people frequenly busted for making a nuisance of themselves. “In case one of this group is arrested for the fourth time in 12 months, that person has to make a decision: treatment or punishment.  And there always is capacity in the clinic and there always is capacity in the jail.”^[29]  This tolerance for drug users, however, does not extend to dealers.  The Government of the Netherlands, like other signatories of the United Nations Single Convention, is obligated to go after traffickers, and they have to take the obligation seriously. Rotterdam is the largest port in the world and the European gateway for South American and Asian shippers. So the Dutch pursue drug kingpins with a vengeance and overlook the street dealer with a wink and a nod. It’s a policy that Bernard Scholten acknowledges as “enlightened schizophrenia.”

In spite of all evidence to the contrary, U.S. officials never seem to tire of reporting the collapse and fall of the Dutch system, but from time to time this conceit blows up in somebody’s face. Lee Brown, first drug czar of the Clinton Administration, was speaking to a Los Angeles Town Hall meeting about the disaster in Holland when a gentleman in the audience stood up and introduced himself as the Consul General of the Netherlands and politely refuted everything Brown had just said.^[30] But while the Americans are the most vocal, they are not the only critics of Dutch liberalism.  The French are also hopping mad. When President Jacques Chirac took office in June of 1995, he reportedly told the Dutch Prime Minister, “Either you fight drug trafficking or I close the borders.” Chirac was particularly annoyed with the parade of French narco-tourists crossing into Rotterdam on weekends to get high on heroin. The Elysee Palace berated the Dutch for their corrupting influence. And the Dutch, ever courteous, skipped the opportunity to remind Chirac that his addiction rate was nearly double theirs.^[31]

In 1994 an American journalist was interviewing Bing Spear, former Chief Inspector of the Home Office Drugs Branch, and