Donna Shalala Quotes

Should someone go to jail for just doing drugs? I believe the time has come for that to end.

If drugs are bad, any respectable society should do something to deal with them.

Prohibition of substances which give pleasure to people does not work. Addiction is a health problem, not a moral one, and there are many proven strategies which can reduce its burden.

Anyone who advocates pill testing is giving the green light to drugs. That is absolutely unacceptable.

I always thought a very strong anti-drug policy was a good thing for my union members.

Once brave politicians and others explain the war on drugs' true cost, the American people will scream for a cease-fire. Bring the troops home, people will urge. Treat drugs as a health problem, not as a matter for the criminal justice system.

Casual drug users should be taken out and shot.

Agitating the community and increasingly forcing itself upon our attention is the narcotic drug evil. I am convinced that part of the agitation on this subject is due to the sensationalism of certain types of newspapers and magazines. Lurid, sensational articles, intended to inflame the imagination of young people and to make the whole subject mysteriously and morbidly attractive, have led to the prevalence of a belief that the use of narcotic drugs is much more general than it really is.

The consumption of drugs could be legalized, not penalized.

Incarcerating people for their [drug] consumption choices has the consistency of arresting a survivor of suicide for attempted murder.

I've never done drugs. That's because I saw this stuff literally every day when I was 3 or 4 years old.

What I support is a whole different approach with regard to drug use, and that is spending less money on the prosecution and incarceration side and more money on prevention and education, which I know works.

I've never been into artists promoting drugs.

Drugs are horrible; I say no to drugs. I've never done drugs in my life.

I know why we can't have a frank discussion with our policymakers - if you're in the government or in law enforcement you cannot acknowledge that drugs are anything but inherently evil and morally wrong.

It is very rewarding to serve the country by helping President Bush work to reduce the drug problem.

I sit on the Drug Policy Subcommittee of the United States Congress. I'm on the speaker's task force. This is something people would rather turn away from and not face, but in fact it is possibly the greatest threat we face.

And in fact, one of the central reasons why I never got involved with any drugs or anything is that I remember talking to people in maybe 1975 who saw Hendrix but couldn't remember it. I was like, 'How could that be?'

The establishment of a National Methamphetamine Prevention Week will significantly increase awareness of meth and educate the public on effective ways to help prevent its use.

I still don't know anything about drugs, or who takes them, or what happens.

I don't do drugs. I never have taken any drugs. I don't believe in them.

I don't know if people really want to know how I feel about drugs. I'm not such a stickler. I believe you can choose to live your life any way you want.

We need safe communities that are free from methamphetamine and a federal commitment to stand next to state leadership and law enforcement in the fight against this epidemic.

The war on drugs is wrong, both tactically and morally. It assumes that people are too stupid, too reckless, and too irresponsible to decide whether and under what conditions to consume drugs. The war on drugs is morally bankrupt.

If you want to fight a war on drugs, sit down at your own kitchen table and talk to your own children.