COUNTY CUTS COULD MEAN LESS DRUG-WAR MONEY -- AND THAT'S NOT SUCH A BAD THING

Cook County State's Attorney Richard Devine objects to new Cook County
Board President Todd Stroger and his budget-cutting that will mean
lost patronage jobs, fewer drug-war services and a balanced budget
without a tax increase.

Objection overruled.

Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart and suburban police chiefs also are up in
arms over the $67 million in cuts to the Cook County sheriff's office
that will diminish drug enforcement and necessarily eliminate some
long-term drug investigations.

Hey, no problem. The drug war doesn't work anyway --take tomorrow's
drug bust by the drug ton, or yesterday's. Or take the Afghanistan
situation: Even with 150,000 soldiers on the ground in Afghanistan,
the U.S. Army could not stop the bumper 2006 opium crop of 6,700
metric tons. And we prosecute heroin here by the gram. These examples
tell the folly of "staying the course" and hoping to win the drug war.
It's a bad policy that endlessly costs and gets us nowhere.

"Oh, but what about our drug courts, our drug-diversion program, our
drug-treatment? What about drug testing, drug drops and drug
counseling? What about our undercover drug cops, our confiscation
programs, our prosecutors, our public defenders, our drug education
programs and our sheriff's police? Oh, my D.A.R.E." the addicted
public officials and employees cry.

The drug war is a cash cow for drug dealers and a patronage pig for
public officials. Fly over the Cook County Jail and take a bird's eye
look at the drug-war prison sprawl. New jail after new jail -- a
patronage dream. Eight out of every 10 inmates who enter the Cook
County Jail are there for a "drug crime." Better to build pyramids or
cathedrals.

But not all jail inmates are your friendly, law-abiding (but for
drugs), drug-using neighbors, friends and relatives. No, drug
prohibition causes serious crime, too. After a four-year decline, the
Chicago police blame gangs and gang squabbles over drug turf as the
reason murders are up.

In the early 1990s when I was campaigning for an end to unbridled
prison construction and the legalization of drugs, so drugs could be
controlled and regulated by government, and crime abated, I
confidently assured my audiences that the drug war would eventually
end. I guaranteed it. I confided that the drug war was sure to end
because, eventually, government could not longer pay the bills for the
problems that prohibition cost (prisons, courts, probation, clerks,
sheriffs, public defenders, etc., and medical costs associated with
new intravenous drug-users contracting AIDS and endless prohibition
bullet holes).

In a private meeting with then-Cook County Board President Dick Phelan
and his financial confidant, John Filan, I made these same
observations. At one point during my rant, Mr. Filan underscored my
point, "He's talking about 80 percent of our budget."

Fourteen years later, now with more unaffordable drug-war bills coming
home to roost, the $500 million deficit in the Cook County budget
hurts. But Cook County has been a leading drug-war belligerent, and
the sins of the father (and many others) must now be paid by the son.

Stroger deserves a standing ovation for his proposed balanced-budget
cuts, because fiscal responsibility always merits applause. Although
Stroger may not have intended to disconnect Cook County from its fix
of drug-war patronage, contracts, construction and services -- his
budget-cutting may force Cook County into unwanted rehab. The
intervention is for the county's own good.

James Gierach is an Oak Lawn-based attorney.