TURNER SHOWS COURAGE

The reason city councilors were taken back by the remarks of fellow council
member Chuck Turner was that they were dealing with something they usually
shy away from: the truth ("City Councilor: It may be time to end the war on
drugs," May 15). For decades we have been pouring billions of tax dollars
into a black hole, trying to legislate peoples' behavior. The results have
been drive-by shootings, a black market that allows children easy access to
drugs, corrupted officials, domestically cultivated marijuana being one of
the top cash crops, prisons overfilled with non-violent drug users, ruined
lives not because of drugs themselves but from draconian drug laws, and
cheap and more plentiful drugs than ever before.

Joe Genevich, Dorchester