WHERE THERE IS SMOKE, THERE ARE MIRRORS

DANIEL FORBES, the journalist who revealed last January that the White
House Office of National Drug Control Policy cuts deals with TV networks to
weave anti-drug messages, like product placement, into the story lines of
TV shows, has a new ax to grind. This time it's Bob Taft, the Republican
governor of Ohio, whom he accuses of plotting with the Partnership for a
Drug-Free America to create a partisan political campaign against a
drug-reform initiative in the state. In a rambling 43-page report posted on
the Web site of the Institute for Policy Studies (ipc-dc.org), a left-wing
think tank, Dan alleges that Taft, his wife, Hope Taft and the PDFA spent
government money planning a campaign against a state initiative that would
promote treatment instead of criminal sentences for simple drug possession.

Unfortunately there's not a whiff of a smoking gun in the report other than
some publicly available transcripts of meetings between the alleged
conspirators, and there are no sources for his story, because no one
returned Dan's phone calls. Finally, there is no ad campaign and it doesn't
appear that there will be one. Did they call it off? "That's a darn good
question," Dan, who writes for High Times, tells Adages, "they're not
telling me. The Partnership hasn't returned my phone calls for five years."
The PDFA did return Adages call. "We've never created any advertising to
influence the outcome of a drug based referenda in any state," said Steve
Dnistrian, director of public affairs. "Clearly, Dan is smoking some of the
wacky weed that he has a great affection for when he is sitting down
writing these things."