Pubdate: Sun, 12 Feb 2006
Source: Newsday (NY)
Copyright: 2006 Newsday Inc.
Contact:  http://www.newsday.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/308
Author: Ellis Henican
Cited: Drug Policy Alliance http://www.drugpolicy.org
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?179 (Nadelmann, Ethan)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/people/Milton+Friedman
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/people/William+F.+Buckley
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/soros.htm (Soros, George)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/people/Calvina+Fay
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?214 (Drug Policy Alliance)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Cannabis)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/hr.htm (Harm Reduction)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?140 (Rockefeller Drug Laws)

WAR ON DRUGS - IS IT REALLY 'RIGHT'?

What's so conservative about the war on drugs?

Spending billions in taxpayer dollars with no clear progress? 
Inserting government agents into Americans' private lives? Holding a 
million men and women in prison for what are mostly nonviolent crimes?

Please, how does any of that promote the values that principled 
conservatives hold dear?

None of it does, of course.

But now, seemingly all of a sudden, people on the left aren't the 
only ones expressing doubts about America's war on (some) drugs. Some 
of America's most energized conservatives - activists and 
intellectuals on the right - are openly asking, "Isn't there a better 
way to deal with drug abuse than the old lock-'em-up-forever approach?"

At week's end, thousands of conservative activists gathered in 
Washington for the annual CPAC, the massive Conservative Police 
Action Conference, half pep rally and half conservative family 
reunion. The attendees were regaled with the usual conservative 
litany - warnings about illegal immigration, attacks on the liberal 
media, throaty calls for a muscular war on terrorism. Dick Cheney and 
Karl Rove revved up the crowd.

"Conservatism is the dominant political creed in America," Rove 
declared approvingly.

But this power group of fired-up conservatives also heard something 
else, a message that seemed to come as a surprise to some in the 
sprawling meeting room: pointed and serious questions about America's 
35-year campaign to rid the nation of heroin, cocaine, marijuana and 
other illegal drugs.

Who'd have expected this at a CPAC meeting? Extended comments from 
the podium by Ethan Nadelman, executive director of the Drug Policy 
Alliance, a man who has been called the invisible hand of drug reform 
in America. A former Princeton University professor, Nadelman has 
guided the national fight for medical marijuana and been a key player 
in the battle to ease the draconian Rockefeller-era drug laws in New York.

Actually, Nadelman told the group, there is some real historical 
precedent for conservative skepticism toward harsh drug laws. "Milton 
Friedman and William F. Buckley are probably the two most 
distinguished conservative thinkers of the second half of the 
Twentieth Century," he said. "Both of them made clear that they 
considered the drug laws absurd and antithetical to conservative values."

What do conservatives stand for, he asked rhetorically.

Individual freedom. Fiscal restraint. Holding adults responsible for 
their own personal decisions. Not expecting government to become a 
24-hour-a-day nanny. "Isn't that what conservatism is all about?" 
Nadelman asked.

So why is government deciding what American adults snort, smoke and 
swallow - and enforcing those laws with the threat of decades behind bars?

Some old-guard conservatives are aghast that this discussion has gone 
so far. Some critics complained that Nadelman's group got some of its 
funding from international financier George Soros, an ardent opponent 
of George W. Bush.

And Nadelman's planned debate opponent refused at the last moment to 
go on. Calvina Fay of the Drug Free America Foundation complained 
that the debate moderator also supported drug-law reform.

The event, billed "A Conservative Drug Policy? A Mini Debate on the 
War on Drugs," went on anyway, with drug-war defender Gary Cobb 
substituting for Fay.

"There is a growing split," Nadelman said after he'd finished his 
presentation to the conservatives.

As on many issues, social conservatives and libertarian conservatives 
see the drug question quite differently. But Nadelman said he notices 
more openness among younger conservatives who've started growing 
weary of the just-say-no and lock-'em-up-forever approaches to drug 
abuse. These younger conservatives are more open to drug treatment 
instead of prison and to the "harm reduction" movement that seeks to 
replace anti-drug preaching with practical steps that actually save lives.

"Just the fact that we're discussing this in such a setting," 
Nadelman said. "It's really exciting." 
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake