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NBC News MEET THE PRESS Sunday, August 10, 1997

GUESTS: SEN. RICHARD LUGAR (RIN) Senate Committee on Foreign Relations

SEN. CHUCK HAGEL (RNE) Senate Committee on Foreign Relations

SEN. THAD COCHRAN (RMS)

ALEXIS HERMAN U.S. Secretary of Labor

GEN. BARRY McCAFFREY Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy.

MODERATOR/PANELIST: Tim Russert NBC News

ROUNDTABLE:Paul Gigot The Wall Street Journal Jack Germond The
Baltimore Sun

MR. RUSSERT: Welcome again to MEET THE PRESS. Our issues this Sunday
morning: The Teamsters strike against UPS is now one week old. Millions of
Americans are being affected. Why won't the president intervene? We'll ask
the secretary of labor, Alexis Herman. Then, political hardball in
Washington: Should Jesse Helms be allowed to block the former Massachusetts
governor, William Weld, from becoming ambassador to Mexico? We'll talk with
three Republican senators in the middle of this debate, Richard Lugar of
Indiana, Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, and Thad Cochran of Mississippi.

And as our kids prepare to go back to school, new studies say more than
half of them will try drugs before they finish high school. Why can't we
win this socalled war on drugs? We'll ask the nation's drug czar, General
Barry McCaffrey. And in our MEET THE PRESS minute, former first lady Nancy
Reagan brought her antidrug campaign to MEET THE PRESS 11 years ago.

(Videotape, September 14, 1986):

MRS. NANCY REAGAN: Well, we have to have the fight against drugs, but I
don't believe that just dumping a lot of money into this is going to solve
the problem.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT: And in our political roundtable, insights and analysis from
Paul Gigot of The Wall Street Journal and Jack Germond of The Baltimore Sun.

But first, joining us now with the very latest on the UPS strike, the
secretary of labor, Alexis Herman.



MR. RUSSERT: We have to leave it there. Senator Thad Cochran, Senator Chuck
Hagel, Senator Richard Lugar, thanks all very much for joining us this
Sunday morning. Coming next, the nation's drug czar, General Barry
McCaffrey. And our MEET THE PRESS Minute with former first lady Nancy
Reagan, from 11 years ago.

(Announcements)

MR. RUSSERT: Welcome.

GEN. McCAFFREY:Good to be here.

MR. RUSSERT: New study's out. Good news; bad news. The number of young kids
experimenting with marijuana seems to have gone down a bit...

GEN. McCAFFREY:Mmhmm.

MR. RUSSERT: ...and yet you're quoted last week as saying that onehalf of
the nation's kids will try drugs before they get out of high school. Is
there any chance we'll ever win this socalled war against drugs?

GEN. McCAFFREY: Well, Secretary Shalala and Dr. Nelda Shavaz had some
reasonably mixed reviews out last week. There is some good news. I mean,
the good news is that kids, in general, rather than continuing a fiveyear
upward trend, we saw a modest decrease in the apparent rates of drug abuse
among the 12 to 17yearold group. Also, apparently, some decrease in
alcohol use. So I don't think any of us are going to be too quick to assert
that we've turned it around. Joe Califano at Columbia University and Lloyd
Johnston at University of Michigan will both have other studies out. We're
at a turning point, though, and I think it's starting to work.

MR. RUSSERT: One of the more disturbing facts was heroin...

GEN. McCAFFREY:Uhhuh.

MR. RUSSERT: ...is on a dramatic upswing, particularly with young adults,
18 to 25. Why?

GEN. McCAFFREY: Well, part of it may well be that heroin production has
doubled in the last 10 years. So the price has never been lower. The purity
is high. These kids are smoking it and snorting it. The numbers on heroin
use are disturbing141,000 new initiates, the highest rate of startingup
heroin use we've seen in 10 years.

MR. RUSSERT: All this talk, this constant debate, spending billions and
billions and billions of dollars, some suggest why not just legalize drugs?
Get the black market out of it?

GEN. McCAFFREY: Mmhmm. What a disaster. You know, it's counterintuitive
that if the price went down, if it was socially approved, if it was not
against the lawmost of us don't use drugs. The country is about at a 6
percent drugabuse rate. The chances are good if these were more available
that we might see a doubling in the rates of drug abuse. So we're doing
pretty good. Cocaine useJanet Reno and Jeremy Travis released some stats
on that rate last week also. A tremendous decline over the space of the
years. So we think we're on the right track.

