STOP WASTING MONEY ON DRUG WAR

Much has been said about the growing debate between the Republicans and the
Democrats over President George W. Bush's tax cut.

The Democrats say we can't afford the tax cut after the Sept. 11 attacks
and the recession. The Republicans say the only way we can get out of this
recession is by keeping the tax cut.

But without returning to deficit spending, we can keep the tax cut if we
cut the unnecessary items from the budget.

We have spent hundreds of billions of dollars over the last 30 years on the
war against drugs, even though it has had no quantifiable positive impact
and has cost thousands of innocent lives.

The war on drugs has cost over a million people their freedom and has put
billions of dollars under the control of criminal enterprises and terrorists.

Anyone who has paid attention to the facts can see that the war on drugs
has created far more problems than it has solved.

The list of people who are profiting from it is long and prominent.

We cannot continue to spend more than $100 billion per year for a program
that has given us no resources to deal with addictions or addicts, no
reduction to our children's drug usage and that incarcerates more than half
a million people whose only crime was possession of drugs.

Why not spend that money protecting Americans from harm?

Andy Moon, Houston