The anti-narcotics police arrived here in the heart of Colombia's cocaine industry last month to destroy the coca crop. The community was determined to save it. Roughly 1,000 farmers, some armed with clubs, surrounded the hilltop camp that police had set up in a jungle clearing and began closing in on the officers. The police started shooting. When they were done, seven farmers were dead and 21 were wounded. "Several friends and neighbors died on the ground waiting for medical assistance," said Luis Gaitan, 32, who protected himself by hiding behind a tree stump. [continues 1571 words]
LOS RIOS, Colombia - Every three months or so, Javier Tupaz, a father of six, heads downhill from his clapboard home to work in his cocaine laboratory. Under a black tent in the jungle, he shovels coca leaves into a giant vat with gasoline, then adds cement powder - the first steps in his cocaine recipe. Like everyone in his village, Mr. Tupaz depends on coca for cash and has survived decades of war here in Colombia. He churned out his product during the seemingly endless conflict between the rebels and the government, which tried many times to destroy his coca plants. He simply replanted. [continues 1457 words]
The Feb. 15 editorial "Success in Colombia" focused almost entirely on counterinsurgency success against the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and thus was another sad example of willful amnesia about U.S. drug control policy impacts abroad. Ignored by the editorial were the equally important counternarcotics goals and impacts of Plan Colombia. After 15 years and almost $10 billion in U.S. aid, the question needs to be asked if U.S. taxpayers received their money's worth from this investment in the largest drug control program in the annals of the war on drugs in the Western Hemisphere. Today, Colombian cocaine production is increasing. Moreover, Colombia is a major source of heroin in the United States' national epidemic, with Maryland a sad case in point. [continues 88 words]
In Colombia, Peace Deal With the FARC in Sight But Herbicide-Resistant Coca Production on Rise In the lowlands surrounding the town of La Hormiga, coca was once king. Fields of the bright green bushes stretched to the horizon in every direction and farmers were flush with cash. The surrounding municipality was the one with the most coca crops in the country that produced the most cocaine in the world. This was "ground zero" for Plan Colombia, a massive multipronged effort funded by nearly $10bn in US aid that started in 2000. The plan aimed to recover a country that was in the grips of drug mafias, leftist guerrillas and rightwing militias, and whose institutions malfunctioned and economy faltered. [continues 1427 words]
Despite U.S. Efforts to Cut Off the Drug at the Source, Colombia Is Again the World's Top Coca Producer Tierradentro, Colombia - Illegal coca cultivation is surging in Colombia, erasing one of the showcase achievements of U.S. counternarcotics policy and threatening to send a burst of cheap cocaine through the smuggling pipeline to the United States. Just two years after it ceased to be the world's largest producer, falling behind Peru, Colombia now grows more illegal coca than Peru and third-place Bolivia combined. In 2014, the last year for which statistics are available, Colombians planted 44 percent more coca than in 2013, and U.S. drug agents say this year's crop is probably even larger. [continues 1487 words]
The capture of Joaquin "El Chapo (Shorty)" Guzman in February 2014 was lauded at home and abroad as one of the most important accomplishments of Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto, who restored Mexico's longtime ruling party to power after a 12-year hiatus. However, on July 11, 2015, Guzman escaped from Mexico's top maximum-security prison. Now, one of Pena Nieto's greatest feats is widely seen as his greatest failure, and a possible setback to U.S.-Mexico relations. Since Guzman's escape through a 1.5-kilometer ventilated tunnel, pundits are debating who is to blame and what comes next in the fight against Mexican organized crime. [continues 807 words]
Michael Botticelli Explains the Focus on Misuse of Prescription Medication Michael Botticelli, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, is reorienting the focus of the U.S. "war on drugs" to make Americans more aware of the dangers posed by domestic prescription drug abuse, as opposed to international illicit drug trafficking. He shared his perspectives with Points during a recent visit to Dallas. In years past, the "drug czar" has tended to focus on issues such as Plan Colombia and fighting international drug cartels. You're taking a different track, almost entirely focused on domestic drug consumption. Why? [continues 876 words]
