A couple of interesting short articles on what to do about illegal drug use came out over the weekend:
Rethinking the War on Drugs
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303425504577353754196169014.html?wpisrc=nl_wonk
The thesis of this article is that we don’t have just two choices: an all-out prohibition, such as we’re attempting now, or legalization, which would quickly solve some problems but also create other, serious ones. We have other ways to cut down on demand, as a few pilot programs around the country are starting to show. Violent drinkers, users, or dealers would continue to receive harsh treatment, but “non-problem” users, people on probation, etc., would be motivated to stop drinking to excess or using drugs by a simple system of checks or testing. People who stay clean remain free, but those who keep using would get tagged with significantly unpleasant (but non-draconian) penalties.
The author grants that these programs will not eliminate demand or wipe out the black markets but argues that they would reduce the problem to manageable proportions by focusing on the 20% of dealers, users, and abusers that cause 80% of the problems.
OK, so it’s not perfect. But wouldn’t it be nice to have a social policy that was free of hypocritical moralizing and actually had some benefit, that did something constructive? What we’re doing now sure isn’t working.
The Marijuana Exception
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303425504577353852663443304.html
This article basically says that marijuana scarcely shows up on the radar screen when viewed alongside coke, speed, crack, and smack, which are by far much bigger and more serious problems.
Happily, the article discounts the “gateway” effect (the argument that smoking marijuana leads to consumption of hard drugs), but it does worry that increased marijuana consumption could actually lead to increased heavy drinking. According to the first article mentioned above, alcohol kills more people in the US every year than all other illicit drug use combined (about 85,000 vs. 17,000).
I don’t know about you, but my experience with smoking weed has been that I drink less, not more, when I smoke. Pot and booze gives me the whirlies and makes me puke, then I either feel like crap or I pass out.
And who was it, George Carlin, maybe, that asked when was the last time you heard of a really stoned driver being stopped for speeding?