Pubdate: Sat, 31 Mar 2001
Source: Vacaville Reporter (CA)
Copyright: 2001 Vacaville Reporter
Contact:  http://www.thereporter.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/472
Author: Mike Plylar

WAR ON DRUGS NEEDS NEW TACTICS

Reporter Editor:

What does your recent letter writer, "Laws must target pushers" 
(Reporter, March 27), think these tougher drug laws should be? She 
apparently realizes the futility of it all, as she acknowledges this 
is a war we cannot win.

If incarcerating more people than any country in the free world, 
shooting innocent people in their own homes by mistake, employing 
Draconian mandatory minimum sentences, going to war on foreign soil, 
destroying our legacy as a free people, and spending a treasure trove 
of taxpayer assets doesn't foot the bill, just what might be her idea 
of "tougher."

Should we chop off everyone's head, after they had their perfunctory 
day in court? Doesn't work. Saudi Arabia does it quite often, and 
guess what, they keep lopping off those heads and the drugs continue 
to flow.

How about concentration camps and gas chambers? I don't think so, but 
you can never tell.

The California voters got it right with Proposition 36. So give it a 
chance. We've waited decades for the war on drugs to work its 
handiwork and look where it's left us. Exactly where history said it 
would lead.

Mike Plylar, Kremmling, Colo.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Josh Sutcliffe