IN DRUG WAR, HONESTY IS THE BEST POLICY

I hadn't dreamed of Jeannie in a long time, but there she was on "Larry
King Live" a few nights ago, discussing her 35-year-old son's death from a
heroin overdose.

Barbara Eden of the enviable flat tummy has gone from granter of grown
men's wishes to poster girl for the federal Drug Enforcement Administration.

First the qualifiers and disclaimers: Eden is a lovely woman whose heart is
in the right place. She has suffered a tragic loss and wants to help
others. She noted repeatedly on King's show that she's no expert and was
offering only her own point of view.

Which was wrong in at least one important way.

Unwittingly, and with anything but malice, people like Eden are part of the
drug problem, because they treat users like idiots. That is, they tell them
that all drugs are equally bad, evil and harmful. From their perspective,
smoking a joint is only marginally different from shooting heroin.

Drug war has no credibility

Any casual user of marijuana -- and most people I pass on the street have
been downwind from a joint at some point in their lives -- knows this is a
lie. And there goes credibility. Throw out the bong and the hypodermic
needle if you want to, but don't insist that the two are equal instruments
of destruction, as Eden did on King's show.

Kids, with their overdeveloped baloney-sensors, know it's not true. They
know that marijuana may diminish their culinary standards and make them
temporarily fascinated by the intricate lives of ants, but they also know
that they won't necessarily be shooting heroin by sundown tomorrow.

Addicts are addicts; some, like Eden's son, may even become addicted to
steroids. But a social user of marijuana is no more likely to start
mainlining heroin than a weekend beer drinker is to start stashing Mad Dog
in his lunch box.

There isn't space here to outline all the arguments for and against
legalization of some drugs, but it's clear that: drugs are easy to get; the
drug subculture thrives in part because it is forbidden and therefore
attractive; dollar for dollar, the billions we funnel into this "war" would
be better spent on education, prevention and treatment.

Would it not be better to control those substances, tax them, limit their
availability to minors -- as we try to do with alcohol -- rather than
criminalize a huge segment of the population that probably includes many of
our neighbors and even our own children?

Not all drugs are awful

The genie in the bottle is truth, and the truth is that all drugs are not
awful, evil or equally harmful. In fact, drugs are often quite a lot of
fun, which is why people consume, absorb, smoke, snort or shoot them. But
they are also dangerous to varying degrees and can wreak havoc on users,
families, friends and communities.

The truth is also this: Drug abuse is different from drug use, just as
alcoholism is different from the weekend cocktail party. Rather than fight
the abuse war from a moral, shame-on-you posture -- which doesn't work with
any age -- we might try a medical model that educates with facts and urges
human wisdom.

Think of it as an investment in credibility, so that potential users tune
in to the discussion on consequences that needs to follow.