Pubdate: Tue, 25 Jul 2000 Source: Evening Courier (UK) Copyright: 2000 The Halifax Courier Ltd. Contact: Mailbag, PO Box 19, Halifax, West Yorkshire HX1 2SF, England Fax: +44-(0)1422-260341 Website: http://www.halifaxcourier.co.uk/ Author: Myron Von Hollingsworth WHY LEADERS WON'T ACT OVER CANNABIS Cannabis has no lethal dose and its pharmacological effects have never caused a single death in over 5,000 years of recorded history. The unseen driving force against the medical or unrestricted adult legislation of cannabis is the fact that cannabis can't be patented. This precludes the need for big business to be involved and that fact makes cannabis commercially unattractive, pharmaceutically speaking. It seems that if it can't be profitised successfully the government can't justify legalisation, even for the sick and dying. Unfortunately a change in current policy of prohibition would necessitate that the alternative (legalisation) reap more profits, seen and unseen, than our present policy does. Maybe the politicians are required to adhere to the party line of prohibition because law enforcement, customs, the prison industrial complex, the drug testing industry, the INS, the CIA, the FBI, the DEA, the politicians themselves et al can't live without the budget justification, not to mention the invisible profits, bribery, corruption and forfeiture benefits that prohibition affords them. Myron Von Hollingsworth Malvey Avenue Fort Worth Texas U.S.A. - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake