Source: The Winnipeg Sun
Contact:  11 Aug 1998
Author: Chris Buors

DRUG PROHIBITION DISASTER MUST END

`The prestige of government has undoubtedly been lowered considerably by
the prohibition law. For nothing is more destructive of respect for the
government and the law of the land than passing laws which cannot be
enforced.' - Albert Einstein -

If more people were to use MS Morgan's comparison of the lessons learned
from alcohol prohibition to today's drug prohibition, the law would change
in short order. Heroin addicts are overdosing and dying in Vancouver as
well as Winnipeg for the same reasons people went blind and died of alcohol
poisoning in the 20's. Prohibition caused people from all walks of life to
disrespect the law and brew alcohol on their stove tops and mix gin in the
bathtub, who knows what it was cut with to increase profits?

Today who knows where heroin is refined and what it is cut with to increase
profits? Results are the same in both cases, a drug supply of unknown
quantity and unknown quality.

The debate roared on for 50 years in the U.S. before alcohol was
prohibited. Temperance supporters envisioned an alcohol free society. After
11 years it was discarded for the disaster history proves it to be. In
Canada we are approaching 75 years of drug prohibition in the quest for a
drug free society. History will record this experiment as the unmitigated
disaster that it is.

Chris Buors (204)663-3485

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Checked-by: Mike Gogulski