MR. RUSSERT: So the whole notion of legalization, then, is just off the
boards?

GEN. McCAFFREY: Well, I think so. I don't think the American people are
going to buy that, and certainly educators and doctors and law enforcement
officials and parents shouldn't sign up for it.

MR. RUSSERT: There's a big debate about the medicinal use of marijuana.

GEN. McCAFFREY: Mmhmm.

MR. RUSSERT: The National Institute of Health had a study just the other
day recommending that there be more grants made available to study this
issue further. Last fall you campaigned vigorously against initiatives in
Arizona and California...

GEN. McCAFFREY: Mmhmm.

MR. RUSSERT: ...which would, in effect, allow the medicinal use of marijuana.

GEN. McCAFFREY: Mmhmm.

MR. RUSSERT: How serious of a problem is using marijuana for medicinal use?

GEN. McCAFFREY: Well, the California Proposition 215 and Arizona's approach
we thought were bad medicine, bad science. What we're trying to do is put
this back where it should be, with Dr. Harold Varmus and the NIH and Dr.
Alan Leshner, National Institute of Drug Abuse. They convened a countrywide
assembly of scientists. They're going to look at the question. And that's
where it belongs. If it's safe and effective, then medicine and science
ought to judge it, not politics.

MR. RUSSERT: There's an initiative at the District of Columbia...

GEN. McCAFFREY: Yeah.

MR. RUSSERT: ...advocating the medicinal use of marijuana.

GEN. McCAFFREY: Yeah.

MR. RUSSERT: Would you support that initiative?

GEN. McCAFFREY: Oh, no, not at all. We've got a national campaign by drug
legalizers, in my view, to try and use medicinal uses of drugs and
legalization of hemp as a stalking horse to get in under the radar screen.
So, again, the proper place where Donna Shalala and I and others think this
question ought to be decided is by doctors and scientists, not by local
politics.

MR. RUSSERT: A few weeks ago I spoke to Speaker Newt Gingrich on CNBC about
the war on drugs, about you as well. I want to roll that tape for our
viewers and get your reaction. Here's Newt Gingrich.

(Videotape, July 12, 1997):

REP. NEWT GINGRICH (Speaker of the House): When I met with General
McCaffrey, I was thrilled by his response. I mean, he is a serious man. He
has been ahe understands being a theater commander. You know, he was the
theater commander in Southcom. So when you say to him, design a campaign
plan for victory, you're talking to a man who has the professional skill to
do it.

MR. RUSSERT: When will we see this war or this plan?

REP. GINGRICH: I think he has promised me a pretty comprehensive plan by
September. We have to reauthorize the drug office. I want him to become a
genuine czar. I would like to give him for four years the power to
coordinate all American capabilities on winning the war on drugs from
prevention to rehabilitation to local enfthe ability to genuinely have
impact...

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT: What do you think?

GEN. McCAFFREY: Well, I certainly appreciate the bipartisan support I get
out of both houses. I mean, the '97 budget was passed with a 9.4 percent
increase, so the speaker's support is absolutely vital. All I would,
though, add to that is at the end of the day the problem in this country on
drugs is a local series of epidemics. So, in our view, parents and
community coalitionsteachers, local law enforcement are really the
heart and soul of the national drug strategy. We've got to talk to our
children, 68 million of them.

MR. RUSSERT: Is the speaker correct, though, that you're going to draw up a
battle plan which would make you more than just an adviser, but, in effect,
a czar who could say, "Coast Guard, do this; police, do this; Mr.
President, do this"?

GEN. McCAFFREY: Mmhmm. Mmhmm. Well, we'll have to see if we can craft
something that fits the needs of the nine appropriations bills that I have
in front of the Congress right now. There's more than 50 agencies involved
in this, Tim. I'm used to being in command of situations in the military.
In my view, the current approach is I'm the intellectual quarterback of
what's a pretty decent team. Janet Reno, Donna Shalala, Dick Riley, Tom
Constantine and others.

MR. RUSSERT: Of the DEA.

GEN. McCAFFREY: Yeah. Exactly. So...

MR. RUSSERT: Parents who are watching this program today who have children
9, 10, 11, 12which is more deadly to their kids right now, or a more
serious problem, tobacco, alcohol or drugs?

