Success In War On Drugs: Cocaine Prices Up And Quality Down

The Bush administration announced signs of success with the $4 billion drug war on cocaine in Columbia, as the street price of the drug has increased and the purity rate decreased, The New York Times reports. According to the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, the price of a gram of cocaine rose 19 percent between February and September, to $170, while the purity level dropped 15 percent.

Drug policy analysts are skeptical, saying the White House was drawing conclusions from too short a time period. Though the administration sprayed 36,000 acres of coca plants in 2004, they admitted the amount of coca in Colombia was "statistically unchanged" from 2003 and that Colombia still produces more than enough cocaine to satisfy the American demand. Cocaine trafficking has regularly rebounded after slower periods, said John Walsh, part of a policy analysis group who follows American drug policy for the Washington Office on Latin America.

You have got to be kidding me! You call this success? The War on Drugs has been an abject failure. Anyone who tells you otherwise is lying! Prohibition didn't work with alcohol why would anyone think it would work with drugs? This is all about control as long as drugs remain illegal the bad guys are in control.