DRUG WAR CONTINUES

Today, the White House is to deliver to Congress a progress report on the
war on drugs. White House drug czar Barry McCaffrey says the report shows
the nation has made “substantial progress in confronting illegal drug abuse
and drug trafficking.”

To bolster his argument, he points out “that youth drug use dropped 13
percent last year, overall cocaine use is down, methamphetamine seizures
are dramatically up and drug crime and drug-related murders are dropping.”

But the report also includes some less rosy statistics. Drug-related deaths
have reached record levels, cocaine and heroin prices are at their lowest
levels in two decades, and only four of every 10 drug addicts who need
treatment receive it.

McCaffrey says “we are winning” the war on drugs, but the sad fact is, the
country is no closer to winning this war than when it was first declared by
President Richard Nixon in 1971.

The United States took a wrong turn in the 1920s when it began turning drug
use into a crime problem instead of a medical problem. Like the so-called
“noble experiment” of Prohibition, drug prohibition is a failure. It has
not stopped the flow of drugs into the country, and it is draining immense
monetary and human resources that could be put to better use elsewhere.