BUSH URGED TO HANG TOUGH IN DRUG WAR

WASHINGTON -- Earlier this month, a group of key Republican legislators
sent President Bush a letter that firmly warned him not to back off on the
nation's fight against narcotics traffickers.

"We believe that any downgrade of the drug czar position below Cabinet
status at the outset of your administration would be a political misstep,"
said the letter, signed by key Republican House committee chairmen.

The letter was a pre-emptive shot across Bush's bow in response to whispers
that the new administration was looking to lower the profile on drug
enforcement issues, said some Washington anti-drug insiders.

To legislators committed to a traditional approach to fighting the war on
drugs, downgrading the drug czar's status would be an admission that the
war on drugs was unwinnable.

"The feeling has been that there was an inclination within the Bush camp to
reduce the status of the drug czar from a Cabinet to a non-Cabinet
position, and also to tone down any rhetoric about a war on drugs," said
John Walters, who served as drug czar at the end of former President Bush's
administration.

Since his election, the younger Bush has sent out what some see as
conflicting signals on drug policy.

On the one hand, he has picked some tough anti-drug warriors for his
administration.

On the other hand, he has delayed the choice for his top drug adviser and
has sent messages in interviews that indicate he may be contemplating
changes from hard-line anti-drug measures.

Bush's anti-drug approach will be clearer once he picks someone to head the
Office of National Drug Control Policy, the so-called drug czar.

A few names of potential Bush drug czar selections have circulated in
Washington, including Brent Coles, mayor of Boise, Idaho; Florida state
drug czar Jim McDonough; former Florida congressman Bill McCollum; and
former Arizona Sen. Dennis DeConcini.

Asked for a comment on when Bush would make a decision on the post, White
House spokesman Scott McClellan said: "We don't speculate on any
appointments. When the administration is ready to make an announcement,
we'll let people know."

Bush has made some recent statements that have been well received by those
who feel the United States' approach to fighting drugs has to radically change.

"I think a lot of people are coming to the realization that maybe long
minimum sentences for the first-time users may not be the best way to
occupy jail space and/or heal people from their disease. And I'm willing to
look at that," Bush said in a CNN interview late last week.

He also referred to "making sure the powder-cocaine and the crack-cocaine
penalties are the same. I don't believe we ought to be discriminatory."

Eliminating mandatory minimums for nonviolent drug crimes and narrowing the
disparity between powder- and crack-cocaine sentences have been key goals
of liberal anti-drug groups and African-American organizations.

"The fact that Bush would even be talking about these things is
encouraging," said Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the Drug Policy
Foundation, a think tank based in New York.

On the other hand, there is little in what Bush has done so far to support
any theory that his administration is going soft on drug enforcement.

In a speech in October, in which Bush last spoke in detail about drugs, he
said, "Over time, drugs rob men and women and children of their dignity and
character. ... Illegal drugs are the enemies of innocence and ambition and
hope. I will exert presidential leadership to send the clear and consistent
message that drug abuse is dangerous and wrong."

And since his election, Bush and top aides have seemed to embrace a strong
law-and-order approach to the war on drugs.

On Wednesday, the White House said it was going to stick with an ambitious
and controversial $1.3 billion aid plan to Colombia it inherited from the
Clinton administration

Under "Plan Colombia," the United States is funding helicopters and other
military equipment to help Colombia mount a campaign against
narco-traffickers in the southern part of that country who have been
shielded by Marxist guerrillas.

Also last week, Bush selected as his top adviser to Latin America John
Maisto, a former ambassador to Venezuela whose most recent job was advising
the military's U.S. Southern Command in Miami on training Colombian
brigades for that fight.

Earlier this month during his confirmation hearing, Secretary of State
Colin Powell affirmed his support for Plan Colombia and talked about
expanding it to neighboring countries.

Domestically, Bush has also signaled a tough approach to fighting drugs. He
told Drug Enforcement Administrator Donnie Marshall, who is an advocate for
using federal resources to interdict drugs and bust drug kingpins, that he
would be retained.

In his position paper on drugs during the campaign, Bush talked about
increasing by more than $2.7 billion the $19 billion spent on various
anti-drug efforts annually.

And Bush nominated as attorney general John Ashcroft, a man who has an
uncompromising approach for dealing with drug offenders.

Ashcroft backs mandatory minimum prison terms for those convicted of
selling drugs.

He also has voted against efforts to lessen the disparity between sentences
for crack-cocaine users and powder-cocaine users, something many
African-American leaders say is racially biased as whites use more powdered
cocaine and blacks more crack cocaine.

Nadelmann, the executive director of the Drug Policy Foundation, said the
Ashcroft nomination as attorney general was "a disaster, as far as we are
concerned."

However, his group and others have been more encouraged by other Bush
appointees, including former Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson to head Health
and Human Services and Donald Rumsfeld to run the Pentagon.

Thompson has made public statements that the war on drugs is a failure and
that locking up large numbers of drug offenders is overburdening prison
systems.

In 1980, there were about a half-million people imprisoned in the United
States. In 2000, the population in U.S. prisons and jails rose to more than
2 million, with much of the increase attributed to stiff sentences for drug
offenders.

Rumsfeld made statements in his confirmation hearing this month that
appeared to challenge the wisdom of Plan Colombia and other drug
interdiction efforts.

Illegal drug use is "overwhelmingly a demand problem," Rumsfeld said. "If
demand persists, it's going to find ways to get what it wants, and if it
isn't from Colombia, it's going to be from someplace else."

The differences in philosophy among Bush Cabinet appointees reflect those
among Republicans -- and the rest of the United States, experts say.

"One of the reasons Bush appears a bit reluctant to grab this problem in a
high-profile way is that it is difficult to build a consensus, even among
Republicans," Walters said.

"The conservative side is split between the hard-core law-and-order people
and those who are more libertarian, who don't want the federal government
deeply involved in people's lives."

In the end, Bush will have a difficult time significantly changing the
anti-drug culture, both liberals and conservatives predicted.

The war on drugs gained a high profile under the Republican administrations
of Presidents Reagan and Bush from 1981 to 1993, with former drug czar Bill
Bennett using the bully pulpit of the office to make fighting drugs a moral
crusade.

However, some felt that approach led to a lessening of emphasis on treating
drug users.

President Clinton began his administration by cutting the drug office
staff, reducing the drug czar's power and focusing on drug treatment more
than stopping drugs from entering the nation.

However, Clinton backed off after a firestorm when then-Surgeon General
Joycelyn Elders talked about decriminalization and related public relations
disasters. In the end, he appointed Gen. Barry McCaffrey as drug czar and
committed to costly anti-drug efforts in Colombia.

Nadelmann said he is optimistic that the public mood is changing on drug
policy and that Bush will respond to that.

"People are saying, if stopping drugs from getting here doesn't work, let's
try something else," Nadelmann said. "The enthusiasm in America for just
locking up more and more people is starting to fade."

However, key members of Congress overseeing the war on drugs, as well as
federal law enforcement and members of the anti-drug establishment, would
strongly oppose anything perceived as softening efforts to keep drugs out
of of the United States.

The Gilman-Burton letter to Bush hammered home that point. "The threat from
illegal drugs is our most insidious national security threat," the
committee chairmen wrote. "We believe it is an appropriate time to
re-energize our national commitment to effectively fight the drug epidemic."