Pubdate: Wed, 06 Jun 2001
Source: Northwest Florida Daily News (FL)
Copyright: 2001 Northwest Florida Daily News
Contact:  http://www.nwfdailynews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/313
Author: Richard Gile

NO LEGALIZATION

If drugs are legalized, America is headed for an even more dangerous 
chapter in its history than experienced in the decades since alcohol was 
declared legal.

For the benefit of believers in legalization, I suggest they read about a 
one-year experiment with legalization laws in Zurich, Switzerland. Drug 
abusers proliferated in the parks and alleyways. Dirty needles were 
disposed of in public places not unlike the disposal of cigarette butts by 
Americans.

As for the U.S. Congress passing a sensible law that would legalize drugs 
and concentrate on treatment alone, most laws passed by Congress that 
mollify and coddle a minority group complicate the condition to be relieved 
and waste huge sums of taxpayer money for minimal results.

Similar to laws that legalize alcohol, it would be necessary to have a 
minimum legal age set for users. Let's get real. That alone would challenge 
teens to obtain drugs illegally just as it has for alcohol.

As politically incorrect as it may seem to those advocates of 
oversimplified drug-legalization solutions, other countries that have much 
tougher penalties for illegal drug use have pretty much solved their drug 
problems.

Not only do tougher laws get the abusers off the streets, but treatment 
that otherwise would be resisted is often mandatory.

RICHARD GILE

Niceville
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