A REAL THREAT

Re "Campaigns no longer go up in smoke" (Monitor, Nov.7):

What is shocking about recent admissions of past drug use by
Democratic presidential candidates in the America Rocks the Vote
debate aired on CNN is not that three prominent, successful
politicians have used marijuana. After all, nearly 40 percent of all
Americans have. What is truly scandalous is that of three candidates
who answered the drug use question in the affirmative, none took a
position on national drug policy. When a marijuana user gets arrested
every 45 seconds, when our prisons are overflowing with nonviolent
drug offenders and when drug convictions keep people from receiving
public benefits including loans for college, it's clear that America's
drug laws result in worse harm than they avert. What we need is
leadership that will not sidestep this issue as an embarrassment to
their professional reputation but confront it as a real threat to our
collective freedom.

Julie Ruiz-Sierra

Davis, Calif.