SLIPPERY SLOPE

Well, someone has to speak up and point out the obvious when the king has
no clothes. Bill Hamburg sees a three-piece suit where the nakedness of the
war on noncorporate drugs is clear ("Terrorists and drugs," Public Forum,
March 3). While he may agree with the drug war-speak that claims smoking a
joint is the moral equivalent of flying a jetliner into a skyscraper, I
doubt he's considered that the drug war acts as a protection racket for the
grossly inflated profits made off simple garden products.

As concerned as I am over the vast loss of freedoms that can be associated
to the drug war, I am even more concerned over the use of emotion-evoking
propaganda to help shape a political policy. It's a slippery slope that a
freedom-loving people should see avoided, lest it become habit.

Rick Root, Westminster