PRISON POPULATION

I was saddened to read in the Sentinel Sunday that the United States
now imprisons a higher percentage of its population than most other
nations on Earth and that the bulk of the increase is
drug-related.

Hardly anyone would argue that drugs are a good thing. That said,
before the war on drugs, we had drugs. Now we have drugs, gangs,
drive-by shootings and other violence, corruption of law enforcement
by drug money, a gutted Fourth Amendment and police powers equal to or
worse than those in some totalitarian states.

The time has come to realize that we can have a war on drugs or we
can have a free society, but we cannot have both. I don't think that
should be a tough choice, but for those who do, throw in the fact that
drugs aren't going anywhere. We've made the incredibly bad bargain of
giving up freedom and not getting anything in return.

Mel Dahl