END HYPOCRISY

Re "Legal pot: A cash harvest for state?" (Page A1, Feb. 24): Finally,
somebody has publicly announced a plan that just makes sense. It's
time this state (and the rest of the world with it) ended the
hypocrisy about our culture's choices for recreational enjoyment. In
my opinion, marijuana is less harmful than the two prominent legal
"drugs" in our society: alcohol and tobacco.

Both of these legal substances are well known to be harmful to our
systems, especially when abused. Yet we squander our law enforcement
resources by having them enforce a needless farce of a law.

I don't believe that legalizing marijuana will harm our society -
political juggernauts have just seen to it that marijuana is connected
to "hard drugs." Actually, its use is more comparable to our "legal
drugs."

While legalizing it may make access easier, marijuana is currently
being used by about everyone who wants to, who is not worried about
drug testing for work. So we're just missing the financial benefits
available from its legalization - $4 billion to $14 billion is a lot
of revenue that is leaving our economy. Add the costs of trying to
enforce the current laws and it just makes too much sense to legalize
it - which is why we'll probably never see it happen.

Mark Caldwell

Sacramento