Pubdate: Fri, 17 Nov 2006
Source: Kamloops This Week (CN BC)
Copyright: 2006 Kamloops This Week
Contact:  http://www.kamloopsthisweek.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1271
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v06/n1531/a09.html
Author: Russell Barth
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)

FOOLISH WAR ON DRUGS CREATED TO BE CONTINUOUS

Editor:

Re: Christopher Foulds' column of Nov. 12 ('Not all drugs are equal: 
How about legal pot?'):

Taking the pot business out of the hands of teens and criminals and 
putting it into the hands of responsible adults is socially conservative.

Generating tax revenue from that industry is fiscally conservative, 
and using that money to teach kids why they should avoid drugs is 
morally conservative.

Foulds wonders why the government won't legalize pot when it is 
clearly the "conservative" thing to do.

Since Al Capone had a lot of high-ranking law-enforcement and 
government officials on his payroll, that may offer a clue as to our 
current government's behaviour. Could the government be in cahoots 
with organized crime? It has happened before.

Or maybe the government wants to keep pot illegal so they can justify 
hiring more cops and building more jails.

If they legalized pot, crime would drop, alcohol and hard-drug use 
would drop, use of pharmaceuticals would drop, our federal budget 
surplus would go up and Canadians would start demanding social 
programs, decent schools and health care, and environmental cleanup.

When one considers that junk food will kill many times more Canadians 
than all illegal drugs combined, it is hard to think of drugs as the 
"epidemic" that the media, government, and police have hyped it into.

Yet they keep at it, and this convinces the public (who, for the most 
part, aren't really paying that close attention anyway) that it is 
absolutely necessary to have a cop on every street corner and to 
curtail civil rights and liberties.

Cops, government and gangsters get more money and more power, and the 
rest of us suffer. The war on drugs was never about drugs. It is a 
war on personal freedom.

And this war was never meant to be won - it was meant to be continuous.

Russell Barth

Federal Medical Marijuana License Holder

Ottawa
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman