Manski on the Drug War

From the Charles Manki entry at wikipedia.

The NRC's Committee on Data and Research for Policy on Illegal Drugs found that existing studies on efforts to address drug usage and smuggling, from U.S. military operations to eradicate coca fields in Colombia, to domestic drug treatment centers, have all been inconclusive, if the programs have been evaluated at all: “The existing drug-use monitoring systems are strikingly inadequate to support the full range of policy decisions that the nation must make...It is unconscionable for this country to continue to carry out a public policy of this magnitude and cost without any way of knowing whether and to what extent it is having the desired effect.” The study, though not ignored by the press, was almost entirely ignored by policymakers, leading Manski to conclude, as one observer noted, that "the drug war has no interest in its own results."

In my most idealistic, incredibly selfish and myopic moments, I believe an Obama administration will be different in this one way. I will probably be very disappointed, though, to learn it's no different than any other administration when it comes to prisons and drugs. The reason for these policies is not person-specific, but probably rooted in the complex relationships between the political sphere and the median voter - who is White, middle class, and a big supporter of the current war on drugs, regardless of any inefficiencies or inequities that it may bring.