Pubdate: Sat, 26 Oct 2002
Source: Sun Herald (MS)
Copyright: 2002, The Sun Herald
Contact:  http://www.sunherald.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/432
Author: Melody Worsham

WHAT ABOUT HELPING PARENTS?

I saw in the newspaper recently that the Office of National Drug Control 
Policy had decided that helping a teen who uses marijuana is a better 
approach than punishing him. The National Education Association 
representative said that if you punish a child by expulsion, "Where's he 
going to go?"

Well, he can't go home. Either the parents are working two jobs to pay the 
bills and cannot supervise the kid, or they are headed for their own 
punishment for using some drug.

Most kids who drink alcohol or use drugs or smoke cigarettes learned it 
first through their parents. In fact one in five adults in Mississippi has 
used (or still uses) marijuana. What's going to happen to these kids when 
their parents are punished for the non-violent crime of smoking a joint? 
There are already nearly 300,000 kids in Mississippi foster care because 
their parents are in jail.

How does this help the kids? How does this help the parents? Is drug use so 
prevalent that finally the government is realizing that they can't put 20 
percent of the population out of commission? Are they now going soft on the 
crime that brings them the highest revenue?

Is this so-called "new idea" of helping those with drug problems an 
admission that for the last 50 years they have been taking the wrong 
approach to drug abuse? Or did some high-ranking politician's kids get 
expelled recently?

MELODY WORSHAM Biloxi District 5 representative Mississippi Libertarian 
Party  ---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom