WAR ON DRUGS IS A FAILURE

I congratulate Lou Magnini on his thoughtful, sensible and rational
letter (Rutland Herald, June 7) on drugs and the uselessness of busts
and incarceration. We have been fighting "the War on Drugs" for four
decades. Has it worked? I think not. Why? Because it is too
politically charged, emotionally exhausting and never, never thought
over in ways that are useful or "out of the box." Some are trying
(Attorney Sands among others) but they are always met with "in the
box" thinkers and an older generation that is never intellectually
agile enough to have any other way but to "lock 'em up."

Tobacco and alcohol are just as dangerous as other drugs, and there is
little crime surrounding these drugs. Why? Because they are legal to
purchase (albeit with age requirements).

If crack cocaine and marijuana were drugs that were used for hundreds
of years and tobacco and alcohol were an invention of the '60 and
'70s, don't you think for a minute that tobacco and alcohol would be
illegal and crack and marijuana would be legal and regulated? We are a
country of fear and taboos and never seem to learn that the long and
failed existing ways, while good intentioned - will never work.

Vincent Jay Merluzzi

Sudbury