WAR ON DRUGS EXPENSIVE, INEFFECTIVE

To the Editor:

George W. Bush needs to choose a war on drugs or a war in Iraq. We
cannot afford both!

Fifteen million smoke cannabis. Police arrest nearly 700,000 cannabis
smokers a year at $35 billion a year. Spending all this money has
turned a war on cannabis into a losing war!

Shouldn't law enforcement focus more on hard drugs -- cocaine, heroin,
and methamphetamine -- that are associated with violence and crime?
The war on drugs is not working. The government is lying about
cannabis. No one ever died from smoking cannabis. Rep. James
Sensenbrenner, R-Wis, is working quietly but efficiently to turn the
entire United States population into informants by force. He
introduced legislation that would draft every American into a war on
drugs. H.R. 1528, the Safe Access to Drug Treatment and Child
Protection Act, will compel people to spy on family, friends, and
neighbors; to go undercover and wear a wire if needed. People could
face mandatory jail time. I know of one other person who wanted you
to spy on family and friends. That was Hitler.

Rep. Sensebrenner's bill is more dangerous than Nazi law because thanks to
the Patriot Act the government is permitted to indefinitely keep cell
phones and other electronic communications. If this bill passes, the United
States will turn into a full-blown police state. This bill has to fail.

Bush needs to start spending our money here, not everywhere else. I resent
my tax dollars going to Iraq or anywhere else. Unless Bush wants to use his
own money.

JEAN WEILLS

Harrison Township