Pubdate: Fri, 19 Nov 2004
Source: Metrowest Daily News (MA)
Copyright: 2004 MetroWest Daily News
Contact:  http://www.metrowestdailynews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/619
Author: Robert Sharpe
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v04.n1599.a05.html

TAXPAYERS LOSE IN DRUG WAR

Regarding your Nov. 9th  editorial, not only should medical marijuana be
made
available to Massachusetts  patients in need, but adult recreational use
should be regulated.

Marijuana  prohibition has done little other than burden millions of
otherwise law-abiding  citizens with criminal records. The  University
of Michigan's Monitoring the Future Study reports that lifetime use
of marijuana is higher in the United States than any European country,
yet  America is one of the few Western countries that uses its
criminal justice  system to punish citizens who prefer marijuana to
martinis. Unlike  alcohol, marijuana has never been shown to cause an
overdose death, nor does it  share the addictive properties of tobacco.

The short-term health effects of  marijuana are inconsequential
compared to the long-term effects of criminal  records.

Unfortunately, marijuana represents the counterculture to many
Americans. In subsidizing the prejudices of culture warriors, the U.S.
government is subsidizing organized crime.

The drug  war's distortion of immutable laws of supply and demand make
an easily grown  weed literally worth its weight in gold. The only
clear winners in the war on  marijuana are drug cartels and shameless
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 American taxpayers 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:  http://www.monitoringthefuture.org/pubs/espad_pr.pdf

Robert Sharpe, policy analyst, Common Sense for Drug Policy

Washington, D.C.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Larry Seguin