A Federal Grant Means Help For Parents Who Are Hooked On Meth.

Liliana Escalante began taking methamphetamine at age 13 to take her mind off problems at home.

It wasn't long before the desire to ease her pain landed her in the court system.

Today, Escalante, 18, is clean and looking for a new job so she can provide for her healthy 3-month-old daughter, thanks to court-ordered drug abuse treatment.

She credits her recovery with "knowing someone was there for me and that I wasn't alone."

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Lt. Robert Sullivan retires after decades of busting crack, pot and meth dealers.

First day of work: Feb. 1, 1982.

In 1987, he was part of the biggest cocaine bust in county history, and since then has repeated the feat no fewer than five times, for crack, for pot, for ecstasy.

In 1989, after Sullivan and other detectives chased him for six months, they arrested the king of the east Pasco crack trade, James "Bush" Wimbush. They said he supplied 85 percent of the drug in the area, to the tune of $30,000 a week.

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Don Jones, a former municipal judge from Miami, spoke to members of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws at UCF on Wednesday regarding the necessity to change drug prohibition laws.

He was introduced by Justin Martineau, the president of NORML at UCF, as "the first man to serve in an integrated, post-Brown v. Board of Education court in the South," along with several other accomplishments.

Jones spoke on behalf of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition and said it is an international nonprofit organization that gives voice to law enforcement.

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Geoff Fox's article "Pardoned Man Thankful to be With Loved Ones" tells of Richard Paey, who finally came home from prison. He mentions the help he got from FAMM (Families Against Mandatory Minimums) and TNC (The November Coalition). Let me spread the credit.

First, Paey himself, with his keen sense of justice. Second, Linda Paey,who continued to support her husband despite the disapproval of both families. Third, the in-your-face activism of Siobhan Reynolds, founder of www.painreliefnetwork, and of Nora Callahan, founder of www.november.org (http://www.november.org). Those two women, especially Reynolds, took Richard's story to the national media and connected Linda with expert legal counsel. Bob Batey, Stetson law professor, leads the local FAMM chapter that meets each month in the Tampa Stetson Law School.Then came Dan Ruth's pithy columns; then came letters, phone calls, emails, post cards and faxes of ordinary people moved by the facts and their sense of fairness. Is this the end of the Paey story? I hope not.

John Chase, Palm Harbor, FL

[end]

Gen. Barry McCaffrey offers an excellent primer on Colombia's recent economic and political reforms and why the United States must pass the U.S.-Colombia free-trade agreement stalled in Washington (Congress should OK trade deal, Issues & Ideas, Nov. 25). By promptly passing the trade agreement, Congress will help cement these reforms and send the unmistakable signal to other Latin American nations that Washington takes seriously economic and democratic liberalization.

The economic reasons for passage are as compelling as the national-security arguments that McCaffrey outlined. Colombia is developing into a regional economic power, and it is the second-largest Latin American market for U.S. agriculture exports.

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Members of a highway cleanup crew collected some intriguing litter along Interstate 4, near Plant City, on Tuesday morning.

At 7:30 a.m., the crewmen were near McIntosh Road when they spotted two large plastic trash bags on the side of the highway that were filled with about 60 pounds of marijuana, the Florida Highway Patrol said.

Trooper Larry Coggins said the plants, valued at more than $54,000, apparently fell or were thrown out of a passing vehicle. They appeared freshly cut, and some had intact root balls. Investigators suspected the plants were harvested within the previous 24 hours from a grow-house operation, Coggins said.

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In response to the article on the NORML Legalization March, I have to say, "Good for you!" I found your article to be well done, though maybe a little short.

So often in newspapers, articles concerning pot smokers exercising their rights are used as a chance to debase the organization, portraying their members as a gathering of weak-minded ne'er-do-wells. Instead, Ms. [Robyn] Sidersky put a very human face on the writing of her article and included some informative quotes.

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I'm guessing letter writer Anthony Bruno is unfamiliar with the concept, "Think Global, Act Local." In the letter titled, "Protesters Should be Rational Not Radical," printed on Nov. 20, Bruno was panning a recent rally in support of common sense drug law reform. He rightly points out that UCF has no direct control over policy in this matter and suggests the demonstrators take it "somewhere relevant like, Tallahassee or even D.C."

Where Bruno gets it wrong is his belief that local action is irrelevant to the state and national debates. In fact, it requires exactly these types of widespread local demonstrations of just this sort seen at UCF to send the message to state and federal officials that the people are fed up. Mass grassroots campaigns take place at, well, the grassroots.

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In the recent article about medical marijuana, you noted that "hemp became a major crop in Kentucky." In fact, both George Washington and Thomas Jefferson grew hemp, and during World War II, the government ran a "Hemp for Victory" campaign and subsidized crops. I haven't enough space to list all the benefits of hemp, but here are just a few.

Hemp can produce clothes, paper, foods, building supplies, cosmetics, plastics and even fuel. According to Hemp Industries Association, hemp-seed oil contains more omega-3 fatty acids than any other source and is second only to soybeans for complete protein. It produces more pulp per acre than timber, but it grows in less than four months. Unlike cotton, hemp crops don't require pesticides, herbicides, or fungicides - major causes of soil and water pollution. The textiles, paper and building materials that hemp produces are stronger and better than products made by cotton or timber.

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In Anthony Bruno's letter, "Protesters Should Be Rational Not Radical," which printed on Nov. 20, Mr. Bruno tries to sound like he knows what he is talking about. Bruno says, "No one has died from smoking marijuana because it's illegal; therefore there have been no long-term studies."

No one has died from an overdose of pot is because it IS the safest of the intoxicants. In 1988, DEA administrative law judge Francis Young said "cannabis is the safest therapeutic substance known to man."

