US There's no business, like the drug business

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We are told:

1. The illegal drug business operates outside of the awareness of the government and big business (it's black box we know nothing about)

2. The US government fights hard against the illegal drug business

The reality is a little more "nuanced."

Here's the reality:

1. The illegal drug business produces as much revenue as the consumer electronics business

2. Billions of dollars of the industry's money is laundered by major US money center banks

3. The US "fights" drugs when it comes to jailing hapless users and low level dealers. When it comes to fighting cartels, it's had (and has) a horse in every race - in Mexico, in Afghanistan, in Vietnam - and it likes to see its horses win.

This policy has in in play since at least the 1920s when the US looked the other way at the drug dealing of its Chinese anti-communist allies.

Dig a little deeper and you'll find that the illustrious New England families who founded Skull and Bones at Yale made their money running opium to China. Winking at the illegal drug business is as American as apple pie.

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There's no business, like the drug business

As big as consumer electronics

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What we are told