MARIJUANA LAWS BENEFIT DRUG CARTELS

In her Feb. 8 guest opinion, Judy Guenseth makes the common mistake of
assuming that punitive marijuana laws actually deter use.

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
use 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, 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 confusing
drug prohibition's collateral damage with a relatively harmless plant.

The big losers are the taxpayers deluded into believing big government
is the appropriate response to non-traditional consensual vices.

Robert Sharpe MPA,

policy analyst, Common Sense for Drug Policy,

Washington, D.C.