Wednesday, December 17, 2003

Drug Czar Lies and Runs From the Tahoe Daily Tribune: Czar: Drug test students Youths are more dependent on marijuana than cigarettes or alcohol, provoking the White House drug czar to call for drug testing at middle and high schools. John Walters, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, made the statement during a keynote speech at a conference attended by members of the Campaign Against Marijuana Planting at Embassy Suites on Tuesday night. Lies, lies, dangerous lies. Once again, Walters shows that he is willing to risk the health and safety of America's youth in order to further his own personal agenda against marijuana. Both tobacco and alcohol are a much greater dependency risk than marijuana (both in likelihood and severity of dependency). But Walters continually uses the fact that high numbers of marijuana users (not abusers) are in treatment (through criminal justice referral), which is not an indication of dependence, to actually downplay the dangers of alcohol and cigarettes. So did anyone call him on it? Walters was unavailable for comment afterward. He was whisked away by Secret Service to catch a flight back to Washington, D.C. The crowd was full of military officials, undercover agents with goatees and long hair and clean-cut law enforcement officers. Ah, yes. Lie to a sympathetic audience and run away. 2:01:30 PM |  drug policy | Links | permalink | comment []