A TALK WITH A DRUG CZAR ON USES OF POT

Ad Blitz Is Launched in Detroit

The nation's drug czar, John Walters, director of the Office of National
Drug Control Policy, was in Detroit on Tuesday to launch a national ad
campaign aimed at helping African-American parents take a stand against
youth drug use, starting with marijuana.

The campaign, themed "Love. The Anti-Drug," urges parents to communicate
with their teenage children when it comes to drugs.

Walters, a Michigan State University graduate who was born in Detroit and
raised in Lansing, talked about drugs, Canada, the film "Traffic" and
Cheech and Chong.

QUESTION: What are your thoughts on Canada's efforts to legalize marijuana?

ANSWER: "I've talked to Canadian officials about this. I think we have
somewhat conveyed some of the ignorance we've had in America about
marijuana -- calling it the soft drug, the drug that everybody uses. But
the increase in potency and the beginning use at a younger age has
contributed to the fact that 23 percent of Americans we have to treat for
dependency or abuse are teenagers and the vast majority is dependent on
marijuana. The biggest concern we have is not to tell another sovereign
country about how to handle their domestic policy. We're here to share
information."

Q: What are your thoughts on using medical marijuana for treatment for the
sick, such as chemotherapy patients?

A: "We have Marinol that is available by prescription; it's synthetic.
Smoked marijuana has not been showed to be safe and efficacious. We don't
have any bigotry about this. If it met those standards, we could allow it,
and we could even try to control the abuse potential. It has not met it
because it's not a safe and efficacious substance. We can't say it is;
that's not a responsible use of our authority."

Q: Where does most of the marijuana in the United States come from?

A: It "continues to be grown on public lands. Indoor, hydroponically grown
marijuana is another dimension that we're trying to crack down on
aggressively. Another significant portion comes from Mexico. Increasingly,
unfortunately, a large part of particularly high-potency marijuana is
coming from Canada; not only western Canada and the British Columbia area,
but Asian organized-crime groups have moved productions back eastward.
Canadian officials report thousands of indoor growers in the Toronto area."

Q: Why is it more potent these days?

A: "There has been a kind of agricultural technology advancement that has
produced this. Varieties of marijuana that are higher potency have been
developed for the sake of improving the profits that criminal groups can
make. If you think people selling marijuana are Cheech and Chong, you are
living in the past and in a fantasy. They are the same violent
organizations that kill people as a part of doing business and the same
people who live off of misery and addiction."

Q: How realistic is the movie "Traffic"?

A: "The movie 'Traffic,' I think, was in some ways -- in terms of showing
how horrible drug trafficking is -- was true. You can't say it glamorized
drug use or its consequences. But I think it was too pessimistic. I don't
think the efforts that are made as it presented as futile are futile. I
also think the ability of agencies to come together whether they are
national or local has come together over time."