DRUG CZAR'S SOLUTION IS A BITTER PILL

Gen. Barry McCaffrey is wrapping up his nearly five-year tenure as the
president's drug policy adviser with a bang. His parting shot this summer
was to mastermind and successfully lobby Congress for approval of a $1.3
billion aid package to Colombia, most of it for weapons to fight guerrillas
involved in the drug trade.

Now there is, belatedly, some recognition in Congress that Plan Colombia
has potential for disaster. There is second-guessing about pouring money
into the Colombian military, which has been linked to human-rights abuses.
There is recognition that a military response in Colombia will push the
drug trade to neighboring nations and destabilize them.

Plan Colombia is emblematic of McCaffrey's guns-and-bullets approach to
illicit drugs, even though it's a tactic that has not made much headway at
home and is not likely to fare any better in Colombia.

What the U.S. needs instead are innovative strategies based on science and
medicine, rather than politics and military might. That's what the next
president ought to expect from McCaffrey's successor.

McCaffrey, to his credit, has talked up the importance of treatment and
other demand-reduction strategies.

But his proposed $19.5 billion budget for 2001 continues to pump twice as
much money into law enforcement and interdiction as into treatment and
prevention.

During his tenure McCaffrey has fought even relatively modest changes in
drug policies with an inquisitorial zeal--science and facts be damned.

A 1998 study by the Department of Health and Human Services confirmed what
many other scientists had already established: Needle-exchange programs
effectively limit transmission of the AIDS virus among intravenous drug
users, their partners and their babies, with little risk of increased drug use.

Yet McCaffrey successfully led the charge against federal funding of needle
exchanges.

Likewise, he has battled against state initiatives to allow medicinal uses
of marijuana, again disregarding scientific studies and public opinion.

McCaffrey's most cavalier disregard for the facts came when he traveled to
Europe in 1998, supposedly on a "fact-finding" tour of countries with
liberalized drug policies. When he returned, he blasted the Netherlands as
a nest of crime fueled by illegal drugs--a diatribe that had no basis in
fact. Yet the nation's drug czar offered no retraction.

McCaffrey will leave his post Jan. 6. It will be important for his
successor to recognize that, yes, drug addiction is a serious problem. But
the nation needs to combat it with science, common sense and compassion,
not with empty rhetoric or the failed policies of the past.