A CRACK IN THE DRUG WAR

It's certainly legal for local convenience stores to sell items that
are obviously intended as tools to smoke crack cocaine. But in making
the decision to do so, these businesses become an ally to those who
are menacing our communities - and risk goodwill that could cost them
at the cash register.

We aren't naive. We understand that if all the convenience stores in
Robeson County quit selling items that can be modified into crack
pipes, crackheads would find another means to smoke their poison.
Heck, a soft-drink can is potentially a crack pipe.

But what upsets law enforcement officials and others who see the
casualties of drug use every day is the message that is being sent by
these businesses. Steel wool and bogus flower vases that can be
assembled to smoke crack are sometimes displayed together. Rolling
papers used for smoking marijuana are often in easy sight.

Intended or not, this gives the impression of endorsing drug use to
young people who are already vulnerable to peer pressure.

We stop short of calling for laws that would make it illegal to sell
these items. That is simply too slippery of a slope given the range of
things that can be forged into tools for crime or self-destruction.

But that doesn't preclude businesses from removing these items
voluntarily, particularly the steel wool and bogus flower vase that
have no use beyond helping someone slowly commit suicide. We doubt
anyone's livelihood depends on the sales of these low-dollar items.

So far, local law enforcement officers and Tom Norton, the executive
director of Palmer Prevention, a wonderful organization that fights
the drug battle in the streets, have failed in their efforts to get
these businesses to join the program.

Norton talks openly about organizing boycotts of these
businesses.

We would implore these businesses to reconsider the sale of
paraphernalia used for crack use (rolling papers are used for tobacco)
and get on the right side of the fight against drugs.

Having said all this, we concede that this war will not be won by law
enforcement's effort to remove drugs from the streets or drug
paraphernalia from stores. As long as there is demand, there will be
supply.

The way to win the war on drugs is to eliminate the demand, which can
only be done by bringing hope to the hopeless. But that's another discussion.