The fact that heroin, cocaine, fentanyl, and methamphetamine, as well misusing prescription medication, are already illegal, and have been for a long time, may show the limits of government power in solving this problem. Candidates don’t want to talk about the issue except in the most general way because the devil is in the details. Will every addict be allowed to avail themselves of government provided treatment a limitless number of times? If not, how many chances do they get? Will the government provide treatment services through the states who will hire contractors to provide it, or create a new federal agency that will hire contractors? And what about those contractors? If the addict is an Ivy League grad, how much of their own money, since they’ll probably have some, should they have to pay for treatment before taxpayers start footing the bill? The big question is how much coercive power the government will be willing to use to secure addicts in a treatment center against their wishes so that treatment can be implemented. Locking people up is the one thing that government can do that the private sector cannot.