"With a socially conservative government in office since the beginning of this year, this process is only speeding up. A countrywide smoking ban (covering marijuana, too) will take effect in July 2008, likely degrading the coffee shops to mere selling counters. Last year Holland's health secretary even predicted the end of the Dutch exception. "The image of Holland as extremely tolerant toward drugs is less and less in keeping with reality," Hans Hoogervorst, who stepped down in February, told an international audience of addiction experts. "The climate in Holland has changed," adds MP Anker. "People are weary of the happy-clappy liberalism of the 1970s." (Anker's party has proposed shutting down Amsterdam's famous red-light district and converting it into a "second Montmartre," with restaurants and art galleries.)"
http://www.newsweek.com/id/57618/page/2