Pubdate: Sun, 11 Nov 2012
Source: Calgary Sun, The (CN AB)
Copyright: 2012 The Calgary Sun
Contact: http://www.calgarysun.com/letter-to-editor
Website: http://www.calgarysun.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/67
Author: Ian Robinson
Page: 71

HIGH TIME FOR CHANGE

"I've never had a problem with drugs. I've had a problem with the
police."

- - Keith Richards

The provincial government last week launched a consultation with cops
and communities around Alberta to see what they can do to eradicate
the production of a certain green, leafy substance popular among =C2=85
well.

Pretty much every demographic I know.

Couldn't we just heap a big pile of $100 bills in front of the
legislature and set it on fire instead?

It would have about as much effect and, at the very least, provide a
vivid illustration of the futility of the North American war on
unconventional entrepreneurial agriculture.

Plus, you know - unlike most of what happens at the legislature, it'd
be fun to watch.

The usual reasons for the war on drugs are always trotted out with
these kinds of announcements.

You know them by heart.

Grow-ops are bad because the operators steal power from the grid and
their neighbours.

The guy performing the jury-rigged electrical connection - "Hey dude,
red goes to red, right?" - got the job because he took a couple shop
classes in high school.

This increases the danger of fires like the $2 million debacle in
Citadel that saw five houses and 11 vehicles destroyed.

And oh yeah, let's not forget the spectre of violence, as competing
drug gangs try to shut one another down or rip each other off.

A terrible scourge that needs to be fought, right?

Not so much.

Because every negative aspect of the marijuana drug trade is the
result of its illegality.

If cultivating and selling marijuana were legal, the people who do it
wouldn't use firearms to compete.

They'd advertise.

They wouldn't turn residential homes into toxic waste dumps by hiding
their operations inside them.

They'd build greenhouses instead.

They wouldn't be stealing power from the grid.

They'd buy it.

They'd hire employees who would pay taxes on their
income.

The futility of trying to enforce marijuana law in this city is
staggering.

Cops told the Sun this week there are as many as 5,000 indoor
greenhouses in this city.

Crimestoppers fields tips from citizens about 500 of them
annually.

Between April and October of this year, cops got around to serving
warrants on =C2=85 just 54 of them.

Now I'm no math professor, but does that add up to
you?

The illegal drug market comprises nearly 10% of global
trade.

Marijuana cultivation alone is B.C.'s most lucrative agricultural
commodity.

Isn't it time we brought this crop out of the darkness and into the
light =C2=85 and taxed the hell out of it?

I'm no radical on this - more than half of Canadians want marijuana
legalized.

We have spent billions on this futile endeavour.

The Americans - whose laws have unfortunately driven much of this
nation's own drug policy - have spent an estimated $1 trillion since a
guy named Richard Nixon decided to launch the so-called War on Drugs.

The drug war hasn't just been bad for the bottom line of
governments.

It has caused the increased militarization of our police
forces.

Laws permitting asset seizures from people convicted of drug crimes
has introduced the profit motive into the worlds of law enforcement
and politics.

Law and order eroded

Those are both bad things.

Anti-drug laws amount to nothing more than price supports for drug
cartels.

Those laws are what make drugs profitable, so profitable that entire
nations have had their foundations of law and order eroded.

All this goes away if the war on drugs goes away.

And we can all quit calling Crimestoppers on our neighbours when their
windows fog up.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Matt