The reason the "war on drugs" should be abandoned is not because it is futile (although it is) and not because of the perverse behavioral incentives it looses (although it does this, too). Rather, it should be abolished because the behavior against which it is ultimately directed -- self-medication with a psychoactive drug -- does not reach that level of direct harm to another party that warrants criminalization. Many other self- indulgences can and do have a similar bad effect on participants, their lives, and perhaps their families, but these behaviors are not treated as crimes. It is true that a pragmatic cost- effectiveness analysis of drug legalization would probably show that any gains from relaxing law enforcement would be offset by losses in public health accounts; however, under such a scheme, the costs of drug abuse would appropriately be borne by the drug abuser rather than the society that must support and adapt to the law enforcement restrictions, abuses, and violence of the "war on drugs." 20 footnotes