Pubdate: Wed, 14 Oct 2015
Source: Sentinel Review (CN ON)
Copyright: 2015 Woodstock Sentinel Review
Contact: http://www.woodstocksentinelreview.com/letters
Website: http://www.woodstocksentinelreview.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2385
Author: Robert Sharpe
Page: A4

HARPER DELUSIONAL ABOUT MARIJUANA PROHIBITION

Ken Robertson seems to think the best way to protect children from 
drugs is to abdicate the responsibility of regulating drug sales to 
organized crime. That's the status quo. Liberal leader Justin Trudeau 
has the right idea with his proposal to tax and regulate marijuana 
and create age controls. Legally regulating marijuana sales would 
close the gateway to hard drugs by taking distribution out of the 
hands of criminals that sell cocaine, meth and heroin.

It's Prime Minister Stephen Harper that is delusion about marijuana, 
not Trudeau. Marijuana prohibition is dangerous, but the marijuana 
plant is less harmful than legal alcohol or tobacco. Former U.S. 
Surgeon General C. Everett Koop famously described tobacco as more 
addictive than heroin. Thanks to public education, legal tobacco use 
has declined dramatically, without any need to arrest smokers or 
imprison tobacco farmers. Mandatory minimum prison sentences, civil 
asset forfeiture, random drug testing and racial profiling are not 
the most cost-effective means of discouraging unhealthy choices.

Sincerely,

Robert Sharpe, MPA

Policy Analyst Common Sense for Drug Policy
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom