Presidency 1980 - FTP Directory Listing

NEWS' Drug enforcementGov. Jerry Brown decriminalized marijuanain California.The drug lobby is acting to protectits industry in other ways.Keith Stroup, a founder ofNORML, has filed a lawsuitagainst the DEA's California program.He contends that the lowflyingplanes and helicopters usedby the DEA to locate marijuanafields and rip up the plants are aninvasion of the right to privacy!The marijuana growers andtheir political pals are also playinga key role in the environmentalistbattle to stop use of pesticides bythe government, farmers and thetimber industry. They fear thatthese pesticides, which are necessaryto produce a healthy andabundant food and timber crop,may destroy their filthy marijuanacrop.Most cynical of all, the drug lobbyis manipulating the situation topush for full legalization of marijuana.Through Keith Stroup's"Grow America" plan, peoplewould form limited-partner groupsyndicates (sharecropping) formarijuana growing, a practiceStroup says is already covertlygoing on in Arkansas.NORML argues that the solutionto the murder and theft problemis to legalize pot, and moreoverthis will give a powerful joltto the troubled U.S. economy. Ajolt indeed—straight toward oblivion.Coast GuardThe Carter administration, throughboth budgetary policy and throughdecisions concerning the so-calledCuban refugee crisis, has severelygutted U.S. Coast Guard drug patrols.The situation is so seriousthat drug enforcement officialspredict that it will soon result inthe worst drug smuggling epidemicin U.S. history, at a point whenheroin is already flooding the countryat Unprecedented levels.Coast Guard officials, anticipatingan increase in drug trafficking,last February requested an additional$37 million budget allocation.The Carter administrationhas yet to back to this request.Instead, it is suggesting major cutsin the Department of Transportation,the executive departmentthat controls the Coast Guard.Carter Transporation SecretaryNeil Goldschmidt reportedly viewsdrug enforcement as a "low priority"for allocation.Crisis pointCoast Guard officials report thatthe current Cuban refugee exodushas brought the situation to a crisispo}nt. As of next week, half ofthe entire East Coast fleet of CoastGuard cutters will be on stationoff the Florida Straits to interdictthe refugee flow. This will be thelargest single fleet under one commandsince the end of World WarII. The problem, according to worrieddrug enforcement officials, isthat this huge fleet deployment inthe Florida Straits and the removalof cutter patrols from otherpoints on the East and Gulf coastswill give smugglers an open field.Coast Guard officials report thattheir informants say that a largeocean-going ship, laden with sevcutbacksopenCoast Guard cutters are being redeployedout of drug patrols, considerederal hundred pounds of marijuanaand cocaine, traversed a routefrom Colombia all the way up theEast Coast to a destination inMaine. It totally avoided detectionby the depleted Coast Guard patrols.One Coast Guard spokesmanexplained that it was very easy forsuch ships to avoid the massedfleet off Florida, since the Cubanrefugee patrols generally hug thecoastline and go over a 90-100 mileradius within the areas of thestraits; any ship that goes intointernational waters can escapethe fleet.Even if they happen to crosspaths, the Coast Guard is so overworkedon refugee patrols that itis doubtful that they they woulddeploy to do anything.New routesDrug Enforcement Agencyspokesmen report that the Miamiillegal drug rings are now mappingnew routes to take advantage ofthe Carter administration's misdeploymentof the Coast Guard.—Robert Greenberg8 War on Drugs / July 1980