THE MARIJUANA CARTEL

Kathleen Parker's July 8th column was right on target. Marijuana
prohibition has done little other than burden millions of otherwise
law-abiding citizens with criminal records.

The University of Michigan's Monitoring the Future Study reports that
lifetime use of marijuana is higher in the U.S. than any European
country, yet America is one of the few Western countries that use its
criminal justice system to punish citizens who prefer marijuana to
martinis. 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 make an easily grown weed
literally worth its weight in gold. 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 deluded into believing big government
is the appropriate response to non-traditional consensual vices.

The results of a comparative study of European and U.S. rates of drug
use can be found at:
http://www.monitoringthefuture.org/pubs/espad_pr.pdf and United
Nations stats: http://www.unodc.org/unodc/global_illicit_drug_trends.html

ROBERT SHARPE,

Policy Analyst, Common Sense for Drug Policy, Washington, D.C.