Pubdate: Thu, 29 Aug 2002
Source: News Leader, The (VA)
Copyright: 2002 News Leader
Contact: http://www.newsleader.com/customerservice/contact.html
Website: http://www.newsleader.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1985
Author: John Paul Turner
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)

DECRIMINALIZING POT WOULD MAKE SENSE

I saw the "Teens say pot easier to buy than cigarettes" editorial cartoon 
by Jim McCloskey in last Friday's edition of The News Leader as being a 
wake-up call more than anything else. From my own personal observations, 
the kids are not buying the kind of high-grade pure marijuana which the 
University of Mississippi is growing for the government for its 
Compassionate Investigational New Drug program, but rather the street 
variety of it (if it is marijuana) that is often laced with impurities 
which make them sick rather than high.

Tobacco is a dangerous drug for both kids and adults alike. Prescription 
medicine with lethal side effects and alcohol poisoning come to mind, too.

No one has ever died from an overdose of uncontaminated marijuana. It is a 
safe drug when compared to other illegal ones on the black market. The 
government lifting its marijuana prohibition and letting the drug be 
manufactured with a filter like it does with nicotine cigarettes would make 
it a much safer drug. The decriminalization of its usage would be the most 
sensible way, as I see it, to curb the underage possession of alcohol by 
minors, as well.

JOHN PAUL TURNER

Churchville
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MAP posted-by: Beth