LETTERS: DRUG WAR FORCES CHEAP BUT DEADLY DRUGS ON MARKET

To the editor:

I'm glad to see the Southeast Missourian has been bold and smart enough to allow advocates of responsible marijuana use have their silent screams heard.

I recently read a book, "Marijuana: One Man's Mystique, Another Man's Truth," written in 1988 by Maxon Roads that pretty well sums up what is happening with the drug war. In essence, the war is much more destructive than the drugs the war was supposed to stop.

Roads tells how the policies of the war have literally destroyed families and trust even among the best of friends. Because of the government's hard stand against the least harmful of the illegal drugs, marijuana, our government has and continues to force the really bad stuff onto us. The war has made the marijuana the least affordable of all drugs.

God created marijuana, a relatively harmless plant. Man has created, concocted, mixed and brewed all the really cheap but deadly drugs.

I too understand the truth. Stop the illegal drugs from coming? We export the world's worst drugs, cigarettes and alcohol.

RICHARD CORAM

Jackson, Mo.