Pubdate: Tue, 07 Jun 2011 Source: Columbia Daily Tribune (MO) Contact: 2011 Columbia Daily Tribune Website: http://www.columbiatribune.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/91 Note: Prints the street address of LTE writer Author: Henry J. Waters III Bookmark: http://mapinc.org/topic/Global+Commission+on+Drug+Policy Cited: http://www.globalcommissionondrugs.org/ WAR ON DRUGS Futility Becomes More Apparent What do former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan; former Cabinet member George Shultz, who served under Presidents Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon; former U.S. Federal Reserve Board chairman Paul Volcker; former presidents of Mexico, Brazil and Colombia; writers Carlo Fuentes and Mario Vargas Llosa; U.K. business titan Richard Branson; and the current prime minister of Greece all agree on? They say it's time to end the war on drugs. All are part of the 19-member Global Commission on Drug Policy, which calls on governments to end criminalization of controlled substances. "Political leaders and public figures should have the courage to articulate publicly what many of them acknowledge privately, that the evidence overwhelmingly demonstrates that repressive strategies will not solve the drug problem and that the war on drugs has not, and cannot, be won," the report said. The commission points out the obvious. Decriminalization would undermine organized crime and offer health and treatment for users. The report is particularly critical of policies in the United States that must lead changes if the drug war is to be transformed. One need only look at the mayhem occurring near the Mexican border as cartels bribe and murder state and local officials to abet their wildly profitable illegal drug business in the U.S. black market. One might also look at persistent U.S. street crime, mostly fomented by drug dealers and users desperate for cash to afford black market prices. The global commission solution signed by so many prominent leaders sounds familiar. It is precisely what this country did in the 1920s to end the scourge of the black market in alcoholic liquor. Yet the White House drug czar says the report is misguided. "Drug addiction is a disease that can be successfully prevented and treated. Making drugs more available -- as this report suggests -- will make it harder to keep our communities healthy and safe," Rafael Lemaitre said. This is nothing more than a timorous hunkered-down political statement, the opposite of civic leadership. I suppose Lemaitre hasn't looked outside at the streets or scanned a police report lately. Nothing would do more to lessen crime problems in the United States than legalizing drugs. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom