Pubdate: Tue, 19 Feb 2013
Source: Boston Herald (MA)
Copyright: 2013 The Boston Herald, Inc
Contact:  http://news.bostonherald.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/53
Note: Prints only very short LTEs.
Author: Margery Eagan

STATE WILL SOON GET WHIFF OF LEGALIZATION

Drag those bongs out of the closet and check out "perfect" pot 
brownie recipes at weedblog.com.

The Marijuana Policy Project - the national group behind much of the 
recent loosening of marijuana laws and the big pushers of full-blown 
legalization last year in Colorado - has its sights set on New England in 2013.

To legalize marijuana outright in Rhode Island and Maine. To 
decriminalize it in Vermont. To legalize medical marijuana in New 
Hampshire, where new Gov. Maggie Hassan, a Democrat, has voiced support.

And to push for complete legalization here in Massachusetts, perhaps 
via ballot initiative, in 2016.

"We've just won the first two victories in what'll be a long road," 
the marijuana group's Morgan Fox said yesterday, referring to 
legalization votes in Washington state as well as Colorado. "The 
wind's at our back now."

Said Bill Downing of the Massachusetts Cannabis Reform Coalition: 
"We've been working on this for 24 years and (legalization) would've 
passed had it been on the ballot in 2012. It's a huge money maker. 
Hundreds of millions of dollars. And cannabis is a lot less addicting 
than gambling."

Indeed, state Rep. Ellen Story, an Amherst Democrat, has repeatedly 
introduced marijuana reform bills, including one focused on allowing 
legitimate businesses instead of criminal syndicates to profit from 
its sale. Then the state could tax it, like cigarettes.

But Fox said yesterday that legislators traditionally "have been far 
behind" the public on liberalizing marijuana laws. Downing gave 
legalization "zero" chance of passing on Beacon Hill.

Yet he also cited results in November from nonbinding ballot 
questions in Berkshire, Middlesex and Suffolk counties that found 
voters approved full legalization of marijuana by at least a 
two-to-one ratio. And 63 percent of voters in the Bay State approved 
medical marijuana last fall, despite opposition from nearly everyone 
in law enforcement.

Cultural attitudes clearly have changed. Maybe that's because 
millions of so-called ' 70s pot heads turned into upstanding, 
taxpaying and pretty boring baby boomer parents and grandparents.

And those who continued using marijuana resented not only the 
government's hysterical rants against it but also the draconian laws 
that criminalized their Friday night recreational imbibing, in 
private, in their own homes.

Even Downing, whose cannabis reform group has been swimming upstream 
for a quarter of a century, now feels optimistic. "It's very exciting," he said.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom