PUNITIVE DRUG LAWS DON'T REDUCE USE

Columnist Bob Rinearson on May 7 made the common mistake of assuming
that punitive drug laws actually reduce use. The drug war is in large
part a war on marijuana, by far the most popular illicit drug. The
University of Michigan's Monitoring the Future 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
criminalizes citizens who prefer marijuana to martinis.

Unlike alcohol, marijuana has never been shown to cause an overdose
death, nor does it share the addictive properties of tobacco. The
short-term health effects of marijuana are inconsequential compared to
the long-term effects of criminal records. Unfortunately, marijuana
represents the counterculture to many Americans.

In subsidizing the prejudices of culture warriors, government is
subsidizing organized crime. The drug war's distortion of immutable
laws of supply and demand causes big money to grow on little trees.
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, who have been deluded
into believing big government is the appropriate response to
non-traditional consensual vices.

Robert Sharpe

Arlington, Va.