cannabisnews.com: White House Report Stings Drug Agency on Abilities





White House Report Stings Drug Agency on Abilities
Posted by CN Staff on February 04, 2003 at 23:09:25 PT
By Eric Lichtblau
Source: New York Times 
In an unusually harsh critique of an agency with a strong global reputation, the White House has questioned the ability of the Drug Enforcement Administration to stem the flow of narcotics and is threatening to give the agency its smallest budget increase in 15 years.The agency "is unable to demonstrate progress in reducing the availability of illegal drugs in the United States," the Office of Management and Budget wrote in an assessment released this week as part of the budget plan. The agency lacks clear long-term strategies and goals, its managers are not held accountable for problems, and its financial controls do not comply with federal standards, the review found.
The findings raise uncertainties for the agency at a time when Washington expects it to enlarge its antidrug role. That is because the F.B.I. is moving 400 agents off drug cases to terrorism, and the drug agency is being asked to pick up the slack.Officials at the agency and its parent, the Justice Department, said the agency was working to address many of the concerns in the report. They said the report was more a reflection of the agency's failure to communicate its successes than its ability to fight drug trafficking."It's not that we're doing things wrong or we've been ineffective," a spokesman, Will Glaspy, said. "It's more that we just need to do a better job of defining our accomplishments."Officials at the agency pointed to a growing number of seizures for some types of drugs along with the reduced purity of street drugs as evidence of their success in squeezing suppliers out of business. Critics say that drug purity has increased and that drugs have become easier to buy than ever before. President Bush acknowledged in his report on drug strategy for 2002 that use among young people was at "unacceptably high levels" and that "in recent years we have lost ground" in reducing illegal use.The report on the agency was one of 234 that the Office of Management and Budget completed for 20 percent of the programs and agencies as it tries for the first time to assign standards and criteria to budget review.Officials stressed that the criticisms were not uncommon. Like the agency, half the programs reviewed received overall ratings of "results not demonstrated." Still, the severity of the report on the drug agency caught law enforcement officials off guard because of the agency's prominence, size and generally solid reputation in fighting trafficking. Unlike sister agencies like the F.B.I. and the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the drug agency has largely avoided major scandals and calls for reform from members of Congress. It has enjoyed generally strong support on Capitol Hill, and its former director, Asa Hutchinson, who left last week to join the Homeland Security Department, was popular among conservatives in Congress.With that support, the agency has seen its budget more than double since 1995, according to the Justice Department. But in the White House budget released on Monday, the financing is to remain essentially flat at $1.56 billion.Its growth of less than 1 percent is dwarfed by increases in financing at other law enforcement agencies of 10 percent or more. Mr. Glaspy said it represented the smallest increase for the agency since 1988.The performance assessments for the drug agency and other bureaus "were one factor, but clearly not the only factor in funding decisions," said Trent Duffy, a spokesman for the White House on the budget.The overarching concern in financing law enforcement, officials said, is the need to make counterterrorism the top priority. The Bush administration has sought to link drug use to the threat of terrorism, and other Justice Department drug enforcement programs received proposed increases of up to 10 percent in the budget. But the drug agency will be asked to scale back spending in areas like community enforcement even as it seeks to add agents on the street, officials said."When you're fighting a war against terrorism, there is not an infinite amount of money to go around," an official at the Justice Department said. "We are putting significant funds into the war against drugs. But we have to be realistic as to what we can afford."Critics said the critique of the agency was long overdue and could start a debate about how the war on drugs is working."The emperor has no clothes," said Eric F. Sterling, the president of the Criminal Justice Policy Foundation in Silver Spring, Md., and a specialist on drug enforcement. The White House report "should really shake up our national revelry with drug enforcement and generate a major re-evaluation of our antidrug efforts."Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance, a group in New York that promotes alternative policies, said he was "pleasantly surprised" by the findings."Typically," Mr. Nadelmann said, "the D.E.A. has gotten a pretty free ride. Nobody was really held to account for the issue of reducing overall drug use. But this suggests some measure of seriousness about actually putting in a set of real criteria."Source: New York Times (NY)Author: Eric LichtblauPublished: February 05, 2003Copyright: 2003 The New York Times CompanyContact: letters nytimes.com Webpage: http://www.nytimes.com/Drug Policy Alliancehttp://www.drugpolicy.org/Criminal Justice Policy Foundationhttp://www.cjpf.org/CannabisNews DEA Archiveshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/list/DEA.shtml
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Comment #10 posted by BigDawg on February 06, 2003 at 05:11:50 PT
My thiughts exactly
My first thought was "Oh no!", because I feel the DEA will just increase the seizure rate to make up for lost funding. My second thought was that the recent publicity has been bad enough, but if they start acting even more out of line, then it may work in our favor. Though it will be a rough and dangerous ride.
