US drugs tsar John Walters has admitted that Washington's anti-narcotics policy in Latin America has so far failed.

Mr Walters said in Mexico that billions of dollars of investment over many years have failed to dent the flow of Latin American cocaine onto US streets.

"We have not yet seen in all these efforts what we're hoping for on the supply side, which is a reduction in availability," he said in Mexico City.

But he predicted positive results would be seen within a year.

Mr Walters was speaking just after he had visited Colombia.

His comments can be seen as an admission that the so-called Plan Colombia has been a failure.

This initiative to wipe out drug smuggling gangs and eradicate coca crops has seen the Colombian government become the third largest recipient of US military aid in the world.

While praising Mexico's efforts to combat the drugs trade, Mr Walters also said that there'd been no notable disruption in the supply of drugs to the US.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3540686.stm

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Wow. That's something I didn't know.

If the governments of the world were smart, they would legalize all drugs and then sell them to make money. People using them would have to agree to go to treatment. Nobody wants violence. They want the drug. Violence only comes from being illegal. How many "Plan X" do they have? They don't work!!

Its about time some one in the gove si willing to admit this war on drugs is long lost and a joke. treatment is far better and much more effective.

The drug war which is a disaster so many ways, ruining lives, enriching cartels and corrupt governments, infringing on freedoms, wasting billions. The problem isn't in Columbia, the problem is in Washington DC.

Uh... no. I don't want my tax dollars to be used to supply some crack head with his daily dope, and then pay to send him to get "rehabilitated" for it. Sorry. No sale.

The war on drugs. <-- LOL

The American taxpayers are funding both side of this useless and unwinable war. We need our leaders to take a serious look at this problem and find workable solutions. Prohibition didn't work because so long as a substance has a willing buyer, it will never truely be eliminated.

Marijuana should be immediately legalized. The proven effects are no different than the effects of alcohol or tobacco and removing the potheads from the criminal justice system would save tremendous amounts of money (and the taxes on sales would help the economy) and would save time where the police could focus their efforts on other crimes.

We should then take the tax money from the legal sale of marijuana and use it for drug treatment. Unlike Marijuana -- cocaine, herion, etc. are seriously dangerous both to the individual and society and since we will never eliminate use while willing buyers exist, we should try to lessen its effects on society by removing (through treatment) the willing buyers of these hard drugs.

We should also (with the tax money from the legal sale of marijuana) buy enough muzzles for all the idiots who will scream that those in favor of these steps are "soft on crime" or "soft on drugs." Any intelligent General will tell you that somtimes in life you have to choose your battles and if we are going to fight all drugs with military strikes at the sources and incarceration of the users, then we are guaranteeing that we will lose this "war."

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"George W. Bush surrounds himself with smart people the way a hole surrounds itself with a donut." —Dennis Miller

"Rehabilitation" of hard drug-users is notoriously inaffective. Spending tax money on it is a waste of public funds. It may be an unwinable war, but I say it needs to be fought, if only because our morality demands it. As long as poverty exists (in other words, for the forseeable future), there will always be a hard drug problem.

If you agree that the war as it is being waged is unwinable, why not try something different? Maybe what I suggested will be ineffective, but what we are doing has been a failure, so what have we to lose?

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"George W. Bush surrounds himself with smart people the way a hole surrounds itself with a donut." —Dennis Miller

Because I believe the "something different" you suggested is immoral.

First, what is immoral about trying to help people instead of punishing them? Don't you think Jesus would try to cure a drug user before he punished the drug user?

Second, why do you believe that morality should control how society operates? It is true that society should try to act morally, but that morality can't be the sole basis of our laws.

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"George W. Bush surrounds himself with smart people the way a hole surrounds itself with a donut." —Dennis Miller

jeez....don't go there PJ - -that leo person has put his/her foot in his/her mouth a few times already on the whole religion thing - - it's claiming to be christian but has ALL the hatred the church inculcates in it's flocks, which we THINKING POEPLE know is not just a bad religion - it's evil.
You can't win an argument with those types PJ - they have been trained with answers to all arguments and most of them make NO sense, but you can't make them see that - - they've been taught to do so will send them to hell.

You wanna make one of 'em crazy, just ask 'em why it's okay to play god by creating babies for any woman whom GOD HAS MADE barren, thereby totally telling their god that his plan for their life is RE-JECTED!!!!

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There have been people coming out of the CIA, ATF and spooks from the special forces for 20 years saying "ain't gonna work - we ain't winnin' and we can't win".
But because it's such a lucrative program for the agencies involved the 'war' continues................sucking money from our country that could be use dto either rehab the users or warehouse the hopeless addicts.



Side note - - some of that money should also go to the education system which has been dealign with the by-clow effects (so to speak) of crystal meth and crack-addicted babies whose developmental and learning skills have been damaged in utero.
If we can get those kids educated to the point of being able to get gainful employment in a vocation we'll be avoiding a lot of trouble and expense when they are grown.

There was a news report a few months ago about the NYPD seeing more nad more crytsal meth dealing and addiction in their area and it was a new phenom to them because their region was till mostly a cocaine market.

I had no idea the tweakers (crystal addicts) hadn't infested every region yet! I thought heck if they're big in rural Illinois and Missouri they must be everywhere and bygod there sure are a lot of them here in Arizona and not just Phoenix either.


GET READY NEW YAWWWK!!!!
These people cannot hold jobs or maintain their own lives, let alone their kids' lives. I can go on and on about the effects on our economy here, but anyone who's interested should go read and educate yourself.

Sociologists and educators have been warning the gov't for 15+ about the waves of crack/crystal babies hitting the schools and failing if they don't get special attention they need.

This is a journey in what I would call well founded speculation.....

1. Most of the funding for Terrorists/Terrorism worldwide comes from the Black Market.

2. Most of the money generated in the Black Market economy is due to the Drug Trade.

3. Most of the money in the Drug Trade is due to Drug Prohibition.

So, without Drug Prohibition then this economic chain of events, would totally collapse??????

Yes, it does.

The same thing happened with Alcohol Prohibition within the US during the early 1900's. If you really want to rid the world of Drug Lords, Brutal Dictators, and Terrorist Masterminds then LEGALIZE DRUGS NOW!!!!!! Without the money drug prohibition affords them they have no base of power to stand on.

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The Science of Brute Force......

I don't know whether you have been listening to the NPR series on this issue that aired this week, b ut the mayor of El Paso ran the numbers on the drug war and pointed out the strong correlation between the increase of money on the drug war and the decline in the price of drugs. Every year money to fight drugs goes up--every year drug prices go down. Only token "drug lords" are busted. There are skirmishes, but there is no real war.

He speculated that if this trend keeps up...then eventually drugs will be free. This hyperbole brings the fruitlessness of pouring money into this cause into perspective.

The discussion also centered around the informal drug economy in Mexico being understood on both sides of the border as absolutely neccessary so that Mexico does not completely go under.

We absolutely need to decriminalize all drugs and move toward taking control of this informal economy.

The first step in that is to legalize marijuana.

I think we saw the real resolve of the war on drugs with the debaucle of the poppy fields in Afghanistan.

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Those who define have the power. http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/...heney.ssl.html