Dave’s Reviews > Smoke and Mirrors: The War on Drugs and the Politics of Failure > Status Update

Precisely because it doesn't kill people who use it, spawn gun battles in city streets, enrich foreign drug lords, or inspire women to abandon their babies, marijuana separates drug policy for public welfare from drug policy for public relations. (1/2)

The prospect of even a slight softening on marijuana was tantalizing, because if anything is clear from the past 25 years of drug warfare, it is that marijuana-- not crack, cocaine or heroin-- is politically the most important legal drug. (1/2)

On June 21 [1991] Dr. James O. Mason, chief of the Public Health Service, announced the government would no longer make marijuana available to desperately sick people... In his press conference, Mason acknowledged the decision was based on politics, not health. "If it's perceived that PHS is going around giving marijuana to people, there would be a perception that this stuff can't be so bad."

Drug violence, unheard of at the start of the Drug War, now terrorized poor neighborhoods. Drug combatants died daily; just the number of slain innocent bystanders had tripled in two years prior to Bush's inauguration. (2/2, 1989)

Despite the billions spent, the millions imprisoned, and the loss of liberties to both drug user and nonuser alike, drugs were cheaper, more potent, and used by younger children than when Nixon started the war. The drug cartels were wealthier and more sophisticated than ever. The number of cocaine dependents had grown. (1/2)