WAITING TO INHALE

I am perfectly happy to accept the Supreme Court's unanimous ruling
that illness is no defense against federal prosecution for consuming
marijuana. According to the court, "Congress has made a determination
that marijuana has no medical benefits worthy of an exception" to the
laws against controlled substances.

This is certainly plausible.

The argument for so-called medical marijuana claims that smoking pot,
at most, alleviates some of the symptoms of pain and nausea associated
with cancer, chemotherapy and AIDS. It is entirely possible that the
therapeutic properties of marijuana are illusory, a placebo, with no
basis in scientific evidence.

Certainly the "cannabis clubs" that have emerged in those states that
have sanctioned the medical use of marijuana -- Alaska, Arizona,
California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Nevada, Oregon and Washington --
show very little evidence of humanitarian intent.

They seem more like thumb-in-the-eye gestures to circumvent state and
federal laws prohibiting pot.

But if we are to accept the argument that the medical virtues of
marijuana are overstated, or even nonexistent, it is only fair to
point out that the arguments for a federal ban on marijuana are
equally exaggerated.

When federal laws to control pot were first enacted, early in the 20th
Century, marijuana was widely believed to cause all manner of mental
and physical harm. Who, among the Baby Boom generation, has not
guffawed at a late-night screening of Reefer Madness (1933), with its
scenes of debauchery and fatal indulgence? The fact that marijuana
swiftly acquired a vogue among jazz musicians, Hollywood types and
bohemians of all creeds and races scarcely enhanced its image.

In time, of course, the conventional wisdom evolved: By the 1960s,
marijuana was seen as not so harmful in itself -- no more harmful,
that is, than innumerable legal substances -- but the gateway to
stronger, more destructive drugs. Using the language later adopted by
gun control and anti-smoking advocates, the federal government argued
that a child who smokes marijuana will soon graduate to hallucinogens,
cocaine, amphetamines, heroin, whatever. And of course, there are
plenty of people who have experienced that sad trajectory.

But the scientific evidence is, yet again, equivocal.

A social historian might argue that the widespread use of marijuana,
leading to harder drugs, coincided with that period in our recent
history (ca. 1965-ca. 1980) when drug use exploded in the general
population. Adolescents graduated from pot to LSD to crystal meth
because the culture encouraged experimentation. Was it the marijuana
that prompted Jason to sample the stronger stuff, or the environment
in which Jason subsisted?

It now appears obvious that social and cultural factors are to
blame.

Indeed, according to federal statistics, the United States seems to
have a permanent pot-smoking contingent, which constitutes a little
less than 9 percent of the population. For these people, marijuana is
not an introductory phase on the path to damnation but a "drug of
choice." I wouldn't argue that what they are doing is good for them,
or that parents and teachers are wrong to discourage interest in pot.
But these people have freely chosen to indulge in a drug which -- for
reasons considerably more political than scientific -- is illegal.

For the record, I should point out that I, like former President Bill
Clinton, sampled marijuana in my youth, and instantly disliked it.
Unlike President Clinton, however, I did inhale -- and have ever since
loathed the odor of the stuff and its particular effect, deplored the
attendant "culture" (if that's the word for it) and avoided the
company of potheads in general.

I am blessed by the fact that my own drug of choice, bourbon, is not
only legal but, like marijuana, comparatively safe when consumed in
moderation.

This is not to say that children should be steered toward alcohol: Its
benefits and dangers are evenly distributed, and abstinence is
healthy, thrifty and wise. But why tolerate the drunk or lament the
alcoholic while throwing the smoker of marijuana in jail? It is not
science which informs our resistance to pot, or even common sense, but
politics, habit and the natural instinct to enact into law the
deeply-held conviction that father knows best.

In a free society, you shouldn't need arguments to make something
legal, but instead, demand good reasons to make it illegal.

Congress and the Supreme Court have both determined that marijuana has
no medical properties. Fair enough. But neither do gin, sex, tobacco
or chocolate, all of which can lead to excess and disaster.

The drug war has failed not because drugs are irresistibly attractive,
or efforts to indoctrinate the young are doomed to fail. It is,
instead, a peculiar double standard that has earned a certain cynicism
and contempt.