BOGOTA, Colombia - The government of Colombia on Thursday night rejected a major tool in the American-backed antidrug campaign - ordering a halt to the aerial spraying of the country's vast illegal plantings of coca, the crop used to make cocaine, citing concerns that the spray causes cancer. The decision ends a program that has continued for more than two decades, raising questions about the viability of long-accepted strategies in the war on drugs in the region. Colombia is one of the closest allies of the United States in Latin America and its most stalwart partner on antidrug policy, but the change of strategy has the potential to add a new element of tension to the relationship. [continues 1068 words]
Program in Colombia Is Stopped After News That Shoot-Downs of U.S. Pilots Were Carried Out by Rebels. BOGOTA, Colombia - U.S.-funded anti-coca spraying in Colombia has been suspended indefinitely in the aftermath of the shooting down, apparently by leftist rebels, of two spray planes and the death of one of the American pilots, sources confirmed Monday. One fumigation airplane was shot down Sept. 27, killing the pilot, whose name was not made public. A second crop-duster was brought down Oct. 5, prompting the U.S. Embassy in Bogota to suspend spraying, according to one well-informed source who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the press. [continues 406 words]
BOGOTA, Colombia - Along the winding road from Cali, Colombia's third largest city, to the port of Buenaventura on the Pacific coast, a new section of road is suspended over a steep mountain flank. Nearby, work crews blast tunnels through the mountains, where soon a two-lane highway will run. Last May, Colombia inaugurated a free trade agreement with the United States: These new arteries will bring the country's abundant mineral resources -- including gold, timber, and oil -- to foreign markets. [continues 3142 words]
The Conservatives have always talked tough about organized crime in the region, but Canada's foreign-policy goals remain unclear, writes ROBERT MUGGAH. For at least the past five years, Canada has quietly waged a half hearted war on organized crime and drug cartels. Even before Canada's prolonged engagement in Afghanistan started winding down, politicians and strategists were refocusing on real and perceived threats south of the border in Latin America and the Caribbean. After decades of non-engagement, Canada launched an Americas Strategy in 2007, announcing that it would step up its diplomatic, defence and development engagement in some of the most insecure countries on the planet. This was never going to be easy: six of the top 10 most violent countries in the world are in the Western Hemisphere and for some, the situation is worsening. [continues 1073 words]
U.S. Troops, Pilots Routinely Deployed to Chase, Capture Traffickers The crew members aboard the USS Underwood could see through their night goggles what was happening on the fleeing boat: Someone was dumping bales. When the Navy guided-missile frigate later dropped anchor in Panamanian waters on that sunny August morning, Ensign Clarissa Carpio, a 23-year-old from San Francisco, climbed into the inflatable dinghy with four unarmed sailors and two Coast Guard officers like herself, carrying light submachine guns. It was her first deployment, but Carpio was ready for combat. [continues 1297 words]
U.S.-Vetted Sensitive Investigative Units Rack Up Impressive Successes In The Drug Wars Using American Technology And Training At A Relatively Low Cost. CARTAGENA, Colombia - Under cover of a moonless night in early July, the crew took no more than five minutes to load more than a ton of cocaine on a motorboat beached on a deserted shore of the Guajira peninsula in northeastern Colombia. Equipped with three 200-horsepower engines, the "go-fast" craft then roared off toward the Dominican Republic, the first stop on the drugs' way north. [continues 866 words]
Special Units Rely on American Technology and Training, Racking Up Impressive Successes at a Relatively Low Cost. CARTAGENA, Colombia - Under cover of a moonless night in early July, the crew took no more than five minutes to load more than a ton of cocaine on a motorboat beached on a deserted shore of the Guajira peninsula in northeastern Colombia. Equipped with three 200-horsepower engines, the "go-fast" craft then roared off toward the Dominican Republic, the first stop on the drugs' way north. [continues 1543 words]
Strategies That Strike a Middle Ground Are Best, Say Kevin Sabet "I personally, and my administration's position, is that [drug] legalization is not the answer." Which U.S. president uttered these words about our nation's drug policy? Was it Woodrow Wilson, a progressive leader who urged the country to unite against drugs? Perhaps it was FDR, who signed the first federal law banning marijuana? Or maybe it was the guy who everyone thinks started the war on drugs (he didn't), Richard Nixon? [continues 578 words]
