NATION : Bush Rejects Shultz Drug Plan

President Bush’s spokesman rejected a suggestion today by former Secretary of State George P. Shultz that drugs be legalized and jokingly said, “He’s been on the West Coast too long.”

“Clearly, we do not believe that drugs should be legalized,” said White House press secretary Marlin Fitzwater. “The President feels very strongly that (legalization) is the wrong direction, the wrong time.”

Shultz, in an Oct. 7 address at Stanford University Business School, where he is on the faculty, expressed fear that Bush’s war on drugs, like previous such offensives, may fail.

Shultz said although he welcomes increased efforts, he believes that authorities must take the profit motive out of the multibillion-dollar drug trade.

“We need to at least consider and examine forms of controlled legalization of drugs,” Shultz said, adding, “I find it very difficult to say that. Sometimes at a reception or cocktail party, I advance these views and people head for somebody else. They don’t even want to talk to you.”