PRIVILEGE SHIELD

The so-called U.S. war on drugs hasn't been doing much good during the Clinton administration, a well-documented fact that the White House would like to keep under wraps. But this is an election year, and Republicans continue to remind President Clinton of his administration's failure in this area.

Although official reports confirming increased drug use by teen-agers and gains in heroin and cocaine trafficking are fairly recent, the president was told more than a year and a half ago that things were going badly. Who made this report? None other than the director of the FBI, Louis Freeh.

Director Freeh hand-delivered to the president what he knew was a sensitive report, particularly just as campaign momentum was beginning to build. In the report, the FBI cited a lack of "any true leadership" in the effort to stem the flow of heroin and cocaine.

Just how sensitive and embarrassing the report's contents were became painfully clear earlier this month when the White House refused to give a copy to a House subcommittee investigating various allegations about the drug war. The White House refusal was based on the argument that the report was a confidential document, and making it public would somehow harm the constitutional separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches of government.

That is a fine point of which to withhold information, particularly if full disclosure could somehow move the nation toward a victory -- any victory -- in the war on drugs.

This isn't the first time the White House has hidden behind the executive-privilege argument when embarrassing information has been requested. Both the FBI report and the Clinton administration's refusal to turn it over are further evidence of the shallowness of this administration's handling of some of the nation's most serious problems.