Tweeted just now by Rafael LeMaitre, spokesperson for the ONDCP:
News: President Obama announces intent to nominate @ONDCP Director Kerlikowske to serve as Commissioner of Customs and Border Protection.
Yes, this is the guy who’s made a living out of saying the drug war is over, that we can’t arrest our way out of the problem, and that we need to focus on treatment. Now he’s going to be in charge of interdiction?
Is there no integrity at all at that level? Or at least an attempt to pretend?
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More important is will Obama replace Kerli or will he start shutting the ONDCP down,,his taking them out of being a cabinet office was a signal that the tide was turning on the bureaucracy. We can hope they start disassembling the drug war machine somewhere.
I guess it says something about my cynicism that I never even considered that option.
My reaction was Uh-Oh….we may be getting Kevvie. Now that would suck mightily.
No effing way, just stop. Shut the H-E-double-hockey-sticks up, darkcycle. Just, just . . . arrgh!
Man, that would make me lose my remnants of hope in seeing any progress in forming our drug-policy, and it would just sadly affirm my growing cynicism about the intelligence, sanity, and integrity of our “leaders.”
Well, let’s see… if they wanted to continue the emphasis on treatment, they could go with someone with experience at the ONDCP and in treatment programs… someone like… Andrea.
Now I won’t sleep. Thanks.
I don’t think they will shut the ONDCP down. That would send the wrong message to the children.
One way to eliminate a bureaucracy is to get a bigger bureaucracy to absorb it. That doesn’t necessarily make the agency go away in the true sense. But at least the lightening rod factor is gone. Given that prohibition’s lightening rod has melted to its foundation by bolts from the Internet, we may now be seeing some damage control happening before our very eyes.
There have been similar attempts to lump all drug enforcement into the generalized category of ‘transnational crime’, thereby spreading the risk of failure throughout a bigger law enforcement entity, making it more difficult for protesters and activists to ruin any specific bureaucratic person’s political career or life—the fate of any drug czar.
On the plus side, absorption makes it easier to eliminate disagreeable remnants of an agency behind closed doors, with citizens distracted by something else. An abrupt end to the ONDCP/DEA would scare people. A corporate raider approach, breaking up an evil entity into useable or non-useable pieces, selling off or disposing of its declining assets, is less direct, and thereby less noticeable.
Obama himself has no integrity. If he did, he’d keep his promises.
Look on the bright side. At least he won’t be Drug Czar any more. Maybe he got tired of lying for a living, and thought he’d be put to better use kicking some illegal immigrant ass.
Regardless, does it really matter who the Drug Czar is? They’re just a spokesman for the administration’s PR campaign. They don’t make decisions or contribute in any way to policy, so I imagine a semi-trained monkey could do the job. (Although a monkey’d probably have a problem with all the lying that’s required.)
Meet the new boss…
I hereby nominate Barry McCaffrey for a return engagement as Drug Czar. An encore performance if you will. I bet he’d have a ball in that position nowadays. He’d probably choke on all that nonsense about a kinder, gentler drug war. It’s just the kind of powerless position he’d excel at. Any seconds?
The Peter Principle in action. I can’t wait to see who the next Director of the ONDCP will be.
I believe the new millenium has renamed the Peter Principle, if not mistaken it’s now the Weiner/Pecker Principle…
and as far as Gil… if he takes this position he can still remain Deputy Droopy Dog.
Shut up and show some fucking respect! Drug use is down. But you fucksfuck up America with lies about drugs bein safe. Hope you choke on a dick and get raped and catch aids and die
You really got to stop huffing paint, Pete. It doesn’t help you sound rational. And stop scratching. Those scabs will get infected.
Don’t feed the troll, please.
I nominate Hubert H. Humphrey to be the next drug czar. He has the one, single qualification necessary to meet federal drug recruiting standards: he’s dead.
and he has the coolest initials ever
M.A.R.K.?
no… HHH
I said, all those years ago, that Gil was a political opportunist. This just vindicates that observation.
As to his replacement, well, the same ‘qualifications’ remain: deliberate dogged obtuseness, despite the overwhelming amount of scientific evidence proving an officially sanctioned policy being supported is both fraudulent and mendacious…solely for mercenary reasons.
Quite a few people in Gub’mint are more than willing to pimp their self-esteem for a paycheck. Gil is just the latest. He won’t be the last, and there’ll be others, until this damnable prohibition is retired.