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"January, 2015 will mark a century of the war on drugs in the United States: one hundred years since the first arrests under the Harrison Act. Facing down this anniversary, Johann Hari was witnessing a close relative and an ex-boyfriend bottoming out on cocaine and heroin. But what was the big picture in the war on drugs? Why does it continue, when most people now think it has failed? The reporter set out on a two-year, 20,000-mile journey through the theater of this war--to find out how it began, how it has affected people around the world, and how we can move beyond it. Chasing the Scream is fueled by dramatic personal stories of the people he meets along the way: A transsexual crack dealer in Brooklyn who wanted to know who killed her mother, and a mother in Mexico who spent years tracking her daughter's murderer across the desert. A child smuggled out of the Jewish ghetto during the Holocaust who helped unlock the scientific secrets of addiction. A doctor who pushed the decriminalization in Portugal of all drugs - from cannabis to crack. The title itself comes from a formative story of Harry Anslinger, first commissioner of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, sent as a boy to the pharmacy for a neighbor screaming in withdrawal -- an experience which led him to fear drugs without regard to context. Always we come back to the front lines in the U.S., where we instigated the war and exported it around the globe, but where change is also coming. Powerful, propulsive, and persuasive, Chasing the Scream is the page-turning story of a century-long mistake, which shows us the way to a more humane future"--

Intro -- Title Page -- Dedication -- Contents -- Introduction -- Part I: Mount Rushmore -- 1: The Black Hand -- 2: Sunshine and Weaklings -- 3: The Barrel of Harry's Gun -- 4: The Bullet at the Birth -- Part II: Ghosts -- 5: Souls of Mischief -- 6: Hard to Be Harry -- 7: Mushrooms -- Part III: Angels -- 8: State of Shame -- 9: Bart Simpson and the Angel of Juárez -- 10: Marisela's Long March -- Part IV: The Temple -- 11: The Grieving Mongoose -- 12: Terminal City -- 13: Batman's Bad Call -- Part V: Peace -- 14: The Drug Addicts' Uprising -- 15: Snowfall and Strengthening -- 16: The Spirit of '74 -- 17: The Man in the Well -- 18: High Noon -- Conclusion: If You Are Alone -- Afterword: The Opposite of Addiction Is Connection -- A Note on Narrative Techniques -- Acknowledgments -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index -- eCopyright

Over the last few years, the world has watched jihadist assassinations on the streets of Amsterdam, civilian slaughter in Madrid and on the London Underground, France's car-and-vanities bonfire, and the global assault on Denmark after one of its newspapers dared to depict the Prophet Muhammad in a derogatory cartoon. For ordinary Europeans who pride ourselves on our multiculturalism and tolerance, the continent seems stranger and sadder. The windows of my apartment in London stare out toward the scene of a recent suicide-murder, and when they are open on a summer morning, the low wailing of a muezzin can be heard clearing the air. On the streets and in the mosques outside, jihadi young men distributing "death to democracy" leaflets subtly clash with young Muslim feminists who want an open, liberal Islam. Kaffiyas and head-scarves contrast with makeup and wonderbras in a bewildering Islamic cacophony.

Nick Cohen's response is perplexing, characterized as it is by daft hyperbole (I'm Maoist now?), denial of his own statements, and arguments that he knows I agree with and have done more to advance than he. It's disappointing he doesn't try to defend his positions or engage with any of my arguments, despite the fact I tried hard to fairly summarize his case. For example, he simply repeats his claim that the Iraq War marked a radical break with Henry Kissinger's influence on U.S. foreign policy—and, to sustain this, he ignores the lengthy part of my review pointing out that Kissinger is now, according to Bob Woodward, "the most senior foreign policy adviser to [Bush] outside the administration." This information doesn't fit into his Manichean polemics so, rather than defend his case, he simply pretends it isn't so.

The pro-invasion left was always a small battalion, made up almost entirely of journalists and intellectuals who believed toppling the Taliban and Saddam Hussein was a good idea—even if the only leader available to lead the charge was George W. Bush. Yet almost since the first statue of Saddam fell to the ground, it has been losing troops—to the antiwar side, to a sullen AWOL silence, or to despair. So far, there have been retractions from Peter Beinart, Norman Geras, David Aaronovitch, and more; only a few lone fighters remain, like Japanese troops hiding in the forest, unaware their war has been lost. Now, with What's Left?, the most substantial work by a pro-war left intellectual has been published, and we can ask, Did this strange niche in Anglo-American politics—of which I was a part, for a time—produce any enduring insights?

HOW LIBERALS LOST THEIR WAY by Nick Cohen Fourth Estate, 2007 400 pp $26 THE PRO-INVASION LEFT was always a small battalion, made up almost entirely of journalists and intellectuals who believed toppling the Taliban and Saddam Hussein was a good idea-even if the only leader available to lead the charge was George W. Bush. A passage where he complains that the benefits system 'provides a perverse incentive for single motherhood' says that 'the liberal professionals of the welfare state were aggravating the poverty and racism they said they opposed,' and rants about 'the two-faced civil liberties lawyer' sounds like Norman Podhoretz circa 1968, a sign that Cohen is sliding into full-blown neoconservatism.

For thousands of younger people, hard-core pornography on the internet is becoming their introduction to sexual expression. Yet there is still one lingering leftover from our Puritan past: the sudden ubiquity of porn has barely been discussed in public. Are we going to carry on pretending in schools and in public that the internet sex show doesn't exist? Do we want to prepare ourselves for this powerful and warping intoxicant, or do we want to remain unprepared? (Quotes from original text)

Johann Hari begibt sich in seinem Buch IDoDrogen: Die Geschichte eines langen KriegesIDk auf eine Reise IBM von Brooklyn über Mexiko bis nach Deutschland IBM und erzählt dabei die Geschichten derjenigen, deren Leben vom Kampf mit Drogen geprägt ist: Dealern, Süchtigen, Kartellmitgliedern IBM den Verlierern und Profiteuren. Der Kampf gegen Drogen gilt inzwischen als gescheitert, der Handel ist immer noch ein blühendes Geschäft, alle Massnahmen gegen den Konsum sind erfolglos. Hari versucht mit dem Wissen um die scheinbare Aussichtslosigkeit die folgenden Fragen zu beantworten: Woran liegt das? Was macht Drogen in all ihren Aspekten so erfolgreich? Seine einzigartige literarische Reportage ist eine Geschichte des Krieges gegen Drogen sowie ein mitreissendes und streitbares Plädoyer zum Umdenken. (Verlagswerbung)