PYRRHIC VICTORY IN THE WAR ON DRUGS

Regarding your Aug. 18 article "US notches world's highest incarceration
rate": America is supposed to be the Land of the Free. How can this be when
we have the world's highest rate of citizens incarcerated? I don't see the
situation getting any better, especially since President Bush signed a bill
in April that forces judges to follow strict federal sentencing guidelines,
rather than give a lesser sentence they feel would be fairer after reviewing
the facts of the case.

Last year, a federal report showed that the growth in prison population
would cost the federal government and states - i.e. taxpayers - about $40
billion a year. Experts attribute this to mandatory sentences for drug
offenders - many of whom, believe it or not, would never hurt a fly and may
be suffering from an addiction. It would be more productive to provide them
with treatment at far less cost.

Congress has to take a serious look at the damages of the war on drugs.

Sandy Cote
Toledo, Ohio