"Do As I..."

Leaving aside the merits of doing so, legalizing marijuana in California would put the U.S. in an untenable position with Latin America.  Even its friends in the region have begun to point out the glaring inconsistency of the Americans' insistent demand that their countries fight "the war on drugs" wholeheartedly, while legalizing it on its home front.  It's being said time and time again that, without the American consumer, the Latin American producer would not have such a big market for its product.

The strategy against drug addiction should have been revised a long time ago.  This is essentially a mental health problem turned into a law enforcement one by refusing to recognize it as the former.  Decades of saying that marijuana is the "gateway" to other drugs now prevent that public policy be changed because either they were wrong all along or they're giving up and giving in to potheads, and no one wants to go down in history with that on his record.

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