SATURDAY ESSAY: DEA'S SLIPPERY SLOPE

Libertarians who give no quarter, and, if true to form, expect none, are
unable to accept the government's assertion of control over their bodies
inherent in the war on drugs.

Others do not accept that view and emphasize lives lost and potential
squandered. They are not prepared to sanction the means for addiction, but
just the same they are sympathetic to applying - when the only crime is
what the addict is doing to himself - a medical approach supervised by the
criminal courts.

Then, there's what happened in California.

Federal agents stormed the room of a woman at a medical marijuana
cooperative this month, handcuffed her and repeatedly ordered her to stand.
She began suffering chest pains, but the agents would not call an ambulance.

Oh, yes. The woman has polio; crutches and leg braces were in plain view
next to her bed. No charges were filed, as prosecution was problematic.

The report in USA Today, which documents the tension between the medical
marijuana movement and the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, adds
iron to the libertarian criticism. Others inclined toward the blending of
law enforcement and medicine may be no less outraged.

Legal experts looking for a counter to the DEA say medical marijuana laws -
California was the first to legalize it in 1996, followed by eight states -
may be a constitutional expression of states' rights under the 10th
Amendment, which reserves to them the authority to regulate medical
practice. Good point.

With such dubious raids, we think, the feds are banking that the slippery
slope does not become more precipitous. But isn't it also possible that
their rigidity may accomplish what they most fear?