Pubdate: Thu, 28 Oct 1999 Date: 10/28/1999 Source: Amarillo Globe-News (TX) Author: Mike Plylar Note: Subject line by MAP. LTE headlines as below. Related: Editorial: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v99/n1160/a06.html New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson is doing the only thing an honest man can do: He's telling the truth. How refreshing to hear a public servant doing what he is paid to do - serve the citizens in his state. It would be nice to see law enforcement following his lead instead of bashing him for his honest opinions. The police are supposed to be public servants, but somehow they've lost their way and become enemies of a large segment of the population in their attempts to protect their favorite cash cow, the drug war. It seems unreasonable that the police would conduct a war against their employers in this once free country, but the war must continue, forever, due to the anti-drug cartels' continuing need for funds. You would provide your readers with a much needed service if you actually did a report concerning how the United States got into this mess. It wasn't begun by Richard Nixon or Ronald Reagan, but was begun more than 60 years ago by Harry Anslinger as an attack against racial minorities and in an attempt to create jobs for his ex-alcohol prohibition bureaucrats. It has continued to this day for the very same reasons. Old Harry used statements such as, "Marijuana makes black men rape white women" and other ludicrous propaganda to begin this war, and the bureaucrats who want its continuance use many of the same tactics today, veiled as a need to protect Americans from themselves. If you doubt this, the information can easily be found in the congressional records from 1937, when our legislators passed the Marijuana Tax Act. The war on drugs has been a fraud since its inception. Mike Plylar Kremmling, Colo.