ANTI-DRUG MESSAGES

Re "White House rewards networks for anti-drug scripts," Jan. 14: I have
a script for a TV show. It's a historical, Michener-style miniseries.
It starts in 1900, when the trade in marijuana, opium, cocaine and
alcohol was not a violent affair. When the government bans these things,
they become much more profitable and organized crime takes off. Alcohol
is wisely relegalized, but the other drugs are suppressed. The criminals
become some of the richest and most powerful people, virtually
controlling politics in Mexico and Colombia, using horrible violence
when money is not enough. Meanwhile, our government steadily rolls back
the constitutional freedoms that were designed to prevent a police state,
encourages surveillance of every aspect of our lives right down to our
excrement and instigates an insidious propaganda campaign. The former
land of liberty becomes the land of prisons and zero tolerance. All
rationality and compassion are silenced by the drumbeats of this holy
crusade.

I am sure the drug czar will not fund this script. In fact, if any TV
network were to present the drug war in a such a critical light, the
government would make sanctions against it. Exactly what kind of
freedom of speech do we have in this country?