The people want legalization. Er, I mean, the people who aren't corporations...

“If our poll is right, then it can only be a matter of time before laws start to change, at least in the more liberal states,” The Economist opined.

Dudes, look closer — it’s already started.

(The Economist) A new poll from The Economist and YouGov contains exciting news for marijuana advocates. “A huge majority of Americans, more than two to one once ‘don’t knows’ have been excluded, support the legalization and taxation of marijuana,” the magazine announced.

Even without excluding the “don’t knows,” a clear majority — 58 percent — favors treating cannabis like tobacco or alcohol, according to the poll.

The data reveal some interesting patterns, according to the magazine. In every age group, more people favor legalization than oppose it.

The poll, covering a number of subjects besides marijuana, is available online here [PDF].

Download the NORML Daily Audio Stash for 2009-03-06

Download audio file (NORML_Daily_AudioStash_2009-03-06.mp3)

Today’s Stash:

• Hemp Headlines
  80-year-old Oregon woman booked, 68-year-old man shot and killed by police over marijuana
  Georgia kidney patient denied transplant by Blue Cross Blue Shield for marijuana use
  The Economist: “Prohibition has failed; legalization is the least bad solution”
• CelebStoner.com Report: Steve Bloom’s exclusive interview with B-Real of Cypress Hill and a discussion of female pot icons, who are they?
• Music: It’s a Rap on Friday – ‘Peter Pan’ by OddBallaz
• Dr. Earleywine Argues For The Use Of Medical Marijuana
• Ethan Nadelmann on Fox & Friends

Tonight I will be a guest on Cannabis Common Sense, which you can watch live on the intertubes at UStream.tv.  One hour live call-in show starts at 8pm Pacific / 11pm Eastern – phone number is 503-288-4448.  If you call in, tell the phone screener (Andrew) that “Radical” Russ loves the Cheese (it’s a double inside joke – I’m a Packers fan and I love a strain he grows called “Cheese” and I didn’t even know it was called that).  Or don’t, but call in anyway.  It will be fun to hear from Stashers nationwide. — “R”R

Next week ministers from around the world gather in Vienna to set international drug policy for the next decade. Like first-world-war generals, many will claim that all that is needed is more of the same. In fact the war on drugs has been a disaster, creating failed states in the developing world even as addiction has flourished in the rich world. By any sensible measure, this 100-year struggle has been illiberal, murderous and pointless. That is why The Economist continues to believe that the least bad policy is to legalise drugs.

“Least bad” does not mean good. Legalisation, though clearly better for producer countries, would bring (different) risks to consumer countries. As we outline below, many vulnerable drug-takers would suffer. But in our view, more would gain.

After pointing out the evidence of the Drug War’s failure to achieve “A drug free world by 2008″ as the UN’s general assembly crowed in 1998, The Economist points out:

This is not for want of effort. The United States alone spends some $40 billion each year on trying to eliminate the supply of drugs. It arrests 1.5m of its citizens each year for drug offences, locking up half a million of them; tougher drug laws are the main reason why one in five black American men spend some time behind bars. In the developing world blood is being shed at an astonishing rate. In Mexico more than 800 policemen and soldiers have been killed since December 2006 (and the annual overall death toll is running at over 6,000). This week yet another leader of a troubled drug-ridden country—Guinea Bissau—was assassinated.

The Economist then explains how legalization won’t be a tough sell at all in the producer countries, but it is faced with major political hurdles in the consumer countries:

That fear is based in large part on the presumption that more people would take drugs under a legal regime. That presumption may be wrong. There is no correlation between the harshness of drug laws and the incidence of drug-taking: citizens living under tough regimes (notably America but also Britain) take more drugs, not fewer. Embarrassed drug warriors blame this on alleged cultural differences, but even in fairly similar countries tough rules make little difference to the number of addicts: harsh Sweden and more liberal Norway have precisely the same addiction rates. Legalisation might reduce both supply (pushers by definition push) and demand (part of that dangerous thrill would go). Nobody knows for certain. But it is hard to argue that sales of any product that is made cheaper, safer and more widely available would fall. Any honest proponent of legalisation would be wise to assume that drug-taking as a whole would rise.

Here at NORML we promote the legalization of cannabis.  Other drugs should require other measures that take into account the addictiveness and socially destructive capabilities of those drugs.  I personally don’t believe those measures should include locking up addicts — prison is a lousy rehab — but I also don’t think a regulatory scheme that treats marijuana similar to alcohol would be appropriate for, say, cocaine, meth, or heroin.

But when you say the word “Legalization”, immediately people conjure visions of “Maui Wowie”, “Colombia Flake”, “Crystal Energy”, and “Super Smack” sold on convenience store shelves next to the 24-oz beers and junk food snack cakes.  “Legalization”, though, can mean marijuana in adults-only stores with IDs checked for age 21 and limits placed on amount purchased while it can also mean much more stringent restrictions on other drugs like prescriptions and pharmacies and tight controls.