Pubdate: Mon, 15 Nov 2004
Source: Montreal Gazette (CN QU)
Copyright: 2004 The Gazette, a division of Southam Inc.
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/montreal/montrealgazette/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/274
Author: Robert Sharpe
Related: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v04/n1598/a02.html
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada)

ONLY CRIMINALS PROFIT FROM MARIJUANA PROHIBITION

U.S. ambassador Paul Cellucci is kidding himself if he thinks punitive 
marijuana laws actually deter use (Gazette, Nov. 10, "New pot law could 
cause border gridlock: U.S. envoy"). The University of Michigan's 
Monitoring the Future Study reports that lifetime use of marijuana is 
higher in the U.S. than any European country, yet the U.S. is one of the 
few Western countries that uses its criminal-justice system to punish those 
who prefer marijuana to martinis. The short-term health effects of 
marijuana are inconsequential compared with the long-term effects of 
criminal records. Unfortunately, marijuana represents the counterculture to 
many Americans.

In subsidizing the prejudices of culture warriors, government is 
subsidizing organized crime. The drug war's distortion of immutable laws of 
supply and demand makes an easily grown weed literally worth its weight in 
gold. The only clear winners are drug cartels and tough-on-drugs 
politicians who've built careers on confusing drug prohibition's collateral 
damage with a relatively harmless plant. The big losers in this battle are 
the taxpayers who have been deluded into believing big government is the 
appropriate response to non-traditional consensual vices.

The results of a comparative study of European and U.S. rates of drug use 
can be found at: www.monitoringthefuture.org/pubs/espad_pr.pdf

Robert Sharpe

Common Sense for Drug Policy

Washington, D.C.
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MAP posted-by: Jo-D