DOUBLE STANDARD ON DRUG TESTING IN CONGRESS

Young people worry John Glenn. The 77-year-old senator and astronaut isn't
troubled by their clothes or music. It's the apathy

young Americans feel toward politics, Glenn tells Time magazine in its Aug.
17 issue. "They don't want to touch it," Glenn laments.

If Sen. Glenn can't figure out why the young have soured on the political
process, he should consider this:

Republican leaders have quashed a plan by two Republican lawmakers to
require drug testing of House members and their staffs. Rep. Joe Barton of
Texas, a co-sponsor of the proposal with Rep. Gerald Solomon of New York,
said the chairman of the House Republican Conference, Rep. John Boehner of
Ohio, is refusing to allow the drug plan to be brought up for discussion
because many lawmakers have complained that the measure is unnecessary and
insulting.

Recently the House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed the "Drug Free
Workplace Act of 1998" - a piece of legislationthat will expand mandatory
workplace drug testing in the United States.

Our elected representatives have no qualms about forcing the American
public to urinate into a bottle to prove their innocence, but consider it
insulting to be required to do likewise.

The hypocrisy that fills the political process needs to be flushed out.
Then the young might be inclined to use the system.

WALTER F. WOUK

Howes Cave

The writer is president of the Schoharie chapter of NORML, the National
Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

Checked-by: Pat Dolan