We shouldn't even be discussing this.
but since we are, here's a few snips from one really good opinion piece at the time by Arianna Huffington:
>While Noelle has been given every break in the book -- and then some -- her father has made it harder for others in her position to get the help they need by cutting the budgets of drug treatment and drug court programs in his state. He has also actively opposed a proposed ballot initiative that would send an estimated 10,000 non-violent drug offenders into treatment instead of jail. I guess what's good for the goose, gets the gander locked away.
Of course, Jeb's wildly inconsistent attitude on the issue -- treatment and privacy for his daughter, incarceration and public humiliation for everyone else -- is part and parcel of the galling hypocrisy that infects America's insane drug war on every level.
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Or does that kind of overheated and stigmatizing rhetoric only apply to those other, non-Bush-family youthful drug users? After all, a glaring double standard has been a hallmark of our nation's drug policy for decades. It's why African Americans make up only 13 percent of the country's drug users but 55 percent of those convicted of drug possession and 74 percent of those sent to jail on possession charges. And why the youthful indiscretions of the rich are routinely treated with a slap on the wrist and a ticket to rehab while poor kids are shipped off to prison.
If America's drug laws were applied consistently, Jeb Bush and his family would be evicted from their publicly-funded digs, just as people living in public housing can be thrown out of their homes if any household member or guest is found using drugs -- even if the drug use happened someplace other than in the housing project. And Noelle could find herself joining the tens of thousands of young people unable to get a college education because of a provision in the Higher Education Act that denies financial aid to students convicted of possessing illegal drugs.
http://www.interventionmag.com/cms/modules.php?artid=53&file=index&name=Sections&op=modload&req=printpage