Prohibition Tells US That Drug Use Would Skyrocket The human nervous system interacts in pleasing and addictive ways with certain molecules derived from some plants, which is why humans may have developed beer before they developed bread. Psychoactive - consciousness and addictive drugs are natural, a fact that should immunize policy makers against extravagant hopes as they cope with America's drug problem, which is convulsing some nations to our south. The costs - human, financial and social - of combating (most) drugs are prompting calls for decriminalization or legalization. America should, however, learn from the psychoactive drug used by a majorityof American adults- alcohol. [continues 654 words]
The human nervous system interacts in pleasing and addictive ways with certain molecules derived from some plants, which is why humans may have developed beer before they developed bread. Psychoactive - consciousness-altering - and addictive drugs are natural, a fact that should immunize policymakers against extravagant hopes as they cope with the United States' drug problem, which is convulsing some nations to our south. The costs - human, financial and social - of combating (most) drugs are prompting calls for decriminalization or legalization. The United States should, however, learn from the psychoactive drug used by a majority of U.S. adults - alcohol. [continues 662 words]
The human nervous system interacts in pleasing and addictive ways with certain molecules derived from some plants, which is why humans may have developed beer before they developed bread. Psychoactive - consciousness-altering - and addictive drugs are natural, a fact that should immunize policy makers against extravagant hopes as they cope with America's drug problem, which is convulsing some nations to our south. The costs - human, financial and social - of combating (most) drugs are prompting calls for decriminalization or legalization. America should, however, learn from the psychoactive drug used by a majority of American adults - alcohol. [continues 655 words]
The human nervous system interacts in pleasing and addictive ways with certain molecules derived from some plants, which is why humans may have developed beer before they developed bread. Psychoactive - consciousness-altering - and addictive drugs are natural, a fact that should immunize policymakers against extravagant hopes as they cope with America's drug problem, which is convulsing some nations to our south. The costs - human, financial and social - of combating (most) drugs are prompting calls for decriminalization or legalization. America should, however, learn from the psychoactive drug used by a majority of American adults - alcohol. [continues 656 words]
Three Central American Leaders Fail to Agree on Changing Their Laws, Possibly Including Legalization. A conclave of Central American presidents meeting in Guatemala to discuss a major overhaul of their drug laws - including legalization or decriminalization - failed to arrive at a consensus Saturday and agreed to meet again soon in Honduras. Guatemalan President Otto Perez Molina had invited five counterparts to discuss what he described as growing frustration with Washington's anti-drug policy, which many in the region say is exacting too high a price in crime and corruption. [continues 557 words]
While military pressure has been exerted in all coca-producing nations at different times, the military defeat of guerrilla organizations, such as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known as FARC, or the Sendero Luminoso, hasn't halted the cocaine mafias' operations and ability to adapt to narcotics-control efforts because the goals of the cartels and the guerrillas are intrinsically different. (Cocaine: The New Front Lines," Review, Jan. 14). Since the defeat of the Cali Cartel in 1995, the mafias have developed an organizational structure similar to a multiheaded hydra, which can't be defeated by killing one head. Learning from the Medellin and Cali cartels, the mafias keep a low profile and feed their inputs into Mexico where the cartels vie for control over the drug trade. [continues 78 words]
Colombia's Success in Curbing the Drug Trade Has Created More Opportunities for Countries Hostile to the United States. What Happens When Coca Farmers and Their Allies Are in Charge?. In the dusty town of Villa Tunari in Bolivia's tropical coca-growing region, farmers used to barricade their roads against U.S.-backed drug police sent to prevent their leafy crop from becoming cocaine. These days, the police are gone, the coca is plentiful and locals close off roads for multiday block parties--not rumbles with law enforcement. [continues 2327 words]
If one looked at the Western Hemisphere from outer space, one would not see the borders that separate nations. At best we would see two large land masses -- North and South American -- united by a "thin bridge" between the two -- Central America. On land, our political leaders and governments see it differently. We have three nations of North America; seven tiny republics that make up Central America, and a score of nations in South America. They carefully monitor boundaries as a most important task. [continues 370 words]
Since President Nixon began the battle, a trillion dollars and 40 years have been spent trying to end it. So why is the government losing so badly? Forty years ago this week, President Richard Nixon defined his country's new drug policy with a military metaphor that stuck. "Public enemy number one in the United States is drug abuse," he declared. "In order to fight and defeat this enemy, it is necessary to wage a new, all-out offensive." A trillion dollars and seven presidents later, the war is still being fought, and lost, with catastrophic results. [continues 1577 words]
The Waldorf Astoria may be worlds away from the blood-spotted streets of Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, where the "drug war" has taken over 35,000 lives; the fiefdom-like favelas of Rio, Brazil, where even the police don't go; or Pakistan, one of the lowest-ranking on human development in the world, and neighbor to its largest opium producer. But members of the Global Commission on Drug Policy came to the famed New York hotel Friday to bring together leading thinkers and call for an end to the global "war on drugs," whose failed policies have claimed thousands of victims around the world over the last five decades. [continues 1909 words]
The editorial "'Plan Mexico'?" (Page B8, Friday) applauds the efforts of Texas Congressman Michael McCaul to paint yet another shade of lipstick on the pig we named the War On Drugs. Isn't 50 years of failed global drug war schemes enough? McCaul will ask, what is the United States' role in Mexico's war against the drug cartels? Don't bother. When we opted for prohibition of currently illegal drugs, we created the cartels and the subsequent violence. When we cast our role as response by force, as in Plan Colombia, we spread cocaine production back to Peru and Ecuador. Mexico now grows its own opium poppies. The Mexican forces the U.S. helped pay to train were hired away by the Zetas to be the killers we deplore. We have spread narco-violence throughout dozens of other countries in our hemisphere and to West Africa in previous attempts to save Mexico. [continues 165 words]
When Washington ramped up its anti-drug efforts through Plan Colombia, more than 90 percent of the cocaine consumed in the United States came through Colombia. A decade later, we get about 97 percent of our cocaine via Colombia. Amazingly, officials are hailing the program's "success" and want Mexico to learn from Colombia's experience. While Plan Colombia may have helped make that country safer from guerrilla attacks, it has failed as a drug-control strategy. Adapting that program in Mexico won't staunch that country's bloodbath and isn't likely to produce better results. [continues 608 words]
On Feb. 15, Jaime Zapata and Victor Avila pleaded for their lives in Spanish, identifying themselves as American federal agents moments after members of a Mexican drug cartel forced their vehicle bearing U.S. diplomat plates off the highway in Central Mexico. The cartel responded by firing more than 80 rounds from automatic weapons. That event instantly changed the landscape of our nation's involvement in Mexico's bloody war. For the first time in 25 years, cartels are targeting American law enforcement. Avila recently described the ambush by the Zeta cartel, comprised of former Mexican military special forces as "pure evil." Even at the Mexican hospital, he feared that they would come back and finish the job. [continues 543 words]
In 1998 the UN declared: "a drug-free world, we can do it!" In reality, we cannot. The War on Drugs has failed. According to all available indices, it is no longer defendable. Vast expenditure on drug law enforcement has resulted in increasing levels of overall drug-use and lowered drug prices. 2011 is the 50th anniversary of the 1961 UN Convention, which lies at the root of the criminalizing approach to drug control. Now is the perfect time to re-evaluate our approach. [continues 704 words]
How Changes in Technology Are Making It Harder to Nab the Bad Guys In 2010, the U.S. Coast Guard seized just over 90 tons of cocaine destined for U.S. shores, a haul valued at more than USD $3.5 billion. However, in the multibillion-a-year U.S. cocaine industry, the Coast Guard's interdiction rate accounts for only 26 per cent of the estimated 350 tons of cocaine arriving in the U.S. each year; the sale of which supports both criminal and terrorist groups in Latin America and abroad. [continues 1339 words]
