Pubdate: Thu, 15 May 2014
Source: Alibi (NM)
Copyright: 2014 Weekly Alibi
Contact:  http://alibi.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2313
Author: Don Schrader

FRONTLINES OF MARIJUANA REFORM

Dear Alibi,

I strongly support legalizing marijuana. Booze, cigarettes and
prescription drugs kill millions worldwide every year, but I know of
no one killed from using only marijuana.

In the 1970s I took some tokes offered me, but I have never bought,
never sold, never grown marijuana in my life.

If I had a disease where my only choices were a prescription drug or
medical marijuana, I would choose marijuana-no question.

Eating it raw or vaporizing it is healthier than smoking
it.

More than 4,000 years ago, a leading Chinese doctor recommended
marijuana for many of the same sicknesses doctors now prescribe it.
Marijuana has [at least] 75 unique healing ingredients not found in
any other plant. Marijuana is the single most versatile herbal remedy
on Earth. No other plant contains as wide a range of healing herbal
ingredients.

Marijuana can help cancer, PTSD, chronic pain, nausea, inflammation,
HIV/AIDS, Alzheimer's and other dementia, immunity, appetite,
glaucoma, Lou Gehrig's disease, peripheral neuropathy, anorexia,
hepatitis C, Crohn's disease, insomnia, arthritis, epilepsy,
Parkinson's, multiple sclerosis and hospice patients.

I damn the racist US drug war devastating low-income communities of
color. Far more African-American and Latino youth, percentage-wise,
get locked up for marijuana than Anglo youth, even though rates of use
are about the same. US hysteria against marijuana was rooted for
decades in racism against Mexicanos and African-Americans and also in
the greed of timber, petrochemical and drug companies.

The last three US presidents-Clinton, Bush and Obama-all admitted to
past use of marijuana. All three later were re-elected. If they had
grown up low income or non-white in the inner city, they all might
have lived in prison instead of the White House and in some states,
never have been allowed to vote for president [again for] the rest of
their lives-let alone become president!

Until marijuana is legal in New Mexico, I refuse to risk arrest,
court, fines and jail for myself or for whomever would sell marijuana
to me-if I were to use marijuana without being approved for medical
marijuana. I refuse to make my life more secretive and to increase my
fear of police.

Buying imported, illegal marijuana from Mexico pays for the drug gangs
to mass murder thousands of people in Mexico.

Except for the serious legal risks, I would infinitely prefer friends
using their own homegrown, organic marijuana instead of smoking any
cigarettes or drinking any booze.

I highly recommend these books-Marijuana Gateway to Health by Clint 
Werner, The Great Book of Hemp by Rowan Robinson and The New Jim Crow: 
Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander.

Don Schrader
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