Pubdate: Sat, 27 Jan 2001
Source: Houston Chronicle (TX)
Copyright: 2001 Houston Chronicle
Contact:  Viewpoints Editor, P.O. Box 4260 Houston, Texas 77210-4260
Fax: (713) 220-3575
Website: http://www.chron.com/
Forum: http://www.chron.com/content/hcitalk/index.html
Author:  Michael Hedges,  Houston Chronicle Washington Bureau

BUSH URGED TO HANG TOUGH IN DRUG WAR

WASHINGTON -- Earlier this month, a group of key Republican legislators 
sent President Bush a letter that firmly warned him not to back off on the 
nation's fight against narcotics traffickers.

"We believe that any downgrade of the drug czar position below Cabinet 
status at the outset of your administration would be a political misstep," 
said the letter, signed by key Republican House committee chairmen.

The letter was a pre-emptive shot across Bush's bow in response to whispers 
that the new administration was looking to lower the profile on drug 
enforcement issues, said some Washington anti-drug insiders.

To legislators committed to a traditional approach to fighting the war on 
drugs, downgrading the drug czar's status would be an admission that the 
war on drugs was unwinnable.

"The feeling has been that there was an inclination within the Bush camp to 
reduce the status of the drug czar from a Cabinet to a non-Cabinet 
position, and also to tone down any rhetoric about a war on drugs," said 
John Walters, who served as drug czar at the end of former President Bush's 
administration.

Since his election, the younger Bush has sent out what some see as 
conflicting signals on drug policy.

On the one hand, he has picked some tough anti-drug warriors for his 
administration.

On the other hand, he has delayed the choice for his top drug adviser and 
has sent messages in interviews that indicate he may be contemplating 
changes from hard-line anti-drug measures.

Bush's anti-drug approach will be clearer once he picks someone to head the 
Office of National Drug Control Policy, the so-called drug czar.

A few names of potential Bush drug czar selections have circulated in 
Washington, including Brent Coles, mayor of Boise, Idaho; Florida state 
drug czar Jim McDonough; former Florida congressman Bill McCollum; and 
former Arizona Sen. Dennis DeConcini.

Asked for a comment on when Bush would make a decision on the post, White 
House spokesman Scott McClellan said: "We don't speculate on any 
appointments. When the administration is ready to make an announcement, 
we'll let people know."

Bush has made some recent statements that have been well received by those 
who feel the United States' approach to fighting drugs has to radically change.

"I think a lot of people are coming to the realization that maybe long 
minimum sentences for the first-time users may not be the best way to 
occupy jail space and/or heal people from their disease. And I'm willing to 
look at that," Bush said in a CNN interview late last week.

He also referred to "making sure the powder-cocaine and the crack-cocaine 
penalties are the same. I don't believe we ought to be discriminatory."

Eliminating mandatory minimums for nonviolent drug crimes and narrowing the 
disparity between powder- and crack-cocaine sentences have been key goals 
of liberal anti-drug groups and African-American organizations.

"The fact that Bush would even be talking about these things is 
encouraging," said Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the Drug Policy 
Foundation, a think tank based in New York.

On the other hand, there is little in what Bush has done so far to support 
any theory that his administration is going soft on drug enforcement.

In a speech in October, in which Bush last spoke in detail about drugs, he 
said, "Over time, drugs rob men and women and children of their dignity and 
character. ... Illegal drugs are the enemies of innocence and ambition and 
hope. I will exert presidential leadership to send the clear and consistent 
message that drug abuse is dangerous and wrong."

And since his election, Bush and top aides have seemed to embrace a strong 
law-and-order approach to the war on drugs.

On Wednesday, the White House said it was going to stick with an ambitious 
and controversial $1.3 billion aid plan to Colombia it inherited from the 
Clinton administration

Under "Plan Colombia," the United States is funding helicopters and other 
military equipment to help Colombia mount a campaign against 
narco-traffickers in the southern part of that country who have been 
shielded by Marxist guerrillas.

