Pubdate: Sat, 17 Mar 2012
Source: Sun Herald (MS)
Copyright: 2012, The Sun Herald
Contact:  http://www.sunherald.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/432
Author: Liz Perkinson

IT'S UNFAIR AND CRUEL NOT TO LEGALIZE MEDICAL MARIJUANA

A big ditto to Wayne Parker's Letter to the Editor on Wednesday about 
the ludicrousness of imprisoning people for using medical marijuana. 
Jerry Withem is serving time for this offense. My sister takes 
prescription marijuana to treat her chemosymptom of nausea -- she is 
not incarcerated. This is the epitome of hypocrisy and an egregiously 
unjust scenario. But to take this one step further, why not just 
legalize all marijuana -- period?

It's been said the definition of insanity is doing the same thing 
over and over and expecting a different result. Case in point: 
Prohibition was declared a monumental failure, yet here we are 
repeating history. You can walk into a store and buy alcohol or 
cigarettes (either of which can cause of death or disability, but if 
you buy marijuana you are a criminal. Studies show pot to be less 
addictive and less harmful than alcohol and tobacco. (Sure, the drug 
companies wouldn't like the loss of revenue due to Marinol being off 
the market, but too bad.)

Think of all the prison beds that would be freed up, which would save 
bundles of taxpayer money and, also, the legal sale of pot would 
bring an influx of new tax revenue to communities. As a bonus, all 
the pot dealers would be out of business, which would reduce crime. 
Seems like a win-win to me.

We can only imagine how many celebrities and other rich folks smoke 
pot and will never see the inside of a jail cell. It's time our 
legislators get their sanctimonious heads out of the sand and do the 
right thing, because what we are currently doing is certainly unfair 
and downright cruel.

LIZ PERKINSON

Bay St. Louis
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MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart