Pubdate: Sun, 29 Jun 2003
Source: Galveston County Daily News (TX)
Copyright: 2003 Galveston Newspapers, Inc.
Contact:  http://www.galvnews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/164
Author:  Dean Becker

WAR ON DRUGS SHOWS NO END

The loss of task force funds to the law enforcement community must surely 
create a great deal of fear in economic times like these (The Daily News, 
June 18).

The drug war is a cash cow, a means whereby rights are often 
short-circuited, where drugs are sometimes planted or stolen and all too 
often, lives destroyed over minor amounts of drugs. Informants, undercover 
officers and district attorneys try their best to look tough on crime so as 
to continue to reap the rewards of the "easy pickings" of arresting drug users.

In this time of great financial hardship for the national, state and local 
governments, we must focus on crime that has a victim. In an 
ever-increasing fashion, the drug war shows itself to be a corrupt cesspool 
that has no chance of ever succeeding.

We've been hyping drug prohibition as the answer to our nation's problems 
for decades on end. The hypocrisy of these failed policies is evident to 
all but those whose mortgage payments demand that this war continue.

Dean Becker

President, Houston NORML; Community Liaison, Drug Policy Forum of Texas
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