most part I would say that this book is very credible he has a huge bibliography and has wrote for many newspapers about this topic.  

The main purpose that Dan wrote was to inform about this war that’s going on in the U.S. and how bad it is failing.  I would say that this book is very basis.  Its one sided, it doesn’t talk about any of the positive things that this war has done, not that they’re many of them.  The author made it seem that this war is the worst thing that has happened to America and that “WE” as a nation need to do something now!

Although it was written very negatively it had a very interesting structure.  This is because the way it was written was it had chapters like any other book, but it was also a timeline.  For example each chapter was a certain period of time throughout the past thirty-five years that this war has been going on.  That part of the book was interesting and unique, something I hadn’t seen before.

From what I know about this author he seems like he knows what he was talking about.  This author, Dan Baum, is a writer for many big time newspaper such as The New Yorker and The Los Angeles Times.  Another reason that I he is very credible is because he had an enormous bibliography from research that he had done in order to write this book.

Even though this topic is very interesting the style that this book was written in was extremely flat.  The author used very long sentences, and all the same length.  He had a descent word selection.  It was very text book like.  The style he wrote in was almost like a text book, boring, long, and just stated facts.  The book was written in third person, the entire book was narrative it had no dialogue what so ever.

In conclusion, the book tied in perfectly to my topic it was exactly what I need for this assignment.  The only thing that wasn’t so great about was that it didn’t show both sides of it.  Even though, it agreed with my thoughts and opinion that, this war is pointless and wasting way to much money, I would of liked for it to talk about some of the good things that this war has brought to the U.S.   

Research an Angle

With the research that was done, a very interesting angle was.  That angle is that this war on drugs is destroying lives for many reasons, that does not include death caused by illegal drugs.  The research states that many different thing, but one that was interesting was that by legalising drugs the crime and deaths would go down.  As well as not spending so much money.   The author of the research that was read brought up an interesting point that said, "making all illegal drugs legal would bring down the number of deaths and crimes."  This is because, it would put drug lords and terrorists out of business for the lack of money.  Therefore the drug dealing business would not be as competitive and there would be no need for them to kill one another.  

The reason the drug dealing business is so competitive according to Jack Cole the author of  "The War on Drugs Is Destroying Lives," is because "the value of these products virtually by up to 17,000 percent increase between where they're grown, mainly, in third world countries, like, as you know, Afghanistan, Colombia, and where they're sold in Los Angeles, or New York City."  That causes for competition and also killings among drug lords and gangsters.  

Another reason why this war on drugs is ruining so many lives is because, the laws and policies for it are more or less corrupt.  For example police are allowed to take any force of action when they "believe" that there are drugs involved.  Therefore, that makes it an unfair fight because police are known to place illegal drugs in order to make an arrest.  And like the author Jack Cole, " if we legalise drugs tomorrow, it would be too late as far as I'm concerned, because today we're going to destroy a lot more lives by arresting people."

In conclusion, as the research showed what the U.S. government is doing against with this war on drugs is not working.  They need a different approach in order to win this fight.  But who will be the one to bring change? Barack Obama?