KEEP THE WAR ON DRUGS GOING

Re: We Can't Afford A War On Weed, Larry Campbell, Philip Owen and Sam
Sullivan, Dec. 19.

The former mayors of Vancouver advocating for decriminalizing the
gateway drug cannabis is ludicrous. It was largely because of their
permissiveness and leniency that Vancouver's Downtown Eastside turned
into the nightmare that it is today. Continuing down this path would
be asinine.

Seattle, a city comparable in weather and socio-economic climate, does
not have the same problem with open drug use simply because it is not
tolerated. New York cleaned up its decaying core in the 1980s by
cracking down on drug use, not by some hare-brained scheme of
decriminalization.

The constant reference to "the war on drugs" is also getting tiresome.
The struggle to keep drugs off the streets is more like a constant
battle, similar to those society wages with any other illegal,
undesirable activity.

Jeffrey Hay

Ladner B.C.