PUT THIS IDEA IN YOUR PIPE AND SMOKE IT

Suburban Update

If proponents of a popular ballot initiative in Nevada have their way, theirs will be the first state to legalize marijuana for recreational use.

Under their proposal, the state would regulate the production and sale of marijuana to adults, and collect taxes on it into the bargain.

It makes sense that this would happen in Nevada. This is a state that already makes recreation out of activities other people consider vices: gambling, legal prostitution and assaulting normal standards of good taste, to name a few.

So maybe they figure if they're going to hell anyway, they might as well go stoned.

Or maybe the whole thing is a ploy to get more tourists. Maybe they've already got a new ad campaign in the works, using the slogan ``Las Vegas, the Amsterdam of the West." All they lack are tulips.

On the other hand, Nevadans have no monopoly on vice, or their tourist industry wouldn't be so successful already. Lately, Las Vegas has been trying to encourage people to think of it as a ``family" destination, but let's face it, about as many people go to Vegas for the shows as read Playboy for the articles.

So possibly Nevadans simply figure they should deal with marijuana the way they do other vices: If you can't beat it, regulate it.

And if you're doing that anyway, then (this being America) you might as well make a profit from it. Most states and the federal government are still trying to beat it, but the national consensus on marijuana does seem to be changing. Nine states (including Nevada) have passed legislation to allow patients with a doctor's prescription to use marijuana for pain relief.

These laws are in defiance of federal law, but a bill recently introduced in the House of Representatives with bipartisan support would allow states to legalize medical marijuana.

These changes have widespread support, even among people who have no interest in using marijuana. If it's medically superior to the alternatives for certain conditions, we figure, then what's the big deal?

Save the worrying for addictive tranquilizers, not a cancer patient's painkiller.

Of course, Nevada's law would go much farther, though its conflict with federal law means it couldn't take effect even if passed. Even supporters don't expect Nevada to start contracting with marijuana growers next spring.

What they want is to make Americans rethink our drug policy.

Certainly some impatience with the current approach is in order. We've spent about as much on the war on drugs as we did on the Cold War, but there's no Soviet Union to pack it in and declare us the winner at the end.

The best we can hope for is to keep spending billions more every year just to hold the line. If this were a military strategy, we'd fire the general.

The fact that Nevada's legalization effort focuses on marijuana also reflects the maturing of the baby boomers, who were the first Americans to use cannabis on a large scale. So many potheads of the '60s and '70s grew up to be normal, middle-class adults that it's hard for this generation to accept the demonization of the drug that's been the establishment party line for almost 40 years.

And now that we boomers have suddenly discovered we are the establishment, that line's become just a little embarrassing as well.

But whether legalizing marijuana would really result in a net societal benefit is the megabillion-dollar question. Proponents say it would conserve law enforcement resources and let the police and courts focus on more serious crimes.

Critics fear marijuana use would increase. And the effect on children - who are always at the center of any drug debate - is wholly unknown.

The Nevada initiative would ban sales to people under age 21, but it's fair enough to worry that legalizing sales to adults will lead to an increase in consumption by kids. (Though it could hardly make marijuana easier to obtain; the class druggie is already closer than the corner drugstore.)

The closeness of the polls in Nevada (currently 44 percent are in favor and 46 percent opposed) shows voters there understand that legalizing marijuana would be a major gamble. But what makes gambling such a popular vice is that every once in a while, somebody wins big. And watching this gamble unfold would offer more than entertainment value for the rest of us.

If Nevadans have found a way to beat the house, it would be worth a trip to Vegas to see how it's done.