Latest Drug Hot Spot for British: Prisons

Do you think drug prices are astronomical? Want to find a place where drugs are cheap and plentiful? If you are British, all you have to do is get convicted of a crime and sent to jail where drugs are reportedly cheaper than they are for non-prisoners:

Prisoners are ignoring chances to escape because they would rather stay in their cushy jails where drugs are cheaper than on the outside, a prison chief officers has said. Lags at Britain's 'toughest' prisons are treated to breakfast in bed, have Sky TV in every cell and are given cash bonuses for good behavior. At one prison in Yorkshire, drug dealers and hookers regularly break IN to ply their trade by leaning ladders up against prison walls. But none of the criminals take the opportunity to leave because they have got it so easy, according to assistant general secretary of the Prison Officers Association Glyn Travis.

Earlier in the month, Prime Minister Gordon Brown proposed to increase the length of prison sentences for marijuana smokers by three years. I criticized this move at the time, but maybe I misunderstood his intentions. Perhaps he just wants to give pot smokers access to the cheap stuff. But seriously, what’s the point of increasing the maximum sentence for marijuana smokers when the jails are overrun with drugs? It is absolutely baffling that the Prime Minister of a country can be concerned with non-violent marijuana smokers when the prison system is a joke. It is literally a joke. People are actually breaking into prison. That is something you would expect to see in a cartoon not actually happening in a developed country. This situation just further illustrates the failures of prohibition and the ridiculousness of Brown’s marijuana smoker crackdown. The British can’t keep the drugs out of their jails where they have direct surveillance over prisoners. And they somehow expect to win the war on drugs and prevent the circulation of them throughout the regular population? Give me a break.