Drug WarRant

[daksya]

The rejection of marijuana legalization measures is a result of the voting demographics, rather than a principled rejection, as I'll show below.

The result in Nevada went 44 to 56 in favor of legalization. Based on the CNN exit poll and data from the 2004 NSDUH (annual national drug use survey)

Age --- Prop. -- 'Yes' --- Ever MJ use
18-29 --- 12% --- 57% --- 53.1%
30-64 --- 71% --- 44% --- 48.8%
65+ ----- 17% --- 36% --- 5.8%
--- ---- 100% --- 44% --- 42.8%

As you can see, marijuana reform support closely parallels the demographics of lifetime exposure to marijuana. The 65+ group is unusual in two ways: they show dramatically lower marijuana lifetime use, which is anachronistic - it won't remain true of those who constitute the 65+ group 10-15 years from now. Secondly, they buck the trend and show significantly higher support than expected from their lifetime use. That can only rise as the group is reconstituted. Finally, the 30-64 support will increase as the current 18-29 group become part of that group.