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Mandatory minimum prison sentences have done little more than give the land of the free the highest incarceration rate in the world (For equal treatment under the law, Opinion, Nov. 21). The deterrent value of tough drug laws is overrated. During the crack epidemic of the '80s, New York City chose the zero-tolerance approach, prosecuting as many offenders as possible. Meanwhile, Washington, D.C., Mayor Marion Barry was smoking crack, and America's capital had the highest per-capita murder rate in the country. Yet crack use declined in both cities simultaneously.

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In Anthony Bruno's letter, "Protesters Should Be Rational Not Radical," which printed on Nov. 20, Mr. Bruno tries to sound like he knows what he is talking about. Bruno says, "No one has died from smoking marijuana because it's illegal; therefore there have been no long-term studies."

No one has died from an overdose of pot is because it IS the safest of the intoxicants. In 1988, DEA administrative law judge Francis Young said "cannabis is the safest therapeutic substance known to man."

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During The Holiday Season, The Wish Often Expressed Is For Peace On Earth.

We know that for too much of Jacksonville that's not the reality as our city struggles with violent crime.

But the holidays bring hope, and there is hope.

There will be much conversation in the days ahead about violent crime and murders.

Too often, the wrong questions are being asked: What is Mayor John Peyton going to do? What is Sheriff John Rutherford going to do?

The better question is this: What is the community going to do?

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Crackdown in Miami Sends Growers North

LAKELAND - The numbers are striking.

Sheriff's deputies and police say they have raided and dismantled 34 marijuana "grow houses" in Polk County through the first 10 months of 2007. In all of 2006, that number was three.

What's going on? Law enforcement officials say criminal organizations based largely in Miami are choosing Polk County as a site for what amounts to marijuana export manufacturing plants.

The houses are producing high-quality, high-cost marijuana with elevated levels of THC, the drug that gives marijuana users their high.

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The proposed free-trade agreement with Colombia has stalled in Congress. The success and stability of Colombia and the Pan-American region depend on our ability to recognize the importance of this agreement to the United States, to Colombia's economy, to human rights progress and to enhanced U.S. national security.

This fall I spent several days in Colombia, meeting with President Alvaro Uribe and other high-ranking officials in the government and military. I visited refugee camps, economic development zones and counter-drug operations. The Colombia I recently visited is drastically different from the place I visited seven years ago when I served as the U.S. national drug czar.

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I'd like to add something to the Monday letter, "McCollum blowing smoke with marijuana warnings." It seems that the big brains in government have learned nothing from Prohibition: Even an ordinary schlump like me knows that if people want something, they're going to get it, be it booze, weed or coke. If they can't get it legally, they turn to the black market, making the sellers incredibly rich in the process. Bootleggers or drug lords, it's all the same; money that could be flowing into the tax coffers is going to them instead, while innocent people go to jail for nothing.

The greatest lesson that the government fools never learned? You can't legislate morality.

Joe Hartman

[end]

HUDSON - Last year, Richard Paey ate a cold Thanksgiving dinner at Tomoka Correctional Institution with his cellmate, a convicted murderer who had killed a previous cellmate.

Paey was surrounded by better food and friendlier faces Thursday.

Two months after his 25-year sentence for drug trafficking was overturned, Paey spent the holiday with wife Linda, daughters Catherine and Elizabeth, both 17, son Benjamin, 15, and his mother, Helen.

"To be home now means so much," Paey said. "I don't want to even leave for a night. In prison, the phone system doesn't really encourage family unity. A 15-minute call was $5. We'd get these huge phone bills. The phone got turned off several times. That's a frightening thing to happen."

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The Supreme Court recently heard a case that touched on a 20-year-old controversy involving justice and crack cocaine.

The court will rule early next year in Kimbrough v. United States whether a federal district judge's more lenient sentencing decision, based on his disagreement with policy that punishes crimes involving crack cocaine more harshly than those involving powder cocaine, is reasonable.

The case will help judges determine their ability to sentence below an advisory guideline range. Unfortunately, the outcome will leave in place the excessive mandatory penalties that the Kimbrough judge found unjust.

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The U.S. Sentencing Commission is taking welcome steps toward ending an unjust disparity in federal sentences for cocaine-related crimes. For two decades, people convicted of possessing or selling crack cocaine have been treated to much harsher penalties than those involved with powder cocaine. Under federal law, it takes 100 times as much powder cocaine as crack to draw stiff five- and 10-year mandatory prison terms.

Target Drug Kingpins

Even if the commission does all it can, it would not be enough to eliminate the injustice that has disproportionately imprisoned crack-cocaine offenders. Only Congress can fix what it broke when it set badly skewed mandatory-minimum prison sentences based on misinformation.

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Welcome Move Toward Fairer Drug Sentences

Semantics and racist laws aside, crack and cocaine are essentially the same thing. A cocaine hit lasts longer. A crack hit is more intense. Crack rocks are sold in tiny portions, giving the illusion of being cheaper than cocaine. In fact, high for high, crack is more expensive. Figure in the punishment for crack possession compared with cocaine, and crack becomes a merciless drug.

Under federal law, an automatic five-year prison sentence is meted out for possession of 500 grams of cocaine. The same five-year sentence applies for just 5 grams of crack: a 100-to-1 disparity. Why the difference? Because Congress in 1986, when the ratio was set, let racism and hysteria drive policy. Powder cocaine is generally consumed by middle- and upper-class whites. Crack is considered the poor man's cocaine. More specifically: the black and Hispanic man's, and woman's, cocaine. (About 64 percent of crack users are black or Hispanic.)

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