A DRUG WAR SLUSH FUND

Perhaps one has to give some die-hard prohibitionists points for brazenness
and for honesty of a sort. Last Thursday, a subcommittee of the House
Government Reform Committee specifically authorized the "drug czar" to use
taxpayer money in political campaigns - as long as it is "to oppose an
attempt to legalize the use" of any currently illegal drug.

Previously, the "drug czar," formally the head of the White House Office of
National Drug Control Policy, was legally barred from using the money
appropriated for the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign for "partisan
political purposes."

Drug-war leaders have wiggled around this requirement for years, of course.
In 1996, then-drug czar Barry McCaffrey, with his repeated trips to meet
with officials and express alarm, was almost the entire campaign against
California's Proposition 215, the medical marijuana initiative approved by
voters. Advocates complained about the possible use of taxpayer money to
influence a political campaign. Drug-policy spokesmen said nothing
incorrect was done and that Gen. McCaffrey was doing it on his own time,
but never furnished documentation.

Last fall in Nevada, there was a ballot initiative to virtually
decriminalize marijuana. Current drug-policy leader John Walters spent
considerable time in the state seeking places to speak and media interviews
in opposition to the initiative. The Marijuana Policy Project in
Washington, D.C., has filed complaints with both federal and state
authorities, alleging that Mr. Walters used taxpayers' funds to influence
an election and demanding that he be required at least to file a campaign
finance report declaring how much money was spent and where it came from.
So far they have gotten no response.

So some members of the House thought it would be smart to specifically
authorize Mr. Walters to use as much as he deems desirable of the $1.02
billion he will be receiving over the next five years for TV ads to oppose
grass-roots efforts to reform drug policy.

This would be a profoundly corrupt and corrupting policy. In a democratic
(or republican) society, the core idea is that the government is supposed
to work for the people. To have the permanent bureaucracy using the
people's money to influence the people's votes is manifestly unfair and
thoroughly backward.

We don't know whether a move to give the drug czar a billion-dollar
political slush fund reflects insecurity over what the people might do if
not properly instructed by their betters or the simple arrogance of the
longtime political-bureaucratic operator. Whatever the motivation, this is
bad policy.

The full Government Reform Committee will consider the bill with the
slush-fund provision tomorrow. It should eliminate it immediately.