Pubdate: Sun, 18 Feb 2001 Source: San Diego Union Tribune (CA) Copyright: 2001 Union-Tribune Publishing Co. Contact: PO Box 120191, San Diego, CA, 92112-0191 Fax: (619) 293-1440 Website: http://www.uniontrib.com/ Forum: http://www.uniontrib.com/cgi-bin/WebX Author: Manon G. McKinnon Note: McKinnon is an independent journalist in Washington. This commentary was written for Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service. REGAINING THE MOMENTUM IN THE WAR ON DRUGS FALLS CHURCH, Va. -- Three days after Christmas an Associated Press story out of Philadelphia reported: "Four masked intruders burst into a dilapidated crack house and opened fire on 10 persons, killing seven. . . . One woman inside the house was heard screaming 'Help me! Oh my God help me!' . . . two of the victims were reported drug dealers . . . the house was 200 feet from an elementary school." The district attorney told reporters, "For those of us who think drug use is glamorous, it's a horrible mistake." A few days later, the Stephen Soderbergh movie "Traffic" opened to rave reviews and gave audiences a fictional glimpse of the horror and savagery of the drug life. Particularly gruesome was the depiction of the empty adolescent girl who filled the void in her soul with drugs and prostitution; but there was no one in the story - -- on either side of the law -- whose life was not brutalized and made tragic by drugs. The ever more powerful drug legalizers like to say that both the Philadelphia massacre and the movie illustrate the futility of the war on drugs. As always, they are horribly wrong and oblivious to the human devastation surrounding drugs. In the words of professor James Q. Wilson of UCLA, "Drug use is wrong because it is immoral, and it is immoral because it enslaves the mind and destroys the soul." Former drug czar William Bennett, put it this way: "People addicted to drugs neglect their duties . . . they will neglect God, family, children, friends and jobs -- everything in life that is important, noble and worthwhile -- for the sake of drugs." Drugs, Bennett notes, "undermine the necessary virtues of a free society -- autonomy, self-reliance and individual responsibility . . . for a citizenry to be perpetually in a drug-induced haze doesn't bode well for the future of self-government." And the Drug Enforcement Administration reminds us that crime, domestic violence, child abuse and fetal damage all come in the package with drugs. Now it is time for President George W. Bush to pick his drug czar; a man or woman whose job has been made more difficult by the last eight years. After the Clinton years, every indicator is bad. Consider a few: Drugs are more potent, cheaper and more available. Youth drug use is up, youth are less negative toward drugs and the age of first use is shockingly down to 13 years or under. Emergency room visits for drug overdoses are up and methamphetamine use is exploding. The ruinous idea of drug legalization is back as eight states have legalized marijuana and other drugs under the hoax of medical need. And, finally, narco-terrorism has fanned the flames of civil war in Colombia, devastating that nation's legitimate economy and threatening to suck the United States into what some critics predict could become another Vietnam. Yet despite the false claims of drug legalizers, the situation is not hopeless. What most people have forgotten is the success this country had in reducing drug use during the 1980s -- primarily under the administrations of Ronald Reagan and the new president's own father. Between 1977 and 1992, overall casual drug use by Americans dropped by 78 percent. For high school seniors the decline between 1985 and 1992 was 81 percent -- and this was achieved at a time when many other social pathologies were growing. The progress was based on an integrated -- and committed -- strategy that included interdiction, treatment, education, prevention and law enforcement. There followed overwhelming cultural change in which illegal drug use went from being stylish and liberating to passe and dangerous. Children learned to "Just Say No." Outgoing drug czar Barry McCaffrey did what he could. He fostered a national advertising campaign to dissuade the new generation of teens, 54 percent of whom now say they have tried illegal drugs. He stood up for scientific truth and held fast that raw, smoked marijuana is not medicine. He lobbied for and won aid to the anti-drug forces in Colombia. But there was never a commitment to reduce supply and demand during the Clinton-Gore years comparable to that of the Reagan and Bush years. When Bill Clinton took office, there were about 12 million drug users in the United States. Had the drug war continued in the 1980s mode, that figure might be 6 million today. Instead, it is 14-plus million, and the new users are the young. It is time to recall 19th-century German philosopher Immanuel Kant's observation that "the actual proves the possible." What was done in the 1980s can be done again. If the new President Bush will fight illegal drugs with the same commitment and force that his father did, he will have the overwhelming support and appreciation of people in America and across the world. George W. Bush sent a good signal when he chose the tough drug fighter John Ashcroft as his attorney general. Now he must bring on a like-minded drug czar and get back to winning the war. McKinnon is an independent journalist in Washington. Her e-mail address is This commentary was written for Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service. - --- MAP posted-by: Jo-D