 [2]  USENET DRUGS (1:375/48)  ALT.DRUGS.USENET 
 Msg  : #1258 [4]                                                               
 From : GREGORY C.O'KELLY                   1:2613/335      Tue 15 Mar 94 22:49 
 To   : All                                                                     
 Subj : THE MOVING FINGER WRITES                                                

From: GREGORY C.O'KELLY <gokelly@delphi.com>
Organization: Delphi (info@delphi.com email, 800-695-4005 voice)






Commentary by Hugh Downs on ABC Radio's "Perspectives" 2/16/94

Towards the end of 1993, the Surgeon General of the United States, Dr. Jocelyn
Elders, addressed the National Press Club. Dr. Elders' speech was about violence
in the streets and the home. Violence is an obvious health issue because
violence injures and
kills. After her remarks, the Surgeon General was asked if she thought crime
could be reduced if drugs were made legal. The Surgeon General said:
"I do feel that we would markedly reduce our crime rate if drugs were legalized,
but I don't know all the ramefications of this. I do feel that we need to do
some studies. In some of the counties that have legalized drugs, they certainly
have shown that
there has been a reduction in their crime rate and that there has been no
increase in the drug use rate."   Dr. Elders' suggestion caused a stir. The
White House immedately distanced itself from the Surgeon General's remarks, and
claimed that no such studi
es were even being considered. Unfortunately, despite the claims of some
journalists that her remarks triggered a debate, her remarks did not trigger a
debate. Her remarks, or more precisely the reactions to her remarks, only
underscored the fact that sh
e had touched on a taboo subject.
  We treat a small number of certain drugs as special cases. Some drugs are
treated like sacred cows. When we hear phrases like "legalize drugs" or "War on
Drugs," we should remember that the word "drugs" in these cases implies a
relatively short list, pr
imarily heroin, cocaine, and marijuana. We should also remember that aside from
those particular drugs, virtually every other drug known to medical science is
already legal. Thousands of drugs that can kill or maim, or entice addictions,
are already lega
l. And they can all be obtained with prescriptions at corner retail stores.
These dangerous substances are used every day by literally millions of people.
We call these dangerous substances "medicines." Now it's important to realize
that there is no "War
 on Medicines." The word "drugs" in the so-called "War on Drugs" refers only to
certain substances. And at least one of those substances, marijuana, is not even
considered dangerous.
  If Dr. Elders is looking for studes, she might want to contact Dr. Frederick
H. Meyers, Professor of Pharmacology at UC San Francisco. Dr. Meyers and his
panel of drug experts has conducted a yearly assessment of drug use for the
state of California for
 more than 20 years. But in 1989, when the panel recommended that it was time to
permit marijuana cultivation for personal use, the Attorney General's office
censored the report. Evidently, it is taboo even to discuss the use of some
drugs, especially co
caine, heroin, and marijuana, but it's OK to discuss, and use, other equally
potent drugs. Drugs like Dilaudid, Placidyl, Demerol, alcohol, tobacco are all
licensed and controlled by the government. The black market in these legal
dangerous drugs is mini
scule, the violence surrounding them is insignificant, and they are connected to
no drug fortunes at all.
  Culture and history may explain why we perceive these drugs differently from
others, but today, the big reason that some drugs are legal and some drugs are
illegal has a lot to do with money and power. Fighting drug use consumes an
enormous amount of mo
ney. The most recent war, the one perpetrated by Mr. Reagan and Mr. Bush, has
now wasted a total of more than100 billion dollars of dwindling tax money.
Making some drugs illegal also automatically creates drug dealers. And those
drug dealers have extort
ed at least as much money from our weakened economy.   The illegal drug industry
represents a gigantic, untapped and untaxed underground economy. In some states,
like California, Texas, and Florida,  it may be larger than the legal economy.
Of course, no
boby knows for sure because it's all illegal. We do know that taxpayers already
lost $100 billion on the drug war. The underground economy is surely close to
that. If we start adding up all those hundreds of billions of dollars we get
some astronomical n
umbers. Stopping the war on drugs immediately would save not one fortune but
quite literally millions of fortunes. Stopping the war would also provide other
benefits. Our overcrowded prisons could be used once again to house dangerous
criminals instead o
f drug users. Tod Clear, a professor of criminal justice at Rutgers, says 60% of
the federal prison population is drug related, compared to only 8% in 1975.
  Another benefit would be to dismantle the corrupt machinery now used to fight
drug use. The illegal drug industry has become a symbiotic combination of both
cops and robbers. The tremendous fortunes created by illegality have eaten away
at legitimate la
w enforcement, and dragged otherwise good individuals down to the level of
common criminals. In some cases, whole institutions have succumbed to crime. The
temptation to make big money from the drug trade is tremendous. The web of
