Dare To Ask Talk And News About Our Differences 
Sam, I have to disagree with you. Caveat: I’m also going to give my very biased, gut reaction. As a recovering addict, I won’t accept the argument that legitimizing drug use will abate usage and criminality. Cigarettes and alcohol are killing a whole lot of folks, and they’re legal. Addiction is a symptom of a much larger social ill. Legal access will do more harm than good. I will concede the medicinal benefit of smoking, but I’m very suspect of the messages we will communicate to our children when we legalize the sale of marijuana, and the increased abuse from easier access to the narcotic. (I can conversely tell you how the drug lords purposely shrunk the availability of weed to increase the sale of coke/crack).
And please, if anyone tells me again that weed is relatively harmless, I’ll throw up. I know enough people who ruined their lives “just smoking weed.” Weed is the “f— it” drug. Users typically develop an I-give-up, who cares attitude.
If you think it’s harmless, ask the insurers who pay the medical claims for individuals who injure themselves on the job because they were high, or the employers who are tired of the absteeism level of employees who only get high on the weekends but can’t seem to make it into work on Monday. Ask the professor about the bright student who’s pulling Cs because she fails to commit the necessary time to her assignments. THC does damage brain cells, and weed has 10 times more nicotine than cigarettes. And for many addicts, weed was the doorway to the so-called hardcore drugs. My stand is more than just some soapbox, shallow, moralistic (and since when is actually having some morals a bad thing?) whine. How about practical, logical opposition? I’ve experienced firsthand the horror of drug addiction. Wouldn’t wish it on a dog.
Lastly, those who think addiction happens only to poor, lazy, stupid and weak folks, think again. Statistics on drug addiction are higher than many of us think, and the numbers are incredibly alarming if you look at the numbers on substance abuse (misuse). Everyone who abuses doesn’t necessarily become addicted, but those who are addicted started by abusing drugs.
I question how much we have really profited by legalizing alcohol and nicotine. In my mind, they are equally lethal. The only difference is that their manufacturers and our government are getting a cut of the profit. Ask the man with one lung and on an oxgen tank if he feels cigarettes are harmless.