Amazon.com Review
"When, back in 1988, the
New York Review of Books sent me to Columbia to write about the Latin American cocaine trade," notes Michael Massing, a contributing editor of the
Columbia Journalism Review and 1992 recipient of a MacArthur "genius" grant, "I had little notion that the issue of drugs would engross me for so many years." The "War on Drugs," arguably, has been the United States' most futile and expensive social campaign. In 1998, the federal drug budget was more than $17 billion--over ten times its 1981 allocation--and yet the corresponding population of drug offenders in the nation's state and federal prisons has increased tenfold within that same period. What to do?
The Fix makes a case for the return of the community-based drug treatment clinic model that was a cornerstone of U.S. drug policy under Richard Nixon. While Nixon's personal distaste for illegal drugs may have been most evident in his decision to ignore evidence indicating that marijuana use did not lead irreparably to harder drugs, his pragmatism helped him recognize that the problem of narcotics was far more cost-effectively approached as a health issue rather than one strictly of law enforcement. In a narrative that alternates between descriptions of a drug-ridden neighborhood in Harlem and policy makers in the nation's capital, Massing compellingly argues that the most effective battle against addiction is the creation and maintenance of a comprehensive national treatment system. --Patrizia DiLucchio
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
The tabloidy, haranguing tone of the curious subtitle doesn't do justice to this book's careful research and well-written narrative. Far from being a love letter to Richard Nixon's drug policy, it discusses America's war on drugs in the context of real people suffering with addiction. Massing, a New York City-based reporter, has written about the drug trade for 10 years, so he has the knowledge and eye for detail that give this work its best moments. Believing that "the policies being formulated in Washington today bear little relation to what is taking place on the street," Massing starts his story in Spanish Harlem, following the lives of Raphael Flores, who runs a struggling drop-in center for addicts, and Yvonne Hamilton, a crack addict trying to get her life together. The middle third of the book shifts dramatically in tone as Massing chronicles the evolution of the war on drugs in Washington. During Nixon's tenure, the government spent more money on treatment (the "demand" side) than on stopping drug trafficking (the "supply" side), which led to declines in both drug overdoses and crime rates. As successive presidents felt pressure to emphasize the "war" rather than treatment, the number of chronic addicts skyrocketed. In the last section Massing returns to Harlem, where Hamilton's struggle to remain drug-free makes for gripping reading. The Washington section works as political history, but the bios of various bureaucrats can't compete with the slices of Harlem street life. While Massing may think Nixon's strategy would work again today, Hamilton's story demonstrates that the drug problem is much more complicated than any government strategy.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
