Source: Dallas Morning News (TX) Contact: http://www.dallasnews.com/ Pubdate: Fri, 2 Oct 1998 Author: DAVID RUCKER NAFTA AND DRUGS Recently, Sen. Kay Hutchison along with Congressmen Sam Johnson and Pete Sessions received a thumbs up from The Dallas Morning News for their efforts in the so-called "war on drugs." In listing Dallas and Fort Worth as a "High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area," these officials have opened the door to as much as $5 million of our tax dollars to be wasted on this woefully inadequate effort. It is too bad The Dallas Morning News and these brave distributors of our money did not stand up and fight one of the greatest pieces of drug use "enabling" legislation ever: NAFTA. According to experts in and out of government service, the passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement has generated a massive influx of illegal drugs into this country - specifically into major metropolitan areas adjoining north-south highways. A superficial understanding of the drug problem may lead The Dallas Morning News to praise efforts to solve the problem from the floor of the House and Senate, but the sad fact is the root of the drug problem is receiving careful watering under NAFTA's loosened up borders, while our grandstanding paper and some politicians cheer the effort of spending millions to lop off a leaf from the tree. The moral of this story? If you want to kill the tree of drugs, stop watering it. DAVID RUCKER 1007 Arborside Mesquite, Tx 75150 - --- Checked-by: Rich O'Grady