The prospects for reforming drug policy have never been so good. The persistent failure and negative consequences of drug war policies, combined with budgetary woes and generational change, are mainstreaming reformist ideas once considered taboo. Nowhere is this convergence more evident than with respect to marijuana. In 1969, when Gallup first asked Americans if they support legalizing marijuana use, 12 percent were in favor. Support hovered in the mid-20s for many years, then started drifting upward--from 25 percent in 1995 to 36 percent in 2005. In October, at the height of the landmark campaign for legalization in California, the latest Gallup poll found 46 percent in favor nationally, with 50 percent opposed. Prop 19 garnered 46.5 percent of the vote--and roughly a quarter of Californians who voted against it said they favored legalization but were hesitant to vote yes for one reason or another. [continues 696 words]
The prospects for reforming drug policy have never been so good. The persistent failure and negative consequences of drug war policies, combined with budgetary woes and generational change, are mainstreaming reformist ideas once considered taboo. Nowhere is this convergence more evident than with respect to marijuana. In 1969, when Gallup first asked Americans if they support legalizing marijuana use, 12 percent were in favor. Support hovered in the mid-20s for many years, then started drifting upward--from 25 percent in 1995 to 36 percent in 2005. In October, at the height of the landmark campaign for legalization in California, the latest Gallup poll found 46 percent in favor nationally, with 50 percent opposed. [continues 662 words]
On Tuesday, prohibitionists once again managed to hold a fraying line when Californians defeated Proposition 19, which would have legalized the production, sale and use of small quantities of marijuana by people 21 or older. Though disappointed by the results, Prop 19 supporters have considerable cause for optimism. The approximately 46 percent of those who approved the measure was overweighted with younger voters. For them, legalization is a matter of when, not if. That assessment is supported by the ease with which Californians can already obtain cannabis legally at hundreds of medical dispensaries in the state and by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's recently signing into law a bill that reduces the penalties for marijuana possession from a misdemeanor to an infraction comparable to a traffic ticket. [continues 711 words]
The U.S. Cuts Funding For Its Neighbor To Fight The Drug Cartels. As Americans read about the massacres, beheadings, kidnappings and assassinations that have become commonplace in Mexico, they might reasonably conclude that its government could use all the help it can get in its war against the powerful drug cartels perpetrating these atrocities. The Obama Administration takes a different view. The State Department recently announced that it would withhold $26 million in funding for the $1.6 billion "Merida Initiative" until the Mexican government could make "additional progress" on its human rights record. The Administration wants the Mexican government to prosecute soldiers accused of human rights violations in civilian courts rather than military tribunals, and to expand the authority of its National Human Rights Commission. Not surprisingly, the Mexican government was not pleased. [continues 530 words]
US Secretary of State Angers Mexican Politicians and Raises Indignation With Idea of Sending in American Military Hillary Clinton has sparked anger in Mexico by comparing its drug-related violence to an insurgency and hinting that US troops may need to intervene. The US secretary of state said Mexico's level of car bombings, kidnappings and mayhem resembled Colombia a generation ago. She floated the prospect of US military advisers being sent to Mexico and central America. [continues 610 words]
BOTH the United States and Mexico have approached the war on Mexican drug cartels with Colombia in mind. Washington's Merida Initiative, loosely modeled on its Plan Colombia antidrug campaign from a decade ago, provides Mexico with money for helicopters, police training and command-and-control technology. The Mexican government, meanwhile, has taken steps to modernize its judicial system, purge the police of corruption and improve intelligence services. But according to a Government Accountability Office report released this summer, the billions of dollars spent by Mexico and the United States over the last four years have done little to thwart Mexico's cartels. [continues 538 words]
