WAR OVER, DRUGS WIN

As has been frequently observed, regardless of who wins the White House, we
will have a past recreational drug user overseeing the federal Drug War,
which is now more punitive and heavily financed than at any time in history.

Both have vowed to continue the war; at press time we are just waiting to
see which one it will be.

But a ballot initiative in California put the Drug War itself to a vote,
and drugs won. Or rather, the taxpayers, drug addicts, and the U.S.
Constitution won. Proposition 36, a voter initiative placed on the ballot
by petition, mandates treatment instead of incarceration for first- and
second-time non-violent drug offenders in the state.

Supporters estimate it will divert about 37,000 people a year from jail to
treatment, and state budget authorities project the state will eventually
save between $100 and $150 million per year in incarceration costs, the San
Jose Mercury News reported. The measure is also expected to forestall the
construction of a new, $450 million prison in California. Support for the
initiative was funded in large part by investor George Soros, together with
John Sperling, chairman of the University of Phoenix, and Peter Lewis, the
chairman of Progressive Insurance in Cleveland. Soros also funded
California's medical marijuana initiative, which has effectively legalized
simple possession in much of the state.

The billionaire investor has been a major thorn in the side of the federal
drug warriors, as evidenced by the disgustingly fascinating transcript of a
phone conversation between outgoing drug czar Barry McCaffrey and former
New York Times columnist Abe Rosenthal (recently obtained and reprinted by
Harper's Magazine), in which the two commiserate over Soros' successes and
discuss whether and how he ought to be punished by the White House.

Also in California, residents of Mendocino County can now grow up to 25
marijuana plants on their own property, following the passage of a local
proposition in that northern coastal county.

Of course, state and federal laws still prohibit this, but growers will no
longer be troubled be local law enforcement, it seems.

A considerable portion of the economy of the county comes from the sale of
premium marijuana, for which the area is world famous.