DRUG WAR IN KOKOMO

Apparently Kokomo, Ind., has a lot in common with Medellin, Colombia
("Small town drug turf wars," Daily Southtown, May 16).

When obscene amounts of money are at stake criminals have been known to use
violence as a means of securing market share. Yet it is not drugs that
drive the killings so much as drug trade profits, estimated by the United
Nations at $400 billion per year. These tremendous profits would not be
possible if not for drug prohibition. As long as demand remains constant,
police efforts to limit supply only make drug trafficking more profitable.

Whenever drug law-related violence makes headlines the inevitable response
from our leaders is more tax dollars spent on the War on Drugs, which then
leads to increased profitability and increased violence and death. Until
politicians from both parties recognize the parallels between the Drug War
and our country's disastrous experiment with alcohol prohibition things
will only get worse. That means more death, increased incidence of HIV for
intravenous drug users and fewer civil rights for all Americans. When
alcohol prohibition ended, liquor producers stopped killing each other,
consumers stopped going blind from bathtub gin and minors had to show proof
of age to buy alcohol. We could easily put an end to the violence and make
it harder for American youth to purchase drugs by lifting drug prohibition.

Of course, that might send children the wrong message. The only message I'm
getting from Capitol Hill is that it's better to continue wasting billions
of tax dollars a year on a counterproductive policy than to admit you've
made a horrible mistake.

Robert Sharpe Students for Sensible Drug Policy George Washington
University Washington