Mark Souder: “I thank both gentlemen for talking about drug testing. I want to put this a little bit in the context, because that was…”

“I thank both gentlemen for talking about drug testing. I want to put this a little bit in the context, because that was a critical part of the State of the Union last night to talk about that in particular, but once again as the President said at the front of that section, that, in fact, we have had a reduction in drug use in the United States. That is partly because we have a holistic policy that the drug testing is a key component of the accountability and the measurement. As both of my colleagues have pointed out as well as myself, but particularly the gentleman from California, it is a stigma part that one of the things, I have been to Colombia now about 10 times and in multiple countries, particularly in the Andean region, where because of our demand, because we cannot control our demand, we are disrupting and overturning democracies that have been there for hundreds of years. In Colombia, I think it was actually in Ecuador, in Guayaquil, a young student came up to me and said, why do you keep picking on the Andean nations? When I went to school in the United States, I saw no stigma at all. You could get dope in any college, you could get it from anybody. Why don't you put some stigma? That is partly why I offered the amendment that is a very unpopular amendment but basically says if you get convicted of a drug crime and you are taking money from the taxpayers of the United States you're going to lose your loan.”