New Survey: Teens Drinking and Smoking Cigarettes Less, Smoking More Pot

If you wish to increase the popularity and availability of any mind-altering substance then all you have to do is ban it. Prohibition invariably increases usage rates (temptation of the "forbidden fruit" coupled with myriads of users very likely becoming dealers themselves) while legalized regulation restricts access to young people. Many of us have now finally wised up to the fact that the best avenue towards realistically dealing with drug use and addiction is through proper regulation, which is what we already do with alcohol & tobacco - two of our most dangerous mood altering substances. But for those of you whose ignorant minds traverse a fantasy plane of existence, you will no doubt remain sorely upset with any type of solution that does not seem to lead to the absurd and unattainable utopia of a drug free society. There is an irrefutable connection between drug prohibition and the crime, corruption, disease and death it causes. If you are not capable of understanding this connection, then maybe you're using something far stronger than the rest of us. Anybody 'halfway bright' and who's not psychologically challenged, should be capable of understanding, that it is not simply the demand for drugs that creates the mayhem, it is our refusal to let legal businesses meet that demand. No amount of money, police powers, weaponry, wishful thinking or pseudo-science will make our streets safer, only an end to prohibition can do that. How much longer are you willing to foolishly risk your own survival by continuing to ignore the obvious, historically confirmed solution? If you support prohibition you've helped trigger the worst crime wave in history. If you support prohibition you've helped escalate the number of people on welfare who can't find employment due to their felony status. If you support prohibition you've a helped create a black market with massive incentives to hook both adults and children alike. If you support prohibition you've helped to make these dangerous substances available in schools and prisons. If you support prohibition you've helped raise gang warfare to a level not seen since the days of alcohol bootlegging. If you support prohibition you've helped create the prison-for-profit synergy with drug lords. If you support prohibition you've helped remove many important civil liberties from those citizens you falsely claim to represent. If you support prohibition you've helped put previously unknown and contaminated drugs on the streets. If you support prohibition you've helped to escalate Theft, Muggings and Burglaries. If you support prohibition you've helped to divert scarce law-enforcement resources away from protecting your fellow citizens from the ever escalating violence against their person or property. If you support prohibition you've helped overcrowd the courts and prisons, thus making it increasingly impossible to curtail the people who are hurting and terrorizing others. If you support prohibition you've helped evolve local gangs into transnational enterprises with intricate power structures that reach into every corner of society, controlling vast swaths of territory with significant social and military resources at their disposal. If you support prohibition then prepare yourself for even more death, corruption, sickness, imprisonment, unemployment, foreclosed homes, and the complete loss of the rule of law and the Bill of Rights.