DRUG WAR LOSERS

Regarding Bill Steigerwald's column "America's No. 1 crop ain't Xmas
trees" (Dec. 24 and PghTrib.com), the drug war is in large part a war
on marijuana -- by far the most popular illicit drug.

A University of Michigan 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.

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, 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 confusing
drug prohibition's collateral damage with a relatively harmless
plant. The big losers in this battle are the taxpayers deluded into
believing big government is the appropriate response to
nontraditional consensual vices.

ROBERT SHARPE

Washington, D.C.

The writer is a policy analyst for Common Sense for Drug Policy
(csdp.org).