The passion swirling around the drug issue was the major surprise of the three-day Shadow Convention. The first day was devoted to reducing poverty, the third to campaign finance reform. But it was second day, devoted to calling for an end to the drug war, that created the most excitement.

Politicians like Jesse Jackson, Reps. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y. and Maxine Waters, D-Calif., plus California Republican Rep. Tom Campbell spoke to a packed and emotional audience about the costs of the war in human terms.

But Maher may well be the nation's most visible proponent for ending the drug war. He makes his case primarily on libertarian grounds, arguing that government has no right to regulate what goes on "inside people's heads." But this libertarian also feels strongly that parents should actively restrict their children's ability to use drugs, even to the point of permitting mandatory drug-testing in the schools.

Salon caught up with Maher on the day after his Shadow Convention speech. The contrast between his high-decibel TV persona and his quieter intensity in a one-on-one interview was striking.

What are your main objections to the drug war?

Well, No. 1: It's a dismal failure. What's that definition of fanaticism? Redoubling your efforts when they're going in the wrong direction. That seems to be what's going on. Where do I begin? The tremendous hypocrisy of demonizing certain mind-altering substances, while protecting and profiting from others. Also, using the argument that something is not good for children, and then taking it away from adults. We certainly don't do that with cars, or fire, or liquor, or 1,000 other things. What ever happened with telling your kids "This isn't for you"?

When I was at the Shadow Convention, I mentioned the connection between the drug war and campaign finance. The Partnership For a Drug-Free America really isn't for a drug-free America. It's a lobbying arm for the liquor and prescription drug industries. It's for an America free of the drugs that are in competition with those that are being protected legally.

I assume you're for treatment instead of incarceration, medical marijuana, and eliminating minimum sentences. But would you also decriminalize marijuana, cocaine, heroin, ecstasy, mushrooms, whatever?

Yes, I'm for the legalization of all drugs.

Including heroin?

Including heroin. Obviously, it's something you should only get with a prescription. I don't think it's something you should be able to buy on the street corner. But drugs are treated as a blanket evil, which is inherent in the term "drug war." That's our first problem, thinking of this as a war. Because a war is something that eventually is settled. Boom. And that's never going to happen. Drugs and the inclination of mankind to alter his consciousness, and to treat and medicate himself, is something that's been with us since the beginning of time and will never go away.

Why do you think pot is so attractive to so many people? What does it do for folks?

Well, if you're sick it's tremendously beneficent. It helps with appetite for cancer and AIDS patients, for people who can't get food down, people who don't have an appetite because of severe illness. It helps with glaucoma. I don't have any of these, but I know from people who do. My friend, Todd McCormack, who's in prison for medical marijuana, had cancer since he was a child. And marijuana is the only thing that eases his pain.

What about the average person? Why do so many people in our society like to take drugs? What is the attraction?

When I was in high school, one of my after-school jobs was for a liquor store. And I remember the owner of the liquor store used to say, "You know, we do good when times are bad, and we do good when times are good." Meaning you can use things to alleviate reality when things are bad, and you can use substances to heighten reality when things are good. The most interesting place you can ever travel is inside your own head. And if you've never even tried any drugs, then you're always staying home.

I don't recommend it to kids. I never even drank when I was in high school. And I think that's good, because you have to get used to reality before you start twisting it.

But for a government to step in and say to any of its citizens that what you do inside your own mind is illegal -- I can't think of a more private place than the inside of my head. And when they start messing with that, they are going against one of the basic ideas that this country is founded on, which is individual freedom and liberty.

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