Busted

Mike Gray
December 2002     ISBN: 1560254327

Edited and introduced by Mike Gray, one of America's leading voices for drug policy reform, Busted includes Oliver Stone's jailhouse interview with the deposed leader of Panama, General Manuel Noriega, and Milton Friedman's declaration that there is "no justice in the war on drugs." The effect of US policy south of the border is explored in T.D. Allman's report on the "blowback" from American policy in Colombia and Charles Bowden's insights into the life and death of a DEA informant. Maia Szalavitz and Maurice Frank offer alternative policies for treating addicts, while Ethan Nadelmann proposes a "common-sense drug policy." Joshua Wolf Shenk explores the dislocation between America's relationship with legal and illegal drugs, Russ Baker describes how the philanthropist George Soros defied drug orthodoxy, and Lester Grinspoon makes the case for medical marijuana. With articles by Christopher Hitchens, P.J. O'Rourke, Philippe Bourgois, Dave Kopel, William Buckley Jr., Joseph McNamara, Robert W. Sweet and Stephen Jay Gould, among others, Busted is a compelling and comprehensive survey of America's unwinnable war.

"Gray's genius is not that he's dug up much new material, but that he's spliced the familiar information with lesser-known texts in a way that puts the issues in a persuasive context.... 'Busted' does what more political anthologies should--it builds an implicit and convincing argument, not simply and straightforwardly, but by layering case after case until the evidence is irrefutable.... As a source of ammunition for opponents of the drug war, a manifesto of reason, and a document of where our drug policy stands now, Gray has compiled an invaluable and comprehensive reference."

--LA Weekly

"If you weren't already suspicious of the 'war on drugs' and this collection fails to dissuade you, then you probably work for the DEA."

--Kirkus Reviews

Mike Gray is the author of Drug Crazy and the screenwriter of The China Syndrome. He has produced the award-winning documentaries American Revolution and The Murder of Fred Hampton. He has written for The Nation, the Los Angeles Times and Rolling Stone. He is the chair of Common Sense for Drug Policy, a Washington DC-based advocacy group.