[Vision2020] Failed Drug Policies from Nixon to Bush

[Garrett Clevenger]

Considering marijuana was reported to be the 3rd highest cash crop in Washington state a few years ago (and it probably still tops the list) obviously there's a lot demand. It's foolish to waste money incarcerating pot smokers, and lose out on tax revenue that could be collected. Particularly in these hard economic times, it seems like it makes sense to decriminalize marijuana, and actually add money to state coffers. It could be regulated like alcohol (a way more destructive drug in my opinion) and given a sin tax.

The fact that growing hemp for industrial use is illegal, too, shows how ridiculous the whole thing is. This type of hemp has little psychoactive properties, and apparently will get you sick if you smoke it. They call it ditch weed in the south because it's so pervasive, and people know to leave it alone.

The USDA used to promote hemp growing by farmers because it is such an easy plant to grow, and has so many uses. If we were allowed to grow it today, we'd be adding another layer of wealth to our country.

The whole war on pot was pushed by the paper, pharmaceutical and oil industries because it competed with them, as this plant can be used to make pulp, rope, medicine and food. The bane of these tyranical industries are plants that any farmer can grow and profit from, rather than keeping that wealth in these industries hands.

Since marijuana was mostly smoked by minorities during its ban in the 1930's, it wasn't too hard for those industries to convince Congress that it should be made illegal. But countless billions of dollars and wrecked lives later, it is still a popular drug. And it will probably always be that way.

As a farmer, I'm offended that I cannot grow a plant that could be used as a subsitute for oil and cutting down trees. I thank our state rep Tom Trail for pushing to make it legal to grow. It's too bad we have too many reps who can't see past their narrow view.

gclev



Nick writes:

Nixon is the first post-war president to declare war on drugs.  He was determined to enforce a policy that placed marijuana in the same category as heroin. In the early days of Nixon's war, a person caught with any amount of marijuana could be sentenced to seven years in prison.

In 1971 Nixon appointed Pennsylvania Gov. Ray Shafer to chair the National Commission on Marijuana and Drug Abuse, which unexpectedly recommended that pot possession be decriminalized.  Always coarse and obscene, Nixon lashed out at members of the Commission calling them "bastards" and "Jews."

Since the day Nixon rejected the recommendations of the Shafer Commission, fifteen million Americans have been arrested for marijuana charges (88 percent for possession only), but pot dealing and smoking continue unabated. Since 1980 the number of drug offenders incarcerated by states increased from 6 percent to 21 percent and those in federal prisons went from 25 to 57 percent. Sadly, 80 percent of all those in prison for drug offenses are either Latinos or African Americans.

Paramilitary SWAT teams in U.S. cities have been overly aggressive against suspected drug dealers.  The libertarian CATO Institute has reported that these units have entered the homes of 170 innocents and killed 43.  The CATO website also lists 23 nonviolent offenders and 25 police officers killed.

Last year the U.S. spent $69 billion interfering in the lives of North and South Americans, supporting military activities and crop eradication that have alienated millions of people south of the border.  

In 2007 one of the first acts of Mexican President Felipe Calderon was to use the army to crack down on Mexico's three major drug cartels. Calderon used the army because local and regional police and many office holders had already been bought off by the cartels.  The results of Mexico's military solution to drug smuggling have been disastrous.  In the past two years an estimated 8,790 people have been killed, including 800 soldiers and police officers. 

Mexico is the transshipment point for 90 percent of the cocaine coming to the U.S.  The main source of this drug is Columbia, which has been the focus of U.S. efforts of eradication and interdiction.  Since 2000 the U.S. has poured $6 billion dollars into Columbia, but cocaine production has still increased 4 percent during that time. 

Large acreages of coca have been destroyed; the big cartels have been broken up; left-wing guerrillas are in retreat; and the streets of Bogata are safer.  But the coca farmers have simply switched to smaller plots closer to the jungle and right-wing paramilitary units are still involved in cocaine production and smuggling. 

Nixon's war on drugs have turned entire nations against us.  Evo Morales, a former coca grower, is now Bolivia's president.  At recent speech at the UN, Morales held up a coca leaf and spoke about a World Health Organization (WHO) study that concluded that the ingestion of coca was not harmful and that it might even have some beneficial effects.  When I was in Peru in 2002, my guide distributed coca leaves to our group as a remedy for altitude sickness. 

In 1989 I chaired the Borah Symposium on the topic "Cocaine and Conflict" and our keynote speaker was Ethan Nadelman. Now the head of the Drug Policy Institute, he is a leading spokesman for drug legalization, which means legal regulation, not total free use (except of marijuana) of hard drugs.  

Proponents of legal regulation contend that removing the illegal trade and criminal gangs will have the same positive effect as the ending of Prohibition in 1933.  A $250-350 billion business would become a source for much needed tax revenue that can be used to rebuild communities and rehabilitate those relative few who have been addicted to drugs.  

A 2007 Zogby Poll asked the following question of 1028 people: "If hard drugs such as heroin or cocaine were legalized, would you be likely to use them."  Only 6 answered in the affirmative.  
There are over 250 shops in the Netherlands where one can buy marijuana legally, but only 16 percent of the adult population has even tried cannibals, while 33 percent of Americans have.  One commentator quipped that the Dutch have made smoking pot "uncool." 

Reading the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) website, one would think that liberalizing drug laws in Europe has been a complete failure. In England doctors used to prescribe heroin to addicts under controlled conditions and their numbers stabilized at 2,000, but since that program was abolished in 1970 the number has risen to 300,000.  Similar programs in Germany, Spain, Switzerland, and the Netherlands have proved effective.

One of the most effective organizations for legal regulation of drugs is Law Enforcement against Prohibition (LEAP). Since its founding in 2002, LEAP's membership, former police officers, DEA agents, and city officials, has grown to 5,000.  These men and women have seen first hand how Nixon's war on drugs has devastated their communities and made criminals out of ordinary citizens.  

As long as the U.S. has the highest drug use rate in the industrialized world, this demand will drive the criminal drug trade and will continue to destabilize all the countries south of the border. We should immediately un-declare the wars on drugs and terror.  Police surveillance and investigation should replace paramilitary over-kill. We should decriminalize the use of marijuana and we should try the policy of legal regulation of all other drugs and see if it works.