GEN. McCAFFREY: Well, what we've talked about is gateway behavior. If
you're early adolescent and you're doing a lot of marijuana, you're smoking
cigarettes and you're binge drinking, you're in trouble. You know, the
Califano data indicates you may put yourself in an 80fold increased risk
of addictive behavior later on in life. We've got four million Americans
addicted to illegal drugs, and if you want to avoid that, then parents have
to tell their kids: Zero tolerance of pot, cigarettes and alcohol.

MR. RUSSERT: Will America ever be drugfree realistically?

GEN. McCAFFREY: No. But we probably at current rates of 6 percent drug
abuse are 300 percent too high. We ought to be able to return drug abuse in
America to where it was in the '60s, under 2 percent, with a lot less
misery and a lot less crime if we do so.

MR. RUSSERT: Do we need more money for education and prevention and
treatment?

GEN. McCAFFREY: Clearly. The biggest change in the '98 budget was a 21
percent increase in all those programs targeted on children. We have $175
million a year youth media strategy campaign. So we're going to go out and
talk to our kids in the media that they're paying attention to.

MR. RUSSERT: Nancy Reagan, who we'll see in the MEET THE PRESS Minute, made
famous "Just Say No."

GEN. McCAFFREY: Mmhmm.

MR. RUSSERT: If General Barry McCaffrey could give one message to parents
and kids this morning on MEET THE PRESS, what would he say?

GEN. McCAFFREY: Parents, talk to your children. If you want to win the war
on drugs, sit down at your kitchen table and talk to them about zero
tolerance of drugs.

MR. RUSSERT: That has to be the last word. Drug czar Barry McCaffrey,
thanks very much for joining us.

GEN. McCAFFREY: Good to be here, Tim.

MR. RUSSERT: And we'll be right back with Jack Germond and Paul Gigot and
Nancy Reagan in our MEET THE PRESS Minute.

(Announcements)

(Videotape):

MRS. REAGAN: When someone offers you drugs, what will you do?

Group of Children: (In unison) No!

Unidentified Child: Say no!

(End videotape)

(Announcements)

MR. RUSSERT: In her eight years as first lady, Nancy Reagan's simple but
forceful message on drugs was "Just say no." Eleven years ago, she made her
case on MEET THE PRESS.

(Videotape, September 14, 1986):

MR. MARVIN KALB: Do you think that given all of the difficulties on budget
deficits and all that we can afford the fight against drugs?

MRS. REAGAN: Well, we have to have the fight against drugs, but I don't
believe that just dumping a lot of money into this is going to solve the
problem. I think, and I've always said thisI think that we're now at the
point now that we arethat we have reached the level of awareness, now
we're at the point of making people stand up and take a position that this
is morally wrong. And they have to make a full commitment, but that's the
way you're going to solve it and not by just throwing a lot of money into a
problem.

MR. KALB: You feel, for example, in terms of your personal family, that
your children working should submit themselves to drug testing if asked?

MRS. REAGAN: If asked, I would hope they would.

MR. KALB: You would hope they would. And that would, of course, then go for
anydo you know, for example, whether your children have ever had drugs or
taken drugs?

MRS. REAGAN: Oh, when they were in college they tried marijuana, yes.
Mmhmm. And thatyes.

MR. KALB: And that was it and they...

MRS. REAGAN: That was it, yes.

MR. KALB: ...didn't like it or...

MRS. REAGAN: No. That was back in the '60s when we were going through a
very rough time.

MR. KALB: Right. One final question. You have been at this now for quite a
few years, and for a time, you seemed as if you were baying at the moon
because nobody was listening.

MRS. REAGAN: Yes.

MR. KALB: And as you said earlier, you now have everybody's attention.
Where there many times when you were discouraged through this process?

MRS. REAGAN: Well, there were times when I wished that more people were
with me. Discouraged, no. No. Because of seeing all those kids and
listening to them in the rehabilitation places and they were so, so willing
and so anxious to get back their normal lives, and they were really
fighting a very tough fight. And thatyou can't get discouraged when
you're talking to people like that.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT: Nancy Reagan just celebrated her 76th birthday. She's living
in California, caring for President Reagan, who is suffering from
Alzheimer's disease.

That's all for today.