The End of America's Longest War

Nixon first muttered the words "War on Drugs" 40 years ago and ever since then this drug control policy has been a dismal failure. Statistically, use of marijuana, cocaine and heroin were generally higher in 2007 than ten years earlier. One example from an October 2008 article in the the NYT...

In 2002, the Bush administration’s National Drug Control Strategy set a goal of reducing illegal drug use by 25 percent in five years. This was followed by an unprecedented campaign of persuasion (more than 100 different anti-drug advertisements and commercials) and law enforcement as the number of annual arrests for marijuana possession climbed above 700,000 — higher than ever before, and greater than the combined total for all violent crimes.

Now that the first five years’ results are available, the campaign can officially be called a failure, according to an analysis of federal drug-use surveys by Jon Gettman, a senior fellow at the George Mason University School of Public Policy.

Think about that bolded statement for a second. Arrests for just marijuana possession were higher than the combined total for all violent crimes over a five year period. That's stunning.

The only "success" in this War on Drugs has been the added business supplied to the prison industry to house all of the drug related "criminals." Fortunately Obama sees the problem for what it is, a public health issue and now a sane perspective reigns on drug control policy in the US.

From the Wall Street Journal...

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.

The Obama administration is likely to deal with drugs as a matter of public health rather than criminal justice alone, with treatment's role growing relative to incarceration, Mr. Kerlikowske said.

Already, the administration has called for an end to the disparity in how crimes involving crack cocaine and powder cocaine are dealt with. Critics of the law say it unfairly targeted African-American communities, where crack is more prevalent.

The administration also said federal authorities would no longer raid medical-marijuana dispensaries in the 13 states where voters have made medical marijuana legal. Agents had previously done so under federal law, which doesn't provide for any exceptions to its marijuana prohibition.

During the presidential campaign, President Barack Obama also talked about ending the federal ban on funding for needle-exchange programs, which are used to stem the spread of HIV among intravenous-drug users.