SEEKING ANSWERS TO DRUG PROBLEM

[LETTER #1]
Dear Editor:

Thanks for Mitchell's letter on getting drugs easily in Austin
["Postmarks," Vol.18, No.19]. Notice the irony; his letter about
musician friends flirting with heroin addiction and the Austin Music
Awards announcement -- same page. Music is healing, poppies are
pretty, but life is dark when it turns out that your Austin musician
son's hints that "some changes need to be made" turns out to mean
that he has to kick heroin. For years I've watched him and his
attractive, talented friends go through tremendous changes, from
emergency hocking and unhocking musical instruments to ripping each
other off to calling 911 when someone stops breathing after
ingesting/injecting who knows what. I'm writing because I feel
bewildered, angry, helpless. Are there other people who want to do
something about this situation without "enabling" those they love and
without turning into a prudish shrew? (Mitchell was "enabling" his

friend by lying for him.) As poet Edward Dorn wrote, "America is
unthinkable without drugs" reminding us of the Boston Tea Party.
Remember the Eighties, Iran Contra, drugs for money, CIA involvement,
etc? Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against government per se,
nothing against drugs per se, but having practiced criminal law in
Austin for 13 years, I don't believe criminalizing drug possession is
an answer. (Although I recognize that prisons are big business.) We
sometimes would count cases on the dockets of the Criminal Courts
here, noticing that usually half are drug-related, many theft-related,
so likely tangentially drug-related.

I'd welcome hearing from other people, musicians, parents, people in
recovery, in the throes of addiction, in the criminal justice system,
the "community supervision" system, anyone concerned about easy access
to drugs in Austin. The system appears broken; I can't fix it. So I'm
not practicing criminal law anymore. I'm trying to heal myself, my
family, and be a good friend to those I love. We of the Sixties are
not dead yet, but some of our children may be soon. Unless we make
some changes Austin will be Plano.

Peggey Kelley

[LETTER # 2]

DON'T BLAME DRUGS

Hey Chronicle Dudes,

I'm writing you this letter because I'm tired of these bootlicking
conservatives blaming all the world's problems on drugs and/or liberals.

They're always trying to pawn words like personal responsibility off
on other people, though they never seem to grasp the meaning
themselves. Just because you do a little heroin or a hit of crack
doesn't mean you can rape some chick or rob a bank.

I have been doing drugs for 22 years and I never raped or robbed
anybody, and although it's not politically correct to say so I'm a
happy, well-adjusted person.

Maybe if some of these Pat Boone lookalikes would look in the mirror
they would find out what the real problem is, or better yet why don't
these fake beer drinking yankees like George Bush Jr. go back to
their own states and run them.

Thanks y'all,
Mike Luther