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Alcohol and tobacco are gateway drugs too in that people who use those substances are several times more likely to use hard drugs like cocaine than people who do not use those substances. Does use of these substances make people want to use cocaine, or is use of these drugs just an indicator that people are the type who like to use intoxicants and are likely to use other intoxicants as well? There really isn't any proof at all that marijuana makes people want to use other drugs. I bet if it was legal and sold through legal channels, it wouldn't be anymore of a gateway drug than tobacco and alcohol because people would buy it from licensed shops rather than from drug dealers who offer them other drugs and using marijuana wouldn't automatically make them members of the illegal drug counterculture. Once people know you use one illegal drug they aren't so worried about breaking the other stuff out in front of you or even offering it to you because if you use one illegal drug you aren't likely to tell on them for using or even offering you another. Legalize marijuana and the gateway problem largely goes away.

As for use of marijuana increasing when it becomes legal, I think use probably would increase at first, but my bet is it wouldn't go up that much and it might end up going down in time. Look at what's happening with tobacco use. Tobacco is legal yet use of tobacco is going down. Less people are taking up smoking and even though nicotine is extremely addictive, a whole heck of a lot more than marijuana, a lot of people are actually quitting cigarettes. Marijuana smoking is also an unhealthy habit. There are plenty of good reasons not to smoke it. Personally, I doubt the laws against marijuana deter that many people from using it because the likelihood of getting caught is so slim and if people do get caught the punishments are not that severe. There are probably not that many people out there who really want to smoke marijuana but won't do it simply because it's illegal. I think what keeps most from smoking it are all the other bad things about marijuana, the fact that it makes people forgetful, that it turns so many into blithering idiots in social situations, the fact that it's a time waster that stinks and makes your breath smell bad, is bad for teeth and gums, etc. More than half of all adults under 60 in this country have tried it, yet hardly any of those people still smoke it. If it was so great most would still smoke it. If marijuana was legalized use probably would go up some at first, probably mostly among people who had smoked it before but quit, but in time they'd see that all the negatives associated with marijuana smoking are still there, and most would decide marijuana is still not for them.

For decades now the U.S. has had higher per capita marijuana use rates than just about any other country in the world. Very few countries have even close to the per capita use rates we have. Marijuana isn't completely legal anywhere that I know of, but in some of these other countries where per capita use is a lot lower than it is in the U.S. marijuana is practically legal. In some countries possession of small amounts isn't a crime. In some sales of marijuana, while not technically legal, are allowed. In Holland marijuana production isn't legal, but they allow licensed retail shops to sell what they buy off the black market. There are hundreds of these shops in Holland. They are not hidden. Some will even have pictures of marijuana leafs on their signs. Some are chains. Some display their product in glass cases for all in the shop to see. They all have menus listing various varieties of marijuana and hashish with prices. Possession of marijuana is not a crime there. It's practically legal, yet far fewer Dutch than Americans have even tried marijuana and a lower percentage are current smokers. There are going to be cultural differences between Dutch and Americans, but we aren't that much different. We wouldn't see our whole population go nutty and all of the sudden everyone takes up pot smoking. That hasn't happened in any country ever that I know of. Even where it is practically legal only a small portion of the public chooses to use marijuana. I think we're pretty close to the natural limit. Most who would really like it already do it. Most of us though won't smoke marijuana legal or not because we don't like it and/or we know it's just a bad thing to get involved with for a number of reasons not having anything to do with its legal status.

I agree that we need to draw a line. I don't want all drugs to be legal because so many are so dangerous and some are just incredibly addictive. The risk of harm to innocent people is too great. I think it's a mistake though for us to draw that line at marijuana though, for a number of reasons. First, it's far too popular. It's everywhere. The ban doesn't work at all. It's easily available and relatively cheap when you look at how much it costs for a single use. You can get high for pennies. At least prohibition keeps drugs like cocaine and heroin relatively expensive, and a drug like heroin is so unpopular that you won't even be able to find it in most parts of America. It's in the big cities and some small towns, but it isn't everywhere like marijuana. I'm an attorney and I've handled literally thousands of pounds worth of drugs cases, millions of dollars worth. Big cases, small cases, I've handled them all, but in all the years I've done it I've only had one heroin case and these guys were drug mules caught driving down the highway who wouldn't have even stopped in my area had the police not pulled them over. We have plenty of cocaine and meth, and marijuana is just all over the place, but heroin is rarely ever found here. If it was legal and sold in a shop here in town, what was once pretty much unavailable would be available, and while most wouldn't touch it some would to see what it is all about and before long we'd have trouble making heroin addicts in this town where before we had none. That wouldn't be an issue though with marijuana because it is easily available everywhere already, and relatively cheap too.

The market for illegal drugs is huge. Marijuana is the most popular of all illegal drugs. More people use marijuana than all other drugs combined. A huge part of the marijuana consumed in this country, probably most, is smuggled from south of the border. Most of the drug smuggling activity is marijuana smuggling. Most of the drug transactions in this country are marijuana sales. There is a huge infrastructure in place for the illegal marijuana trade, from production, to smuggling and distribution throughout the country and finally retail sales. Since these massive networks are already in place for the multibillion dollar marijuana industry, we see an awful lot of the hard stuff going through the existing marijuana channels. Why should these guys reinvent the wheel. The infrastructure is there to move a lot of drugs. It's easy to just use existing marijuana smugglers or marijuana distributors to move the other stuff. There are already all sorts of small timers out there selling a little weed to their friends. It makes sense for major drug traffickers to get some cocaine or ecstasy or meth to these people to sell to their existing customers and that is exactly what happens every day in this country. If we make marijuana legal, not only will we rob these huge drug trafficking organizations of billions and billions of dollars in revenue, we'll take from them these very valuable distribution networks that make it easy for them to distribute the hard stuff.

Prohibition is least effective against marijuana. It's already easily available everywhere. It's already relatively cheap on a “per buzz” basis. Marijuana, while certainly not harmless, is the least harmful it seems of the illegal drugs. It's not particularly addictive. People don't usually have any trouble quitting it, and most who smoke it do in fact end up growing out of that phase in their lives and leaving it alone. No one ever dies from marijuana overdoses. Marijuana use doesn't appear to cause much crime. A good 75% or better of all the battery cases I've seen in court have been cases where some drunk guy got riled up and got stupid and/or mean. You just don't see that with marijuana. It doesn't have that effect on people. It doesn't make people violent and you don't see a lot property crimes committed so that people can get money to buy pot. It's just not that bad. I wouldn't want to be in the habit of smoking it but I can't get all worked up about someone else choosing to use it. We need to live and let live and if people aren't hurting other people or putting people at a great deal of unnecessary risk of serious harm we need to leave them alone. We should draw the line at drugs like meth. but marijuana should be regulated similar to the way we regulate alcohol.