WE'RE CONFUSING THE ADDICTS

Perhaps it is time to have some pity for the drug community. Just
think how their confusion must be mounting because of recent
activities by police and political authorities.

First, society (wrongly, unjustly and stupidly, in my opinion)
declares all drugs including marijuana to be illegal, thereby driving
drug users, producers and distributors into a "sub-rosa" situation
where all their activities must be hidden from view.

Second, society sees the social and medical harm stemming from this
situation and spends millions of dollars to establish user-friendly
places of business where drug users can find a safe and clean home
for their activities -- thereby removing drug use from the filth and
unsanitary conditions of the back alley.

Third, based on this policy, drug users come out into the open.

Fourth, we now learn that special task forces are being put together
to combat the open use of drugs, thereby driving users, producers and
distributors back into "sub-rosa-land."

Somehow, I doubt that lunatics in an asylum could come up with a more
muddled, uncertain or just plain dumb course of policies and actions
regarding this serious problem faced by society.

Leonard Melman,

Nanoose Bay.