RAID UNDERSCORES COST OF DRUG WAR

This Berwyn Heights raid seems very shocking, but perhaps it
shouldn't ("Prince George's raid prompts call for probe," Aug. 8).
The "war on drugs" has been doing things like this to people for decades.

Maybe we'll finally pay attention to how dangerous and
counterproductive the "war on drugs" is now that a white middle-class
family has suffered the sort of pain and indignity poor and nonwhite
people have repeatedly suffered in this war for decades.

But putting the racial aspects of the drug war aside for a moment, I
would ask everyone to read about this incident and think about
whether the drug war is worth all this.

Are you willing to accept that any Tuesday morning, the police might
kick down your door, murder your pets, make you walk backward down
the stairs in your underwear with your hands above your head, then
handcuff you and throw you to the floor to stare at the pets' corpses
- - all to be sure that no one is getting high and eating cookies?

Craig Bettenhausen

Baltimore