Mike Hogan says: "Ricardo Cortes, author of the pro-pot children’s book It’s Just a Plant, created an illustrated history of America’s Drug War for vanityfair.com. It tests the assumptions that have led the US to spend $(removed) billion a year on a military campaign against an unhealthy habit and questions whether Obama’s drug czar, Gil Kerlikowske, has the will or the ability to follow up on his pledge to end the Drug War at long last."
In 1980, Ronald Reagan shifted responsibility for the anti-drug effort from the health department to the Department of Justice. “I would say that this is the most intense federal effort ever against drugs,” said Associate Attorney General Rudolph Giuliani, who oversaw the D.E.A. and the Bureau of Prisons and who orchestrated expansion of the F.B.I. into drug enforcement. Senator Joe Biden began advocating for a Cabinet-level position to coordinate federal agencies–a “drug czar.” So began the era of “zero tolerance.” Reagan’s presidency reversed his predecessors’ drug-control policies, and funding for law enforcement rose to three times that for abuse-prevention and treatment programs.
