Pubdate: Mon, 9 Nov 2009 Source: News Journal, The (Wilmington, DE) Copyright: 2009 The News Journal Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/1c6Xgdq3 Website: http://www.delawareonline.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/822 Author: Richard Schimelfenig FORGET ABOUT S.B. 94, IT'S TIME TO LEGALIZE MARIJUANA Delaware's Legislature is about to consider Senate Bill 94, which supposedly is intended to protect patients who may benefit from the medical use of marijuana. The bill is a farce. After intentionally removing glaucoma from the short list of protected patients, only seven diseases will qualify a patient for protection. Not covered are chronic pain, Crohn's disease and many, many other diseases for which marijuana provides relief. Worse yet, S.B. 94 will create several new anti-religious, anti-recreational use crimes. This will be nothing but a green light to law enforcement to start arresting marijuana consumers again, as these laws have done in every state that passed them. A couple of decades ago, over 8,000 people a year were arrested for marijuana offenses, and many were patients. Last year, according to the FBI, a few more than 200 were arrested, and none of them were patients. Instead of passing the stalking horse of S.B. 94, Delaware legislators need to make official the de facto legalization the state has been enjoying. Richard Schimelfenig Wilmington - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake