MARIJUANA LEGALIZATION? A WHITE HOUSE REBUTTAL, FINALLY

White House 'drug Czar' Gil Kerlikowske Lays Out His Most Thorough
Arguments Yet Against Marijuana Legalization. They Help Clear Up Confusion
Over White House Drug Policy, And Can Serve As Talking Points For Parents
And Officials.

The Obama White House has finally laid out its most thorough, reasoned
rebuttal to arguments for marijuana legalization - countering a
campaign that is gaining alarming momentum at the state level.

The president's tough position was delivered in early March by his
"drug czar," Gil Kerlikowske, in a private talk before police chiefs
in California - which is ground zero for this debate.

"Marijuana legalization - for any purpose - is a nonstarter in the
Obama administration," said Mr. Kerlikowske, a former police chief
himself.

It's almost certain that California voters will be asked in a November
ballot initiative whether to allow local governments to regulate and
tax marijuana (similar to taxes on sales of alcohol). Other states are
considering similar proposals, which are really a backdoor way to
legalize pot.

Thirteen states have decriminalized the use or possession of small
amounts of marijuana, which is not the same as legalizing it. Selling
it is still illegal except in states where it is used for medical
purposes. And under federal law, any sort of marijuana use or sale is
a criminal offense.

The drug czar's remarks are worth notice for two reasons. First, they
provide needed talking points for those who oppose legalization but
who can't seem to make their message resonate in the face of a
well-financed, well-organized pro-marijuana effort. Second, they help
clear up confusion about the White House policy on
legalization.

When Attorney General Eric Holder announced last year that US law
enforcement officials would neither raid nor prosecute medical
marijuana dispensaries or those using them, states got mixed signals.
Mr. Holder explained it as a matter of the best use of scarce federal
law enforcement resources, which he didn't want to expend in the now
14 states that have approved some use of medical marijuana.

But "a lot of people believe the administration is somewhat in favor
of the decriminalization of marijuana," says Scott Kirkland, police
chief for El Cerrito, in the San Francisco Bay area. In California,
the public, city council members, city managers, even police chiefs
have "misinterpreted" the administration's position, says Mr.
Kirkland, the spokesman for marijuana issues for the California Police
Chiefs Association.

The drug czar couldn't have been more plain. On medical marijuana,
which has strong public backing in opinion polls, the former Seattle
police chief said that "science should determine what a medicine is,
not popular vote." As Kerlikowske pointed out, marijuana is harmful -
and he has the studies to back it up. Read the footnotes in his
speech; they're sobering, especially No. 8.

Legalization supporters argue that no one has ever died from an
overdose of this "soft" drug. But here's what "science" has found so
far: Smoking marijuana can result in dependence on the drug.

More than 30 percent of people who are 18 and over and who used
marijuana in the past year are either dependent on the drug or abuse
it - that is, they use it repeatedly under hazardous conditions or are
imparied when they're supposed to be interacting with others, such as
at work. This is according to a 2004 study in the Journal of the
American Medical Association.

Pot is also associated with poor motor skills, cognitive impairment
(i.e., affecting the ability to think, reason, and process
information), and respiratory and mental illness.

The recent "Pentagon shooter," John Patrick Bedell, was a heavy
marijuana user. The disturbed young man's psychiatrist told the
Associated Press that marijuana made the symptoms of his mental
illness more pronounced. Mr. Bedell's brother, Jeffrey, told The
Washington Post that marijuana made his brother's thinking "more
disordered" and that he had implored him to stop smoking pot, to no
avail.

Kerlikowske also effectively knocked down the argument that regulating
and taxing marijuana is a great way for states to make money in these
deficit-dreary times. Indeed, NORML, the lead group in the
legalization movement, is set to launch a digital ad campaign in
Manhattan's Times Square next week: "Money CAN grow on trees!"

It's a claim that's too good to be true, just as the exclamation point
implies. Look at the nation's experience with regulated alcohol.
America collects nearly $15 billion a year in federal and state taxes
from alcohol. But Kerlikowske says that covers less than 10 percent of
the "social costs" related to healthcare, lost productivity, and law
enforcement. And what about lost lives? Let's not add marijuana to the
mix of regulated substances.

"The costs of legalizing marijuana would outweigh any possible tax
that could be levied," Kerlikowske explains. In the United States,
illegal drugs already cost an estimated $180 billion annually in
social costs, according to the Office of National Drug Control Policy.
That number would increase as marijuana became more widely and easily
available.

The Dutch - so often praised by marijuana advocates - have had to
greatly ratchet back the number of legal marijuana outlets because of
crime, nuisance, and increased pot usage among youth. Los Angeles,
too, now sees the need to scale back the number of private
dispensaries of medical marijuana. Many California towns have looked
at L.A. and are saying "no" to dispensaries.

The California Board of Equalization, which administers the state's
sales tax, estimates $1.4 billion of potential revenue from a
marijuana tax. Found money? Its reasoning is based on either "a series
of assumptions that are in some instances subject to tremendous
uncertainty or in other cases not valid," according to an independent
study by the RAND Corporation.

What's too bad about the drug czar's speech is that it was made behind
closed doors at a venue not accessible to the press, then quietly put
on the administration's website. Given the confusion over the message,
the White House needs to be far more outspoken about this.

President Obama himself needs to get more involved than simply letting
his drug czar reveal this critical stance below the radar. As a
high-profile parent, he can help other parents who are struggling to
prevent their children from going down the rabbit hole of drug use. If
one message can resonate in this debate, it's that America's young
people are most vulnerable to the threat of legalization.

They are particularly sensitive to the price of pot (and prices will
come down if pot is legalized). They're the most influenced by
societal norms (and public approval is growing). And they're the ones
most heavily engaged in studying and learning - a process that pot
smoking can impair.

Individuals who reach age 21 without using drugs are almost certain to
never use them. But according to a study by a leading source on young
people and drugs, Monitoring the Future, marijuana use among teens has
increased in recent years, after a decade of decline. Teens perceive less
risk in use - not surprising when states approve
of it as medicine. Risk perception greatly influences drug use among
young people.

The risks of marijuana - and the wisdom of knowing that joy and
satisfaction are not found in a drug - are lessons that Mr. Obama
could effectively teach the nation. But even so, it can't stop there.

The momentum, for now, is with those who want to legalize marijuana.
They have been generously financed by a few billionaires, including
George Soros, and make strategic use of the Internet and media.

It will take clear-thinking parents, teachers, local officials, faith
leaders, and law enforcement officers to convincingly articulate why
the march to legalization must be stopped. They can, if they use the
kinds of reasonable and fact-based arguments that the nation's drug
czar has just laid out.