END DRUG WAR

In response to the news story ["Teen drug alert," May 22]: During
Prohibition, consumers went blind from drinking bathtub gin. The PMA
drug that killed Sara Aeschlimann and Steve Lorenz is today's version
of bathtub gin. They thought they were buying ecstacy, but the black
market has no quality controls. An unregulated market makes it easier
for children to buy illicit drugs than beer.

Drug dealers don't check IDs for age. But they do kill to protect
turf, and recruit minors who are immune to the lengthy prison
sentences imposed on adults. Drugs are cheaper and more plentiful than
ever. The failed War on Some Drugs has gone on long enough. For the
children's sake, we need to end it.

Robert Sharpe, Students for Sensible Drug Policy, Washington, D.C.