Cannabis News Media Awareness Project
  A Debatable War on Drugs
Posted by FoM on August 25, 2001 at 21:47:46 PT
By David S. Broder 
Source: Washington Post  

justice The high esteem in which former representative Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas is held by his colleagues was demonstrated by the 98 to 1 Senate vote confirming him last month as the new director of the Drug Enforcement Administration.

Even more telling was the fact that Rep. John Conyers of Michigan, the senior Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee and an ardent opponent of the impeachment of President Clinton, appeared at the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing to praise Hutchinson, who had been one of the Republican House managers presenting the case against Clinton to the full Senate.

In his 4 1/2 years in the House, Hutchinson, a former U.S. attorney, earned an estimable reputation as a thoughtful conservative and, as such liberals as Conyers and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy of Vermont affirmed, as a fair-minded advocate.

Hutchinson will need all his skills in his new job, for the nation is clearly about to embark on a long-overdue debate on the so-called "war on drugs." The DEA is, as the name implies, primarily a law-enforcement agency, but John Walters, Bush's choice to head the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, has been in limbo, awaiting a confirmation hearing since May. Many of the same Democrats who welcomed Hutchinson's nomination have argued that Walters's hard-line approach, emphasizing interdiction and incarceration over education and treatment, makes him the wrong choice for "drug czar." At least until Walters's fate is resolved, Hutchinson is in the hot seat on Bush administration policy toward drugs.

During the past three decades, the United States has invested billions in fighting the scourge of drugs, and more and more serious people are questioning its effectiveness. The critics range from conservatives such as Bill Buckley and New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson to an array of liberals, and they are having an impact on public opinion. While few agree with the editors of the influential British newspaper the Economist, which last month laid out at length "the case for legalizing drugs," many more are expressing their doubts about current policies.

A Pew Research Center survey last February found that three out of four Americans believe "we are losing the drug war," and by a margin of 52 percent to 35 percent they said drug use "should be treated as a disease, not a crime."

In a recent issue of the American Prospect magazine, California journalist Peter Schrag pointed to the growing trend in the states, where initiatives allowing medical use of marijuana or mandating treatment rather than jail for drug-users have been winning large public majorities.

Hutchinson was dodgy in his confirmation hearing on the question of sending federal agents out to arrest doctors who prescribe marijuana as a pain- and nausea-relieving agent for cancer patients and other seriously ill people, as eight states now allow. The Supreme Court held earlier this year that the feds have that authority. When Hutchinson was asked if he would use it, he said it was something on which he needed to confer with the attorney general, adding that it was important "that we do not send the wrong signal . . . that marijuana use is an acceptable practice."

But Hutchinson also applauded a bipartisan bill, crafted by Leahy and the Judiciary Committee's ranking Republican, Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah, to expand funding of drug treatment programs, especially for prisoners and youths, and to increase the number of drug courts, where judges can order nonviolent drug offenders to undergo treatment and continuing tests, rather than put them in jail.

Hutchinson took over his DEA duties last week at the same time the Department of Justice bragged that more people than ever are in federal prison on drug charges and are serving longer sentences. That report showed there were more suspects arrested in 1999 on charges involving marijuana than for powder or crack cocaine. A higher portion of the marijuana suspects who wound up in federal prison were simply users than was the case with any of the hard drugs.

That raises obvious questions about the priorities of federal drug enforcement agents and prosecutors. No one seems to know how many people are in state prisons for simple possession of marijuana. But in 1998, those prisons held 236,800 people convicted on drug charges -- 57 percent more than had been there in 1990.

The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University estimated in 1998 that 70 percent to 85 percent of all state prison inmates -- not just those convicted on drug charges -- need treatment, but only 13 percent of them get it.

The whole "war on drugs" cries out for reexamination.

