Illegal Drugs

Drug tests conducted on stable hands at Pimlico Race Course have revealed rampant use of illegal drugs by workers entrusted with the care of thoroughbreds at one of the nation's best-known racetracks.Maryland Racing Commission inspectors, backed by Baltimore police officers, swept into Pimlico on Monday and tested 74 stable employees for illegal drug use. Thirty tested positive -- ranging from marijuana to cocaine -- and were immediately ordered off the grounds.The large proportion of positive tests did not surprise John Franzone, racing commission chairman.

Here is an excerpt of an editorial from the Boston Globe, which was published Monday.THE SAME lobby that killed a proposal last year to standardize blood alcohol levels for drunken driving is now trying to keep underage drinking out of a youth education campaign sponsored by the nation's drug czar, General Barry McCaffrey.The National Beer Wholesalers Association opposes the inclusion of underage drinking in the $195 million media campaign, claiming that alcohol is a legal substance and should not be lumped with marijuana, cocaine and other illegal drugs.

WASHINGTON -- A standoff between the Clinton White House and the Republican-controlled Congress has blocked an emergency, billion-dollar aid package for Colombia, upsetting Colombian officials and adding new instability to a nation racked by civil war, corruption and illegal drugs.Some Clinton administration officials believe the money won't be available until spring at the earliest. That will delay U.S. anti-drug efforts even as Colombian drug shipments to major American cities, including Baltimore, are getting larger, cheaper and more potent.

WASHINGTON -- What's on display hints that this is no ordinary museum: Rolling papers, the kind used to smoke joints. Turn-of-the-century pill bottles labeled "Heroin." And a chrome-plated Harley Davidson, once the ride of a dope-trafficking biker gang in New England.It is the federal government's newest stab at drug education.Set to open next month in Arlington, Va., the Drug Enforcement Administration Museum explores America's drug culture and how segments of the population became addicted as early as the turn of the century -- before federal drug laws -- and why, after painful lessons were learned then, millions are obsessed with illegal drugs today.

WASHINGTON -- To reveal or not to reveal, that is the question -- particularly when baby boomer candidates, who grew up in an era of casual drug use, campaign in a national climate that has demonized illicit drugs.What George W. Bush has made into something of a secret -- did he or didn't he use illegal drugs in the past -- reflects the tension in today's cultural attitudes toward cocaine and other hard drugs. Americans tend to condemn illegal drugs while showing understanding for those who once experimented with them.

It has become very much the fashion on the left and the righ to denounce the "war on drugs" as a failure so abject that the only possible solution is to legalize drugs. The legalizers have taken to speaking of drug "Prohibition," as if cocaine and heroin were comparable to alcohol, and insisting that the big problem is, and always has been, not the drugs themselves but our drug laws. The latest entry from the left is Hollywood filmmaker Mike Gray's "Drug Crazy: How We Got Into This Mess & How We Can Get Out" (Random House, 251 pages, $23.95)

ANYONE WHO suffers from chronic asthma knows just how frightening a sudden attack can be. As the airways close, breathing becomes difficult.The experience is akin to drowning.Last month, a Carroll County sixth-grader refused to stand idly by as a fellow student began gasping for breath on the bus ride home.Both students had been diagnosed with asthma, but only one was carrying an inhaler and she understandably rushed to share it.Heroine's reflexive actLittle did this heroine realize that her reflexive act of kindness would ignite a health policy controversy.

A Howard County judge was correct in finding a car "not guilty" in a drug case and thwarting government efforts to take it from its owner, the state Court of Special Appeals ruled Friday.The local government probably "coveted the car" because it was a $20,000 purple Corvette that was fully paid for, making it valuable, a three-judge panel said in upholding a 1997 decision by Howard County Circuit Judge Diane O. Leasure. So eager was the county to acquire the car that it filed the forfeiture paperwork before it had received test results of the suspected drugs seized from the owner, the court noted.

LISTEN CLOSELY and it won't take long before the familiar cry of some Howard County teen-agers begins to rise: "There's nothing to do." But some juveniles, unfortunately, have found two illegal things to do: drugs and alcohol.A two-part series last week in The Sun's Howard County section by Dana Hedgpeth and Caitlin Francke revealed that teen-agers who belong to affluent families are just as likely to drink and take illegal drugs as their counterparts across Maryland. Put aside thoughts that a wealthy home is insurance against the twin troubles often associated with poor, urban life.

WASHINGTON -- Adolescent drug use dropped in 1996 for the first time in five years, in a sign that the nation's anti-drug efforts are beginning to reach young people, according to a government survey released yesterday.At the same time, the report found that illicit drug use remains persistently high among college-age adults and that heroin use is rising, especially among young people.Even for teen-agers, drug use is still nearly 80 percent higher than when President Clinton took office. That bad news kept administration officials from declaring victory at a news conference yesterday announcing the results.

Ten years ago, a photo that showed an athlete like Michael Phelps apparently getting high at a party probably would have resulted in considerable fallout. That might still happen to the athlete who has won the most gold medals in Olympic history, who has millions of dollars in endorsements riding on the outcome. But his admission that he used "bad judgment" has been greeted mostly with forgiveness, humor or a shrug of the shoulders. Four of his sponsors - Speedo, Omega, Hilton Hotels and PureSport - released statements yesterday saying they still support him, even if they don't condone his actions, and will continue a business relationship with him. No sponsor has publicly tried to drop Phelps as an endorser.

3 teens pick wrong victim; one is seized, two sought Three teenagers picked the wrong man to rob Monday night in an alley in West Baltimore. One was arrested, and police were seeking the other two. Police said the man was sitting in his parked car in the 100 block of S. Mount St. when he was approached by three teenage boys who talked to him about drugs and asked the man to meet them in an alley behind nearby Lemmon Street. There, police said, one of the boys brandished what appeared to be a small-caliber handgun and demanded the man's money.

LAURENS, Iowa -- Methamphetamine has claimed every tooth in Dennis Patten's head, which is why his face is caving into his jaw and why just about everything south of his neck is falling apart. The squat Patten is a 28-year veteran of the Iowa drug wars, 25 of them spent as an addict and the past three as an uncertain, just-say-no convert torn by occasional gnawing cravings for the drugs that have crippled him. "I can't honestly say that if you dumped some [meth] right here," he said, tapping a couple of fingers on a table in front of him, "that I'd turn it down."

Time for cease-fire in failed drug war Every bit of data about the drug war indicates that it is a colossal failure ("Data show war on drugs failing as cocaine gets cheaper, purer," May 5). From 1995 to 2005, the federal drug war budget rose 79 percent. During that time, the number of people in the United States who had used drugs in the past year rose 55 percent, drug-induced mortality went up 116 percent, drug arrests went up 25 percent and drug rehab admissions went up 22 percent.

Mayor says treatment is best Mayor Sheila Dixon yesterday declined to say whether she supports decriminalizing the use of illegal drugs after being asked three times about her views on the topic at a news conference. "Drug addiction is a health issue, and drug treatment and providing support services to families is so significant and key," she said in response to a question from a television reporter. "That is where you break the cycles." Police say that much of the city's violence is fueled by the drug trade in Baltimore, and some believe that decriminalizing drug use would drastically reduce killings and shootings because crews would no longer fight over territory and money.

Baltimore Police Commissioner Leonard D. Hamm is among a diverse group of city officials who are backing proposed legislation that would force the governor to spend as much as $30 million annually for drug treatment in Maryland. In the past, drug treatment advocates have had to compete for funding with other groups as part of the annual budget process. Although advocates would have to submit budget requests for the bulk of their funding, a dedicated pool of money could make a considerable difference, especially in Baltimore, where available services still fall short of treatment needs.

ATLANTA -- All wars have a way of creating collateral damage, as the desk-bound bureaucrats euphemistically call the dead innocents, destroyed buildings and decimated towns that just happen to be in the way of bombs and bullets. Kathryn Johnston was collateral damage in America's misguided "war on drugs." On Nov. 21, the 88-year-old woman was shot dead by Atlanta undercover police officers who crashed through her door after dark to execute a "no-knock" search warrant for illegal drugs.

WASHINGTON -- Fewer teenagers are abusing illegal drugs, although the rate of illicit drug use among all Americans has remained steady over the past three years, according to a government report released yesterday. The proportion of youths ages 12 to 17 reporting that they had used illegal drugs - a category that includes marijuana and cocaine, but not alcohol or tobacco - in the previous month decreased by about 370,000, from 11.6 percent to a little less than 10 percent, between 2002 and 2005, the National Survey on Drug Use and Health showed.

Around the world, millions of people are exposed to a real health threat every day - the danger of taking the wrong medication. This spreading problem has nothing to do with patients mixing up their pills. Rather, it's caused by the proliferation of counterfeit drug traffickers, who are profiting immensely from selling fake medicines. To combat this threat, the FDA requires distributors to keep detailed records of the sources of the medications they dispense. But that's a futile undertaking.

ATLANTA -- Just once, I'd like to see a corporate executive whose company has knowingly hired illegal immigrants doing the perp walk for his offenses - handcuffed, disgraced, chaperoned by law enforcement officials as cameras record his every tentative step. For just a few days, I'd like to see the conservative blogosphere roasting the textile mill managers and onion field owners who routinely make a mockery of immigration law with a wink and a nod at forged documents. But that's not the way politics works, is it?