Pubdate: Sat, 14 Aug 2004
Source: Asheville Citizen-Times (NC)
Copyright: 2004 Asheville Citizen-Times
Contact:  http://www.citizen-times.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/863
Author: Herman J. Muenchen

MANY POSITIVE ASPECTS OF HEMP FARMING FOR U.S.

We are experiencing the following four problems that are interwoven.

1. Our so-called war on drugs is a complete, dismal and costly failure.

2. All we are doing is filling our jails with people who have committed 
minor crimes to alleviate their addiction which they cannot control.

3. We are paying farmers not to grow tobacco, while they are looking for a 
crop to grow successfully.

4. We are cutting down our forests to provide the paper we need for our 
daily newspapers.

I submit the following suggestions to solve all four problems:

1. Use the war-on-drugs money to set up drug treatment centers to provide 
the drug addicts with the drugs they need under a controlled program that 
will gradually reduce their need for the drugs.

2. Farmers will now be allowed to grow hemp to provide some of the drugs 
for the above program.

3. The hemp can also be used to manufacture the paper we need, plus other 
products like rope, and save our forests.

Hopefully some of our forward-thinking leaders will accept these ideas and 
act on them.

Herman J. Muenchen

Black Mountain 
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake