Let’s get this out of the way first: I have smoked marijuana before.

There, now I’ve said it, and some may want to call me a pothead and disregard my argument. Feel free to use the label — but do consider why marijuana should be legalized.

If nothing else, I think we should all agree that marijuana should be legalized for the potential medical benefits. (At this point, some may be formulating a heavy-handed lecture on the “perils” of drugs. To them, I say don’t bother. I have a member of my nuclear family in Narcotics Anonymous, and a relative of mine was recently arrested for methamphetamines, so the moral posturing is unnecessary. I’ve seen firsthand the worst that drugs can do.)

We should legalize marijuana in the same manner that alcohol is legal. We could all go to Iowa State cheaper from increased tax revenue, and businesses could grow just on the increased revenue from cookies.

The real question here isn’t why should we legalize pot; the question is: Why is pot illegal in the first place? Alcohol, cigarettes, fast food, gambling, pornography and strip bars are legal. Guns and ferocious animals are legal with the proper licenses. Boxing, drag racing, skydiving and hunting are legal. All are dangerous in their own way. But when two guys get off work and one has a Scotch and the other lights a joint, the first guy is accepted and the latter is jailed. That’s not right.

What sense does that make? What sense does it make to lump pot along with heroin in the Schedule I group of illegal substances as part of the Controlled Substances Act? (When you get a chance, Google “Harry J. Anslinger.”)

Here is where the strong anti-pot contingent pleads, “But pot is a gateway drug! It leads to things like cocaine, prostitution, murder, anarchy and eating all the Doritos!” Indeed, there might even be a few statistics to back up this little jab, and they’re correct. I do not recommend that anyone of any age or background smoke marijuana, and yes, many people who smoke it come into contact with other drugs and use them. But why this is the case? The answer is quite simple. Marijuana is illegal; therefore, to purchase it, one must get it on the black market, where you coincidentally find all those other delightful things and decide to try some.

The fatal flaw in that tired gateway argument is that the drug is not the problem. Marijuana is not the problem and neither is even heroin. We — Americans — are the problem. The real heart of the drug problem in America is not any one drug in particular or any one group of people. It is the way we view drugs. Does anybody else see the irony of people stuffing aspirin pills and antihistamines down their throats when they’re not sick while condemning pot at the same time? Drug companies like Pfizer are somehow holy, but we must spend federal dollars so the Drug Enforcement Administration can fly around in helicopters with flame throwers to destroy ditch weed that isn’t even smokable?

Last but not least, the medical marijuana issue is not going to go away. Trust me on this issue. Medical marijuana is the future. Now, no doctor is going to come forward and say that marijuana is completely harmless, because it isn’t, and nothing that you smoke will ever be. That’s the nature of smoke itself. But if patients and doctors want it for their treatments, why deny them? It’s cheap and apparently effective. We let people take morphine after surgery for the pain. Why can’t they have marijuana so they can eat after chemotherapy?

Don’t take my word for it. Just listen to Francis Young. In 1988, Young, the DEA’s administrative law judge, said that marijuana in its natural form is “one of the safest, therapeutically active substances known to man.”

It might be too early to dream of when we can ease the national debt with marijuana and brownie taxes, but I think we can all agree that the terminally ill deserve some options for treatment.