Drug demand reduction requires a mandate by the President for non-punitive random drug testing for all students grades 6 thru 12. If the President is really serious about the issue, it is time for him to act.

Even a dog eventually learns not to drink out of a toilet if you slam the toilet seat lid on its head enough times but our government just doesn't get it the war on drugs just doesn't work. The lid has been slammed down on our heads since this so called war on drugs began and still we don't learn. We just throw more good money on it you might just as well burn it in the streets for all the good it has done. I'd like to know just how much has been spent on this and when we're just going to admit defeat. The whole thing is a waste of time and money.

Lucky Mexico! Based on the success of our own drug war, about the only thing we can teach them is how NOT to do it. It's more guns, more government intrusion into civil society and a pathetic demand reduction program.

Obama needs to fight the war on drugs here in the u.s.a. he could start by drug testing anyone that receives any type of public help and if they cant pass a drug test then stop giving them help.unless they are under a doctors care.and the ones that failed get them into a substance abuse program and the only way to get their help back is by staying clean and sober.see what everyone is over looking is when we are in our addictive state we would sell our own mother to get our next fix or high,I know I am a recovering addict myself and yes I have seen people sell their own souls chasing there next high.

Obama might be bolder if someone had formulated a demand reduction strategy that makes sense. Focusing solely on recoveries -- one person at a time, one day at a time -- makes for good anecdotes but will do little to reduce demand, or incidence and prevalence for that matter. A new multi-billion investment in intervention and treatment might bear some fruit, but Americans have no stomach for even more government aid and intervention. Knowledgeable public health researchers know this and have been silent. Even supporters for recovery have little interest in public health considerations (other than lip service) or prevention of any kind, regardless of what the research shows.

I am extremely disappointed that President Obama is focusing totally in the wrong place to help our very serious drug problem. It has been proven over and over that trying to diminish the supply is totally ineffective. Any time and money that Obama would commit to helping Mexico would be much better spent here in our own country focusing on the "demand" not the "supply" part of the drug issue. We critically need a lot more dollars available for the treatment/rehabilitation of people who have drug addictions!!

You can't lower drug demand after the fact. It need to be done on the front end by prevention and using enviromental strategies. David is right about once someone starts using. While treatment is a very important part of the strategy, we need to put a barior between the individual and drug use by utilizing policy, media and organizing communities.

We are trying to fight this as if we were still in Prohibition. That approach did not work and it was abandoned. This initiative will only result in more death, more incarceration, more lives destroyed and Mexico in ruins. When will we learn that as long long as drug remain illegal and using them puts you in jail we will only make things worse.

If Obama was serious about helping Mexico, he would cut demand by withholding federal funds on any state that has passed drug laws that are not in agreement with federal laws, like medicinal marijuana. We can't say we are on the side of the Mexican Government and not do anything to squash the demand. Put the pressure on the dopers. Next he would make a federal madate that all fines for possession, transportation and illigal use or being under the influence be increased to a minimum for $4,000 and $1,000 per ounce. And that anyone arrested for possession, transportation, and being under the influence is put on immediate probation and remain there untill their fines have been paid and drug classes have been completed. Probationers shall be monitored with Ankle bracelets, so they can be tracked and located by their probation officers, if needed. This remedy would fund itself and be a bigger deterant to the user.

I agree obama should focus on the demand end,If he would cut out the demand then we would not have to worry about where it is comming from.Put the billions of dollars he is sending to mexico into treatment centers right here in this country where it is needed.

america's war on the demand for drugs has been and will be a failure as long as the supply is not seen as a threat to the security of the usa. instead of thowing vast amounts of money at countries that don't seem to have a genuwine intrest in halting the supply we should be puting santions on the table for drug dealing countries.