Still Lying to the End

David Murray, the alleged "chief scientist" at the White House drug czar's office, seems determined to end his tenure in a blaze of dishonesty. In a just-published article in New Scientist that examines the excellent Beckley Foundation Global Cannabis Commission report, Murray touts recent declines in U.S. teen marijuana use and claims, "In the absence of prohibition, it would have been difficult to achieve that."

That's nonsense, as we've already pointed out. As many U.S. teens currently smoke marijuana as smoke cigarettes, which are legal for adults. Since 1991, teen marijuana use has increased while teen cigarette smoking has dropped by nearly half.A good case can be made that a major reason for this has been a concerted campaign to curtail tobacco sales to persons under 18 -- a campaign that has only been possible because tobacco is legal, allowing producers and sellers to be regulated -- but at the very least, it demonstrates that prohibition for adults is not necessary to curb misuse of a substance by children.

A few months ago, a World Health Organization survey published in PLoS Medicine found that the U.S. and New Zealand to have the world's highest rates of marijuana use, despite having some of the world's strictest laws. Both the overall rate of use and use by age 15 in the U.S. were far higher than in the Netherlands, with its famously tolerant marijuana policies.

We still don't know who president-elect Barack  Obama will appoint to replace drug czar John Walters and his gang of hacks like Murray, but it's hard to imagine how he could do worse.