FREEMAN'S COLUMN WAS RIGHT ON TARGET

Editor:

Mark Freeman's Feb. 16 column was right on target.

Decriminalizing marijuana would free up police resources in Glens Falls,
without necessarily leading to increased use. Punitive marijuana laws have
little, if any, deterrent value. The University of Michigan's Monitoring
the Future Study reports that lifetime use of marijuana is higher in the
United States than any European country, yet America will is one of the few
Western countries that wastes scarce resources punishing citizens who
prefer marijuana to martinis.

Unlike alcohol, marijuana has never been shown to cause an overdose death,
nor does it share the addictive properties of tobacco. The short-term
health effects of marijuana are inconsequential compared to the long-term
effects of criminal records. Unfortunately, marijuana represents the
counterculture to misguided reactionaries in Congress intent on legislating
their version of morality. In subsidizing the prejudices of culture
warriors, our government is inadvertently 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 on confusing drug
prohibition's collateral damage with a relatively harmless plant. The big
losers in this battle are the taxpayers who have been deluded into
believing big government is the appropriate response to non-traditional
consensual vices.

ROBERT SHARPE, M.P.A., Program Officer, Drug Policy Alliance, Washington, D.C.