Michigan is in deep financial trouble. That's common knowledge. Drastic times call for drastic solutions. That should be obvious, too. So, should we slash spending even further or raise taxes higher yet? Hard choices, either way.

There is a third option, however, that would both dramatically cut spending and raise large sums of new tax revenue.

The only question is, do the politicos in Michigan have the courage our grandparents demonstrated 75 years ago when faced with similar financial and criminal crisis? Legalize, tax and regulate marijuana.

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Kurt Vonnegut Jr. is up in heaven now. That's his favorite joke, he wrote in "A Man Without a Country."

He also wrote, "If I should die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph: 'The only proof he needed for the existence of God was music.' "

Thanks to Vonnegut, who died April 11 at 84, every Dogwood Fine Arts Festival since the first one in 1993 has been anti-climactic. That's because the first visiting author happened to be my literary John Lennon.

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Editor, The News:

With all due respect to my colleague Saginaw County Sheriff Charles Brown, we both know the use of alcohol causes the most demand for police services in Michigan. We both know it is the drug trade that causes nearly all the violence associated with illegal drugs. We both know this prohibition causes 75 percent of felony crime, and it funds terrorism.

I challenge him to state the positive benefits and explain how the "New Prohibition" is reducing crime, death, disease and drug use.

Howard J. Wooldridge

Bath Township

[end]

Editor, The News:

I have been following the work of the brave and principled law-enforcement officers at Law Enforcement Against Prohibition. Howard Woolbridge is trying to save the next generation from prison, disease and death. ("Theory: Safer to legalize drugs," The Saginaw News, April 14)

Whenever LEAP comes to a town to discuss drugs on an adult and responsible level, however, it seems as though Chief Chicken Little is right behind him, yelling, "The sky will fall if we try anything else!" That they have fat drug budgets and more from the bottomless, trillion dollar tax pit of prohibition isn't the point.

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Editor, The News:

Actually, Howard Wooldridge and Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, or LEAP, favor the re-legalization of all of our now illegal drugs.

For most of our nation's history there were no such things as illegal drugs. For most of our nation's history there was no such thing as "drug-related crime," or even drug dealers as we know them today.

The vast majority of our problems with illegal drugs are because certain (politically selected) drugs are illegal. Because the drugs are illegal, they are of unknown quality, unknown purity and unknown potency -- just like alcohol was when it was illegal. And just like alcohol was when it was illegal, our illegal drugs are unregulated, untaxed and controlled by criminals.

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I am curious why a couple who were making one of the most dangerous drugs for humans only got 30 days and 60 days in jail respectively ("Ex-supervisor's wife gets 60 days," Press, April 14). The state of Michigan lists manufacturing methamphetamine as a 20-year felony and/or a $25,000 fine. Even possession of methamphetamine is a 10-year felony and/or $15,000 fine.

Using methamphetamine is a one-year misdemeanor and/or $2,000 fine. With the amount of news coverage meth receives and the damage that methamphetamine causes to people's lives, one would think that people who make it should get longer than a month or two in jail. Especially people who have a position of trust in the community, as supervisor of a township in which the county is having to continually battle the methamphetamine problem.

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BURTON - Robert Berishaj, who has lived in this country since he was 9, is being deported from the United States.

Now, he's looking to Canada for help.

Berishaj, 27, on Wednesday was ordered to leave the United States by July 9 and give up his Social Security number, passport and working papers. The rest of his family, including his two brothers and parents, live in the U.S. legally, but a legal loophole and a 2003 misdemeanor marijuana conviction (later expunged from his record) have resulted in Berishaj being booted from the U.S.

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The federal government should legalize and regulate drugs for recreational and medical use because they are too dangerous to leave in the hands of criminals, a former Michigan lawman says.

Howard J. Wooldridge, a self-described education specialist in Washington, D.C., with the Boston-based Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, said a $1 trillion war against drugs since the 1970s has failed to stop the flow of narcotics into the nation and that many drugs often sell for less, are stronger and are more readily available than ever.

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To the Daily:

One reason to stop imprisoning responsible adults for using cannabis that wasn't mentioned in the Daily's article about Hash Bash (A less political Hash Bash, an Arquette cameo, 04/09/2007) is that it's Biblically correct. Christ God Our Father indicates that He created all the seed-bearing plants - saying they are all good - on literally the very first page of the Bible (Genesis 1:11-12 and 29-30). The only Biblical restriction placed on cannabis is that it is to be accepted with thankfulness (Timothy 4:1-5).

Stan White

Dillon, Colo.

[end]

Writer Visits

Dean Kuipers is visiting the Delton District Library, 330 N. Grove St., Delton at 6 p.m. Kuipers is the author of "Burning Rainbow Farm: How a Stoner Utopia Went Up in Smoke." There is no charge. 623-8040.

