Hemispheric Think Tank Says Time for Drug Policy Rethink
[image:1 align:right]A prestigious Washington, DC-based center for hemispheric policy analysis and discussion, the Inter-American Dialogue, is calling for a refashioning of US drug policy. It demands an end to "the silent tolerance of ineffective, socially harmful laws, institutions, and policies" and has some suggestions as to where to go next.
In a report authored by the Dialogue's Peter Hakim, Rethinking US Drug Policy, the Dialogue said: "The available evidence suggests that in the past two decades, US anti-drug policies have done little to diminish the problems they were designed to address." The report proposed a number of initiatives the US government could undertake to set the stage for a thorough rethinking of US drug policy:
- Support recent Congressional initiatives to establish House and Senate commissions to review US anti-drug strategies and develop alternative approaches;
- Join with other nations to organize an inter-governmental task force on narcotics strategy that would review and appraise global drug policies;
- Revise outdated UN treaties that underpin the international narcotics regime;
- Expand data collection, analysis, and research on multiple aspects of drug problems and the policies and programs designed to address them; and
- Identify and scale up successful drug programs that promise to reduce drug addiction and the health risks to addicts, increase the prospects of rehabilitation, and decrease drug related crimes.
The Inter-American Dialogue is holding a public discussion of the report and its recommendations Thursday, 2/10/11 on Capitol Hill.
Comments
Good read
I suggest that all read the report, its only about 20 pages of actual reading, link is above.
It has some sound reasoning, but I figure any politician that reads it will twist some information and ignore other bits of info. They will take the rethinking of drug policy to mean some kind of clockwork orange solution. The report does use the words "addict" "drug abuse" and "illicit substance" among others too much. Sure, such things are problems, but the ideas of responsible use and legalization need to be taken seriously.
Harm Reduction
The Drug Czar himself said, when he was telling Congress about the current drug control budget, that harm reduction was not a phrase he would ever use. I guess that means our current policy is the exact opposite, which would be harm maximization.
this is good!!
I'm hoping that more and more reports will come out against this insane drug war. We need to get this into the main stream and have people actually talk about it, instead of just smiling and laughing it off. The more you talk about it then the more people will understand it and get used to the idea of sensible regulation. People need to know that drugs are here to stay forever and that the best we can do is try and manage them best we can. I really encourage people to go out and talk to everyone and educate people on this subject.
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