Your article on the environmental damage from illegal marijuana growing (" 'A huge, huge mess'," Times-Standard, Sept. 2, Page A1) was good as far as it went. However, you overlooked the real issue: that damage is not caused by the marijuana, but by the laws prohibiting it. Do we see these problems in broccoli fields? Do tomato farmers abuse their lands in these ways? The same kinds of damage occurred at bootlegging still during alcohol prohibition and at the cocaine plantations in Colombia. We see this damage at the labs of home-made meth, not at the pharmaceutical plants that produce meth under the name Desoxyn for prescription to children with ADHD. Legalize marijuana and let honest, law-abiding farmers replace the crooks. Buford C. Terrell Professor of law (ret.) Stafford, Texas [end]
Regarding "Hard stuff; Get real about dealing with illegal drugs" (Page B11, Tuesday), the emperor has no clothes. Thank you for your editorial praising the report of the Global Commission on Drugs. That commission, whose membership included some of the most conservative Republicans from recent administrations, showed what almost everyone knows but is afraid to mention: The 40-year-old War on Drugs is a costly and destructive failure. It's time to strip this tired old fraud bare and look for better ways to deal with the problems of drug misuse. [continues 87 words]
I have a simple question for those states trying to trim their prison budgets: Wouldn't they be better off, and save even more money, if they just stopped arresting people for nonviolent drug offenses? Buford C. Terrell Stafford, Texas [end]
Tod Robberson raises several good questions about drug legalization but ignores the obvious answers. I'll respond to just one: what will happen to the cartels? What happened to Al Capone when alcohol was legalized? The bad news is he didn't go away. Just now, the Mafia is no longer a major threat. But when the illegal money was taken out of alcohol, the mob quit having machine gun shootouts in the streets of Chicago. The price of legal beer wasn't worth dying over. Take the $20 billion a year that the illegality of drugs sends to the Mexican cartels, and they will quit shooting, too. They will just become ordinary crooks that ordinary cops can deal with. As a bonus, we do a better job of keeping legal booze and tobacco away from kids than we do with illegal marijuana. Buford C. Terrell, Stafford [end]
Re: "Drug demand fuels violence" by Alfred C. Schram, Monday Letters. American drug appetite does not fuel Mexican violence. American drug laws fund Mexican (and American) violence. Legal marijuana should be no more expensive than tea bags ($1 per ounce) or ground coffee ($0.35 per ounce). Illegal marijuana goes for more than $100 per ounce. If we really want to stop the violence in both Mexico and the U.S., we will end drug prohibition and reduce demand for drugs the way we have reduced demand for cigarettes -- by education. Buford C. Terrell Stafford [end]
It doesn't matter if Deputy Chief William Brooks thinks the vote to decriminalize marijuana is crazy or not. His bosses, We The People, have spoken. His job, as their agent, is now to enforce the will of We The People. If he cannot accept, and protect, the right of an individual to possess a small portion of marijuana without entanglement in the criminal justice system, then he should get out of their way and resign. He has been told what his job is; he must now either quit griping and do it or step aside. I'm sure he would find a more congenial home in the DEA. Buford C. Terrell Professor of Law (retired) Stafford, Texas [end]
The word for this political season is "Change." We hear it from the candidates and from the commentators and pundits, but mainly we hear it from the voters. I'm starting to believe them. Change is in the air; and it smells a lot like burning bud. At the state level, three New England states -- Vermont, Massachusetts, and now New Hampshire -- have some kind of decriminalization bill actively in the legislative process; and the debate is substantive in all of them. Medical marijuana is nearing ballot status as a referendum in Wisconsin and has been introduced into one mid-Atlantic legislature. [continues 497 words]
Re: "U.S. may send Mexico $1.4 billion in drug war -- Money in Pentagon budget targets training, high-tech tools," Tuesday news story. It is ironic that the government should be sending $1.4 billion to the Mexican government to fight the drug traffic when the U.S. drug laws help send some $30 billion-plus each year to the Mexican cartels that finance the drug importation business. The only way to stop the violent and criminal border traffic in illegal drugs is to change the drug laws so that the traffic becomes moderate, legal and regulated. Prohibited drugs, like prohibited alcohol, are transported and sold by people like Al Capone. A legal drug, like legal alcohol, is sold by companies like Walgreen's. Can the $1.4 billion we send one side of this struggle overcome the $30 billion we send the other side? Not likely. Buford C. Terrell, Houston [end]
