Cynthia Tucker blasts drug prohibition in the Atlanta Journal.
Via Pete Guither, a drug control office in Kentucky announced that police agencies across the country last week engaged in week-long drug sweeps in an effort to forestall cuts in the Byrne Grant. The Byrne Grant is a federal program that ties federal funding for local police agencies directly to drug arrests. It’s the reason we have so many of these problematic regional narcotics task forces, which due to their their multi-jurisdictional status and the fact that they really don’t answer to anyone, have given us Tulia, Hearne, the torture of Eugene Siler, and a whole lot of botched drug raids. The state of Texas’ house or representatives actually attempted to ban the task forces in the wake of several high-profile incidents.
More broadly, though, I’m not sure if this effort doesn’t undermine its own cause. You have to wonder just how effective Byrne Grants are at eradicating drugs if the state of Kentucky alone can just decide one week to go out and round up “965 pounds of marijuana, approximately 12 pounds of cocaine, 266 hydrocodone tablets, 950 other prescription tablets, and 467 grams of methamphetamine,” for no other reason than to prove a point.
The Johnston case is causing members of Georgia’s congressional delegation to revisit the issue of informants. Thing is, there’s an informant scandal every couple of years. It usually leads to talk about how bad the system is, then little if anything in the way of actual reform.
Interesting post at TalkLeft about Iggy Pop, and how Nixon’s obsession with marijuana helped spark a cocaine boom in Detroit. Dan Baum relays similar stories all across the country in his excellent history of the drug war, Smoke and Mirrors.
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