WAR ON DRUGS NEEDS NEW TACTICS

Reporter Editor:

What does your recent letter writer, "Laws must target pushers"
(Reporter, March 27), think these tougher drug laws should be? She
apparently realizes the futility of it all, as she acknowledges this
is a war we cannot win.

If incarcerating more people than any country in the free world,
shooting innocent people in their own homes by mistake, employing
Draconian mandatory minimum sentences, going to war on foreign soil,
destroying our legacy as a free people, and spending a treasure trove
of taxpayer assets doesn't foot the bill, just what might be her idea
of "tougher."

Should we chop off everyone's head, after they had their perfunctory
day in court? Doesn't work. Saudi Arabia does it quite often, and
guess what, they keep lopping off those heads and the drugs continue
to flow.

How about concentration camps and gas chambers? I don't think so, but
you can never tell.

The California voters got it right with Proposition 36. So give it a
chance. We've waited decades for the war on drugs to work its
handiwork and look where it's left us. Exactly where history said it
would lead.

Mike Plylar, Kremmling, Colo.