I (Used to) Smoke Marijuana

So Will Wilkinson lays out the cost of the drug war and has, with a growing recent trend, admitted to marijuana use. I can't say I smoke pot anymore, because I don't, but I used to and I am not afraid to admit it.

I never got in trouble with it: never been arrested, lost no jobs, never experienced pot-induced depression, and I suffer no permanent memory loss. I just smoked a lot when I was younger and outgrew it. I didn't stop because it was "the responsible thing to do"--I stopped because I just didn't like the daze I was in the next day. It effects everyone differently, and that is just one of the side-effects that affected me once I became an occasional smoker, and I don't like it.

But for all the marijuana I smoked--I was never a dealer--the law says I was a criminal. And so was Michael Phelps. And Newt Gingrich. And cancer and AIDS patients in California. And Snoop Dogg. And Woody Harrelson. And Bill Clinton. And Barack Obama. And Tony Blair. And tens of millions of Americans in every walk of life--that, through their actions, have subjected themselves to arrest, conviction, loss of job and educational opportunity because some people believe it immoral to get high.

But, indeed, with death tolls rising on the U.S.-Mexico border, with numerous people being kicked-out of college for drug offenses and losing college loans because of drug convictions, and the hundreds of deaths and injuries that have resulted from the law enforcement of this petty vice, marijuana prohibition is itself immoral and must be ended.

I, too, smoked marijuana, and I liked it.