EL PASO -- A former U.S. ambassador to Mexico said Thursday in Washington, D.C., that it will take 10 years for Mexico to break free from the violence that has taken hold and killed about 23,000 people. John D. Negroponte, ambassador to Mexico from 1989 to 1993, told a joint hearing of the Subcommittee on Border, Maritime and Global Counterterrorism and the Committee on Foreign Affairs' Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere, that fixing Mexico and in turn securing the border will take about that long. [continues 593 words]
Lawlessness, Drug Crimes Down Sharply BOGOTA -- It is a pretty typical scene even for a weeknight. Restaurants and bars are teeming with patrons, the beat of traditional Latin music spilling out on the crowded sidewalks. Stores are packed with evening shoppers and a steady stream of international business executives and tourists are checking in to gleaming new hotels. But it is a remarkably different setting for Colombia's capital than a few years ago, when many people rarely left their homes after dark for fear of bombings, homicides, and kidnappings by drug cartels, criminal gangs, and guerrilla fighters. [continues 1103 words]
The War on Drugs Has Been a Cornerstone of America's Criminal Justice System Ever Since President Richard Nixon Coined the Phrase Four Decades Ago. Three recent developments suggest that policy-makers are finally losing faith in its effectiveness. The National Drug Threat Assessment, released on Thursday, showed that drugs are cheaper and easier to obtain than ever before. Traffickers and violent street gangs either side of the US-Mexico border are thriving. Law enforcement has failed to interrupt the chain of supply and demand. [continues 1593 words]
Turning to the Gringos for Help As Drug-Related Violence Continues to Rise, Mexican and American Officials Unveil Plans for Unprecedented Security CO-Operation. but Will They Work? LAST March, after Mexican officials took offence at warnings from their American counterparts about security south of the border, Hillary Clinton travelled to Mexico City to repair the diplomatic damage. The secretary of state accepted blame for her country's demand for illegal drugs, recognised its need to control the southward flow of guns and cash, and vowed that the United States would be an equal partner in the "war" against drug gangs and organised crime declared by Mexico's president, Felipe Calderon. Some of those promises have been kept, in a modest way: over the past year, Barack Obama's administration has seized a little bit more drug money, begun to search southbound freight trains, examined its budget for trying to cut drug demand and raised it by 13%, and shared intelligence that led to the finding (and death) of a top drug trafficker. [continues 799 words]
Merida Initiative Offers $1.3 Billion for Equipment, Training, 'Smart' Border Enforcement and Institutional Reform MEXICO CITY-U.S. and Mexican officials are expected to finalize a new strategy on Tuesday on how to use some $1.3 billion in U.S. aid under the so-called Merida Initiative to try to control growing drug-related violence in Mexico. Officials hope the plan, which mixes military aid such as Black Hawk helicopters with "softer" money such as investments in local communities, can have the same success in turning around Mexico's troubles as Plan Colombia, another U.S. antidrug aid package, did for that country. Officials caution that solving Mexico's problems could be a tougher battle than helping Colombia, where U.S. aid helped the government beat back insurgencies tied to the drugs trade. [continues 788 words]
There's one thing that Presidents Clinton, Bush, and Obama have all agreed on: expanding military aid to Latin America to fight the so-called "Drug War." A new phase of the Drug War began in 2000 under President Bill Clinton, with $1.3 billion in "emergency" funding to fight cocaine production in Colombia by destroying the raw material for it -- coca plants. President George W. Bush continued the fight, which sent nearly $6 billion in aid to Colombia between 2000 and 2008. When cartel violence began to spiral out of control in Mexico, he shepherded hundreds of millions of dollars in aid to the Mexican military. President Barack Obama initially followed in his predecessors' footsteps, but now appears to be headed down a wiser path. [continues 573 words]
Five myths that caused the failed war next door. Mexico's current government took office on Dec. 1, 2006, but really only assumed power 10 days later, when Felipe Calderon, winner of a close presidential election that his leftist opponent petulantly refused to concede, donned a military jacket, declared an all-out war on organized crime and drug trafficking, and ordered the Mexican army out of its barracks and into the country's streets, highways, and towns. The bold move against odious adversaries (and change of topic) garnered Calderon broad support from the public and the international community, along with raised eyebrows among Mexico's political, business, and intellectual elites. [continues 3001 words]
