Swift reader Steve Wellcome, commenting on my recent entry here about the Charles Lynch fiasco, offers us this:

You may want to check out www.leap.cc the website of the organization Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, a group of several thousand current and former law enforcement professionals who are calling for an end to drug prohibition. Not because they condone drug use, certainly, but because drug prohibition is causing far more harm than good. Think of the social harm caused by alcohol prohibition in the 1920s, and multiply that disaster by exponential quantities.

Steve expresses my feelings on the matter quite well. I believe that if the sale and use of drugs were to be suddenly legalized, first, the entire criminal community would be almost instantly crippled due to lack of income, on an international scale.

Reader Mark Hitch sends us the following:

The dreaded Chupacowbra.  I found this specimen along the South Platte River near Sterling, CO.  I think this is the male because of the crest.  The female looked identical, but without the give-away crest.  Now, with this irrefutable evidence, will the scientific community name it after me?  Chupacowbra shamicus hitchii, perhaps.

So, we should have taken a cruise to Colorado instead...

Derek Rogers ran into the JREF crew at the recent CFI World Congress in DC. He had an interesting answer to the question "What should you do when Syvlia Browne comes to town?" Derek and his friends at the Skeptics and Secularists of Atlantic Canada decided to attend. He gives us this very interesting, if somewhat disheartening report:

Sylvia Browne is well-known to readers of Swift.  Like all professional mediums, she makes a living on the grief, pain and desperation of people who are usually blissfully ignorant of cold reading, Barnum statements and the tendency of the human mind to see what it wants to see. The best way to combat ignorance is through education and when Sylvia announced that she would be coming to Halifax, Nova Scotia as part of her latest tour – a farewell tour, apparently (let's hope she's not like Cher) – the Skeptics and Secularists of Atlantic Canada decided to give her audience some information that could save them future heartache and empty wallets.

Due to popular demand, I'd like to announce the return of the "Randigram." This weekly e-mail newsletter will keep you up to date with the latest JREF News, Randi Speaks videos, and Swift articles written by JREF associates.

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Our first regular issue will be re-appearing on April 24, 2009.

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