Pubdate: Mon, 16 Oct 2000 Source: Duluth News-Tribune (MN) Copyright: 2000 Duluth News-Tribune Contact: 424 W. First St., Duluth, MN 55802 Website: http://www.duluthnews.com/ Forum: http://krwebx.infi.net/webxmulti/cgi-bin/WebX?duluth Authors: James Bovard and Joyce Nalepka Note: 2 OPEDs, one from each side of the issue Note: Bovard is the author of the just-published "Feeling Your Pain: The Explosion & Abuse of Government Power in the Clinton-Gore Years" Note: Nalepka is president of America Cares Inc. and Drug-Free Kids -- America's Challenge. IS NOW THE RIGHT TIME TO LEGALIZE MARIJUANA? YES, UNCLOG PRISONS, FIGHT REAL CRIME How much power should some people have to punish other people for politically incorrect habits? Since 1937, the U.S. government has been waging war against marijuana users. According to the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, 70-plus million Americans have used marijuana at least once in their lifetimes. Yet, the federal government still considers marijuana to be the Great Satan. Nearly 700,000 people were arrested for marijuana violations in 1998 - -- more people than were arrested for murder, rape, robbery and aggravated assault combined, as the National Organization for Reform of Marijuana Laws points out. Law enforcement resources are limited: The more time cops spend on marijuana crackdowns, the less time they have to protect Americans against violent predators. How many murders and rapes go unprosecuted because law enforcement is racking up impressive Vietnam-style body counts against potheads? Marijuana laws are more harmful than marijuana. A recent National Academy of Science study concluded: "Except for the harms associated with smoking, the adverse effects of marijuana use are within the range of effects tolerated for other medications." A 1999 study by the University of Toronto found that marijuana has far less adverse effect on drivers than does alcohol. The British medical journal Lancet editorialized in 1995 that "the smoking of cannabis, even long term, is not harmful to health." According to more than 100 published studies, marijuana can provide medical benefits to people suffering from multiple sclerosis, glaucoma, asthma, and the effects of a stroke. Marijuana is also invaluable for people suffering from chemotherapy or the effects of AIDS treatment. A 1999 Gallup poll found that almost three-quarters of Americans favored permitting the use of marijuana as medicine. Yet Drug Czar Gen. Barry McCaffrey ridicules claims of marijuana's medical benefit as "Cheech `n' Chong medicine." Most people who smoke marijuana do not do so for medicinal purpose -- unless one considers alleviation of tension or boredom or unhappiness as medicinal. Marijuana may have fewer side-effects than Prozac, Zolaft or other widely used anti-depressants. It is also debatable whether moderate marijuana use is more mind-numbing than an addiction to television. Excessive marijuana use can, like excessive alcohol consumption, sap a person's will and undermine the person's character. But simply because some substance is harmful in some circumstances does not justify allowing politicians to seize more power over everyone. The war on marijuana is dismally failing to protect children. The percentage of eighth-graders who used marijuana tripled between 1991 and 1997. More high school students (90 percent) reported that marijuana was "fairly easy" or "very easy" to get in 1998 than ever before, according to a federally funded anti-drug survey. There is no proof that legalizing marijuana would result in increased usage. Marijuana is legal for adults in the Netherlands. The percentage of Americans who have used marijuana during their lifetime, or in the last month, is more than double the percentage of Dutch who have used marijuana. Marijuana should be legalized. The same type of restrictions that currently prohibit the sale of alcohol to minors could be enforced as well on marijuana. The system would not be foolproof -- but it would certainly be far less ludicrous than the status quo. Yes, unclog prisons, fight real crime. Bovard is the author of the just-published "Feeling Your Pain: The Explosion & Abuse of Government Power in the Clinton-Gore Years" (St. Martin's Press). Send your views on this column or the one below to Letter to the Editor, by e-mail to or by mail to 424 W. First St., Duluth MN 55802. NO, MEDICAL MARIJUANA IS A HOAX Tell your congressman that you're among the 85 percent of Americans opposed to legalizing drugs. Help him or her understand there's a campaign of misinformation to legalize drugs beginning with the "marijuana cigarettes are medicine" hoax. We've fought drug legalization since l977 when "legalizers" were a few stoned disciples of LSD advocate Timothy Leary. We stopped them in l978 by defeating Rep. Newton Steers, a Maryland Republican who supported weaker drug controls. In fact, legalization was "dead" until the legalizers convinced four wealthy fat cats -- financier George Soros, Progressive Insurance CEO Peter Lewis, Apollo Group President John Sperling and Men's Warehouse CEO George Zimmerman -- that legalizing marijuana was the answer to America's drug problem. Soros and his cronies are pouring millions into misinformation campaigns aimed at passing state initiatives that would violate the Federal Controlled Substances Act. States simply do not have the authority to legalize marijuana, heroin and ecstasy, no matter how many signatures are gathered. The legalizers chose to support state initiatives knowing the U.S. Food and Drug Administration will not approve marijuana cigarettes as medicine. And voters, of course, aren't allowed to approve medicines. Under existing law, only the FDA has that authority. The National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) has led the legalization march. Concerned parents call its founder, Keith Stroup, the "Father of the Teen Marijuana Epidemic." And no wonder! In High Times, a magazine that chronicles the marijuana subculture, Stroup wrote that "there's no particular evidence that even those few young people who smoke a great deal of marijuana necessarily hurt their level of performance, academic or otherwise." Stroup also told a group of students at Atlanta's Emory University: "We're trying to get marijuana reclassified medically. If we do that, we'll be using the issue as a red herring to give marijuana a good name." The legalizers touted marijuana cigarettes as a medicine long after the National Institutes of Health warned: "People with HIV and others whose immune system is impaired should avoid marijuana use." Another legalizing group, the Drug Policy Foundation, recently merged with Soros' Lindesmith Center. DPF's idea of prevention was to develop a "safe crack smoking pipe." Apparently it's OK for crack to burn out your brain as long as it doesn't burn your lips in the process. Unfortunately, the efforts of anti-drug parents are no match for the likes of Soros and his associates. They've literally poured money into the campaign coffers of numerous politicians, including Vice President Al Gore. Gore, it should be noted, has withdrawn his support for the use of "medical marijuana cigarettes." He should return Soros' campaign contributions as well. Other prominent politicians backing legalization are Gov. Gary Johnson, R-N.M., and Rep. Tom Campbell, R-Calif., who is running for the Senate this fall against Democratic incumbent Dianne Feinstein. Americans should go to the polls next month and vote to send lawmakers who favor legalization into political exile where their bizarre ideas can't hurt America's children. That would be real harm reduction. Nalepka is president of America Cares Inc. and Drug-Free Kids -- America's Challenge. - --- MAP posted-by: Jo-D