DRUGGED-DRIVING LAW HAS MANY FLAWS; IT'S JUST NOT NECESSARY

Mr. Mette ("Critic of Drugged-Driving Law Forgets That Smoking Pot Remains
Illegal," The NEWS, March 10) misses the point entirely. The stated purpose
of the bill is to punish people for driving while impaired, not for smoking
pot. However, the way that the bill is written ensures that you will be
punished regardless of whether or not you were impaired at the time if you
have even trace amounts of a metabolite in your system. This is an abuse of
the law.

The bill also gives no more emphasis to "hard drugs" than to marijuana; the
changes to the law all take place in the same few sentences. However,
marijuana metabolites stay in your system much longer than those of "hard
drugs," sending the message, "If you want to get high Friday night and not
get busted Monday morning, use heroin or cocaine, not pot."

Being pulled over won't guarantee that you are made to pee in a cup.
However, having long hair, piercings, tattoos or brown skin might. This
will just be another opportunity for bigoted cops to act out their prejudices.

In addition, there are much greater threats to public safety than "drugged
driving" such as talking on the cell phone, using cold medicines and
driving while sleepy, all of which have been shown in studies to be greater
impairments than smoking pot. The fact that the politicians ignore these
show that they are not as interested in public safety as in persecuting
drug (and especially pot) users.

Brian W. Taylor

Carlisle Avenue

Dayton