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No government program in the world can reform people against their will. Liberals ought to know that better than any one. Its a fact of human nature.

Ah, yes, but liberals & their ilk consider human nature inherently flawed, and therefore requiring correction of said nature. Hence the 20th century's bloody drenched road to the socialist paradise.

Under Lenin and his first Five Year program this notion first came to light. The people/workers of Russia were not responding to the changes as theoretically they should.

Puzzled by this it was thereupon decided that the fault lay not in the Marxist-Leninist philosophy, but in the people. Human nature was obviously flawed. Ergo, it was the people who must be changed for accommodate the theories, not the other way around.

"The addict must want to be motivated to get clean and sober and stay clean and sober. No government program in the world can reform people against their will. Liberals ought to know that better than any one. Its a fact of human nature."

Don't be so quick to give up on the idea of rehabilitating these people. It always amuses me when I talk to people who will stand behind the old way of locking everyone up without trying to rehabilitate them despite the fact that we know that doesn't work yet they are the same people who want to give up the instant we hit speed bumps going the rehab route. I don't know anything about Prop 36, but I know treatment programs can work. They can be cheaper than the prison solution and more effective at reducing recidivism.

I agree that people have to want to quit. The trick is getting them to want to quit bad enough to actually do it. We've had a drug court program in our county for several years and it has been pretty successful. Nationwide about 70% of those sent to prison are rearrested on new felony charges within three years of their release. Our rearrest rates from participants in our drug court program have been much lower than that. Not all of these people are getting off of drugs but substantial numbers are.

One important thing you have to know about these people is that many if not most have been getting high so long they don't know how to live without drugs. On top of that, their brains get wired all screwy from their addictions and constant use of these drugs for so long, especially drugs like methamphetamine. They're going to screw up at first, and it's going to take a long time to get them thinking and living like normal people.

In our program, hardly any of the people go for inpatient treatment. This isn't by design, it's because of lack of budget. We save the few precious treatment slots we have for the worst case addicts. The rest get outpatient group therapy treatment where they work a treatment program workbook, and they also have to go to NA or AA meetings. But along with that, they are drug tested constantly, twice a week at first and a little lest as time goes on. Anyone who fails drug tests or fails to show for one goes to jail, starting with a two weekend stint and the jail sentences increase with each screw up. Missing meetings, showing up late, not doing homework and that sort of thing can result in jail but usually the probation officer or drug counselor think up other punishments like extra NA meetings, or they hold them back in the program so it takes longer for them to finish. Those who fail out of the program go to prison.

These people are forced to get and keep jobs. They have to pay a small monthly fee to help defer some of the costs of the program. They have to get reliable transportation and a place to stay where they will not be around drugs. They are encouraged to make new friends because their old "friends" are just going to get them in trouble. They are drug tested so frequently that it would be nearly impossible for someone to cheat their way through the program. Most of them screw up and spend some time in jail. Almost twenty percent fail out of the program. The rest spend at least 15 months in the program before they graduate. By the end of that time most will have started living like normal people. They'll have a foundation they can build on, and they'll have done without drugs long enough to where it won't be too hard for most of them to stay away from the drugs. For their hard work, their criminal records will be expunged.

This program saves us money. It's not just the prison costs that we save. We also save a lot on litigating these cases, which is quite expensive when you start adding up all of the hours prosecutors, state's witnesses (mostly law enforcement), public defenders, judges, court personnel, and jurors spend preparing for and trying these cases. And then of course there are the appeals. It's usually a heck of a lot easier getting a defendant to agree to drug court then to a prison term, which is where a lot of these people were heading.

Don't be so quick to give up on these types of programs. Some are going to work fairly well, others are going to fail miserably. As time goes on, we'll be better able to assess what works and what doesn't, and success rates should go up from there.