WAR ON DRUGS COSTS INNOCENT LIVES

At least three more completely innocent victims of the War on Drugs have
died last weekend. A young mother and her child, shot down by the
Peruvian Military with the aid of U.S., over the Amazon River in Peru,
and a young preacher in Philadelphia hit by a stray bullet from a
prohibition spawned street drug deal gone bad.

A few months ago it was an 11-year-old boy shot in the back at close
range with a shotgun, wielded by paramilitary SWAT team member in a
fruitless drug bust. These are not rare incidents. In my estimation they
happen at the rate of 20 to 30 a year that we know about. This does not
include the police officers' lives lost or the raids gone amuck that are
covered up.

The blood and sorrow of the innocent victims of the War on Drugs is on
the hands and head of Guy S. Farmer, William Bennett, Robert DuPont and
all the prohibitionist drug warriors. How many innocent people have to
die so that that "one child" they are always talking about ... obviously
the child of Joyce Nalepka of the Family Research Council, or some other
wealthy or upper middle class person who doesn't have time to raise
their own children because they are too "busy" with their careers or
"charitable" activities.

They don't have time to teach their children right from wrong or how to
make choices so they work to see to it that the government kills or
imprisons all the so-called "undesirables" that might taint their
especially valuable children.

Don't dare try and tell me that these deaths are caused because people
use drugs. That is an outright lie and I, for one of many, am sick and
tired of hearing it. The prohibitionists and the zealous drug warriors
are the murderers ... all in the name of keeping that one kid from
having a "toot" while his or her parents are out gallivanting around
with just too much to do to be able to actually know what their child is
doing.

If it weren't for the Joyce Nalepkas, the Guy Farmers, the William
Bennetts and the Robert DuPonts, drugs would be sold legally in stores
with other, even more dangerous, intoxicants like alcohol and tobacco.

Why legalize drugs when we already have enough trouble from alcohol and
tobacco? To save the lives of people like Roni and Charity Bowers, shot
down over Peru, Nafes Johnson, killed by a stray bullet in Philadelphia,
and Alberto Sepulveda, blasted in his own bedroom while he was trying to
do exactly as the, not as esteemed as they used to be, officers bade him
do.

Amanda Jones, Sulphur Springs, Texas