PUT THIS IN YOUR PIPE AND SMOKE IT

Last week's editorial, about marijuana legalization, attracted more
comments than any other editorial to grace this page in the last
year. We're happy for it. It means people are reading, and what they
read inspires them to write. We like feedback, and we got it in
spades. In an ordinary week, it would not be unusual for us to
recieve one (or fewer) letters to the editor.

This past week, we received six, five of which were responses to the
marijuana editorial. Most were polite and argued their points in a
semi-coherent way. Others were disrespectful and crude in their
heavy-handed criticism of our words. The thing that strikes us as
most interesting, however, is that of the five letters responding to
the pot piece, four were written by shills working for various
marijuana-legalization advocacy groups on the West Coast.

We appreciate the comments and we're glad people are reading and
responding to our pieces, but for people to hurl accusations of
propaganda at us and then admit to being propagandists themselves --
well, that's a little confusing to us. So you'll forgive us for not
printing those letters this week. The media serve as mirrors,
reflecting culture and society back to you, the readers. We are not
a megaphone for someone else's platform.