Pubdate: Sun, 16 Oct 2005 Source: Albany Democrat-Herald (OR) Copyright: 2005 Lee Enterprises Contact: http://www.mvonline.com/support/contact/DHedletters.php Website: http://www.democratherald.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/7 Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/opinion.htm (Opinion) WEIRD? AND YET WE LIKE OREGON On the page opposite, Bill O'Reilly does not have his facts quite right, but his main point is on the mark. The point is that with the recent sex-show ruling by the state Supreme Court, Oregon hammers home its national reputation of being slightly nuts. The court did not say that a ban on sex acts in public is unconstitutional. Its ruling concerned performances, if you can call them that, in private establishments open to adults, but not in public as in a park or on the street. Chances are the distinction is lost on most Americans in the other states. And that's fine, because the distinction really makes no sense. The court's ruling was based on the section of the Oregon Constitution that guarantees free speech. And by its very nature -- because nobody cares what anybody says in private where nobody can hear it -- the section guarantees free speech in public. So if it protects nude dancing or sex shows as a form of protected expression, then it necessarily protects them in public as well. The court hasn't had an occasion to go that far. But if it followed its own logic, it would have to uphold public performances of whatever it has said is covered by the protection of free speech or expression. Oregon also makes itself look silly with the law on medical marijuana. As of last July, some 11,100 people in Oregon had cards allowing them to possess medical marijuana. During the preceding year, the state had issued 17,663 patient and caregiver identification cards under the medical marijuana program. Nearly 10,000 of the card holders gave pain as one of the reasons for wanting the card. Everybody looking at those numbers has to suspect that in many cases the law is a sham -- a pretext for being allowed to smoke pot without legal liability. Nobody can prove this because you can't prove that somebody is not in pain. The only reason we have this law is that all the proponents of the initiative thought they could get voters to approve. Oregon might not be ready to make marijuana completely legal -- a refusal that keeps criminals in the business of dealing -- but it's no wonder that outsiders laugh at the phony half-way measure that we've put into law. Assisted suicide fits the pattern. The law makes sense from a humanitarian standpoint. But it's easy to make it sound unwise and cruel -- as allowing doctors to have a hand in dispatching unfortunate people when real medicine cannot help them. All of this fits in neatly with our refusal to allow self-service at gas stations, for which there is absolutely no justification from the standpoint of safety, but which we continue because we don't want to get out in the rain to pump our own gas. So yes, O'Reilly, ours is a peculiar state. But most of us, while disagreeing with particular peculiarities, still like it just fine.