DRUG PROHIBITION IS COUNTERPRODUCTIVE

Letter writer Rick Root was right on the mark in his Dec. 24 letter,
"Nation has drug prohibition problem."

At the beginning of the last century, Bayer heroin was sold in local
pharmacies for about the same price as Bayer aspirin. Also, Coca-Cola
contained cocaine instead of caffeine and sold for 5 cents a bottle. Drug
users didn't have to rob, steal or commit acts of prostitution to obtain
their drugs. Drug lords and drug dealers, as we know them today, didn't exist.

Drug prohibition is just as counterproductive as alcohol prohibition.
Today, drug buyers are purchasing drugs of unknown quality, unknown potency
and unknown purity.

This is not unlike the "bathtub gin" our grandfathers purchased that
resulted in needless blindings and deaths.

Kirk Muse

Vancouver, Wash.