DRUG WAR SQUABBLE AN ONGOING FRAUD

The cruel deception of the "drug wars" goes on: Just give us $500
million more to spend on training and equipping Mexican police, said
the White House drug-policy director last week, and you'll see progress.

Implicit in that pitch to Congress: If you don't approve that outlay,
you're sabotaging the unending battle.

After all, there's fresh leadership in our neighbor nation; maybe the
new guys won't just keep or waste the money while looking the other
way when smugglers are shipping heroin, cocaine and the scourge du
jour, methamphetamines ...

The negative response from some of the Senate's brightest minds is
the right one -- but for the wrong reason: Vermont's Patrick Leahy
objects to acting as "the White House's ATM."

The amount being called for is pathetically small for any serious
offensive against the drug trade, so it's suspicious on that count
alone. Then there's the Bush administration's unwillingness to call
for accountability from Mexican President Felipe Calderon -- which,
of course, would raise issues of sovereignty.

But all that plays into sub-plots of an ongoing tragedy -- one which
has stricken so many families in Northern New Mexico and other parts
of the nation.

Seems no one on Capitol Hill wants to confront a reality: Drug
trafficking, in Mexico and everywhere else illicit narcotics are
grown, processed and moved in America's direction, continues to
thrive because this is where the stuff is consumed -- at whatever
cost a protected market will bear.

Keep drugs illegal, make them more expensive by busting the
occasional shipment, and the price goes up. Those controlling the
supply grow richer; all the more capable of bribing everyone outside
and inside our boundaries, from street cops to prosecutors. And those
who can't be bought can be assassinated.

Meanwhile, to feed their habits, addicts will lie, cheat, steal, even
kill. The law-abiding people and households of our country are
violated -- and pay taxes for the privilege. In Mexico, more than
4,000 people have been killed in drug-gang violence since Calderon
took office and talked tough about drugs. More than 400 of the dead
are cops, so in many places there's no law enforcement left.

Neither Mexico's government nor ours can buy enough cannon-fodder for
this bogus war.

What Congress can do is invest in education, counseling and treatment
- -- to catch up with, then head off, drug use. When those things are
in place, de-criminalize drug possession; make the stuff available,
free or cheap, at clinics. De-glamorize it -- and take away the
profit motive so many vested interests have in drugs.

Who in Congress dares do such a thing?