STOP THE DRUG SCOURGE

Dear Editor,

Like the frog dropped into a pan of cool water, we are content with the
mechanism of the "drug war". Yet, like the frog that never realises the
fire has been lit, we seem unable to realise our predicament.

We jumped into this drug war, we have lit the fire by providing millions of
dollars for interdiction, prisons, police and informants. If we pay
attention, we can see there is also a relevant body count to our drug war.
People whom we should care about are dying because of drug prohibition.

School kids mistakenly shot by gangs. Innocents shot during a raid on the
wrong apartment. A prime example of the random "heat" from this war would
be the missionaries shot out of the sky in Peru or the thousands of
peasants butchered in Colombia.

The body count is growing with the deaths of more policemen, our front-line
soldiers. Soldiers in war are patriotic, there to serve their country. The
same can be said for our law enforcement officers, who protect and serve.
We demand they stop the scourge of drugs. We provide them with guns,
equipment and informants. We pressure them to step into the fray, to stand
the heat, in a war that we can never win.

I thought we were supposed to learn from history.

Dean Becker
Community Liaison, Drug Policy Forum of Texas
Houston Texas, USA
www.cultural-baggage.com