ABC News has one of those classic pot propaganda pieces that relies on anecdotal accounts to sound the alarm about marijuana addiction. We learn the sad stories of a couple people who smoked way too much pot for way too long and ended up unhappy. Meanwhile, buried within all of this is the one relevant statistic that puts it all in perspective:

About 40 percent of all Americans aged 12 and older -- about 94 million -- have tried marijuana at least once, according to a 2003 survey by the National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA). Of those, about 3.6 million were daily users.

Overwhelmingly, people who try marijuana don't get "addicted" to it. They also don't go on to try harder drugs. They don’t get lung cancer, or psychosis, or any of the other horrible outcomes that are so commonly and shamelessly associated with America's most popular illegal drug.

Yet according to ABC News, marijuana is dangerously addictive, and worse still, it's the legalization movement's fault that people don't know how bad it is:

Since the 1970s, when marijuana was the symbol of political protest, the risks of marijuana dependency have been clouded by the legalization debate and long-held beliefs that the illicit drug is harmless.

Nonsense. The reason so many people think marijuana is safe is because they've tried it and it was safe.

Update: If you'd like to read some more about this ABC News story and why it's bad, then this post is for you.