Surely the government could put $50 Billion/year to better use than the 'war on drugs'?
The government is no longer about doing what is best for the people, but doing whatever best gets off the power-junky politicians.

From 1984:

'You understand well enough ~how~ the party maintains
itself in power. Now tell me ~why~ we cling to power. What
is our motive? Why should we want power? Go on, speak,' he
added as Winston remained silent.
[...]
Nevertheless Winston did not speak for another moment or
two.
[...]
'You are ruling over us for our own good,' he said
feebly. 'You believe that human beings are not fit to govern
themselves, and therefore -

He started and almost cried out. A pang of pain had shot
through his body. O'Brien had pushed the lever of the dial
up to thirty-five.

'That was stupid, Winston, stupid!' he said. 'You should
know better than to say a thing like that.'

He pulled the lever back and continued:

'Now I will tell you the answer to my question. It is
this. The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We
are not interested in the good of others; we are interested
solely in power. Not wealth or luxury or long life or
happiness: only power, pure power. What pure power means you
will understand presently. We are different from the
oligarchies of the past, in that we know what we are doing.
All the others, even those who resembled ourselves, were
cowards and hypocrites. The German Nazis and the Russian
Communists came very close to us in their methods, but they
never had the courage to recognize their own motives. They
pretended, perhaps they even believed, that they had seized
power unwillingly and for a limited time, and that just
round the corner there lay a paradise where human beings
would be free and equal. We are not like that. We know that
no one seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it.
Power is not a means, it is an end. One does not establish a
dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes
the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The
object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture
is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin
to understand me?'