POLITICIANS AND DRUGS

Editor -- The important point about John Warnecke's allegations that Al
Gore used a lot more marijuana than previously admitted (``Pot Use May
Cloud Gore Campaign,'' January 29), is not how much he used; it's the
degree to which Gore and all the other candidates have -- with tacit media
complicity -- managed to avoid the entire drug policy issue.

Since the drug war hasn't been questioned, the implication is that it's so
firmly agreed upon, there's no need to raise it as an issue.

This politically correct view may be comfortable for candidates and the
media, but an increasing number of Americans see drug prohibition as a
failed policy which is doing far more to fill prisons than limit drug use;
they want it openly discussed, along with alternative strategies. It now
seems likely that rich political scions, each with a drug-use skeleton in
his youthful closet, will receive the major nominations. They'll both have
a lot more trouble ducking the drug policy issue for the simple reason that
as politicians themselves, they've been staunch supporters of punitive laws
which -- had they been less privileged -- could easily have saddled them
with felony arrest records and kept them permanently out of politics.

Tom O'Connell, MD
San Mateo