You got to hand it to the federal government: if you take the attorney general and the Chief Scientist of ONDCP together, there are only 6,000 non-federal and/or non-crack drug war prisoners.

How does this come about? Take Acting Attorney General Mukasey at his word: the federal crack-cocaine disparity changes will cause a "crime wave" of up to 3,000 crack offenders being immediately released, and 20,000 eligible for sentencing reductions. 21% of those cases had guns involved, meaning about 16,000 were in prison solely for crack-cocaine distribution or possession charges.

This is important because of another interesting figure handed out, this time by the Chief Scientist of the Office of National Drug Control Policy: There are only 22,000 total drug war prisoners in state and federal prisons that only involve drug trafficking and possession.

Don't believe me? We got the audio right here.

So, if 16,000 of those crack defendants are in prison solely for drug possession and distribution charges, that only leaves 6,000 non-crack, non-federal drug war prisoners. I used to think that I was one in 500,000. I somehow feel a little more important knowing that I was one out of 6,000.

The federal government, in its "War on Drugs," only bolsters the old adage:

The first victim of war is the truth. The math of the federal government doesn't add up to what the facts are telling us.

The facts are that the drug war locks up hundreds of thousands of our fellow citizens, violates individual sovereign rights to a person's own body and mind, and the pursuit of prohibition has led to elimination of privacy protection, government restraint, and rational discourse and study of certain chemical substances.