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Arts & Entertainment

Brad Pitt Says He Could Find Any Drug In Any City In 24 Hours

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Brad Pitt said that despite his drug days being behind him, he could find any drug anywhere within 24 hours.Ok, sure, Brad Pitt could probably get anything he wanted in any city in 24 hours because he's Brad Pitt. But Pitt explains that it's also because he believes war on drugs has been a disaster, failing to even make a dent in supply of illicit drugs—to say nothing about the demand.

Pitt made his comments to the Huffington Post while discussing "The House I Live In," the documentary he produced, alongside its director Eugene Jarecki. Pitt told the HuffPo:

My drug days are long since passed but it's certainly true that I could probably land in any city in any state and get you whatever you wanted. I could find anything you were looking for. Give me 24 hours or so. And yet we still support this charade called the drug war. We have spent a trillion dollars. It's lasted for over 40 years. A lot of people have lost their lives for it. And yet we still talk about it like it's this success.

Jarecki adds: "If it was any other federal program, it would be looked at as a ridiculous federal waste. It's only because it's law-enforcement-tough-on-crime, it has that sort of veneer, that no one says this is a gigantic federal invasive program that is a huge waste of money."Jarecki and Pitt talk about how the war on drugs hurts often impoverished addicts here at home. But here's a recent dispatch from the front lines of the drug war in Central America that is causing some U.S. politicians to question aggressive tactics that may be killing innocent civilians.

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