Source: Washington Post (DC)
Author: David S. Broder
Published: Sunday, August 26, 2001; Page B07
Copyright: 2001 The Washington Post Company
Contact: letters@washpost.com
Website: http://www.washingtonpost.com/

Related Articles & Web Site:

Pew Research Center Web Site
http://www.people-press.org/

DEA Head Can Lead in a New Direction or Fail
http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread10719.shtml

A Quagmire for Our Time - American Prospect
http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread10426.shtml


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Comment #6 posted by Patrick on August 26, 2001 at 08:45:05 PT
rabblerouser
I forget which senator by name but is was one from Minnesota and John McCain did not vote!

[ Post Comment ]
 
Comment #5 posted by Patrick on August 26, 2001 at 08:42:28 PT
Hey Wolfie...
…looks like we will get a debate.

Johnson To Debate Medical-Marijuana Laws on Radio
http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread10723.shtml

The only question is how many Americans care enough to tune in?

I am chomping at the bit in anticipation. I have seen Gov. Johnson debate on CNN and watched Asa during the impeachment proceedings of Clinton. Both of these men are very skilled orators. Fortunately, Johnson has sanity, truth, and common sense on his side. It ought to make for an interesting show. Gonna have to invite all my cannabis lovin friends over for a smokefest on this one!


[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #4 posted by rabblerouser on August 26, 2001 at 08:40:37 PT
ninety-eight to one
Who is the one?

[ Post Comment ]
 
Comment #3 posted by FoM on August 26, 2001 at 08:32:34 PT
Just a note
Hi Everyone,
I just can't seem to find any news this morning and we might be getting a thunder storm the way it looks but all is well and as soon as I find some news I sure will get it posted.

More Good Web Sites
http://freedomtoexhale.com/mgd.htm


[ Post Comment ]
 
Comment #2 posted by Ethan Russo, MD on August 26, 2001 at 05:37:40 PT:

Comments
"Hutchinson was dodgy in his confirmation hearing on the question of sending federal agents out to arrest doctors who prescribe marijuana ---- The Supreme Court held earlier this year that the feds have that authority."

I am sick of hearing this error promulgated, especially by the Washington Post, which should have some people that read the laws carefully enough to know better. None of the states allow doctors to "prescribe marijuana." Rather, they allow them to recommend cannabis as a treatment. There is a tremendous difference there. The former would be a violation of federal law as written (but which is based on false premises that should be overturned). The latter is based on free speech rights, and should be inviolate. There has already been a federal case about this, Conanat vs. McCaffrey, in which the tyrannical czar wanted to go after physicians in California for their cannabis recommendations. That policy was struck down. The feds have not chosen to push it up to the Supreme Court, because they would surely lose if the 1st Amendment yet means anything. If they did that, in essense, California would conquer Amerika! If the minions of law enforcement choose to arrest doctors for their opinions, then there will be a lot of them in prison. The public will not like that, and it would only hasten a tremendous backlash against the War on Drugs and its perpetrators.

"A higher portion of the marijuana suspects who wound up in federal prison were simply users than was the case with any of the hard drugs."

This should be the polling question: "Should users of small amounts of cannabis be imprisoned?" You would see a majority against virtually everywhere. It makes sense to nobody but the ideologues to jail cannabis users for longer terms than murderers and rapists. There should be no crime in routine adult cannabis use, and the law should reflect that.




[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #1 posted by Wolfie on August 26, 2001 at 05:35:22 PT
Ahh...I love the smell of hubris in the morning.
All of this clucking about the new DEA chief, and America's "debate" on the War on Drugs (believe me, folks, there will be no debate, just more bleating about getting tougher).

Listen close folks: AMERICA'S STANCE ON THE WAR ON DRUGS IS IRRELEVANT.

Got that? Irrelevant. Doesn't mean squat. The rest of the industrialized world has weighed in, and they don't want any part of it anymore. Europe has decriminalized marijuana, and full legalization will follow shortly. Many countries have decriminalized ALL drug use.

The Drug War is and has always been an American obsession, and the rest of world is tired of dancing to the tune. Its that simple.

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