DECRIMINALIZING DOPE

Re "Up in smoke," Editorial, April 6: You are right. Banning
marijuana makes no sense from a public-benefit point of view. But it
does make sense from several other self-interested standpoints.
First, of course, it makes the "Americans" happy, if by that we mean
the professional political thugs who tend to hold office there,
rather than the bulk of the people. Secondly, it has a local
political appeal to those who believe that morality consists of
telling other people what they cannot do. These make up Harper's
supporters, and his alone, as all the other political parties are
more civilized than that.

The most important reason is that it provides an excuse for
maintaining a large standing army of police, with extraordinary
powers of repression, and lots of expensive, invasive equipment. From
our viewpoint as taxpayers, all that enforcement and legal expense is
a waste; from theirs, it all goes to the right people. When
"maintaining public order" means "doing things my way," you want to
have lots of backup. And when you make illegal something that a
majority of the population indulges in, you can almost always find an
excuse to put someone away if you want to. And that is on top of the
evils of raising the overall level of distrust and paranoia.

TED SYPEREK