Earlier this summer, David Rozga, an 18-year-old teenager from Indianola, Iowa, committed suicide after smoking a substance called K2. This substance is a synthetic form of cannabis, which can be legally purchased in many Iowa stores, as well as many online sites, such as Amazon.com. The incident prompted the Iowa pharmaceutical board to place an emergency ban on K2, rendering it illegal for the time being.

It is indeed a sad story, and my condolences go out to the Rozga family.

However, let’s forget for a moment that any drug, whether it be alcohol, codeine or Cialis, can cause a negative reaction in certain human bodies — my girlfriend becomes violently ill from codeine.

Let’s forget for a moment that the mother of one of Rozga’s friends said that Rozga had been depressed for months and previously spoke of suicide, and that K2 probably exacerbated the situation.

Let’s forget for a moment that this 18-year-old teenager had access to a firearm, which he ultimately killed himself with, and that the firearm had as much to do with Rozga’s death as K2.

Let’s forget all this for one moment, and ask ourselves a few questions:

Why has there been so much attention given to this substance and this case — so much so that the substance is now illegal, when alcohol causes more crime, violence and death than K2 ever has and ever will? Why was there no uproar to make alcohol illegal after the death of ISU student, Raven Gileau? Why is there no uproar when drunk drivers kill innocent bystanders? Why is there no uproar when an intoxicated father beats his family?

In Iowa, and probably in almost every other state in the union, alcohol causes more crime than ALL other drugs combined — this fact can be found in the 2008 Uniform Crime Reports for Iowa on page 121; I invite you to look it up. To say there is a double standard here would be putting it mildly.

Our great country has serious inconsistencies about what it will allow to kill you. We ban drugs such as cannabis and K2 — drugs that you cannot overdose on, do not cause physical dependency, would cause fewer deaths and even be less of a factor in deaths than it somewhat causes, than alcohol — but we allow alcohol and guns to be legal.

To be clear, I am not proposing we outlaw alcohol or guns; I believe in liberty and education. In fact, these substances need to be legalized and regulated the same way as alcohol and guns. Each substance needs to be studied and thoroughly explained to the public; and the specifics of each law need to be adjusted accordingly to the specifics of each substance, just as laws regulating guns differ from laws regulating alcohol.

When you start to look at the facts of what the citizens of our nation, with 1 in 31 adults in the corrections system, more than 1 in 100 adults in jail and more people in federal prison for cannabis offenses than violent offenses — about 60 percent of all federal inmates are incarcerated for drug related offenses, and Iowa alone spent $44 million on cannabis prohibition in 2000.

When you start to look at what we are subjected to, you would be remiss not to shudder.

The saddest part is that nothing will likely change as long as we allow legal bribery in the form of political action committees, and as long as the alcohol, tobacco and pharmaceutical lobbies, which consider these illegal substances their competition, remain so powerful.

The only way reason will every triumph over corruption, obfuscation and ignorance, is if we never cease in hounding our politicians and corporately owned media. It may take a long time, but so long as we cherish our liberties, fiscally sound budgets and ultimately, our principles, the fight will be worth it.