Dear Media Awareness Project,

It has been the singular privilege of my life as a citizen of the United
States, and a resident of the Planet Earth, to enjoy my small association
with the Media Awareness Project.

Called by any name, the war on drugs, or drug prohibition, has become the
human rights shame and the public health disaster of our lifetimes. Its
bizarre policies and cruel laws have turned my Land of the Free into the
unimaginable: The world's leading jailer, by raw number and by percentage
of population, with 2,300,000 children, women and men in American prisons
and jails.

Our Constitutional protections, for so long a beacon to and the envy of the
world, have been shredded like so much toilet paper in the name of the
unwinnable war on drugs -- the war without end, whose enemies are our
family members and our neighbors.

MAP's vision is sweepingly, breathtakingly simple: To bring people the news
from all around the world, scrupulously from "mainstream" and chiefly print
sources, and make that news available at the click of a mouse to anyone
whose curiosity draws him to it.

It sounds as innocent and innocuous as the public library. And yet I am
convinced that the war on drugs, and international drug prohibition, have
no more effective enemy and nemesis than MAP. When this grotesque human
rights catastrophe finally falls and fades, and makes way for humane and
rational policies, this simple global news clipping service, the love child
of volunteers and small private donors, will have proven to be the key to
this revolution. The spirit and the heart of the MAP community are as
important as its design and function. MAP blazes with the zeal of people
trying to shape a sane, just and decent world.

I am deeply grateful that MAP has let me be a part of such a remarkable
crew of dedicated letter-writers and opinion-shapers doing such vitally
important work throughout the world.

Bob Merkin

Northampton, Massachusetts, USA