Pubdate: Thu, 23 Jan 2014
Source: Kearney Hub, The (NE)
Copyright: 2014 Kearney Hub Publishing Company
Contact: http://hub.kearneyhub.com/forms/letter_editor.htm
Website: http://www.kearneyhub.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/3820
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v14/n057/a04.html
Author: Robert Sharpe

DRUG WAR REWARDS CARTELS

Editor's Note The author is a policy analyst with Common Sense for 
Drug Policy in Washington, D.C.

Posted: Thursday, January 23, 2014 12:45 pm Regarding Ronald Fraser's 
Jan. 16 op-ed about the trend toward legalizing marijuana, the days 
when politicians can get away with confusing the drug war's 
tremendous collateral damage with a comparatively harmless plant are 
coming to an end. If the goal of marijuana prohibition is to 
subsidize violent drug cartels, prohibition is a grand success. The 
drug war distorts supply and demand dynamics so that big money grows 
on little trees. If the goal is to deter use, marijuana prohibition 
is a catastrophic failure. The United States has almost double the 
rate of marijuana use as the Netherlands where marijuana is legal. 
The criminalization of Americans who prefer marijuana to martinis has 
no basis in science.

The war on marijuana consumers is a failed cultural inquisition, not 
an evidence-based public health campaign. Not just in Washington and 
Colorado, but throughout the nation, it's time to stop the pointless 
arrests and instead tax legal marijuana.

Robert Sharpe,

Washington, D.C.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom