Number of Americans who say we’re losing the
drug war: 3 in 4 1

Number of Americans over age 11 who have used
illicit drugs in their lifetime: 2 in 5 2

Number of times the total of new drug users
in 1998 is greater than the current population of the City of L.A.: 2
3

Amount of current federal budget dedicated
to controlling drugs: $18.1 billion 4

Estimated amount Americans spent on retail
purchase of illicit drugs in 2000: $62.9 billion 5

Percentage of Americans favoring decriminalization
of marijuana: 46 6

Percentage of white evangelical Protestants
opposing decriminalization of marijuana: 65 7

Year that President Reagan declared a “War
on Drugs”: 1982

Percent increase of federal correctional-facility
budget since 1982: +1,078 8

Percentage of federal inmates doing time for
drugs in 1982: 24 9

Percentage of federal inmates doing time for
drugs in 1999: 58 10

Percent growth of combined state and federal
inmates doing time for drugs from 1982 through 1998: 206 11

Ratio, in cocaine-use reduction, of money spent
on treatment to that spent on domestic law enforcement: 1 to 7 12

Ratio, in cocaine-use reduction, of money spent
on treatment to that spent on source-country control: 1 to 23 13

Number of Blackhawk helicopters the U.S. is
sending to Colombia: 16

Percentage of budget increase of the Drug Enforcement
Agency since 1982: +492 14

Approximate ratio of total pounds of heroin,
cocaine, marijuana and hashish seized by the DEA to pounds seized
by U.S. Customs: 1 to 2 15

Ratio of DEA budget to U.S. Customs anti-drug
budget: 2 to 1 16

Number of cars crossing from Mexico into the
U.S. legally from October 1999 to October 2000: 89 million 21

Typical amount of time a San Ysidro border
agent spends on vehicle inspections: 30 to 90 seconds 22

Amount of cocaine traveling to the U.S. through
Mexico in 1999: 277 metric tons 23

Percent change in retail price of a gram of
cocaine since 1982: -57 24

Percent change in retail purity of a gram of
cocaine since 1982: +78 25

Current estimated purity: 80 to 85 percent
26

Year in which federally mandated minimum-sentence
guidelines for crack cocaine were passed by Congress: 1986 27

Federally mandated minimum sentence for anyone
caught with 500 grams of powder cocaine: 5 years 28

Federally mandated minimum sentence for anyone
caught with 5 grams of crack cocaine: 5 years 29

Ratio of punishment for crack cocaine to powder
cocaine: 100 to 1

Percent change in number of federal drug prisoners
from 1986 through 1999: +350 30

Chance that a new federal prisoner during that
time was sentenced for drugs: 2 in 3 31

Percentage of cocaine users (within the past
12 months) who are white: 73

Percentage of cocaine users (within the past
12 months) who are black: 9

Percentage of cocaine users (within the past
12 months) who are Hispanic: 15 32

Total DEA arrestees for cocaine who are white:
13 percent

Total DEA arrestees for cocaine who are black:
40 percent

Total DEA arrestees for cocaine who are Hispanic:
43 percent 33

Percentage of all black males aged 25 to 29
incarcerated in 2000: 13.1 34

Percentage of all white males aged 25 to 29
incarcerated in 2000: 1.7 35

State in which most manufacture of LSD occurs:
California 36

Year that LSD was declared illegal in the U.S.:
1967

Ratio of number of people who tried hallucinogens
in 1968 to 1998: 1 to 3 37

Year that the Drug Abuse Resistance Education
(DARE) Program was founded by the LAPD: 1983

Effect that DARE participation has on illicit
drug and alcohol use by age 20: 0 38

Effect that DARE participation has on suburban
high school student use of illicit drugs and alcohol: +3 to 5 percent 39

Ratio of people who try marijuana for the first
time to people who try cigarettes: 3 to 4 40

Chance that a college graduate has tried drugs:
1 in 2 41

Chance that a high school dropout has tried
drugs: 1 in 3 42

Years of federal alcohol prohibition: 1920
to 1933

Percent increase of deaths from poisoned liquor
from 1920 to 1925: +290 43

Percent increase of homicide rate from 1920
through 1933: +43 44

Increase of per capita consumption of alcohol
from 1921 through 1929: +550 percent 45

