The overall budget size proposed is a 1.3% increase over last year's budget.
Before the President's Youtube interview, which was dominated by questions regarding cannabis policy, there were questions about what this next federal budget proposal would look like. [Obama gave a safe response to the drug policy questions, saying that it was a "legitimate" topic of debate]
Neill Franklin over at L.E.A.P. (Law Enforcement Against Prohibition) spoke out after the Youtube video.
LEAP head Neill Franklin, a retired Baltimore narcotics cop, applauded Obama's comment but called for him to turn the words into action. The White House is preparing a budget to submit to Congress in the coming weeks, and how much priority it gives to drug treatment versus incarceration will be an indication of the direction the administration plans to take.
"The president talks a good game about shifting resources and having a balanced, public health-oriented approach, but it doesn't square with the budgets he's submitted to Congress," Franklin said in a statement. "The Obama administration has maintained the Bush-era two-to-one budget ratio in favor of prisons and prosecution over treatment and prevention. It doesn't add up. Still, it's historic that the president of the United States is finally saying that legalizing and regulating drugs is a topic worthy of discussion. But since the president remains opposed to legalization, it's clear that the people are going to have to lead the way. Police officers and innocent civilians are dying every single day in this drug war; it's not a back-burner issue."
When the overwhelming focus being given to making "cuts" here, there, and everywhere in state/federal budgets, it would be reasonable to expect a proposal that either scales down our "war on drugs" or at least shifts a significant proportion to treatment alternatives. Keep in mind: even states like California with voter-approved drug treatment laws, such as Proposition 36, or treatment programs (such as halfway houses or prison addiction programs for drug addicts) are cutting back. Virtually every health , education, or vocational program for California inmates is being gutted or eliminated due to budget cuts and cost overruns. Many states have almost no drug treatment programs to begin with.
So one could reasonably observe that a federal "stimulus", if you will, is needed to shore up scarce state treatment programs available. Anyone that says that incarceration is the solution to America's drug addiction problem, does so in the face of all readily available data . Our current policies treats marijuana as more dangerous than oxycontin or guns. The Age of Reason has fully flowered into modern-day America.
This new WH budget doesn't look to be making any significant changes in the status quo. So what's the deal?
"I don't understand how the president can tell us with a straight face that he wants to treat drugs as a health issue but then turn around just a few weeks later and put out a budget that continues to emphasize punishment and interdiction," said Neill Franklin, executive director of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition and a former narcotics officer in Baltimore. "The president needs to put his money where his mouth is. Right now it looks like he's simply all talk and no game."
"I see this similarly to Obama's approach on needle exchange and crack sentencing -- the president supported those reforms verbally, but did nothing else to help them at first, even when he had the opportunity," said David Borden, executive director of StoptheDrugWar.org, publisher of this newsletter. "But when Congress was ready to take them on, the administration provided enough support to get them through. Obama has also supported the idea of shifting the drug budget's priorities, but again has done nothing whatsoever to make it happen. Maybe what he wants is for Congress to do the heavy lifting on this as well. If so, our movement's task is to propose a politically viable new version of the budget that does change the priorities, to build support for it in Congress, and then look for the administration to get on board."
http://stopthedrugwar.org/...
But international anti-drug aid and interdiction spending are dwarfed by domestic drug law enforcement, which would gobble up $9.5 billion under the Obama drug budget, an increase of $315 million over 2010 levels, or 3.4%. Unsurprisingly, the single largest domestic law enforcement expenditure is $3.46 billion to incarcerate federal drug war prisoners.
One of the problems is that we, the citizens, are told by law enforcement that the drug war is merely "enforcing the laws, not creating them". However, in states debating cannabis policy like Colorado, Hawaii, California, and Arizona, we see cops lobbying legislatures, appearing in the media, giving donations, and publicly advocating to continue/escalate the cannabis war. In Arizona, Jan Brewer likes to tie it into her racist positions on immigration policy. Hawaii is trying to decriminalize this year, but law enforcement is running interference. On the other hand, they're lobbying the feds for MORE money; it' s always more and more requested when it comes to wars. It never is a decrease- that's not how wars seem to work, apparently. It's like a scaled-down, smaller version of wars we fight abroad in which a industrial-military apparatus keeps pumping taxpayers for more money to feed the beast. Here, the prison-industrial complex is about way more than prison guard unions like CCPOA and building prisons. It's about active police and sheriff's depts. reaching for as much funding as they can, even though the war on (some) drugs is ineffective and disastrous. [Plus: the failure of drug policy in Mexico, Central/South America, Afghanistan, etc etc]
This budget proposal isn't a step in the wrong direction, per se. One highlight:
The Office of Justice Grants program, which includes the Byrne Justice Assistance Grants used to fund anti-drug multi-jurisdiction law enforcement task forces, would be slashed substantially, from $3.52 billion in 2010 to $2.96 billion in 2012, but on the other hand, the Justice Department 2012 budget contains $600 million to hire and retain 4,500 new police officers.
----
There are a few law enforcement side losers in addition to the Byrne grants. The DEA budget is down slightly, from $2.05 billion in 2010 to $2.01 billion in 2012, but that reflects supplemental spending for the southwest border that was included in 2010. The High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA) program, which has evolved into a prime example of pork, saw its funding slashed to $200 million, down from $239 million
.
So: can/will Congress make drug war cuts? I don't know. But here's a good start:
http://www.rawstory.com/...