Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs

by Johann Hari

One day he came home and his mother called him. She was being detained in a psychiatric unit—she had been manic for years now—and explained she had an exciting announcement. She was going to run for president. “I think I have a real good chance too,” she explained, because she was guaranteed the support of all the mental patients, alcoholics, and drug addicts. She told Bud to think about what cabinet appointment he would like after the election. “I spent considerable time,” he recalled, “trying to decide between secretary of health, education, and welfare.” He thought: “In my family, if we didn’t count our chickens before they’d hatched, I don’t think we’d have been able to do very much counting at all.”