White House Drug Strategy: Use Tax Dollars to Campaign Against Reform
Document Continues Failed Policies as Officials Lobby Against Common-Sense Reforms, MPP Charges
Document Continues Failed Policies as Officials Lobby Against Common-Sense Reforms, MPP Charges
DENVER, COLORADO — The 2006 National Drug Control Strategy unveiled today by White House Drug Czar John Walters renews concerns about the federal government's continuing use of tax dollars to campaign against changes to failed drug policies, officials of the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP) charged. The plan was released at a news conference in Denver, where voters in November passed an initiative that made adult possession and use of marijuana legal under city ordinance.
"This document signals that the administration will continue using tax dollars to campaign against common-sense reforms, while wasting billions on failed policies," said MPP Director of Government Relations Aaron Houston. "It is not a coincidence that John Walters took his junket to Denver, where voters dealt a stinging rebuke to the government's war on marijuana."
On Jan. 27, Walters' special assistant, David Murray, testified against medical marijuana legislation in New Mexico's Senate, but was sharply rebuffed by state legislators. The Santa Fe New Mexican reported, "Some of Murray's toughest criticism came from Republicans," and the bill passed the Senate by a vote of 34-6.
"While Walters continues to rail against supposed 'well-funded drug legalizers,' our efforts are dwarfed by the government's massive prohibition bureaucracy," Houston said. "The drug czar's office spends over four times as much on advertising alone as drug policy reform groups spend on everything we do put together — salaries, rent, the whole works." A comparison of government drug- war budgets to those of reform groups is available here.
"But despite this massive taxpayer-funded effort to prop up prohibition, voters keep choosing sensible reforms," Houston continued. "Denver voters understood that Walters' claims of success are phony, and that marijuana prohibition is a complete failure. According to the federal Monitoring the Future survey, 86 percent of high school seniors say marijuana is 'easy to get,' a figure that hasn't changed since 1975. If that's success, what does failure look like?"
With more than 19,000 members and 100,000 e-mail subscribers nationwide, the Marijuana Policy Project is the largest marijuana policy reform organization in the United States. For more information, please visit MarijuanaPolicy.org.
