Pubdate: Mon, 11 Feb 2002
Source: Scottsbluff Star-Herald (NE)
Copyright: 2002 Scottsbluff Star-Herald
Contact:  http://www.starherald.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1689
Author: Alan Randell
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v02/n136/a08.html
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine)

WAKE UP, AMERICA, AND LEGALIZE METH

To the Editor:

Re: Meth, Jan. 27

"The drug is made up of stuff that can be purchased at stores, a nasty 
concoction - including such things as lye, engine starter and anhydrous 
ammonia -that the drug dealers "cook" to produce the drug."

So what? Lye, engine starter and anhydrous ammonia are legal substances, as 
is rat poison, but, more to the point, what business is it of the cops if I 
decide to poison myself?

"It's a drug that can be dangerous and ultimately deadly, which should be 
obvious from the fact that anything made up of drain cleaner, among other 
things, is not the best for one's insides."

So what? Where is it written in the Declaration of Independence that the 
state has the authority to punish anyone for ingesting anything, however 
harmful?

"In addition to the effects on the user's body, meth production is 
notoriously volatile. If the next-door neighbor has a lab squirreled away 
in his apartment, for instance, the whole building could be caught up in a 
fiery explosion."

If meth were legalized, a meth lab would be subject to safety inspections 
and hence be no more dangerous than a distillery is today.

Wake up, America. Drug prohibition is nothing less than a state sanctioned, 
Hitler-like pogrom designed to divert our attention from more important 
issues by ruining the lives of the innocent few who happen to use or sell 
certain drugs. Hitler's armies couldn't win World War II, but his ideas 
certainly seem to have found ready acceptance in the Land of the Free.

Alan Randell,
Victoria, BC, Canada
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