BRINGING DRUG WAR BACK HOME

Congress is in the midst of a debate over the future funding of
America's war on drugs, especially the phase of the war that takes
place in South America.

Federal drug czar John Walters told lawmakers last week that America
is "heading in the right direction and we are winning" the war
against drugs. He proudly points to the fact that cocaine production
in the Andes has fallen 29 percent in the past four years, and
Colombia's opium crop was cut in half between 2003 and 2004.

What Walters didn't tell lawmakers was the other side of the story.

According to the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime, while cocaine
production fell 11 percent in Colombia last year, it soared by nearly
24 percent in Peru and 35 percent in Bolivia. Overall, coca
cultivation increased 2 percent in the Andes region - where Walters
claims "we are winning" the war on drugs.

In fact, the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service reckons
American taxpayers have given $5.4 billion to the war of drugs in
South America in the past four years, but that expenditure has had no
effect on drug availability in the United States, and prices are at
an all-time low.

So, what has $5.4 billion bought in South America? Apparently,
American dollars - though virtually worthless in reducing the flow of
drugs to the United States - are invaluable in helping nations such
as Colombia fight internal crime. Plan Colombia, which is the
strategy the Bush is promoting in the drug war, has been a resounding
success at reducing street killings and village massacres associated
with the drug business.

In other words, U.S. tax dollars are fighting crime in the streets
of Bogota, but are having little or no effect on the flow of drugs to
Dallas, Philadelphia or Los Angeles.

One senior State Department official, in defense of the Bush
administration's drug wars policy, said, "You adjust your tactics
... there's no inclination on the part of the administration to give
up just because it's tough."

That's an admirable display of grit, but it doesn't answer the
question of why America's taxpayers have to keep shelling out
billions of dollars a year to keep fighting a war on drugs that has
been, and will likely continue to be, a dismal failure.

The money is being spent in the wrong countries. The real war on
drugs should be in American homes and classrooms - explaining to
people the wisdom and logic of not saddling yourself with a drug
habit in the first place.