Americans have had many heartbreaks in recent years as news has come back from Iraq and Afghanistan about U.S. battle deaths in those frustrating wars.
As the exposure of U.S. military personnel is winding down in Iraq, there are still many American soldiers fighting in Afghanistan.
So far, nearly 6,000 Americans have lost their lives in those two long, painful wars.
We mourn every death.
But most of us have been unaware of the tremendous death toll in the war against the use of illegal drugs.
It has been reported that in Mexico alone, approximately 28,000 people have died since 2006 in what might be labeled that country's "drug war."
But how many American deaths have resulted among those who have been engaged in supplying and using illegal drugs? We cannot even guess with any degree of accuracy the number of Americans who have bought illegal drugs and died from using them.
It is amazing that there are so many people willing, even eager, to spend huge amounts of money to invite self-destruction by using addicting, lethal drugs.
"Self-preservation" usually is a tremendously strong natural motivation for most of us. So how is it that so many Americans violate both common sense and our laws to do themselves serious harm through the use of illegal drugs?
It just doesn't make any sense, does it?
But obviously, there are countless people engaged in the process of producing, smuggling, selling, using and even killing themselves with illicit drugs.
And, of course, all of us are victimized by paying the huge human cost and the monetary cost of our law enforcement efforts in trying to minimize the evils of illegal drugs.
We lament the deaths of about 6,000 courageous Americans in the Afghan and Iraq wars - but we are hardly aware of the reportedly high number of deaths in Mexico's drug wars, largely to supply drugs to Americans.
No, it doesn't "make sense."
But it certainly, tragically "makes deaths."