A generation ago, the legalization of marijuana didn't generate much discussion beyond activists and college students. The vast majority of Americans just said no. According to a new Gallup poll, however, about 50 percent of those surveyed support legalization of marijuana - the first time that's happened since their researchers started asking the question back in 1969. What used to be an automatic "no" is becoming a much more open question. There are a few qualifiers, to be sure. The survey's margin of error was 4 percent. Statistician Nate Silver, who writes the influential FiveThirtyEight blog, says it's likely that marijuana's supporters are still in the minority, judging from other surveys conducted this year. [continues 371 words]
The Sociology Of Drug Dealing During the height of the crack epidemic, sociologist Sudhir Venkatesh went into one of the nation's most notorious housing projects, Chicago's Robert Taylor Homes, and learned how the drug economy worked by hanging out with a crack gang for a few years. "Gang Leader for a Day" tells how Venkatesh, then a graduate student at the University of Chicago, won the trust of a gang leader named J.T., who became his guide to the projects. Many readers may remember that Venkatesh's research helped form the basis for the chapter of "Freakonomics" dealing with why some drug dealers live with their mothers. "Gang Leader," too, gets into the day-to-day business realities of selling crack. [continues 788 words]
I imagine that several decades ago the conversation went something like this: "Hey, fellow pharmaceutical researchers, let's spend untold millions to synthetically replicate something with no known medical use, THC, the main chemical in marijuana. Then we'll get the FDA to study our patented synthetic replicate of something with no medical use and approve it for highly profitable sale as medicine." Then the new guy asks, "But haven't people been using marijuana for recreational, religious and medicinal purposes for thousands of years?" [continues 150 words]
June 1996. A Saturday night on the corner of 27th Street and Benton Boulevard. A police officer has shot a suspect after what looked like a drug deal. Soon, a crowd of more than 100 gathers; some begin to throw garbage at several dozen police carrying batons and shields. Young men turn over a car and set it on fire before the crowd disperses. The city buzzed about that melee for days. There were meetings. Editorials. And lots of talk about cleaning up the corner, where drugs were brazenly sold in the light of day. [continues 975 words]
Editor: Just heard on the TV that the street sweep on drugs and dope was working. What a laugh. That is just a good advertisement for the business. If there was not a good market for it on any particular street the market is still there. They might apprehend the ones selling it, but since there is a good market, new dealers will come right in since there is a good market for it in that particular area. It used to be the same way with bootleg legumes. They would catch the ones making and selling it. Everyone would get the news and know just where they could get a fruit jar. It just kept going around and what goes around comes back around. The suppliers would have their old T model Ford souped up. It would probably make 50 miles an hour on a good dirt road. If it did not kick up enough dirt to slow down the sheriff they would have a small pipe running to the hot exhaust pipe and would run some crude oil on it. It would create such a fog of smoke the sheriff would have to give up the chase. Boy those were the good old days. [continues 73 words]
Sgt. Dan Green believes in DARE, a prevention program in which police visit schools and teach students to avoid drugs and alcohol. Green oversees the Drug Abuse Resistance Education program for the Missouri Highway Patrol in 13 counties, coordinating more than 100 officers who address thousands of students each year. So when anyone questions DARE's effectiveness, Green is likely to counter with one question: Whom would people rather have their children learn the truth about drugs from -- their friends or a police officer? [continues 936 words]
More than 1,000 Americans die prematurely each day from tobacco use. Not only is this tolerated, but the U.S. government gives billions, with a B, of our tax dollars to tobacco farmers every year to ensure tobacco farmers stay in business. With this in mind, I can't understand why the government spends resources much needed elsewhere to pursue, prosecute, and imprison adults who grow and/or smoke marijuana. Adults who currently use marijuana don't deserve to be jailed. Adults who used it in the past deserve amnesty. Adults choosing to use marijuana in the future should not have to fear being jailed. [continues 122 words]
With this in mind, I can't understand why the government spends resources much needed elsewhere to pursue, prosecute, and imprison adults who grow and/or smoke marijuana. Adults who currently use marijuana don't deserve to be jailed. Adults who used it in the past deserve amnesty. Adults choosing to use marijuana in the future should not have to fear being jailed. The war on marijuana has brought us some police willing to use improperly issued warrants to conduct illegal searches, houses being seized on charges that are later dropped, warrantless intrusive searches by forward looking infrared helicopters, and lives and families being devastated by marijuana prohibition laws. It has even induced a former U.S. attorney for Alaska and our current governor to put into print statements about Proposition 5 that are easily proved as false. Both put into print that Proposition 5 requires restitution. Absolutely not true. Let's stop the lies and legalize. Join me in voting yes on Proposition 5 this Nov. 7. As always, voter apathy begets tyranny. James Garhart, "Lazy Mt. Jim", Wasilla [end]
I know them, you know them, we all know them. We know them as our coworkers, our neighbors, our friends, our families, and our loved ones. They include people we currently trust, people we admire, people we consider regular, decent folks. One day it is revealed that one of these people enjoys marijuana. That person is now transformed into someone to be taken from their job, their neighbors, their family, their loved ones, their freedom, and incarcerated, at our expense of course. The prisons are so overflowing with them that people convicted of serious crimes against others are often released early to make more and more room for pot smokers. This makes no sense. [continues 115 words]
