DRUG CZAR: GINGRICH 'IRRESPONSIBLE'

WASHINGTON (AP) -- White House drug policy chief Barry R. McCaffrey charged
Monday that House Speaker Newt Gingrich was playing partisan politics and
being ``irresponsible'' in rejecting out-of-hand President Clinton's plan
to reduce illegal drug use.

``I've got an enormous concern about this,'' McCaffrey told The Associated
Press. ``My immediate reaction is that this is irresponsible.''

Clinton and Gingrich both talked about drug policy in separate radio
addresses Saturday, with the speaker dismissing the president's long-term
plan as a ``hodgepodge of half-steps and half-truths'' and saying he will
ask the House to pass a resolution asking for the White House to withdraw
it. He described it as the ``definition of failure.''

``This strikes me as this brilliant man Newt Gingrich conducting drug
policy by what I would have termed in my last life as ``ready, fire,
aim,''' said McCaffrey, a retired Army general.

``I'm sympathetic to partisan wrangling and know that Newt Gingrich is
looking for issues for the midterm election, but that's not what I signed
up to do. I'm afraid he's going to do a disservice to a comprehensive
strategy.''

Gingrich's spokeswoman, Christina Martin, said the Republican from Georgia
had met McCaffrey several times and tried to work with him.

``There's nothing hasty or political about Speaker Gingrich's deep
disappointment that the Clinton administration cannot put together a
serious strategy for saving America's teens in a more timely and effective
manner,'' Martin said. ``The bottom line: the speaker worries that the
slower, more ineffective America's drug plan is, the more young lives lost
and damaged.''

Clinton said he hopes to cut the number of Americans using drugs in half
over the next decade. To accomplish that, the administration has budgeted
$17.1 billion for next year for expanded prevention education, more border
patrol and Drug Enforcement Agency agents, more community policy and
expanded prisoner treatment.

``We put thousands of hours of work into it,'' McCaffrey said. ``Before we
went to print we had the support of law enforcement officers, academics,
mayors, ... this has been a non-partisan approach to the problem that is
widely supported around the country.''

Gingrich, in his radio address, asked why it should take a decade to cut
drug use when the Civil War was won and slavery abolished in just four.

The speaker, who has made a drug-free America the first among four
long-term goals for America, said the GOP-led Congress would pass its own
anti-drug agenda. Other goals are better education, lower taxes and
reforming Social Security.

He suggests building community anti-drug coalitions, giving parents more
anti-drug information, creating drug-free workplaces through market
incentives and starting a national clearinghouse for anti-drug information.

McCaffrey said the administration, with Republican help, had implemented
some of those ideas such as community coalitions and a national youth
strategy.