Gilbert Gutknecht: “I do not think the people back in Wisconsin or Minnesota, at least the common-sense people sitting around the coffee…”

“I do not think the people back in Wisconsin or Minnesota, at least the common-sense people sitting around the coffee shops and the feed mills, I mean they would say this is crazy, especially when we are supposedly having a war on drugs. In fact, what makes it even more bizarre is we have some folks in Washington who want to have this war on tobacco. And, on the one hand, we are going to do everything we can, and I certainly support the notion of doing everything we can to try and keep kids from starting smoking, but, on the other hand, we have some of the most dangerous drugs which we know, for example, if they are a heroin addict ultimately it will kill them; and somehow we have this bizarre notion that we will make it safer by providing clean needles to heroin addicts. This is sort of the tortured logic that has run this city for too long, and I think we have got to get back to some of those old-fashioned notions, things like personal responsibility and ultimately calling things the way they are and saying we have got to do everything to keep people from using heroin rather than making it easier for them to use heroin with cleaner needles.”