corruption riddles law
  It's easy to imagine how an individual policeman, or an individual DEA
investigator, might be tempted by big drug money. Some drug dealers have enough
money to offer a cop the equivalent of several years' salary, in some cases just
to do nothing. They m
ay only be asked to look the other way, or just keep silent.
  Some of the people who are now serving time behind bars for drug violations
once served as law enforcement officials. Conversely, some people who now work
for law enforcement agencies once served criminal organizations. In fact a large
part of the drug
war depends on such informants. The symbiotic dependence between criminals and
authorities should be brought to an end.
  Drug seizure laws have become so irrational, that we now see law enforcement
institutions, not just single individuals, fall into criminal activity. Not long
ago, a law-abiding man in Southern California, a man named Donald Scott, was
attacked and shot
to death by law-enforcement agents who simply wanted his property. Newspapers
around the country reported the story; we did a segment on it on 20-20. Donald
Scott had no drugs at all, but under the zero tolerance laws, police
organizations were permitted
 to kill him and steal his private property, all legally, on the mere stated
suspicion that he had drugs on his property. Recently the Supreme Court decided
that zero tolerance had been grossly abused. Now, accused people must have a
hearing before their
 property is taken.
  We find another abuse of common sense in the tangle of foreign policy and
illegal drugs. American intellengence agencies, especially the CIA, are known to
work closely with drug dealers. Supposedly, the reasons they do is to fight the
drug war. But ofte
n, as we only recently discovered in Haiti, the CIA will create an intelligence
outfit that turns to smuggling cocaine into the U.S.--for the money. The
notorious drug lords of Colombia actively supported the Reagan and Bush
Administrations' war against
Nicaragua. When Congress refused to give money to that illegal war, the
Colombian cocaine lords gave millions of dollars to the so-called contras. When
money was not sent to them, the contras smuggled drugs on their own. The
contras, like Noriega in Pana
ma and the Mujahadeen in Afghanistan, were criminals who were supported with
U.S. tax money. Significantly none of these groups smuggle scotch or tobacco.
Here in the U.S. thousands of local goons are organized into gangs. The war on
drugs has pumped bil
lions of dollars into the profits and holsters of these thugs. If the government
seized their drugs--if the government licensed, regulated, taxed, and patrolled
the drug markets--the way it already does will all other legal drugs--then the
profits flowin
g to local gangs would stop.
  Unfortunately some politicians have built careers on the very instability that
violence and the drug war cause. Social instability provides some politicians
and some institutions with jobs. If the government took control of drugs, a lot
people would be
out of jobs. The anti-drug crusaders, or the tough-on-crime lobby thrives on the
drug war. Their dependence on crime and drugs is intimate and inseperable--the
the very definition of symbiosis. This observation has led me finally to realize
that many an
anti-drug crusader has actually come full circle and now stands four square as a
pro-crime booster. The question comes down to this: who will control these
drugs? The authorities, or the criminals? One answer is legal, the other is
itself criminal.
  Dr. C. Everett Koop once told us that tobacco addiction is more tenacious than
heroin addiction. Tobacco drug dealers are legal, and they're not involved in
public shoot-outs with the authorities. Yet, despite the tenacity of tobacco
addiction, we have
managed dramatically to reduce tobacco consumption in this country, without
making tobacco illegal. Tobacco is a very harmful drug. Efforts to dissuade
people from using it, are to my mind, quite proper. But any  effort to keep it
from people by force wo
uld be counter productive. The worst thing we could do would be to make it
illegal. If cigarettes were outlawed, an apalling wave of crime would engulf us,
as a new class of drug barons would rise to supply smokers with their
cigarettes. And since they'r
e be operating outside the law, we would have a new war to deal with, a war on
cigarettes. Until the campaign of persuasion has reduced the number of people
who start smoking, it remains a major health problem worldwide. Someone once
estimated that more
Colombians die every year from smoking American tobacco than Americans die from
Colombian cocaine.
  And yet, it remains taboo even to discuss the legalization of certain drugs
and not others. Why is this? Some think it is because too many people and
institutions profit from the so-called drug war. It seems like a slightly
paranoid view, but it's hard
to shake. Legalization means getting rid of the criminals and the violence and
putting the government in charge. Legalization means taking the health problem
of drug addiction out of the hands of the attorney general and putting it in the
hands of the su
rgeon general, where it belongs. Apparently not even the Surgeon General herself
can bring up such a possibility right now without being rebuked.

Audiotape available from She Who Remembers Productions, 818/287-8254


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