U.S. DRUG POLICY HAS BEEN A COSTLY, STUNNING FAILURE

Taking advice about drug policy from the U.S. makes about as much sense as
hiring Saddam Hussein as a foreign policy advisor.

Every aspect of U.S. drug policy has been a costly, stunning failure,
wrecking lives and whole cities while achieving absolutely nothing. And yet
here's a U.S. drug czar, flying in to Vancouver to warn that we're heading
for major trouble with our drug policies.

David Murray, special assistant in the Office of National Drug Control
Policy, said crazy ideas like decriminalizing marijuana possession and
opening a safe injection site in Vancouver will lead to no good. The U.S.
will even have to tighten border controls, hurting the Canadian economy,
said Murray, whose visit was aimed at persuading police, politicians and
media that Canada should copy the U.S. war on drugs.

Murray didn't just use threats of U.S. retaliation. He also warned that we
will be stumbling toward disaster. Decriminalize marijuana, and more kids
will use it, police will be swamped and vulnerable minority communities
will be turned into dazed potheads, Murray claimed. Safe injection sites
will also lead to something bad, he said, although he was vague about what
that might be.

Murray couldn't offer any evidence for his claims. In fact, the reality is
that marijuana use has gone down among youth in Holland, which took
marijuana use out of the criminal process. And every country that has tried
to deal with heroin and other drug addictions as a medical problem has
reported fewer deaths, less crime, lower health care costs and fewer
addicts. Compare that with the U.S. record.

America has been waging a stupid, costly and ineffective war on drugs for
decades. The result has been more addiction, deaths, crime and social
decay. Twenty years ago there were about 80,000 drug offenders in U.S.
jails; now there are 400,000, at a cost of $16 billion a year.

Drugs are far more potent, far more widely available and far more widely
used. There is more crime, more shattered families and more death. The U.S.
approach has been tried. And it has failed. I feel a little foolish even
using this space to respond to Murray's nonsense. He claimed that people
need the threat of the "sanctions of law enforcement" or they have no
reason to give up drugs. As if disease, poverty, despair and the threat of
death weren't enough. He claimed marijuana is the first step on the ladder
of drugs, even though a study last year by the U.S. RAND think-tank found
that people who are going to use hard drugs will start with whatever is
easiest to get - whether that's beer, pot, or glue. And asked for evidence
that the U.S. approach to drugs is better than other approaches, Murray had
nothing to offer.

The problem with this kind of misinformation, and U.S. pressure, is that
we're talking about a life-and-death issue. Drugs do take a terrible toll.
People's lives are destroyed, families are shattered and communities are
terribly damaged. Organized criminals profit, and addicts commit countless
small and stupid crimes. But that makes it all the more important that we
tackle the problem sensibly, based on what works, not slogans.

If our goal is to reduce the damage done to individuals and communities by
intravenous drug use, then safe injection sites and other harm reduction
measures have been proven to be the most effective path. They save lives,
and offer a gateway to health care services, addiction programs and
employment, while reducing crime. If our goal is to keep organized
criminals from an expanding role in the marijuana trade, then perhaps we
could make the biggest gains by eliminating the risk of prosecution for
people interested in growing a few plants.

We don't need a war on drugs, which generally turns out to be a war on the
most vulnerable members of society. We need education to help people avoid
addiction and abuse, support for people who want to quit and harm reduction
for people who can't or won't quit. We need solutions, not rhetoric.