Year that Eli Lilly and Company began marketing
Prozac® in the United States: 1987

Year in which Merck Pharmaceuticals first synthesized
methylenedioxymethametaphine (Ecstasy): 1912 47

[

Effect of Prozac® on the brain:
inhibits reuptake of serotonin by neural cells

Effect of Ecstasy on the brain: stimulates
release of serotonin by neural cells

Country where Prozac® was first
introduced: Belgium

Main centers for Ecstasy production: Belgium,
Netherlands, Luxembourg 48

Precursor chemicals necessary for production
of methamphetamine (speed):
ephedrine or pseudoephedrine 49

Active ingredient of Chlor-Trimeton Non-Drowsy
Decongestant 4 Hour®, Dimetapp® decongestants, and Sudafed®:
pseudoephedrine

Year until which speed was available without
a prescription: 1951 50

Number of Ritalin® or generic methylaphenidate
prescriptions written last year:
10.7 million

Number of Americans over age 11 who have used
methamphetamines in their lifetime: 4.3 million 51

Average time it takes for snorted speed to
take effect: 20 minutes 52

Year that speed was first used in an over-the-counter
nasal decongestant by Smith, Kline and French: 1932 53

Estimated number of Americans over age 11 who
have used prescription medicines recreationally in their lifetime: 15.4 million
54

Estimated number of Americans over age 11 who
are current cigarette smokers:
57 million 55

Average number of U.S. citizens who die every
year due to tobacco use: 430,000 56

Average number of deaths per year due to car
crashes in the 1990s: 41,513 57

Average number of deaths per year due to drugs
in the 1990s: 13,412 58

Percentage of pregnant American women who smoke
cigarettes: 20 59

Percentage of pregnant American women who use
cocaine: 0.2 60

Medical cost that smoking cigarettes and cigars
produces in direct (cost of smokers’ diseases) and indirect (secondhand smoke,
prenatal care for low-birth-weight infants and smoking-related fires) expenses:
$100 billion 61

Medical cost (detoxification, rehabilitation
and diseases caused by drug abuse) that drug abuse generates: $9.9 billion
62

Number of times the number of current U.S.
drug users is greater than the current population of Colorado: 3.5 66

Number of times the number of Americans who
ever have used illicit drugs is greater than the current population of California:
2.6 67

Year that Frederich the Great (1712–1786, Prussia)
declared coffee illegal: 1777

Number of bags of coffee harvested in 2000:
112,901,000 68

Footnotes


1 The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press. “74 Percent Say Drug War Being Lost: Interdiction and Incarceration Still Top Remedies” 21 March 2001: 74 percent.


2 Office of Applied Studies, National Institute on Drug Abuse. National Household Survey on Drug Abuse. (Rockville, MD: SAMHSA, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, April 2001), Table G.6: 39.7 percent.


3 Ibid., Section 2.4: number of new users = 7.6 million; U.S. Census Bureau 2000: pop. of City of L.A. = 3,694,820.


4 Office of National Drug Control Policy, Summary: FY 2002 National Drug Control Budget. (Washington DC: U.S. Govrenment Printing Office, April 2001), 1.


5 Office of National Drug Control Policy, What America’s Users Spend on Illegal Drugs 1988-1998. (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, December 2000), 3.


6 Pew op. cit..


7 Pew op. cit..


8 Office of Management and Budget, Federal Government Outlays by Function: Outlays by Function and Subfunction, Table 3.2.


9 Bureau of Justice Statistics, State and Federal Prisoners from 1925 to 1985 NCJ 102494: total number of sentenced fed. prisoners = 24,162; Bureau of Justice Statistics Chief of Corrections Statistics, Beck, Allen J. Telephone interview. 7 June 2001: Total number fed. drug offenders in 1982 = 5,871.


