Drug Policy

1 Pages 313 Words

U.S. Policy on National Drug Control
United States narcotics policy seeks for reduction of the supply of illicit drugs to the United States and reduction of user demand within the United States. This is based on three core principles; (1) Stopping drug use before it starts, (2) Healing America’s drug users and (3) Disrupting the drug market. Bush plans to accomplish these goals by expanding the efforts to reduce foreign production at the source, expanding interdiction and enforcement activities to disrupt supply lines, expand efforts to reduce worldwide demand, and expand economic disincentives for international drug trafficking. President Bush’s National Drug Policy seeks to reduce the use of illegal drugs by 10% over the next 2 years and 25% over the next 5 years. In order to do so the President has set a $19.2 billion budget for Drug Control in 2003. Bush has proposed a $10 million increase for the Drug-Free Communities Support Program and $5 million for the newly found Parents Drug Corps. Bush also is making drug treatment more available for those who need it. In 2003 he proposed $3.8 billion for drug treatment which is more than a 6% increase from 2002. In order to fight drug trafficking and secure or nation’s borders, President Bush has $2.3 billion proposed for drug interdiction, which is an increase of over 10% from 2002. To target the supply of illegal drugs in source countries the President is requesting that $731 million in dedicated funds be appropriated to the Andean Counter-Drug Initiative to be applied to such countries as Bolivia, Colombia and Venezuela. All this is being backed by a bill that was signed July 13, 2000 called “Plan Colombia”. This bill allocates $1.3 billion in military assistance focused primarily to provide emergency supplemental narcotics assistance to Colombia....