The deal conservatives made to keep power was that they would pitch tent with the religious right, so legalizing drugs (or any other truly laissez-fair social policy) will never happen.
On one hand, it is pretty schizophrenic to believe in Jesus and ruthless, social Darwinism at the same time. But on the other hand, the compartmentalism doesn't bother them because it allows them an easy out.
They voted for Bush, they rallied behind him, they gave money to his campaign, but then the second he tanked the economy (because that’s what libertarianism does!) they could just turn around and say, "Oh well, he was just a RINO anyway...he didn’t drive the car off the cliff FAR ENOUGH for our libertarian tastes. And then they walk away looking all smug.
But the fact is that they voted for the guy and supported him until it was inconvenient to do so. Bush gave them everything they ever wanted except privatizing social security and pushing old folks out into the forest to be eaten by wolves, but it wasn’t enough for them. They expect us to magically believe that if we had somehow had even LESS regulation, that the greed would have (I dunno?) checked itself somehow. But if nothing else, the last decade has taught us that capitalism bathed in unchecked greed and deregulation is a complete and utter failure except for the top 2%.
This, of course, is fine if you are in that percentile, or if your ultimate goal is to strip away the vestments of civilization and revert merely to feudalism and the rich ruling the poor. Leo Strauss, the mentor of the neo-conservative movement, was in favor of such a move. But that again brings me to why drugs will never be legal in this country: it would kill the goose that laid the golden egg.
If you have pesky government interfering in your feudalism or otherwise keeping business interests from running roughshod over the population, what’s he next best thing? FREE LABOR IN THE PRISON-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX! Woohoo! The guys who make millions hiring prisoners to make products for slave wages are the same ones who pay politicians to increase penalties for low-level drug offenses. Pot users are an endless supply of free labor! They have no rights and you don’t even really have to pay them! It is like a libertarian dreamworld. And that my friend, is the utilitarian nature of the republican party. If you DON’T AGREE on morals, you WILL AGREE on profits.