cannabisnews.com: Another Bad Strategy In The Drug War





Another Bad Strategy In The Drug War
Posted by FoM on September 12, 1999 at 18:07:45 PT
Turning pot users into felons won't help them 
Source: Lexington Herald-Leader
As other parts of the nation begin questioning -- and rightly so -- the ``lock 'em up and throw away the kilo'' approach to fighting the War on Drugs, the Kentucky Criminal Justice Council wants to see more people do more time for trafficking in smaller quantities of marijuana.
If the panel's recommendations become law, the sale of 2 ounces of pot would become a felony. Currently, selling less than 8 ounces of marijuana is a misdemeanor.The council also wants to create a state Office of Drug Control Policy -- a drug czar, if you will.We would feel much more optimistic if this panel had worried less about incarceration and more about treatment, if it had given less priority to having Kentucky's very own drug czar and more priority to drug courts and other innovative approaches to ending the scourge of drug addiction.Drug use is down across the nation. According to a recent Newsweek story, 10 million fewer Americans are using drugs today than in 1985.Some might attribute this decline to the tough tactics, including stiff prison sentences, applied in the War on Drugs. But that's a doubtful premise. Even the national drug czar, Barry McCaffrey, says ``we cannot arrest our way out of the problem.''Incarceration comes with precious little treatment these days; and treatment, though often fallible, is still the best way to win this war. A California study cited by Newsweek found that every $1 spent on treatment saved $7 in hospital admissions and law enforcement costs.Maybe that's why other states are toning down the ``get tough'' talk and showing more compassion to non-violent drug offenders. That includes low-level traffickers, who are themselves often addicted.We see some of that in Kentucky. The state now has five ``drug courts,'' with 13 more on the way. These courts stress rehabilitation rather than incarceration. The drug courts will see their share of failures, but they are also producing the kind of glowing success stories you aren't apt to find among non-violent drug offenders who are hustled off to prison.As a state, and a nation, we've hustled thousands of these folks into cells during the last couple of decades. We keep building and filling new prisons, and a lot of it is due to the influx of drug offenders. It hasn't worked, though. We haven't won the War on Drugs, and we won't win it by filling more prison beds with folks who sell 2 ounces of marijuana.The new most powerful man in the state Senate, Republican Floor Leader David Williams, who also happens to be chairman of the crime council's Drug Strategy Committee, says the proposals reflect Kentuckians' concern for the seriousness of the drug problem.It is a serious problem -- a very serious problem. If you don't believe it just look to our streets, our schoolyards, our courts and our jails. But solving the problem requires more than finding new ways to imprison non-violent drug offenders. It requires treating the addiction.Published Sunday, September 12, 1999 in the Herald-Leader 
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