I've been studying drugs, drug laws, and drug use, mainly from a historical viewpoint, for many years now. As that time passed, a couple of things slowly dawned on me. The first is that almost all of the people arguing for reform of the drug laws argue either that drugs aren't really as bad as they are portrayed or that they would have no worse effects if they were legal. Even the Libertarians tend to argue that if people want to destroy themselves, they should be allowed to do so. Almost no one argues that the use (other than medical use) of some drugs has some beneficial effect. [continues 627 words]
Re: "Methbusters - Simple laws restrict supply for labs," last Sunday's Editorials. You said: "State Rep. Leo Berman of Tyler is working with state and federal agencies to craft a law to put cold medicines out of reach in Texas, too." This should read "put cold medicines out of the reach of Texans." Many of the new, so far untested, state laws limit sales of Sudafed and other common cold remedies to licensed pharmacies and even to behind-the-counter sales. If you live in a small town without a pharmacy, would you want to have to drive to the nearest city every time you get the sniffles - or wait until morning if your town is big enough for a pharmacy, but not a 24-hour one? [continues 108 words]
Re: "Higher cigarette tax to spur smugglers," July 14. As your story on new taxes on cigarettes pointed out, these taxes are the best thing that has happened to organized crime in years. The mobs that have been dying out or that have concentrated on illegal drugs can now get fat on smuggled cigarettes. While users of a commodity will pay reasonable taxes, if those prices are too high, a black market will organize to avoid them just like black markets provide access to prohibited substances. Even after alcohol prohibition ended in this country, bootleggers flourished in some areas just for customers not wanting to pay the high taxes. [continues 165 words]
The Office for National Drug Control Policy spent $3.2 million for Super Bowl ads claiming that people who buy drugs are supporting terrorists. But that's not the real story. The real story is that the profits in the drug trade garnered by gangsters and terrorists is a product, not of the drugs, but of the laws prohibiting the drugs. Almost nine out of 10 of us use the addicting, mind-altering drug caffeine, but coffee sales don't fund terrorists. A quarter of all adults are addicted to nicotine, but cigarette sales don't fund terrorists. Two-thirds of the country uses the psychoactive drug alcohol, but since 1933, alcohol sales haven't supported terrorists or criminals. [continues 573 words]
OPPOSING PROHIBITION WITHOUT FAVORING LEGALIZATION IS OK In response to Dr. Gordon W. Scott's Aug. 15 column, our current drug laws are a form of prohibition, and like the earlier prohibition of alcohol, carry with them severe social problems - official corruption, deaths from impure products, billions to support a ruthless underworld, and deaths and injuries to innocent bystanders. One can oppose prohibition without favoring drug legalization. Some options include medical models, like those in England and Switzerland, where doctors prescribe drugs for addicts; enforced therapy for drug users, like the new methods in Arizona and California; and removing criminal penalties for possession of small quantities of drugs, like 11 U.S. states, the Netherlands, most of Western Europe, and some Australian provinces have done with marijuana. [continues 141 words]
Doing the right thing about drugs in our society will not happen out of ignorance: We must learn and act on facts, not myths. From the National Commission Report in 1972 to the Institute of Medicine Report in 1999, reports have shown that marijuana use is not addictive and does not lead to use of other drugs. The Viewpoints letters from Robert Sharpe (March 24, "End drug-war madness") and Don McDaniel (April 5, "Weed, booze are killers") are horrible examples of learning the wrong thing. The drug issue is an important one, but solutions will come from knowledge, not scare tactics. Why have the Netherlands, Switzerland and Australia decriminalized marijuana, and why are Canada, Great Britain and much of Europe considering it? Do they know something we don't? Buford C. Terrell Houston [end]
