A LEVEL PLAYING FIELD

Should a student's past history with drugs be considered when determining
whether or not the student receives financial aid? Let me answer this
questions with a few of my own:

Why do rapists, murderers, and thieves qualify for student loans, and
someone who was busted smoking a joint does not?

Why does the government want to penalize people-TWICE- for one mistake.
Does double jeopardy sound familiar?

Does the student who abuses Valium, Phentramine, tobacco, alcohol, or some
other legal drug get penalized for their "problem" or is it just the ones
who caught with the illegal drugs?

If every student who ever used drugs was denied, would there be any
students left at our educational institutions?

A list of prominent people who admitted to using "drugs" at least once.

Vice President Al Gore

Texas Gov. George W. Bush

Carl Sagan

George Washington (grew hemp for both industry and medicine) Other likely
users?

Your neighbor who owns the successful business down the street. One of your
child's favorite teachers. (However, this doesn't mean the teacher pushes
drugs upon the student!)

Half of the people eating at your local fast-food place. The judge who just
sentenced you for marijuana possession.

I could go on for hours or days with this list of people who could have
been denied a chance to go to school because of past "indiscretions." Our
world would look much different if they had been persecuted like today's
students are.

Is this type of treatment really fair to the American people? We have
already segregated over a quarter of our population by declaring a "War on
Drugs," so do we need to continually treat those who possibly made a
"mistake" by taking "drugs" worse than those who molest your daughter?
Minimum sentencing guidelines and legislation like this make this last
statement a cold reality.

If I ever get in trouble for anything, I hope I keep it something simple
and harmless like armed robbery, rape or murder. Obviously they are much
less dangerous to society than is a drug user.

Sean McCoy, Pocatello