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Comment #9 posted by Rainbow on February 05, 2003 at 19:19:33 PT
This scares me a bit
This type of story can have the opposite effect of what the posters are saying.The DEAth folks are gung ho military types who might just start retaliating in even more mean spirited ways. So for the short term things might get ugly with their fanaticism.Then that burst of energy will show even more how off base they are. So maybe in the long term an irrational action by the DEAth will be good.Hold on though because I can see the directives. Sieze more, arrest more and get those numbers up.Cheers,
R
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Comment #8 posted by mayan on February 05, 2003 at 17:37:12 PT
Promote A Failure
Unlike sister agencies like the F.B.I. and the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the drug agency has largely avoided major scandals and calls for reform from members of Congress. It has enjoyed generally strong support on Capitol Hill, and its former director, Asa Hutchinson, who left last week to join the Homeland Security Department, was popular among conservatives in Congress.So why promote a failure? Does Assa have any experience dealing with terrorism or security? No.Does Tom Ridge have any experience dealing with terrorism or security? No. These men may soon be in charge of the detention camps that will hold those deemed dissedents by the state. GULAG AMERIKA:
http://gulagamerika.homestead.com/
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Comment #7 posted by John Tyler on February 05, 2003 at 09:38:24 PT
Bad PR
Ed's trial, verdict, and the accompanying news coverage has been a public relations disaster for the Feds and the DEA.
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Comment #6 posted by Commonsense on February 05, 2003 at 08:53:32 PT
Is Bill Buckley's influence being felt?
I'm beginning to wonder if this administration might secretly have reservations about the war on drugs. In Bush's speech the other day he actually spoke of those afflicted with addictions as if they are people too. Now they are stiffing the DEA on the budget. This is likely to be a move with fairly broad support as people are getting tired of this war. With Rosenthal's trial actually drawing interest from the mainstream media, this is turning out to be a good month for the tide of public opinion in America's drug policy. Drug warriors are losing ground.
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Comment #5 posted by TroutMask on February 05, 2003 at 06:49:15 PT
All you need is...
...More Money!I'm sure if we spend a few thousand trillion dollars more, our drug-free utopia will finally become a reality. Also, I have a bridge for sale.-TM
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Comment #4 posted by Ethan Russo MD on February 05, 2003 at 06:30:53 PT:
Seismic Editorial Shift
There must have been some major shake-up at the NYT. They seem to attempting to rehabilitate themselves into a paper that provides real news and challenges the conventional wisdom (read, "government propaganda").
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Comment #3 posted by The GCW on February 05, 2003 at 05:03:33 PT
LTE's to the NYT, can reference 2 stories.
Since Ed's case has run with the above story, there is an excelent oppertunity to send LTE's which use both stories to support each other.Budgetwise, confronting Ed is inneffive / not cost effective or even supported by citizens.Oh, and "It's not that we're doing things wrong or we've been ineffective," a spokesman, Will Glaspy, said. "It's more that we just need to do a better job of defining our accomplishments."That was ignoid talk... here is the Truth: they haven't been doing things right and ineffective is accurate, since overall drug use is sky high. They have been doing a fine job in "defining our accomplishments", because their accomplishments are muddled in mire, & their accomplishments include, absalute failure and worse.Waste, You can not just flush away.
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Comment #2 posted by The GCW on February 05, 2003 at 04:48:35 PT
Wow. Ethan Nadelmann & Eric F. Sterling,
said it. This report will help drug law reform. And We intend on helping it help drug law reform.Now take into account that this report which will help drug law reform is in addition to all the other achievements that are presently going on. One example: This story in The NYT is running simultaneously with Ed's story, which has been printed now at least 2x.Our stride is good and getting better.This news will set the tone for My entire day.
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Comment #1 posted by i420 on February 05, 2003 at 04:28:06 PT
as if..
 "in recent years we have lost ground 
HaHaHa like they ever had any ground to lose in the first place.
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