Sunday, March 25, 2007

The War on Drugs

Someone's come up with a new way to classify how bad drugs are based on how much physical damage they cause, how dependent you can become on them, and how much harm they cause society (through accidents while under the influence, health care costs, etc.). They had a couple of groups of people (including psychiatrists and police officers) assess various drugs according to these criteria, and they came up with similar results:

If red wine and beer are good for you, then cannabis, LSD, and Ecstasy are practically vitamins. I suppose the pot-heads have been saying that for years, but I really wonder if whoever arbitrarily decided alcohol is OK but marijuana is bad wasn't drunk at the time.

It's also really confusing that some doctors who recommend LSD go to jail but the ones who prescribe methylphenidate (Ritalin) and amphetamine (Adderall) for Calvin are still freely practicing medicine.

What really worries me, though, is what would happen if drugs were legalized. The end of Prohibition resulted in the loss of a major source of income for criminal organizations. If the same thing happened with drugs there would suddenly be a whole lot of cops with a whole lot of money and free time, just looking to make up their quotas with parking and jaywalking tickets. And we certainly don't want that.

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