Also last week, Bush selected as his top adviser to Latin America John 
Maisto, a former ambassador to Venezuela whose most recent job was advising 
the military's U.S. Southern Command in Miami on training Colombian 
brigades for that fight.

Earlier this month during his confirmation hearing, Secretary of State 
Colin Powell affirmed his support for Plan Colombia and talked about 
expanding it to neighboring countries.

Domestically, Bush has also signaled a tough approach to fighting drugs. He 
told Drug Enforcement Administrator Donnie Marshall, who is an advocate for 
using federal resources to interdict drugs and bust drug kingpins, that he 
would be retained.

In his position paper on drugs during the campaign, Bush talked about 
increasing by more than $2.7 billion the $19 billion spent on various 
anti-drug efforts annually.

And Bush nominated as attorney general John Ashcroft, a man who has an 
uncompromising approach for dealing with drug offenders.

Ashcroft backs mandatory minimum prison terms for those convicted of 
selling drugs.

He also has voted against efforts to lessen the disparity between sentences 
for crack-cocaine users and powder-cocaine users, something many 
African-American leaders say is racially biased as whites use more powdered 
cocaine and blacks more crack cocaine.

Nadelmann, the executive director of the Drug Policy Foundation, said the 
Ashcroft nomination as attorney general was "a disaster, as far as we are 
concerned."

However, his group and others have been more encouraged by other Bush 
appointees, including former Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson to head Health 
and Human Services and Donald Rumsfeld to run the Pentagon.

Thompson has made public statements that the war on drugs is a failure and 
that locking up large numbers of drug offenders is overburdening prison 
systems.

In 1980, there were about a half-million people imprisoned in the United 
States. In 2000, the population in U.S. prisons and jails rose to more than 
2 million, with much of the increase attributed to stiff sentences for drug 
offenders.

Rumsfeld made statements in his confirmation hearing this month that 
appeared to challenge the wisdom of Plan Colombia and other drug 
interdiction efforts.

Illegal drug use is "overwhelmingly a demand problem," Rumsfeld said. "If 
demand persists, it's going to find ways to get what it wants, and if it 
isn't from Colombia, it's going to be from someplace else."

The differences in philosophy among Bush Cabinet appointees reflect those 
among Republicans -- and the rest of the United States, experts say.

"One of the reasons Bush appears a bit reluctant to grab this problem in a 
high-profile way is that it is difficult to build a consensus, even among 
Republicans," Walters said.

"The conservative side is split between the hard-core law-and-order people 
and those who are more libertarian, who don't want the federal government 
deeply involved in people's lives."

In the end, Bush will have a difficult time significantly changing the 
anti-drug culture, both liberals and conservatives predicted.

The war on drugs gained a high profile under the Republican administrations 
of Presidents Reagan and Bush from 1981 to 1993, with former drug czar Bill 
Bennett using the bully pulpit of the office to make fighting drugs a moral 
crusade.

However, some felt that approach led to a lessening of emphasis on treating 
drug users.

President Clinton began his administration by cutting the drug office 
staff, reducing the drug czar's power and focusing on drug treatment more 
than stopping drugs from entering the nation.

However, Clinton backed off after a firestorm when then-Surgeon General 
Joycelyn Elders talked about decriminalization and related public relations 
disasters. In the end, he appointed Gen. Barry McCaffrey as drug czar and 
committed to costly anti-drug efforts in Colombia.

Nadelmann said he is optimistic that the public mood is changing on drug 
policy and that Bush will respond to that.

"People are saying, if stopping drugs from getting here doesn't work, let's 
try something else," Nadelmann said. "The enthusiasm in America for just 
locking up more and more people is starting to fade."

However, key members of Congress overseeing the war on drugs, as well as 
federal law enforcement and members of the anti-drug establishment, would 
strongly oppose anything perceived as softening efforts to keep drugs out 
of of the United States.

The Gilman-Burton letter to Bush hammered home that point. "The threat from 
illegal drugs is our most insidious national security threat," the 
committee chairmen wrote. "We believe it is an appropriate time to 
re-energize our national commitment to effectively fight the drug epidemic."
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom