[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 32 (Tuesday, March 21, 2000)]
[House]
[Page H1141]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   JUST SAY NO TO FUNDS FOR COLOMBIA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Pease). Under a previous order of the 
House, the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Ramstad) is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. RAMSTAD. Mr. Speaker, we are about to spend almost $2 billion to 
escalate the war on drugs in Colombia, while here in the United States 
26 million American addicts and alcoholics go untreated.
  We have already spent over $600 million to eradicate drugs at their 
source in Colombia. And what has happened? Both cocaine and heroin 
production in Colombia have more than doubled.
  Colombia is now the source of 80 percent of the cocaine and 75 
percent of the heroin in the United States. Let us face it, our supply-
side efforts have been a colossal failure.
  Congress and the President need to wake up and face reality. Over the 
last 10 years, Mr. Speaker, the Federal Government has spent $150 
billion to combat the supply of illegal drugs. Yet the cocaine market 
is glutted, as always, and heroin is readily available at record high 
purities. The number of hard-core addicts continues to increase every 
day.
  Our drug eradication and interdiction efforts have also been a costly 
failure. As a former United States Navy Commander who led such efforts 
in Colombia for 3 years said recently, quote, ``The $1.7 billion being 
proposed on drug-fighting efforts in Colombia is good money thrown 
after bad.''
  Retired Navy Lieutenant Commander Sylvester Salcedo also said, and I 
am quoting again, ``We cannot make any progress on this drug issue by 
escalating our presence in Colombia. Instead, we should confront the 
issue of demand in the United States by providing treatment services to 
our addicted population.''
  Mr. Speaker, we need to listen to this veteran of the war on drugs 
who added, ``Washington should spend its money not on helicopters and 
trainers but on treatment for addicts.''
  The $400 million cost of helicopters alone for Colombia would provide 
treatment for 200,000 Americans addicted to drugs.
  Mr. Speaker, this is crazy. This is wrong. We are about to spend $2 
billion on Colombia for drug eradication and interdiction while most of 
the 26 million addicts and alcoholics in the United States are unable 
to access treatment. We are about to spend $2 billion on Colombia even 
though treatment has been proven to be 23 times more cost effective 
than eradication of crops and 11 times more cost effective than 
interdiction.
  When will Congress and the President wake up to the basic fact that 
our Nation's supply-side strategy does not attack the underlying 
problem of addiction? It is the addiction that causes people to crave 
and demand drugs.
  When President Richard Nixon declared war on drugs in 1971, he 
directed 60 percent of the funding to treatment. Now we are down to 18 
percent of the funding for treatment. That is a big reason, Mr. 
Speaker, that fully one half of the treatment beds are gone that were 
available here in America 10 years ago. The other reason is that we 
allow insurance companies to discriminate against the disease of 
addiction by limiting access to treatment.
  Mr. Speaker, this is a defining moment in the 30-year effort to curb 
illegal drug use in the United States. We can keep pumping money into 
that supply-side cesspool or we can shift our focus to the drug 
addiction problem here at home. We will never stop the drug epidemic 
unless we cut off the insatiable demand for drugs in our Nation.
  It is time to reject the $2 billion for the failed policy in 
Colombia. It is time to redirect those resources to providing access to 
drug treatment here at home.
  Mr. Speaker, the American people literally, literally, cannot afford 
to wait any longer for Congress to get real about addiction in America, 
the number one public health and public safety problem in our Nation.
  I hope and pray my fellow colleagues will just say no to funds for 
Colombia.

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