"Mission Accomplished" in War on Drugs?
From Alcohol, Tobacco and Other Drugs News:
A mostly overlooked article published in late June put forth an interesting proposition: that the U.S. war on drugs has already been won.
Writing in the Columbus Dispatch on June 30, Ohio State University historian John C. Burnham recounted a recent meeting of seven former U.S. drug czars at the University of Maryland, held to mark the 35th anniversary of the appointment of the first U.S. drug czar, Jerome H. Jaffee, who served in the Nixon administration from 1971 to 1973.
"The seven former czars and former staff members held remarkably unanimous views, though they come from a variety of backgrounds and included Democrats and Republicans who worked for five very different presidents.
And what they had to say was often surprising," wrote Burnham.
Burnham wrote that the "War on Drugs" initially grew out of concern about heroin use among returning U.S. Vietnam War veterans, but a combination of methadone maintenance, education, and law enforcement has resulted in a decline in heroin use and overdose deaths over the past 35 years.
Drug Czars Dispute Conclusions As it turns out, Burnham's conclusions did come as a bit of a shock -- to some of the drug czars who took part in the program.
In interviews with Join Together, Jaffe, Dogoloff, and Brown each disputed the notion that the drug czars agreed that the drug war had succeeded.
"There's a curious new trend amongst drug warriors these days -- declaring victory," wrote Szalavitz.
Oddly, the one area of agreement that Burnham overlooks in his article is where the views of reformers like Szalavitz and drug czars like Dogoloff -- a self-described "right-wing Democrat" who serves on the board of the conservative Drug Watch International -- tend to dovetail: the need for more addiction treatment.
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