[end]

Groden Says Background Checks Needed

Anyone hired by St. Clair County in the future may be required to undergo a background check and drug test.

County Administrator Shaun Groden proposed the idea to the county Board of Commissioners to change the county's hiring policy.

Currently, very few county employees undergo any type of background check. The main exception is uniformed officials, such as sheriff department deputies and courthouse security personnel.

It is not known why the county never has had a policy on performing background checks on new hires.

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Fewer Than Usual Attend Pot Rally on Diag

Standing on the steps of the Hatcher Graduate Library, the site of countless activist speeches over the years, actor and director David Arquette addressed the Diag on Saturday afternoon.

As part of the 36th annual Hash Bash, Arquette was advocating for the legalization of marijuana.

"I got lighters, rolling papers and blunt papers I'll be passing out," Arquette said, drawing cheers from the crowd.

But his appearance had another, less activist purpose.

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Howard Wooldridge, retired police detective and representative of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP), will speak in a town hall style forum from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. April 11.

The presentation is designed to discuss the War on Drugs.

The public is welcome at this free event, being held at 105 South Kedzie Hall, at the corner of Farm Lane and Auditorium Road on the MSU campus.



[end]

Pro-Pot Event Gets Touch of Hollywood

The Hash Bash was cold and a little bit Hollywood Saturday.

Among the featured speakers this year was actor and director David Arquette, touring to promote his movie "The Tripper," which debuts April 20.

Arquette's words followed the theme of the 36th annual event, which emphasized the need to change laws to legalize marijuana.

"What we really should be fighting is violence" as a solution to solving our problems, Arquette told an enthusiastic crowd of more than 400. They endured freezing temperatures, wind and snow flurries for nearly an hour on the University of Michigan Diag Saturday.

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Facing a budget crisis, politicians want to cut the state prison budget. But how they want to do it is like cutting calories by washing down a dozen chocolate donuts with a diet Vernors. Michigan's bloated prison system is bankrupting the state. To fix it, the state must come up with better ideas than unplugging water coolers to save electricity.

Locking up a record 51,500 inmates costs nearly $2 billion a year. That's about $5 million a day -- more than taxpayers spend on higher education. Michigan imprisons 40% more people than other Great Lakes states that have less crime, taking an extra $500 million a year out of the state's general fund.

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Memorial for Pot Concocter Chef Ra Planned on Diag

Scores of pro-marijuana activists will gather on the University of Michigan Diag this Saturday for the 36th annual Hash Bash.

The event serves as an outlet for citizen protest against current marijuana laws, said Adam Brook, its organizer and master of ceremonies since 1989.

"It's a reminder that when you make a law we don't agree with, we're going to come out and let you know," Brook said.

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Thirty-five years ago, students couldn't RSVP to Hash Bash on Facebook.com - word-of-mouth and fliers were the only advertisements for the event. But the lack of easy, online publicity didn't stop scores of students from gathering for the first-ever Hash Bash during the first weekend of April in 1972.

The first Hash Bash was held as a celebration after the success of the "Free John Now" campaign that arouse in response to the incarceration of political activist and Ann Arbor local, John Sinclair.

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The Petoskey School Board needs to educate itself on the limitations of student drug testing. The U.S. Supreme Court made a terrible mistake when it created an exemption to the Constitution and ruled in favor of allowing drug tests for students in extracurricular activities. Student involvement in after-school activities like sports has been shown to reduce drug use. They keep kids busy during the hours they are most likely to get into trouble. Forcing students to undergo degrading urine tests as a prerequisite will only discourage participation.

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CASSOPOLIS - Cass District Library Tuesday announced that Dean Kuipers, author of "Burning Rainbow Farm," will pay a special visit to the library at 2 p.m. on Sunday, April 15, to talk about his writing experience, sign his book and answer guests' questions.

Kuipers has agreed to arrive an hour early to mingle and chat with guests before his presentation.

Refreshments will be provided for everyone's enjoyment.

Kuipers is visiting Cass District Library as part of the Library of Michigan's 2007 "Michigan Notable Authors Tour."

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Courier, Not Dealer, Faces Life Term

Don't confuse this with a call to legalize drugs or even to decriminalize them. The war on drugs is a just cause. Its tactics, though, can be cause for concern.

Veronica Miller is facing the possibility of life in prison. The 43-year-old Port Huron resident is charged with delivering a controlled substance - heroin - to Kim Larvins, who died of an overdose Feb. 9. The death of the 30-year-old Port Huron resident is a tragedy. Found unconscious Jan. 30 on the porch of Miller's Lapeer Avenue home, Larvins spent her last days comatose in a hospital until she died.

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