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LEGALIZING POT WILL CRIPPLE DRUG RINGS

EDITOR:

A letter in the Jan.  22 Courier bemoans the legalization of marijuana for medicinal purposes and suggests that the drug cartels are giddy because of it, and that the Courier has gone liberally rogue.

The writer should be reminded that the government at least has the opportunity to control a legalized substance.  When that substance is illegal, the illicit traffic continues to flourish.  Alcohol is the prime example of the truth of such situations.  When it was illegal during prohibition, the illegal product was everywhere and the mob controlled it, as the drug cartels control their products.  After prohibition was repealed, the mob was no longer interested and the illegal black market disappeared.

By choice, I have never used marijuana, but I see no evidence that it is any more harmful to our country than the huge quantities of alcohol consumed here on a daily basis.  I say we legalize it across the board, control it and tax it, the same as we do for alcohol and cigarettes.

I do not support drug cartels or the horrendous things they do, but I do believe that the people of this country ( primarily the customers who buy illegal drugs ) are at least as guilty as the sellers.  If there is no demand, the supply dries up or the supplier looks for new markets.  Therefore, I favor tough penalties for the users, as the problem will not go away as long as there are willing customers.

As far as the Courier becoming extremely liberal and, therefore, un-American, I see no danger of that happening.  Instead, they are simply starting to do what a newspaper should do - presenting news from both sides of the spectrum.

For the record, I did not know it was a crime to be liberal, nor did I know that liberals were automatically un-American.  The writer apparently adheres to the philosophy that the only real Americans are conservatives.  So much for freedom of choice in the good old U.S.A.

Larry Wickstrom

Prescott