WHY DO VOTERS ALWAYS PICK POT?

As the United States Supreme Court listened to arguments Monday over
medical marijuana for patients with a doctor's recommendation, we got
to wondering: Why, in the face of adamant opposition from those
involved in the "war on drugs," have voters invariably approved such
laws?

It can't be a matter of politics, for medical marijuana initiatives
have been approved everywhere they have been presented to voters,
whether in red states or in blue. Eleven states now have such laws -
Montana being the most recent - and it's starting to look as though
similar measures would pass just about anywhere.

After all, Montana, law-abiding red state that it is, gave 60 percent
of its presidential vote to George Bush. But its vote to approve
medical marijuana was even stronger. Nearly 62 percent of the voters
backed the idea. What gives?

For one thing, people are compassionate. Nearly everybody knows
somebody who is suffering from Parkinson's disease, chemotherapy for
cancer, AIDS, or some other painful problem, and few of us want to
deny them anything that might ease their suffering.

For another thing, people weren't born yesterday. Justice Department
lawyers can assert that marijuana has no medical uses until they're
blue in the face, but people are more likely to believe statements to
the contrary from prestigious medical associations and people whose
pain has been relieved by marijuana.

Even conservative, southern states like Alabama, Louisiana and
Mississippi, which have no medical marijuana laws, have joined the
Supreme Court case on the side of medical marijuana. They say it is
the business of the states, not the federal government or some federal
drug czar, to provide "for the health, safety, welfare and morals of
their citizens."

All this doesn't mean people are scofflaws. They want marijuana
strictly limited to the ill people who doctors believe will benefit
from it. While Montana was passing its medical marijuana measure, the
voters in Oregon rejected a measure that would have drastically
expanded its existing medical marijuana program.

These aren't necessarily the issues the high court will consider. The
justices may base their ruling on more legalistic issues, tell
proponents of medical marijuana to take their arguments to health
regulators, or buy the contention (rejected by voters) that medical
marijuana will send a message that it's OK to take any illegal drug.

But it's interesting that in these politically divisive times, people
still can come together when it comes to putting painkilling over politics.