During Prohibition, newsreels shown at movie theaters often included footage of police or federal authorities smashing bottles of wine, beer, and other booze confiscated from a bootlegger or illegally run speakeasy.
Fifty years later during the "war on drugs," TV newscasts frequently included video coverage of law enforcement officers similarly confiscating large stashes of marijuana, cocaine, or other illegal drugs to "get them off the streets."
How effective were those tactics? Well, anyone who wanted a drink could get one during Prohibition. No wonder the law was eventually rescinded. As for the war on drugs, it didn't stop the life-sapping impact that crack, meth, heroin, and fentanyl have since had on this country.
