LEGALIZE METH?

Let's talk about drugs again this week.

We're inspired to stay on this subject a third week for two
reasons.

No. 1, we heard from several of you who agreed with our stance that
Laclede County needs to get a handle on illegal drugs, especially
methamphetamine, which appears to have become the local drug of choice.

This week we heard more firsthand accounts of drugs -- and, yes,
misuse of alcohol, too -- ruining lives locally. These are sad
stories, stories that for many in our community hit close to home.

But mostly we're inspired to write about drugs one more week because
of the outpouring of e-mails from out-of-staters who have been
critical of these editorials after reading them on the Internet.

We heard from 36 more of them last week, in addition to the nine the
previous week.

We learned that these out-of-staters suddenly are so interested in the
illegal drug industry in Laclede County because these editorials are
being posted on a Web site called the Media Awareness Project
(www.mapinc.org).

"This organization has a nationwide group of volunteers who cut and
paste newspaper articles from around the world and send them to
Mapinc, which posts them on its server," we learned from someone in
drug prevention who monitors the site. "It also teaches supporters how
to write effective letters to the editor and collects all those
published, estimating how many column inches of 'free advertising'
members' efforts have generated."

That's impressive. The pro-drug lobby is a well-oiled public-relations
machine. (And we can thank "Beth" and "Derek" for posting The Daily
Record editorials on the site.)

That's something else we learned. These folks don't like to be called
"pro-drug."

"Alright, let's get something straight you #$% damn *&%$#s. I am not
pro-drug. I am anti-prohibition. Get it?," wrote Charles Byrnes of
Taylor Mill, Ky.

These folks apparently don't want any drugs to be illegal, which
somehow they rationalize is different from being "pro-drug."

"The best way to reduce the harm and heartbreak of illegal drugs is to
end drug prohibition," wrote Alan Randell of Victoria, British
Columbia. "Let's legalize all drugs, remove the propaganda and the
police from the equation and have the drugs manufactured by
knowledgeable, competent organizations who will supply cheap, quality
tested drugs of known purity and potency and who, in order to avoid
legal liability, will impart factual drug information to us and our
children."

If this wasn't such ludicrous logic, it would be funny. Legalize
methamphetamine? Yeah, let's make it even more available in Laclede
County than it already is. Let's ruin more Laclede County lives than
meth already is ruining.

Some of the e-mails were directed at your co-editor
personally:

"You really do have your head somewhere, but I don't think it is in
the sand," wrote Trevor Houlahan of Garson, Ontario.

"Your simplemindedness is laughable," added Mike Smithson of Syracuse,
N.Y.

Referring to a drug bust mentioned in last week's editorial, Kim Hanna
of Worcester, Mass., wrote:

"There'll be no shortage of drugs in Laclede County tonight except for
those people busted. Every other drug user has their drug of choice.
Customers of those busted found new suppliers from a friend of a
friend of a friend. People are high tonight in Laclede County. Are you
jealous?"

Why do we give these folks any mention at all in today's newspaper?
Why are we paying any attention to people thousands of miles away who
are trying to tell Laclede Countians that the only reason we have a
drug problem is because we won't legalize drugs? (We wouldn't have a
burglary problem if we legalized burglary, too.)

Because we're trying to make you as mad as we're becoming. This is the
attitude that our local legal system is up against, this ridiculous
belief that methamphetamine and marijuana and whatever other crap
happens to be floating around Laclede County at this moment wouldn't
be a problem if we just legalized it.

This didn't start out to be a crusade two weeks ago. Thanks to Charles
and Alan and Trevor and Mike and Kim and all of their Internet
friends, we're inspired to fight harder, to give even more
encouragement to Richard Wrinkle and Sam Mustard and Jon Morris and
everyone else who is working to rid Laclede County of the
methamphetamine menace.

We want you -- at least those of you who also want to rid Laclede
County of drugs -- to become just as inspired, which is why we're
posting all 36 e-mails on The Daily Record's Web site. Go to
www.lebanondailyrecord.com, click on "opinion," and you'll see,
unedited and uncensored, what the pro-drug lobby -- we like that term
even more now -- thinks about the war on drugs in Laclede County.

It's a war we never will win completely, but that's no reason not to
fight it.

- --Gary Sosniecki