10 Bureau of Justice Statistics, Compendium of Federal Justice Statistics 1999. NCJ 186179 (Washington D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, April 2001), 3: total drug offender pop. = 57.8 percent


11 Bureau of Justice Statistics, State and Federal Prisoners from 1925 to 1985 NCJ 102494: total number of sentenced fed. prisoners = 24,162; Chief of Corrections Statistics, Beck, Allen J. Telephone interview, 7 June 2001: total number fed. drug offenders in 1982 = 5,871; Bureau of Justice Statistics, Correctional Populations in the United States 1993 NCJ 156241 (Washington D.C: Bureau of Justice Statistics, October 1995): 1982 state drug pop. is 25,300 out of 375,603. (1982 total = 31,171/ 399,765 = 7.8 percent) Bureau of Justice Statistics, Compendium of Federal Justice Statistics 1998 NCJ 180258 (Washington, D.C.: Bureau of Justice Statistics, May 2000), 98: 1998 fed. drug pop. is 63,011 out of 108,925; Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prisoners in 1999 NCJ 183476 (Washington D.C.: Bureau of Justice Statistics, August 2000), 10: in 1998 state drug pop. is 236,800 out of 1,141,700. (TOTAL = 299,811 / 125,0625 = 23.9 percent)


12 Rydell, Peter C. & Everingham, Susan S., “Controlling Cocaine: Supply Versus Demand Programs.” https://www.rand.org Prepared for the Office of National Drug Control Policy, 1994.

[


13 Ibid.


14 Department of Justice, Drug Enforcement Agency, DEA Briefing Book. Appendix: Staffing and Appropriations FY 1971-2000: 1982 = 244.1m; Office of National Drug Control Policy, Summary: FY 2002 National Drug Control Budget. (op. cit.), 122: 2000 budget = 1443.853 m.


15 Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics. Bureau of Justice Statistics, Table 4.39: DEA seizure = 809,507, Table 4.44: Customs seizure = 1,468,158.3.


16 Office of National Drug Control Policy, Summary: FY 2002 National Drug Control Budget. (op. cit.), 122, 223: FY 2001 enacted DEA budget = $1443.853 million; FY 2001 enacted Customs drug budget = $721.595 million.


17 U.S. Department of Justice, National Drug Intelligence Center, National Drug Threat Assessment 2001 2001-Q0317-001 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Publications, October 2000), 37.


18 Ibid., ibid.


19 U.S. Department of Commerce, Tourism Industries Office, “Arrivals to the U.S. 1999 and 1998”


20 Office of National Drug Control Policy, National Drug Control Strategy 2001 Annual Report. (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Print Office), 93.


21 Ibid, ibid.


22 Ibid.


23 Office of National Drug Control Policy, National Drug Control Strategy 2001 Annual Report (op. cit.), 98.


24 Office of National Drug Control Policy, National Drug Control Strategy 2001 Annual Report (op. cit.), 171: retail Price of gram of cocaine in 1982 = $392.97, retail price in 1998 = $169.52.


25 Ibid., ibid: retail purity of a gram in 1982 = 39.58 percent, retail purity of a gram in 1998 = 71.23 percent.


26 Office of National Drug Control Policy Pulse Check, Mid Year 2000 (op. cit.), 25.


27 Office of National Drug Control Policy, National Drug Control Strategy 2001 Annual Report (op. cit.), 91.


28 Ibid., ibid.


29 Ibid., ibid.


30 Bureau of Justice Statistics Statistician, Scalia, John. Telephone interview. 12 June 2001: total number fed. drug offenders in 1986 = 15,185; Bureau of Justice Statistics, Compendium of Federal Justice Statistics 1999 (op. cit.), 100; federal drug pop. 1999 = 68,360.


31 Bureau of Justice Statistics Correctional Populations in the United States 1986, 64: total sentenced fed. pop. in 1986 = 35,045; Bureau of Justice Statistics Statistician, Scalia, John. Telephone interview. 12 June 2001: total number fed. drug offenders in 1986 = 15,185; Bureau of Justice Statistics, Compendium of Federal Justice Statistics 1999 (op. cit.),100: total fed. pop. in 1999 = 119,185, drug pop. = 68,360. (Change in drug/change in total = 63 percent)


32 Office of Applied Studies, National Institute on Drug Abuse. “Detailed Tables of NHSDA Data,” Table 1.36


33 Bureau of Justice Statistics. “Supplement to Table 1.4 of the 1999 Compendium of Federal Justice Statistics.” (op cit) 20 June, 2001.


34 Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prison and Jail Inmates at Midyear 2000 (op. cit.), 9.


