Tag: War on Drugs (page 5)

Attorney General Eric Holder told the Senate today the Administration will begin allowing more ICE agents to make drug busts.

So much for a new direction for the War on Drugs. Where's our legislation ending the crack disparity and eliminating some mandatory minimums? Obviously, on the back burner, once again.

(Guest Post by Boulder, CO criminal defense attorney Lenny Frieling:)

In a large South American country, a farmer looks out from his veranda over his two main crops. On the right side of the rutted dirt, row upon row of coffee are growing in the high mountain air. To the left, coca grows in equally ordered rows. Both crops require tending, and both require some degree of processing to yield roasted coffee beans on one side, processed cocaine on the other.

Both are transported to the United States. In addition to the shipping expenses, the coffee requires the payment of various tariffs, while the coca shipments are accompanied by gangs, bribes, guns, and related violence, to the extent that some towns in Northern Mexico are “owned” by drug cartels. Coffee arrives on US grocery shelves at $6 to $12 a pound. Cocaine arrives at around $44,000 a pound. [More..]

Via Tom at Law Enforcement Against Prohibition: New drug czar Gil Kerlikowske was on KUOW radio today, talking about his new role.

He called the idea of legalization "waving the white flag" and said "legalization is off the the charts when it comes to discussion, from my viewpoint" and that "legalization vocabulary doesn't exist for me and it was made clear that it doesn't exist in President Obama's vocabulary."

Regarding marijuana, he said, "It's a dangerous drug" and, regarding its medical benefits, he said, "we will wait for evidence on whether smoked marijuana has any medicinal benefits - those aren't in." [More...]

Arianna: Ending the War on Drugs: The Moment is Now :

So the question becomes: is the Obama administration really committed to a fundamental shift in America's approach to drug policy or is this about serving up a kinder, gentler drug war?

....But the cost of the drug war -- both human and financial -- is far too high to allow politics to dictate the administration's actions. Indeed, with all the budget cutting going on, how can anyone justify spending tens of billions of dollars a year on an unwinnable war against our own people?

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The new Drug Czar, Gil Kerlikowske, in an interview, suggests the war on drugs may be facing changes -- or is it just an image lift?

The Obama administration's new drug czar says he wants to banish the idea that the U.S. is fighting "a war on drugs," a move that would underscore a shift favoring treatment over incarceration in trying to reduce illicit drug use.

In his first interview since being confirmed to head the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, Gil Kerlikowske said Wednesday the bellicose analogy was a barrier to dealing with the nation's drug issues.

There's some cause for hope: [More...]

We knew this was coming but it's still jarring to see and it is the dead wrong approach to combating Mexico's drug problems.

The Pentagon and Homeland Security Department are developing contingency plans to send National Guard troops to the U.S.-Mexican border under a $350 million initiative that would expand the U.S. military's role in the war on drugs, according to Obama administration officials.

...The initiative, which was tucked into a supplemental budget request sent to Congress this month, has raised concerns over what some U.S. officials perceive as an effort by the Pentagon to increase its counter-narcotics profile through a large pot of money that comes with few visible requirements.

The White House began briefing House and Senate Committees on the plan this week. I complained last month about the $350 million in the budget for the military's use in the war on drugs here, suggesting the U.S. War on Drugs abroad is getting its own stimulus package. [More...]

What do you suppose the total price tag is for this failed war on drugs? One senior Harvard economist estimates we spend $44 billion a year fighting the war on drugs. He says if they were legal, governments would realize about $33 billion a year in tax revenue. Net swing of $77 billion. Could we use that money today for something else? You bet your a*s we could. Plus the cartels would be out of business. Instantly. Goodbye crime and violence.

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First Mexico, now Afghanistan. The Wall St. Journal has as breaking news at the top of its site right now:

The Obama administration will unveil a new Afghanistan strategy Friday that calls for devoting significant new resources to counter-narcotics efforts in Afghanistan and economic development in Pakistan.

Today, Obama's choice of Ambassador to Afghanistan, Lt Gen Karl Eikenberry, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee at his confirmation hearing: [More...]

The UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) opened its Summit on Global Drug Policy today at which they are expected to approve another decade of the War on Drugs. Human Rights Watch explains why the U.N. approach should be rejected.

On March 11-20, 2009, the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) will meet, opening with a high-level segment that will set the international drug policy agenda for the next decade.

In many countries around the world, drug control efforts result in serious human rights abuses - torture and ill-treatment by police, extrajudicial killings, arbitrary detention, and denial of essential medicines and basic health services. UN drug control agencies have paid little attention to whether international drug control efforts are consistent with human rights protections, or to the effect of drug control policies on fundamental human rights.

In our own country, the war on drugs has been a failure, emphasizing prison over treatment. [More...]

Human Rights Watch released a new report this week,
Decades of Disparity, Drug Arrests and Race in the United States (pdf.) The report analyzes the arrest statistics released by the FBI.

Adult African Americans were arrested on drug charges at rates that were 2.8 to 5.5 times as high as those of white adults in every year from 1980 through 2007, the last year for which complete data were available. About one in three of the more than 25.4 million adult drug arrestees during that period was African American.

Via Drug War Chronicle: [More...]

Reuters today provides a timeline for the War on Drugs in Latin America.

It began in 1970 with passage of the Controlled Substances Act. President Richard Nixon declared a War on Drugs in 1971 and the DEA was established in 1973.

Pablo Escobar formed the Medellin cartel in 1983.

By 1985, Mexico began to replace Colombia. In 1993, Columbian police, with assistance from the U.S., kill Escobar. By 1996, the Cali Cartel was dismantled.

In 2000, President Clinton provides Colombia with $1.3 billion to fight the war on drugs. In 2004, George W. Bush provides $1.4 billion to Colombia and Mexico. In 2008, more than 6,000 are killed in drug violence in Mexico.

And they still don't get the picture, the War on Drugs is a failure. Defense Secretary Robert Gates now wants to use our military to continue the losing battle.

[The report] is the latest to question the U.S.'s emphasis on punitive measures to deal with illegal drug use and the criminal violence that accompanies it. A recent Brookings Institution study concluded that despite interdiction and eradication efforts, the world's governments haven't been able to significantly decrease the supply of drugs, while punitive methods haven't succeeded in lowering drug use.

The panel recommends that governments consider measures including decriminalizing the use of marijuana.

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