An indispensable component of the mythical media profile which George Bush has built up over theyears to buttress his electoral aspirations has been his role as an anti-drug fighter. His first formally
scheduled prime time presidential television address to the nation in September, 1989 was devoted
to announcing his plans for measures to combat the illegal narcotics that continued to inundate the
sreets of the United States. During his 1988 election campaign, Bush pointed with astounding
complacency to his record as President Reagan's designated point man in the administration's waron drugs.
In his acceptance speech to the Republican National Convention in 1988, Bush stated: "I want a
drug-free America. Tonight, I challenge the young people of our country to shut down the drug
dealers around the world....My Administration will be telling the dealers, "Whatever we have to do,we'll do, but your day is over. You're history.'"
Indeed, Bush has an impressive resume of bureaucratic titles to back up his claim to be America's
top anti-drug fighter. On January 28, 1982, Reagan created the South Florida Task Force under
Bush's high-profitide of narcotics into Bush's old family bailiwick. On March 23, 1983, Busle leadership to coordinate the efforts of the various federal agencies to stem theh was placed in charge of (^)
the National Narcotics Border Interdiction System, which was supposed to staunch the drug flow
over all US borders. In August, 1986 US officials presented to their Mexican counterparts a scheme
called Operation Alliance, a new border enforcement initiative that was allegedly to do for the US-
Mexican border area what the South Florida Task Force had allegedly already donesoutheastern states. George Bush was appointed chief of Operation Alliance, which involved 20 for the (^)
federal agencies, 500 additional federal officers, and a budget of $266 million.
To crown all these efforts, Bush sought to obtain a cameo role for a brief appearance on the
television series Miami Vice. He was perhaps inspired by his mentor, Kissinger, who had walkedthrough a cameo of his own on Dynasty. But Bush was unable to accomplish his dream.
The drug plague is an area in which the national interest requires results. Illegal narcotics are one of
the most important causes of the dissolution of American society at the present time. To interdict
the drug flows and to prosecute the drug mwould have represented a real public service. But Bush had no intention of seriously pursuing suchoney launderers at the top of the banking community (^)
goals. For him, the war on drugs was a cruel hoax, a cynical exercise in demagogic self-promotion,
designed in large part to camouflage activities by himself and his networks that promoted drug
trafficking. A further shocking episode that has come to light in this regard involves Bush's 14-year
friendship with a member of Meyer Lansky's Miami circles who sold Bush his prized trophy, tCigarette boat Fidelity. he
Bush's war on drugs was a rhetorical and public relations success for a time. On February 16, 1982,
in a speech on his own turf in Miami, Florida, Bush promised to use sophisticated military aircraft
to track the airplanes used by smugglers. Several days later, Bush ordered the US Navy to send inits E2C surveillance aircraft for this purpose. If these were not available in sufficient numbers, said (^)
Bush, he was determined to bring in the larger and more sophisticated AWACS early warning
aircraft to do the job. But Bush's skills as an interagency expediter left something to be desired: by
May, two of the four E2C aircraft that originally had been in Florida were transferred out of the
state. By June, airborne surveillance time was running a mere 40 hourshours promised by Bush, prompting Rep. Glenn English to call hearings on this topic. By October, per month, not the 360 (^)
1982 the General Accounting Office issued an opinion in which it found "it is doubtful whether the
[south Florida] task force can have any substantial long-term impact on drug availability." But the
headlines were grabbed by Bush, who stated in 1984 that the efforts of his task force had eliminated
the marijuana trade in south Florida. That was an absurd claim, but it sounded very good. When