What's Bill Bennett Smoking?

The former drug czar's latest tirade defies reality.

Michael W. Lynch | November 30, 2001

(Page 2 of 2)

So where did all the money go, I asked? "It was not used," replied Cherry, who said that U.S. Customs agents were reassigned away from narcotics.

"Sure, sure, sure," Cherry said when I pointed out that Gen. Barry McCaffrey did everything possible to repress medical marijuana and that Congress passed and that President Clinton signed a bill preventing anyone with a drug conviction from getting student loans. "But," argues Cherry, "I'm saying that Clinton's biggest statement on illegal drugs was, 'I didn't inhale.' That was the message people remember from Bill Clinton about illegal drugs."

But none of that really matters, nor do any of the actual facts of drug use and terrorism. Partisan politics are back. "They want to do to Walters what they did to Ashcroft," Cherry told me. But he was confusing me with someone who cares.