TIME TO CHANGE POLICY

Tuesday's editorial "Drug Wars" was right on the money, no pun intended. The
cost of appropriate drug-treatment for low-level possession offenders is
about one-seventh that of traditional arrest, prosecution and incarceration.

Yet our president and his drug czar, John Walters, continue to channel more
than 85 percent of federal drug policy money to the failed strategies of the
past 30 years.

Bush and Walters crowed earlier this year about having approved "the biggest
increase in drug treatment funding ever" while, in fact, only adding a
half-billion dollars to raise it to just under $2 billion annually.

This as compared to almost $17 billion additional dollars wasted on the
ill-fated War Against Americans, formerly known as the War Against Drugs.
Quite simply, Bush and Walters are brazenly spending taxpayer money at seven
times the rate needed to achieve their professed goal - reducing drug abuse
in America.

And they're not even making that happen either, as record numbers of high
schoolers report using some kind of illicit drug in the past 12 months.

It's time to reconsider the most failed government project of the past 30
years and initiate smart solutions such as those being put forth in Canada,
the United Kingdom and Western Europe.

Stephen Heath

Clearwater, Fla.

EDITOR'S NOTE: The writer is public relations director of Drug Policy
Forum of Florida.