Slate -- Trick or Treatment - Teen drug programs turn curious teens into crackheads. By Maia Szalavitz

A 1998 study of nearly 150 teenagers treated in dozens of centers across the country found that there was 202 percent more crack abuse following treatment and a 13 percent increase in alcohol abuse. In other words, recent research suggests that parents and schools may be sending binge-drinking/social marijuana smokers off to treatment and getting back crackheads in their stead.

Do parents really want their pot-smoking, experimenting binge-drinkers (who are actually typically more moderate than their own parents were at their age) tossed into "therapy" with heroin injectors and told that they are powerless to resist?

We know the rich kids are getting out of jail time but do the programs they are placed in help them? Would a looser policy toward experimentation help?