When slain El Monte educator Bobby Salcedo was laid to rest earlier this month, Cardinal Roger Mahoney and Father Beto Villalobos challenged El Monte to become drug-free. Villalobos reminded the hundreds of mourners that the cost of drugs isn't the dollar price, but rather the lives lost in the war driven by the illicit substances. In so doing, the two religious leaders said U.S. drug users play a complicit role in the violence that has defined Mexico in recent years, violence that has killed more than 12,000 people since 2006. [continues 1288 words]
'Flying here is the biggest rush,' says a Texas crop-duster who now dodges bullets and trees to kill coca plants in Colombia. By Chris Kraul, Reporting from Tumaco, Colombia Spraying 800 pounds of herbicides on coca over treacherous terrain while getting shot at is not everyone's idea of a good time. But for Dave, a 35-year-old crop-duster from Texas turned "top gun" of Tumaco, it's a "kick in the pants." [continues 1312 words]
If you had asked me 10 years ago whether the United States will ever change its interdiction-focused counternarcotics policies -- and perhaps even decriminalize marijuana consumption at home -- I would have told you, "never." Today, I say, "perhaps." Last week, in a tacit admission that current U.S. anti-drug policies are not working, the House of Representatives unanimously passed a bill to create an independent commission to review whether the U.S. anti-drug policies of the past three decades in Latin America are producing positive results. [continues 712 words]
If you had asked me 10 years ago whether the United States will ever change its interdiction-focused counternarcotics policies -- and perhaps even decriminalize marijuana consumption at home -- I would have told you, "never." Today, I say, "perhaps." Earlier this week, in a tacit admission that current U.S. anti-drug policies are not working, the House of Representatives unanimously passed a bill to create an independent commission to review whether the U.S. anti-drug policies of the past three decades in Latin America are producing positive results. [continues 716 words]
Marijuana Is Basically Harmless -- The Monumentally Stupid Drug War Is Not The War on Marijuana Is Insane; Our Officials Keep Sacrificing Tax Dollars, Lives, Civil Liberties, and Their Own Credibility in This Misguided and Losing Effort. You might remember Robert McNamara's stunning mea culpa, delivered a quarter century after his Vietnam War policies sent some 50,000 Americans (and even more horrendous numbers of Vietnamese) to their deaths in that disastrous war. In his 1995 memoir, the man who had been a cold, calculating secretary of defense for both Kennedy and Johnson belatedly confessed that he and other top officials had long known that the war was an unwinnable, ideologically driven mistake. "We were wrong," he wrote, almost tearfully begging in print for public forgiveness. "We were terribly wrong." [continues 2759 words]
Re: "Peace Prize-winning Obama backs military growth in Colombia -- There is more than one route to peace in Colombia, says Tod Robberson," last Sunday Points. As a police officer who worked in the trenches of the drug war for 18 years, I agree with Robberson. There is more than one path to peace in Colombia, namely repealing prohibition laws. After a trillion dollars and 40 years of failed strategies (Plan Colombia, Plan Mexico, mandatory minimum sentencing, etc.), everyone knows that this modern prohibition will continue until we become as wise as our grandparents were in 1933. I marvel how intelligent people like Robberson miss the obvious, certain solution. Howard Wooldridge Dallas [end]
Hours after this year's Nobel Peace Prize was announced, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson spoke to a college audience and gently admonished "our new Nobel Peace Prize-winning president." Richardson, the ex-presidential candidate, diplomat and a past Nobel nominee, relayed a simple message to President Barack Obama: "Pay more attention to Latin America." But in an ironic twist shaken out from last month's Nobel surprise, Obama beat out the odds-on Nobel favorite, Piedad Cordoba, a Colombian senator and successful hostage negotiator who for years has promoted negotiations to end the four-decades-long civil war in Colombia. Oddly enough, Obama has embraced the opposite solution to the tragic conflict in South America - a military expansion. [continues 726 words]
