An opinion piece in the yesterday's WSJ by Mary Anastasia O'Grady reported some insightful remarks from former Brazilian President Fernando Henrique Cardoso. Link: A Path to Victory in the Drug War behind the pay wall. Since Cordoso been out of office he has become a proponent of marijuana decriminalization, and he had some sound reasons.
Simply put, the war on marijuana has failed. The efforts to eradicate marijuana have been unsuccessful, the cartels are getting stronger, and democracy in some South American countries is being threatened.
The main argument against marijuana legalization is that marijuana leads to harder drugs. He blows a big hole in that contention. If marijuana does in fact lead a user to experimentation and eventual addiction to hard drugs, it is because that is the business plan of the illegal drug sellers. Users have to make contact with an illegal seller in order to acquire marijuana. But the big profit margin is in the hard drug line. So the seller tries to get the buyer to upgrade his/her purchase. And when you think about it, why not give hard drugs to the buyer free with the marijuana purchase?
The solution to that particular problem is to take the marijuana business away from the cartels. If the buyer doesn't have any contact with the cartels then it is harder for the cartels to place that temptation in front of the typical marijuana user. And the cartels have less money to fight a war and corrupt government officials.
Makes sense. Some residents in the state of California tried to get a proposition passed that would legalize marijuana, but it failed for various reasons. That would have been a great experiment for the other 49 states to watch. But maybe such an experiment will take place in one of the South American countries. And there will be a lot to learn from it.