| ||||||
|
Arts & Entertainment Books Comics Health & Body Media Mothers Who Think  NewsPeople Politics2000 Technology - Free Software Travel & Food  Columnists
- - - - - - - - - - - -
- - - - - - - - - - - - Also Today For a full list of today's Salon News stories, go to the
News home page. - - - - - - - - - - - - Search Salon - - - - - - - - - - - - Salon Columnists - - - - - - - - - - - - Recently in Salon News Feature Feature Feature Feature Feature - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - |
Class will tell | page 1, 2
Upon conviction, the prospects for this typical offender are poor, since he is unlikely to receive treatment and will eventually emerge into society with a criminal record that leaves him pretty much unfit for any kind of work except the criminal conduct that sent him to prison in the first place. Now let's examine the contrasting case of a more fortunate druggie -- a prominent Reaganite not altogether unlike the current Republican presidential front-runner. Lawrence Kudlow, the conservative Ivy-educated son of a rich New Jersey businessman, once served as chief economist for the Office of Management and Budget during the Reagan administration. Later, he earned $1 million a year at the investment house of Bear Stearns. He was also a cocaine addict who checked into the Hazelden clinic in 1995, after he blacked out and his third wife threatened to divorce him. Following successful treatment, the reformed Kudlow has told his sad story on television and returned to the good graces of his sympathetic fellow Republicans. He currently advises the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee on tax and budget policy, no doubt urging big cuts in domestic spending (including publicly funded drug treatment programs for those who can't afford Hazelden or the Betty Ford Clinic). Joe Conason Joe Conason's column appears in Salon News every other Tuesday.
In short, Kudlow has benefitted from liberal attitudes toward drug abuse, which prescribe medicalization rather than criminalization. Among his Republican peers, however, that kinder, gentler approach is considered too lenient to be applied to the poor. This is where Bush's "compassionate conservatism" confronts rude reality. Judging from his past remarks and present policies, it is clear that he doesn't extend much compassion to the young and foolish who fool around with drugs. Running for governor in 1994, he mocked incumbent Democrat Ann Richards' suggestion to increase treatment programs in the Texas correctional system. "Incarceration is rehabilitation," he said meanly, insisting that the state should spend more money on jails rather than treatment for juvenile offenders. That is why George W. Bush deserves to be interrogated about cocaine and marijuana every day until he stops thumbing his nose and coughs up a true and comprehensive answer. He needs to be asked not only what drugs he did or didn't do in the distant past, but how he justifies his Draconian approach to drug use today. Nor should the Democrats running for president -- both of whom have admitted smoking pot years ago -- escape similar moral scrutiny. All of them must tell us why anyone should languish in prison for doing what these candidates for chief law enforcement officer of the United States have admitted doing themselves.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
- - - - - - - - - - - -
- - - - - - - - - - - - Search Salon | |||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
|||
