AID WRONG STEP IN DRUG WAR

To the editor:

I usually don't read off the same page as Molly Ivins, but her offering,
"War on Drugs' is nothing but an exercise in futility," (Feb. 27) is another
wake-up call and coincides with George Bush's owning up that the problem is
America's demand for drugs.

But on the next turn of the wheel, Bush announced Feb. 27 that he was going
to commit $1 billion in military aid to Ecuador to suppress the growers and
traffickers.

Nothing about committing a billion dollars to education and treatment.
Nothing to alleviate prison overcrowding where drug-related prisoners
constitute the majority. (No! Prisons are big business.)

Nothing about the fact that a large part of that billion will never be used
for the purpose intended. Nothing about the fact the growers who haven't
moved are staying, because they are the government.

Maybe this is to placate the military for cutting their wish list of
unnecessary projects that won't work, maybe something else.

But in the face of all that has happened and been said, Bush's commitment is
a step in the wrong direction.

James Barr, McAllen