Pubdate: Wed, 03 Oct 2001
Source: Asheville Citizen-Times (NC)
Copyright: 2001 Asheville Citizen-Times
Contact:  http://www.citizen-times.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/863
Author: Kirk Muse

PROTECT US FROM OUR ENEMIES, NOT OURSELVES

Citizen-Times letter writer Christopher Palkow was right on the mark in his 
letter, "Stop fighting an unwinnable war (Oct. 1). How much of what the 
United Nations estimates to be a $400 billion industry, the illegal drug 
trade, is used to fund terrorists' activities? $100 million? $1 billion?

We will never know.

At the turn of the last century, Coca-Cola contained cocaine instead of 
caffeine and sold for 5 cents a bottle. Bayer heroin was sold in local 
pharmacies for pennies per dose. If we re-legalized recreational drugs, 
terrorists would loose a major source of their funding and drug lords would 
be out of business in a heartbeat. If we re-legalized recreational drugs we 
would still have drug addicts but the drugs would be regulated, controlled 
and taxed by our government - not criminals and terrorists.

What message would the re-legalization of recreational drugs send to our 
children? That it is not the proper role of a free country's government to 
attempt to dictate to its citizens what they may or may not put into their 
own bodies. Our government should protect us from our enemies. Not ourselves.

Kirk Muse
Vancouver, WA
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MAP posted-by: Beth