From Alan Bock
I may still be in a bit of an afterglow, but I’m feeling more optimistic about the possibility of some reform of our useless but harmful drug prohibition laws than I have in some time. I returned late Sunday night from New Orleans, where I attended the semi-annual conference of the Drug Policy Alliance.
I went in part because the DPA gave me the Edward M. Brecher award for “distinguished achievement in journalism” at the awards banquet Saturday night. Ed Brecher was the science/medicine journalist who put together the book “Licit and Illicit Drugs,” sort of a consumer’s guide to the pros and cons, benefits and unfortunate side-effects of everything from aspirin through prescription drugs to heroin. He noticed that the pharmacological/safety differences between licit and illicit drugs were sometimes nonexistent, and that some illicit drugs were less dangerous than legal drugs, and became a quiet advocate for more rational regulation. Given that previous recipients have included Hugh Downs, Catherine Crier, the Economist magazine and Jacob Sullum of Reason, I was quite honored.
What really cheered me, however, was the fact that 1,200 people, 50 percent more than at the last conference, attended, and almost all of those I met (obviously I couldn’t connect personally with everybody) seemed committed, pretty well informed and reasonably intelligent. I was especially pleased to see so many young people, most of them members of Students for Sensible Drug Policy, and dozens of active and enthusiastic members of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (L.E.A.P.), who have seem the futility and harmfulness of the drug war from the front lines. It was great to see so many people wearing T-shirts saying “Cops say legalize drugs: Ask Me Why.”
Of course the arguments against prohibition have been more intelligent, informed, logical and rational than the arguments for prohibition for a long time, so if sensibleness were the criterion the laws would have been ended eons ago. But I think I see a changing correlation of forces.
Your stance, and the paper’s, on the folly of the drug war has been admirable for a long time, expecially in the face of the knee jerk reaction (especially among the so-called conservative movement) to ratchet up punishments for everything related to the subject. Congratulations.