Marijuana could be treated the same way. They exist only because drugs are illegal. That is in fact, the principal lesson of Prohibition. The crime surrounding drugs is also largely due to drug laws, not drug use. Killings and robberies inevitably accompany illegal markets.
Dealers fight over turf, sellers and customers rob one another.
This sort of crime was absent during the many years when marijuana,. and opium, were legal. If he wants to help eliminate drug abuse, Forbes should offer alternatives, not rhetoric. Turning drug use, fundamentally a moral and spiritual problem, into a crime hasn't ended drug abuse. More than 11 million marijuana arrests over the past three decades have not stopped more than 60 million Americans from using the drug. Contrary to charges that the Clinton administration is soft on drugs, the government has been busting more people than ever.