POT SMOKERS AND DRIVING AN OLD ARGUMENT

Law enforcement hysteria about marijuana smoking drivers on the
highway should have been laid to rest long ago. Every study and every
survey of cannabis use and driving shows that stoned drivers are
safer drivers than teetotalers. For one thing, pot smokers tend to
drive slower and do not exhibit the aggression so common among normal
drivers. Marijuana drivers tend to be more polite avoiding potential accidents.

The way you tell when pot smokers are too high to drive is simple.
Test their coordination and their reaction times etc. Marijuana
causes its maximum effect immediately, so if a driver passes a
roadside sobriety test, there will be no delayed effects later as is
possible with alcohol.

Police are trying to cause panic about marijuana and driving even
though they cannot point to a single indicator that marijuana causes
accidents. If this is a serious matter, where are the wrecks and
where are the dead bodies with marijuana joints smoldering in their
hands that we should be concerned about?

RALPH GIVENS, San Francisco