DON'T LEGALIZE DRUGS

Ed Wells wrote Sept. 23 that victory in our war on drugs need only be
declared - provided we modify our laws, which are counterproductive.

They keep the supply low so demand drives up the price and worsens the
supplying criminal element.

Even so, Wells is not worried the police are risking their lives but
that "good people" like drug smugglers are. What to do?

Wells believes if only we'd decriminalize marijuana, its retail price
would plummet and the mob would go looking for greener pastures.

I'd guess exactly the reverse is true: If possession of a small amount
were no longer prosecuted, then demand would drive the price up and
suppliers would be high - on money.

I suspect, however, he really means legalized - reefers packaged,
taxed and sold like cigarettes. Then the government would be the
supplier.

Wells also recommends cocaine and heroin be prescribed, evidently not
caring that many in the resulting truly permanent underclass -
chilling out in our new opium dens - would be minorities.

Unless we wise up, he says, we "risk a productive, fulfilling future
for our kids" - whom, I'm guessing, we should already start telling to
sniff this and snort that.

- Norman Bleed, Rockford