AMERICAN AIRLINES AND AMERICA'S WAR ON DRUGS

Why is anyone surprised that 60 low-level ground crew and contract
people from American Airlines in Miami were arrested for smuggling
huge amounts of heroin and other drugs into this country?

They are only the last tentacle of a vast smuggling operation that has
corrupted everything it touches with its billions of dollars:
prosecutors, agents, whole police departments and legislators here and
abroad. How else do you think that some 400 tons of illegal drugs get
safely into this country each year? We capture a few of the low-level
distributors while the big organizers of the cartels are literally
untouchable. They have enough money to pay everyone.

The drug "war" was lost a long time ago. It has failed at interdiction
and prosecution. It has failed at the source and on the streets. It
has failed even to lessen the flow of these drugs. The corruption of
drug money has corrupted every segment of American society. The time
has long since passed to consider a radical change in our drug policy.

How about slow legalization starting with marijuana? The results can't
be any worse than they are now even while we can divert billions used
in the failed "war" to rehab and preventive programs. We can always go
back to the same old failure of the past called illegalization. We
have nothing to lose.

PETER J. RIGA
Houston, Texas
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A SECOND REACTION

Joe Oglesby's Aug. 22 column Racial profiling: It's ugly and wrong was
a great piece. My first reaction was anger at Customs and a strong
hope that the jury gives a very substantial award to the black woman
who was so badly mistreated.

My second reaction came after reading the A-section story A governor
attacks the war on drugs. It describes the conservative Republican
governor of New Mexico who has come to the obvious conclusion that the
war on drugs makes no sense. It has been going on for 35 years and has
given us a huge prison population but has had no effect on the drug
trade or drug consumption.

But hooray! Gov. Gary Johnson has concluded that the ugliness and
wrongdoing described by Mr. Oglesby could be eliminated if we had more
politicians like Gov. Johnson and more discussion of the tragedy of
drug prohibition.

RICHARD B. WOLF
Coral Gables