Pubdate: Sat, 02 Oct 1999
Source: Edmonton Sun (Canada)
Copyright: 1999, Canoe Limited Partnership.
Contact:  http://www.canoe.ca/EdmontonSun/
Forum: http://www.canoe.ca/Chat/home.html
Comment: Parenthetical remark by the Sun editor; headline by newshawk
Related: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v99.n1067.a08.html
Author: Alan Randell

HOPELESS CRUSADE

RE: "A gangbuster job" (Sun, Sept. 28). 
Now I've heard everything. You shower the Edmonton police force 
with praise for arresting a number of individuals supposedly 
connected with the illegal drug trade even though you admit the arrests
will not make the slightest difference.

This is acceptable, I suppose, for relatively rare crimes such as
murder and assault, but nothing short of ludicrous when it comes to
enforcing drug laws where the number of lawbreakers probably exceeds
the number of those who abide by them.

In ordering our police to arrest people for what they choose to ingest
into their own bodies, our political leaders have done more than
enough to drag the administration of justice into disrepute, but to
praise a police force for being dumb enough to engage themselves in
this hopeless crusade surely reduces it to a laughingstock.

ALAN RANDELL

(We seriously doubt the number of drug law violators exceeds the
number of law-abiding citizens.)

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