Pubdate: Wed, 26 Apr 2000 Date: 04/26/2000 Source: Mountain Xpress (NC) Author: Nelson In your April 12 issue, you featured an article about Hart Squire and his friends and family, entitled "Casualties of War." The "good guys" against the "bad guys" it's always been that way, always will. As to the identity of the parties? Depends on who you ask. The so-called "War on Drugs" is a propagandist stunt aimed, as are so very many things, at diverting the American people's eyes from the truth. Hart Squire's ordeal is but a drop in a gigantic ocean of misplaced, aggressive, safety-Nazi, do-gooder bull*t because, sadly enough, too much emphasis is placed on appearances. This is a slice of human nature that may never change. A family desires to live in seclusion with close friends, grow organic produce, share love, encourage and inspire one another. The man wears a pony tail; his wife is quiet, reserved, wears overalls; and one or more tie-dyed garment exists in close proximity. Opinion of the conservative public (a percentage of which are closet pedophiles, pornography addicts, as well as alcohol and nicotine junkies): "potheads," "hippies," "weirdos." If the same subjects (or should I say suspects?) were dressed in Versace suits and designer dresses, drove luxury sedans and vacationed in Beliz, would local authorities descend like a blitzkrieg? Perhaps. But they would do it respectfully not full of scoff and piss. For those things are what we respect and value in this country money and power and financial success while our children fry their minds on the Internet, and we lie awake in disillusioned beds lost in foundationless marriages that dissolve when the money runs out. Don't worry about Hart Squire and his family, for they have soul. Worry instead about the heartless, indifferent, industrial machine that seeks to crush every drop of humanity out of us all. [Worry about] those who have given themselves over to a system that controls thought and action, and discourages heart and kindness. Those who have made an unconscious pledge to materialism and ignorance - their minds filled with empty goals and a loveless decency, eyes cold, souls as dry as desert dust. Nelson Hendersonville