Tie-dye crowd opposes plans
to step up fight. In a scene reminiscent of the 1960s, a large crowd of
tie-dye-clad and bearded protesters held an anti-war rally and burned
the flag in Salt Lake City's Liberty Park Sunday afternoon.
But they were protesting the "war
on drugs," not Vietnam, and they torched the U.N. flag, not the Stars
and Stripes.
More than 50 people gathered at
the State Capitol to voice their objections to a proposed escalation of
U.N. efforts to combat the international trade in illegal drugs.
Chanting, "No more drug war," the
crowd then marched down State Street and east to Liberty Park, where
they set fire to the U.N. flag.
Organizers said the Salt Lake
rally and dozens of others throughout the nation are targeting a
worldwide conference on drug trafficking being held this week at U.N.
headquarters in New York City.
The United Nations is dragging the
American people into another unwinnable war, said Ken Larsen,
Independent candidate for Congress in the 2nd Congressional District.
"We've already thrown away $50
billion in this war with no reduction in the the supply of drugs into
this nation," Larsen said.
The war simply drives up the cost
of drugs, which drives up the crime rate in this country, he said.
Declaring an end to the war "would make our streets and homes safe
again," he added.
Also, Larsen said the effort is
destroying the economies and victimizing the citizens of foreign
countries. "America's drug war is a war on the rest of the world,"
Larsen said
Ben Valdez, representing a group
called Hemp Power Utah, said, " "War on drugs' is a misnomer. It's a war
on the people of Utah, the United States and the world."
Valdez said more than 100
different organizations are planning to stage similar protests in more
than 70 cities throughout the country this week. The group participating
in the Salt Lake rally said it will take its protest to Ogden next
weekend.
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