MCCAFFREY IS MOST UNSETTLING

Is there anyone in this administration as unsettling as "drug czar" Barry
McCaffrey? Salon magazine revealed last week that the federal government has
been secretly doing financial favors for the TV networks in return for the
insertion of anti-drug messages into their programming. According to Salon,
the feds promised to let the networks sell their mandated anti-drug
public-advocacy spots to commercial advertisers if they pushed government
anti-drug messages in the story lines of their shows instead.

I waited in vain for the usual suspects to voice outrage, for mass
resignations from TV companies in Hollywood and New York, but there was
barely a squeak.

The New York Times belatedly protested last Tuesday but merely raised the
"possibility ... of state-sponsored propaganda." Possibility?

The White House still won't say which shows were affected. McCaffrey himself
denied there was any quid pro quo but then claimed credit for the program's
reduction in teenage drug use. So let's get this straight: When the
government openly decides not to fund an objectionable art exhibit, it's
brutal censorship. But when it secretly colludes with the networks to turn
regular programming into government brainwashing, it's a defensible part of
the war on drugs. McCaffrey's seeming immunity from criticism is nothing
new, of course. It's just another baleful example of Bill Clinton's personal
weaknesses wreaking public policy havoc.

Because the president can't bring himself to be honest about his own past
inhalations, the rest of us have to put up with an authoritarian fanatic in
the White House's drug office in order to neutralize the social right. God
help us, I suppose, if George W. gets elected.

(.....snip.....)