Pubdate: Tue, 30 June 1998
Source: Fresno Bee, The 
Contact:  
Website: http://www.fresnobee.com/
Author: Larry Johnson

TIME FOR A CHANGE

As I opened my June 28 Bee, the Vision section dropped out, and to my
surprise there was a column which stated that the "war on drugs is now
causing more harm than drug abuse itself." Could it be that after years of
failure at every step, people are finally beginning to realize the truth of
that statement?

Sadly, this article runs under the headline "Surrender," which is blatantly
wrong. Any military person will tell you that in a war when a strategy or
tactic makes the enemy stronger, better equipped and more able to resist,
that it is time to change that strategy or tactic. This is not "surrender";
this is just plain smart.

It is time to decriminalize all currently illegal drugs, empty our prisons
of nonviolent drug offenders and let our police get back to the basics of
law enforcement. As scary as that might seem, when one considers the years
of terror perpetuated by drug prohibition, the billions of wasted public
funds and the millions of lives ruined by enforcement of a failed policy,
there is no other reasonable course of action.

Larry Johnson 
Clovis
#11484 
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Checked-by: Richard Lake