So much for ending the War on Drugs

Drug Czar Kerlikowske has rather famously pronounced on numerous times that he ended the war on drugs (basically by disavowing the term). This is part of his effort to pretend that the current administration is more focused on treatment and prevention than the proven failures of supply-side drug control policy.

Yet the budget has shown that this is all misdirection. Sure, there have been a few extra dollars thrown into treatment, and the drug czar makes an effort to travel around the country visiting treatment centers, but the truth is that we’re still fully funding and supporting the enormous drug war that the U.S. has been fighting for ages.

Now the drug czar has announced the appointment of Marilyn Quagliotti as Deputy Director of Supply Reduction. Check out the qualifications that he brags about for someone joining an agency that is supposedly no longer fighting a war…

…previously served 32 years in the United States Army, rising to the rank of Major General. She was the first woman to attain the rank of General Officer in the Signal Corps and first woman to command a battalion in a combat division. As an Army officer, she served multiple tours throughout the continental United States, South Korea, Germany and Panama. In Panama, she was the Brigade Commander, in command of a unit supporting interdiction efforts to stop the flow of illegal drugs into the United States. Deputy Director Quagliotti holds a M.S degree from the National War College in National Security Strategy…

Nope. No wars here.