35 Ibid., ibid.


36 National Drug Intelligence Center, National Drug Threat Assessment 2001 (op. cit.), 55.


37 U.S. Office of Applied Studies, National Institute on Drug Abuse, National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (op. cit.), Table G.6: number of new users in 1968 = 461, number of new users in 1998 = 1,245


38 Lyman, Donald R.; Milich, Richard; Zimmerman, Rick; Novak, Scott P.; Logan, T.K.; Martin, Catherine; Leukefeld, Carl; Clayton, Richard. “Project DARE: No Effects at 10-Year Follow-Up” Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 67:4 (1999): 590-593.


39 Rosenbaum, Dennis P. & Hanson, Gordon S. “Assessing the Effects of School-based Drug Education: A Six-Year Multilevel Analysis of Project D.A.R.E.” Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 35:4 (1998): 381-412.


40 U.S. Office of Applied Studies, National Institute on Drug Abuse, National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (op. cit.), Section 2.4: number of new marijuana users in 1997 = 2.6 million, number of new cigarette in 1997 = 3.4 million.


41 U.S. Office of Applied Studies, National Institute on Drug Abuse, National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (op. cit.), Section 2.1: College grads = 45.6 percent, high school dropouts = 30.0 percent.


42 Ibid.


43 Ibid.


44 National Center for Health Statistics, Vital Statistics. “Homicide Rates From the Vital Statistics.”


45 Thornton, Mark. “Alcohol Prohibition Was a Failure.” Policy Analysis 157 (1991), 3: per capita consumption in 1921 is approx. .2 gallons, in 1929, approx. 1.3.


46 Office of National Drug Control Policy, National Drug Control Strategy 2001 Annual Report (op. cit.), 15: average commercial THC content in “early 1980s” = under 2 percent, 1999 commercial THC = 5.58.


47 Shenk (op. cit.); Joseph, Miriam. Ecstasy: Its History and Lore. (London: Carlton, 2000), 19.


48 Office of National Drug Control Policy, National Drug Control Strategy 2001 Annual Report (op. cit.), 24.


49 U.S. Department of Justice, National Drug Intelligence Center, National Drug Threat Assessment 2001 (op. cit.), 21.

[


50 Joseph, Miriam. Speed: Its History and Lore. (London: Carlton 2000), 22.


51 U.S. Office of Applied Studies, National Institute on Drug Abuse, National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (op. cit.), Table G.6.


52 Joseph, Miriam. Speed (op. cit.), 10.


53 Ibid., 20.


54 U.S. Office of Applied Studies, National Institute on Drug Abuse, National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (op. cit.), Table G.6.


55 Ibid., Table G.21.


56 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institute on Drug Abuse. NIDA Research Report: Nicotine Addiction NIH 98-4342 (Rockville, MD: NIDA, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services).


57 Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics 1999 (op. cit.), Table 3.117


58 Office of National Drug Control Policy, National Drug Control Strategy 2001 Annual Report (op. cit.), 163.


59 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institute on Drug Abuse. NIDA Research Report: Nicotine Addiction (op. cit.).


60 U.S. Office of Applied Studies, National Institute on Drug Abuse, National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (op. cit.), Table G.11.


61 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institute on Drug Abuse. NIDA Research Report: Nicotine Addiction (op. cit.).


62 National Institute on Drug Abuse, The Economic Costs of Alcohol and Drug Abuse in the United States 1992, Executive Summary.


63 Rydell, Peter C. & Everingham, Susan S. (op. cit.)


64 Ibid.


65 Office of National Drug Control Policy, Summary: FY 2002 National Drug Control Budget. (op. cit.)


66 U.S. Office of Applied Studies, National Institute on Drug Abuse, National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (op. cit.), Table G.6: number of current users = 14,820,000; U.S. Census Bureau 2000: pop. of Colorado = 4,301,261.


67 U.S. Office of Applied Studies, National Institute on Drug Abuse, National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (op. cit.), Table G.6: number of lifetime users = 87,734,000; U.S. Census Bureau 2000: pop. of California = 33,871,648.


68 International Coffee Organization. “Total Production of Exporting Members Crop Years 1995/96 to 2000/01”

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