PROHIBITION AN INEFFECTIVE POLICY

A letter writer certainly has my sympathy for the tragedies he and
his family have suffered ("Where is concern for marijuana victims?"
The Reporter, Nov. 19). However, we should note a few things:

First, marijuana is already illegal and that didn't prevent those problems.

Second, the offenders in those cases could be prosecuted for impaired
driving - just like drunken drivers - regardless of whether the drug
they took is legal.

Third, if deaths on the road are the concern, then alcohol wins all
the prizes, hands down. No other drug, or combination of drugs, even
comes close to the toll that alcohol takes on the roads.

At one time we outlawed alcohol to try to deal with those problems.
We rapidly discovered that Prohibition only made things worse.
Arrests for alcohol-related problems skyrocketed. Homicides soared to
new records. Even worse, it triggered the biggest teen drinking
epidemic the United States has ever seen. Prohibition was eventually
repealed because it caused more problems than it solved.

If the letter writer is really interested in more effective
solutions, he can find the recommendations of most of the major
government commissions from around the world at
www.druglibrary.org/schaffer under "Major Studies of Drugs and Drug Policy."

Clifford A. Schaffer, Agua Dulce