EXPOSE TAKES POTSHOTS AT AMERICA'S WAR ON DRUGS

"Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs, and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market"
by Eric Schlosser (Houghton Mifflin, $23).

Marijuana is one of the largest cash crops in the United States, right up
there with corn and soybeans. The same soil and growing conditions that are
ideal for corn are perfect for cannabis.

In the first of three essays on America's underground markets, Eric
Schlosser passes along some sage advice - decriminalize the stuff and tax
it. The author of "Fast Food Nation" makes a sensible, logically reasoned
case that the war on marijuana is a failure, needlessly ruining lives and
wasting huge amounts of money. He advocates a marijuana policy that is
"desymbolized" and calmly based on the facts.

Schlosser's second essay, on illegal immigrant workers, is rather awkwardly
positioned between the pot and the porn, but he concludes strongly with a
revealing history of the pornography industry as embodied in the career of
Reuben Sturman, a former comic book salesman from Cleveland.