From our blogger pal Theo: America Loves Booze and Pot. Excerpt:

The United States is a huge market for what are deemed illegal drugs and, for many years, marijuana has been among them. That prohibition is now going the way of the earlier effort to make alcohol consumption illegal. Questions remain as to whether this is a good thing or not.

Theo’s contributor, Alan Caruba, concludes:

Americans love booze and love pot. What the long term effects on our society will be are unknown, but there will be effects.

Well, obviously.  Everything has effects.  Booze has been legal, as the respected Mr. Caurba points out, since 1933 – this time.  It should be legal.

And you know what?  Pot should be legal too.

It’s not the place of government to protect us from ourselves.

It’s our place to make our own decisions.  It’s our place to decide what’s good or bad for us.  And the flip side of that is this:  It’s likewise not the place of government to shelter us from the consequences of bad decisions.  So, yes, pot should be legal, as booze is.  And if people abuse it and screw up, it’s on them.  If they screw up and hurt someone else, they face stern criminal penalties – their right to swing their fists ended at someone else’s nose, and they blew it.

It’s not complicated.  Good policy shouldn’t be complicated.