BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s chances of being reappointed appear to be fading as potential coalition partners turn against him a month after a general election that produced no clear winner.

Maliki, a Shi’ite leader, claims credit for stamping out widespread violence between once dominant Sunnis and majority Shi’ites, but is viewed as a divisive strongman by his foes. His coalition finished a close second in the March 7 vote.

DETROIT (Reuters) – Private insurer State Farm informed a government regulator of a worrying trend of vehicle-caused accidents involving Toyota Motor Corp as far back as late 2007, an official at the company said.

“When you start to see significant claims activity that indicates that there may be widespread problems with a product, that’s when you go to the NHTSA,” said company spokesman Kip Diggs. “There had to have been significant activity, a noticeable trend, for that to happen.”

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Law firms across the United States are scrambling for a chance at the mother lode: a lawsuit against embattled, but cash-rich Toyota Motor Corp <7203.T>.

It has been just over two weeks since the world’s largest automaker announced an recall of 8 million vehicles because of a sticky gas pedal, but already at least 30 class-action lawsuits have been filed against the Japanese automaker.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Toyota Motor Corp’s <7203.T> massive safety recall comes as no surprise to Dimitrios Biller, a former company attorney fighting a lawsuit against the world’s No. 1 automaker alleging Toyota has concealed evidence from courts and the U.S. government.

Biller worked at Toyota defending the company in product liability cases from April 2003 until September 2007 and alleges the company systematically hid evidence that would have led to costly trials in the United States.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – The number of Americans receiving emergency food from the largest U.S. hunger-relief charity and its partners rose 46 percent from 2005 to 2009, according to a report released on Tuesday.

“Feeding America” said 37 million people, including 14 million children, needed emergency food aid each year, more than 10 percent of the U.S. population of 300 million. It based the figure on 61,000 interviews and 37,000 surveys of local charitable agencies.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – An American pleaded not guilty on Wednesday to U.S. charges that he scouted targets for a militant Pakistani group blamed for the attack on Mumbai in 2008 that killed more than 160 people.

David Headley, 49, appeared calm in answering questions from a judge during the brief hearing in federal court to arraign him on a dozen charges, some of which carry the death penalty.

KALAMAZOO, Mich (Reuters) – In Stephen Gorsalitz’s courtroom, you could be forgiven for thinking you’ve stumbled into a rehab clinic like the Betty Ford Center.

Gorsalitz patiently listens as defendant Eugenia Jensen tells him she has a steady job at a local restaurant and is working hard to regain custody of her 10-year-old daughter.

KALAMAZOO, Mich, Jan 21 (Reuters) – In Stephen Gorsalitz’s courtroom, you could be forgiven for thinking you’ve stumbled into a rehab clinic like the Betty Ford Center.

Gorsalitz patiently listens as defendant Eugenia Jensen tells him she has a steady job at a local restaurant and is working hard to regain custody of her 10-year-old daughter.

After Jensen, 38, announces that she has been drug free for seven months, the court bursts into warm applause.

"I am pleased with your progress," Gorsalitz says. "And I see you managed not to cry this time," he adds with a smile.

This is certainly not what U.S. President Richard Nixon had in mind when he declared a "War on Drugs" in 1971. But four decades and billions of dollars later, this war — based on law enforcement and a crackdown on production, distribution and consumption — has produced unspectacular results, at best.

So more and more states have been turning to alternative approaches like drug courts, which target consumption among probationers using a combination of frequent tests, the threat of jail time and plenty of moral encouragement.

And it seems to be working. Over the past 20 years drug courts have cut crime rates and proved far cheaper than prison. They are also expected to be part of a drug strategy report the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama is due to issue in February.

"We’re going to go with what works best," said Gil Kerlikowske, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, more commonly called the Drug Czar. "That includes looking at solutions like drug courts."

The other notable shift taking place today centers on marijuana policy. At a time of soaring deficits, more states are seeking to decriminalize marijuana, at least in medical use. Today, more than a dozen states allow the sale of pot to the sick.

"The states are broke, the criminal justice systems in the states are overflowing with prisoners, as in California, and they cannot afford to keep on putting people in jail for drug possession," said drug policy expert Joe Domanick, Associate Director of the Center on Media, Crime and Justice at John Jay College in New York. "They will still do it, but that is why Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger suggested we at least discuss the legalization and taxation of marijuana in California."

But don’t expect President Obama to join the push for legalization any time soon.

The administration has devoted fresh resources to curb violent traffickers from Mexico. Earlier this year both Obama and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano stated their support for Mexican efforts to crush the nation’s drug cartels and staunch overspill violence in the United States. That is a policy goal and unlikely to change.

"I don’t think that Obama is going to say, ‘Okay, we’re going to legalize marijuana,’" said Domanick. "Maybe in the seventh year, the last year of his second term, if he’s got 80 percent approval ratings, otherwise it’s not going to happen."

FORTY YEAR WAR

Since Nixon coined the phrase, every president since has continued the "War on Drugs" in some form.

Much of the focus of the four-decade war been curbing supply and distribution of drugs such as cocaine in its journey from the Andes to dealers and users in U.S. cities. But supply has easily kept pace with demand.

Data compiled by Beau Kilmer, co-director of the RAND Drug Policy Research Center, and University of Maryland professor Peter Reuter, show that at the "farm gate" in Colombia, 100 percent pure cocaine costs about $800.

After several mark-ups along the chain, dealers working for the cartels in the United States break down each kilo into individual grams sold between $80 to $100 each, generating between $80,000 and $100,000 a kilo, according to DEA data.

Kilmer said revenues can be even higher when the cocaine is diluted with other substances, with a kilo bringing in the equivalent of as much as $122,000 in some cases.

"Drug traffickers make so much money that even if there are big seizures they end up losing only a fraction of what they stand to make," Kilmer said.

"Experience has shown that major drug busts can lead to short-term shortages and high prices for drugs," he added. "But within a few months supply catches up with demand again."

According to the National Drug Intelligence Center 2009 report, at least 35 million Americans — more than a tenth of the population — used illicit drugs ranging from pot, to cocaine, meth and heroin and party drugs like ecstasy, or abused prescription drugs.

"If people weren’t buying or using drugs," said Jim Lamkin, chief of police in the town of St Charles in Chicago’s western suburbs, "people wouldn’t be selling them."

Dr Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, said the institute’s data has shown that 34 percent of 18-year-olds have tried marijuana, the no. 1 drug in America.

Terry Goddard, attorney general in Arizona, the border state that bears the brunt of smuggling from Mexico, describes the train of traffickers moving north through the state as a "parade of ants."

"Here’s the thing that bothers me so much about the drug policy that we’ve been engaged in… supply is up, demand is up, and the price is down," he said. "It does not sound like a formula for success to me, and the term abject failure comes to mind. It’s about time that the whole policy was reanalyzed."

DETROIT (Reuters) – In more ways than one, the bulls have been missing at this year’s Detroit auto show.

At the 2008 auto show — back in those heady pre-financial meltdown days — No. 3 U.S. automaker Chrysler drove a herd of Texas longhorn cattle through downtown Detroit to promote the latest incarnation of its Dodge Ram truck.

DETROIT (Reuters) – U.S. auto executives and elected officials at the Detroit auto show on Monday sought to draw a curtain on a year of appalling sales and massively unpopular government aid.

“This is a new day,” said U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, who spoke at the opening of the annual show. “Today is a new day. Today is a new beginning, really.”