MODERN DRUG STRATEGY STILL A PUFF OF LIBERAL SMOKE

The hazy state of Ottawa's approach to drugs leaves us wondering if
everyone in the Liberal barracks is toking up these days.

No, it turns out, at least for the three contenders after Jean Chretien's job.

Finance Minister John Manley has never smoked pot but jokingly wishes he
had because the act is now considered "de rigueur" for political aspirants.

Heritage Minister Sheila Copps "of course" smoked marijuana in her college
days, but no longer.

Backbencher Paul Martin says his experience with drugs is sadly limited to
having once eaten a hash brownie that contained no hash.

They're all clean, and support their government's intention to
decriminalize possession of 30 grams of pot or less. They agree that a
criminal record is too harsh a penalty and wastes court and police time
better spent on real crimes.

So far so good. Now pass the munchies and consider the addled dithering of
the government-at-large.

Justice Minister Martin Cauchon will introduce his long-awaited decrim bill
next month; better late than never. Yet he simultaneously argues that
current harsher penalties should be upheld.

At least those were the instructions to federal lawyers appearing at last
week's Supreme Court of Canada hearing for a trio of pot users arguing that
current pot laws are an unconstitutional, excessive infringement on
personal liberties.

"There is no free-standing right to get stoned," argued lawyer David
Frankel -- unlike the free-standing right to get absolutely pie-eyed on
alcohol.

Cauchon's bill will replace a criminal record with a fine, much like a
parking ticket. Whether or not it passes into law is another matter; it may
be introduced only to languish in Parliament and fall off the order paper
by the next election.

Frankel even told the court there is no guarantee Ottawa will change the
law, a view shared by legal critics who've seen the Liberals fail to walk
the talk before.

The gulf between Cauchon's promise and Frankel's whip wasn't lost on
defence lawyer Paul Berstein.

"It suggests they don't know what they are doing."

Indeed. Berstein and lawyer John Conroy urged the court to ignore Cauchon's
promise and kill the 1923 law as a reefer-madness anachronism.

Peanut allergies harm more folks than pot, said Conroy, but the prohibition
on marijuana has created a massive black market and given more than 600,000
Canadians criminal records.

As with alcohol prohibition, marijuana prohibition is a failure.
Decriminalization is merely a first step, only full legalization will curb
the grow-house black market.

American drug crusaders love to talk trade fears as a consequence of
decriminalization, but they won't tell you this: Having 25 grams or less of
pot in New York is worth only a $100 US fine and no jail.

Back in Liberal land, Canada still awaits a national drug strategy and
approval for safe-injection sites, both years overdue.

They're coming, we're told. So are Santa Claus and his merry elves.