Pubdate: Sun, 13 Jul 2003 Source: Daily Herald (IL) Contact: 2003 The Daily Herald Company Website: http://www.dailyherald.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/107 Author: Richard J. Rawlings WHY KEEP FIGHTING POINTLESS DRUG WAR? The nation's drug czar, John Walters, has announced the start of his new 25 cities initiative to help combat the nation's drug problem at the local level. Does he really think going to the 25 largest cities in the United States is going to help solve the problems at local levels? What kind of plan is this? It is another failed plan, another waste of our tax dollars. A chance for him to sugarcoat the drug war. This 30-year war has not decreased supply or demand. It is a wasteful, counterproductive government jobs program that creates the crime it claims to protect us from while tramping on the Bill of Rights in the process. The countries that have legalized, regulated or have decriminalized marijuana are not in a state of anarchy. Why does the U.S. government keep insisting we fight this war? Richard J. Rawlings Founder, Illinois Marijuana Party Bartonville - --- MAP posted-by: Alex