Pubdate: Sat, 19 Oct 2013
Source: Daily Pilot (Costa Mesa, CA)
Column: It's A Gray Area
Copyright: 2013 Daily Pilot
Contact:  http://www.dailypilot.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/578
Author: James P. Gray
Note: JAMES P. GRAY is a retired Orange County Superior Court judge. He
lives in Newport Beach.

LEGALIZING POT WOULD SOLVE MANY ILLS

At the end of my Sept. 7 column, I asked you to respond to me about 
any area of importance to you, and I would show to your satisfaction 
how it was made worse by marijuana prohibition. So many of you took 
me up on my offer that I want to share my answers. So here goes:

Under our curent system, marijuana is the largest cash crop in 
California - No. 2 is grapes. But when a product like marijuana is 
made illegal, it is pushed underground. So these are some of the 
obvious and not so obvious results:

*There is no licensing, so we have no idea who is raising, packaging 
or selling what.

*The time and place of sales are left to illegal dealers.

*There is no quality control. So today many sellers lace their 
product with methamphetamines, so that they can make more money from 
their soon-to-be addicted customers. That does not happen with cigarettes.

*There are no age restrictions. As a result, it is easier for young 
people to buy marijuana than alcohol. Ask them yourself.

*The sellers of even legal medical marijuana are often prohibited 
from having bank accounts. So having large amounts of cash on the 
premises makes them prime candidates for robberies. This results in 
them arming themselves for their own protection, which results in 
more gun violence.

*The tougher we get on marijuana offenses, literally the softer we 
get on all other prosecutions. For example, today we have hundreds of 
thousands of arrests nationwide each year for marijuana violations, 
of which about 85% are for possession. This leaves fewer resources 
for the prosecution of offenses like robbery, rape and murder.

*Possessing or using marijuana puts many people on parole or 
probation back in jail or prison.

*Large illegal growers almost always raise their marijuana in our 
national forests, so their land cannot be confiscated by the 
government if they are caught. And because the growers have no 
concerns about environmental laws, they divert streams and otherwise 
pollute the land.

*The work ethic of our young people is being corrupted. Imagine a 
party of high school students on a summer evening. A well-known 
teenage marijuana seller is talking with another student who has a 
summer job. So how much money did you make this week flipping 
hamburgers or working at the car wash? $150? Boy are you a sucker, I 
can earn four times that much in an afternoon selling marijuana. And 
everyone there knows he is right.

*Juvenile street gangs are using the selling of marijuana as a 
recruiting tool. Effectively.

*Our farmers are prohibited from growing industrial hemp. Thus our 
merchants must import this versatile and valuable product from 
"radical" countries like Canada, where it is a billion-dollar 
industry. Hemp products can be used for making plywood, lacquer, fuel 
that is better than ethanol from corn, cloth that is more durable 
than cotton, seeds that are highly nutritious, rope and more. The 
hemp industry could revitalize many regions of our country.

*Loss of respect for the law. Today we see rampant hypocrisy in our 
laws, as shown by some people openly using marijuana without fear of 
prosecution, while others end up in jail. In addition, natural 
marijuana remains a Schedule I drug, which means it has no viable 
medical usage, while synthetic marijuana, known as Marinol, is a 
Schedule II drug, so it can legally be prescribed by a medical 
doctor. How can this happen? Because pharmaceutical companies can 
make money on Marinol but not on the natural substance.

*Huge tax revenues are being lost. Would you rather have these 
profits go to Mexican drug cartels and juvenile street gangs, or have 
them used to pay our firefighters and teachers and fix our highways? 
The California attorney general just last year prepared a ballot 
summary for an initiative that would treat marijuana like wine. It 
said our state would save tens of millions of dollars each year in 
enforcement costs and generate hundreds of millions of dollars in 
additional taxes if the initiative passed.

*This would be a victory for freedom by getting the government out of 
the business of deciding what adults can put into their bodies. Our 
health decisions are none of the government's business.

These are just some of the issues raised by your questions. I thought 
you would be interested in the answers.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom