With four Page One stories in as many days, it is clear that the drug
war sells newspapers. Perhaps that is why the Chronicle consistently
editorializes in favor of continuing our nation's failed policy of
drug prohibition. Please check the archives from 1929 to see if the
Chronicle likewise supported perpetuating alcohol prohibition after
the Valentine's Day Massacre. Then, as now, turf battles inevitably
grow ever more horrifying as the illegal business grows ever more lucrative.

And because it handed him an enormous, tax-free, unregulated industry,
Al Capone loved alcohol prohibition just as much as the Chronicle
seems to love drug prohibition.

As the Editorial Board taps away on computer keyboards to champion
such nonsense, they should realize there is blood on their hands.

Editorials like the Dec. 1, "Ciudad Juarez," serve only to prolong
this unwinnable and tragic drug war. On the issue of drug prohibition,
the Chronicle is dead wrong.

Art Smart,
Houston