Legal Commentary

Drug Czar Goes to Congress, Describes Some Shift in War on Drugs

By Jeralyn

Gil Kerlikowski, Obama's Drug Czar, testified Wednesday before the Domestic Policy Subcommittee of the House Committee on Government Oversight and Reform. His prepared statement is here. The hearing was titled, "ONDCP's Fiscal Year 2011 National Drug Control Budget: Are We Still Funding a War on Drugs?"

Here's the statement of Ethan Nadelman, Executive Director, Drug Policy Alliance.

Last May, Kerlikowski also advocated a change in the war on drugs, which has been a failure. At Thursday's hearing, he stressed treatment over incarceration.

The problem? Kerlikowski's new policy looks too much like the old one. [More...]

Here's what he said: "This renewed focus on prevention and treatment does not come at the expense of effective enforcement." And enforcement efforts are also due for an increase in funding, albeit of only 1.9 percent, under the administration's proposed budget.

From Drug Policy Alliance, which while praising the moderate changes of Obama-Kerlikowski, points out:

64% of their budget - virtually the same as under the Bush Administration – focuses on largely futile interdiction efforts as well as arresting, prosecuting and incarcerating extraordinary numbers of people. Only 36% is earmarked for demand reduction. The budget also ignores life-saving harm reduction measures such as naloxone-distribution and heroin assisted treatment, widely viewed around the world as a necessary part of any balanced, evidenced based drug strategy.

“Congress and the Obama administration have broken with the costly and failed drug war strategies of the past in some important ways,” said Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance. “But the continuing emphasis on interdiction and law enforcement in the federal drug war budget suggest that ONDCP is far more wedded to the failures of the past than to any new vision for the future. I urge this committee to hold ONDCP and federal drug policy accountable to new criteria that focus on reductions in the death, disease, crime and suffering associated with both drugs and drug prohibition.”

Full post as published by TalkLeft on April 15, 2010 (boomark / email).