LEGALIZE POT

If cannabis were legal, we wouldn't have violent police actions over it
taking place in Boulder hotel parking lots, as happened June 15 outside the
Ramada Inn (re: "Drug war commotion," In Case You Missed It, June 20). We
wouldn't have pot dealers checking into hotels with reefer-laden duffel
bags in the first place.

There would be no need for gunplay in the public square (the suspects were
evidently unarmed), nor for a wounded pot courier to flee in a
bullet-riddled auto, only to crash several blocks away. A law- enforcement
group known as the Boulder County Drug Task Force, under the supervision of
the federal Drug Enforcement Agency, had hoped to cap an 18-month-long
investigation into a pot-running enterprise that allegedly was planning to
cash in on the steady market for good marijuana that has traditionally made
Boulder such a pot dealers' paradise.

Unfortunately, the bust went sour when one of the suspects failed to meekly
surrender and decided to beat a hasty motorized retreat, knocking down an
officer and receiving gunfire to his shoulder on the way. Thank God no one
else was hurt seriously. If we had a rational drug policy, that is if pot
were decriminalized, this tragic event would never have happened. Instead,
pot dealers would innocuously do business side by competitive side with
liquor peddlers and tobacco merchants, taxed, regulated and under control.

The poor guys on the Drug Task Force could then breathe a sigh of relief
and go back to patrolling Boulder's by-ways for real criminals, happy to be
unburdened of the frustrating and dangerous task of enforcing this
impossible prohibition.

Cord MacGuire

Boulder