Pubdate: Thu, 13 Jul 2006
Source: FFWD (CN AB)
Copyright: 2006 FFWD
Contact:  http://www.ffwdweekly.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1194
Author: Amy Steele
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)

COME ON, JUST LEGALIZE IT!

Book Takes Readers Deep Into B.C.'S Lucrative Pot Kingdom

Bud Inc.: Inside Canada's Marijuana Industry

Ian Mulgrew Random House Canada, 287 pp.

In Bud Inc., Ian Mulgrew takes readers on a highly entertaining and 
fascinating ride through B.C.'s marijuana underworld. The book is 
populated with memorable, outlandish characters, and gives an 
intriguing glimpse into what has become a very large and profitable 
illegal industry for the province.

We meet the colourful B.C. Marijuana Party leader Marc Emery, whose 
life is described as "a constant stream-of-consciousness performance 
fuelled by marijuana," and various pot growers and entrepreneurs, 
including Don Briere, owner of Da Kine Cafe, an Amsterdam-style pot 
cafe that operated for months in Vancouver before being busted by police.

But the book isn't just entertaining. Mulgrew, who is a Vancouver Sun 
legal affairs columnist, makes a strong case for legalization, 
arguing that organized crime is benefiting from marijuana 
prohibition. Meanwhile, pot is turning thousands of generally 
law-abiding Canadian citizens who like to smoke it into criminals 
(Mulgrew writes that more than 600,000 Canadians have criminal 
records for marijuana possession).

In the book, Stephen Easton, an economist at the Fraser Institute, 
estimates the value of the marijuana industry in B.C. at $7.7 billion 
and in Canada at $19.5 billion in 2003. Easton agrees with Mulgrew 
that pot prohibition is doomed to failure, like alcohol prohibition, 
because there's such a large demand for it and therefore it's 
extremely lucrative.

Mulgrew argues that decriminalization is not the answer because it 
doesn't get rid of the lucrative black market, which organized crime 
is happy to take advantage of. Meanwhile, stiffer sentences for users 
and growers also don't make sense because of how pervasive marijuana use is.

Mulgrew also gives readers a crash course in the history of drug 
policy in Canada. Canada criminalized marijuana in 1923. Emily Murphy 
was one of the most "virulent" campaigners against the drug, and 
Mulgrew includes some absurd quotes from her book The Black Canada, 
which was all about marijuana.

"The addict loses all sense of moral responsibility. Addicts to this 
drug while under its influence are immune to pain and could be 
severely injured without having any realization of their condition. 
While in this condition they become raving maniacs and are liable to 
kill or indulge in any form of violence to other persons using the 
most savage methods of cruelty without, as said before, any sense of 
moral responsibility."

Mulgrew's book points out the complete lack of logic and rampant 
hypocrisy of Canada's current pot prohibition and is very relevant to 
Calgary, where grow-ops are exploding, and police and some municipal 
politicians are on a crusade against the "scourge" of marijuana. The 
drug war hasn't stopped drug use now, and it's unlikely that it's 
going to in the future, especially with a drug that has become so 
mainstream. Meanwhile, legalization would take away an easy, 
lucrative revenue source for organized crime. So why are we even 
debating whether or not to legalize it?
- ---
MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman