WHY NOT ADMIT THAT THE DRUG WAR IS LOST?

Your editorial on Saturday explained just one of the reasons why Geraldo
Rivera is quoted in the same edition saying that the drug war is lost. As
he says, we have spent hundreds of billions of dollars and all we have done
is to lower the supply just enough to keep the prices high enough to
generate a huge profit for the drug importers.

Of course some of this huge profit is spread around for bail and lawyers
and bribes and so forth, but it still leaves a monumental fortune for those
who control the trade.

We have already determined that it is legal to take the drugs and possess
an amount supposedly for personal use, and fairly often we read of drug
dealers being let off with little or no punishment. Why not take the
obvious next step and just make the whole thing legal, reduce the drug
prices and let those who want to use them do so? At least not so many of
them would have to steal to support an expensive habit.

There are few remaining who can remember prohibition during the 1920s, when
alcohol was made illegal, which of course led to much expanded business and
profits for the bootlegging rings.

Some of the gangs linger to this day in various lines of both legal and
illegal business.

It didn't work then and it isn't working now, and it will never work as
long as some Americans are willing to pay the price for drugs and our
elected representatives are unwilling to do what it takes to enforce the
laws against importing and selling drugs.

Why not admit it, save us taxpayers a lot of money, and get on with more
important uses for that money than an obviously futile effort?

ROBERT O. BOARDMAN, New Bedford