Pubdate: Tue, 16 Jun 2015
Source: Honolulu Star-Advertiser (HI)
Copyright: 2015 Star Advertiser
Contact: 
http://www.staradvertiser.com/info/Star-Advertiser_Letter_to_the_Editor.html
Website: http://www.staradvertiser.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/5154
Author: Robert Sharpe
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v15/n320/a02.html

NOTHING NEW ABOUT LEGAL MARIJUANA

Rep. Marcus Oshiro is apparently content to recycle prohibitionist 
talking points without doing any background research ("For-profit 
marijuana will be dangerous," Star-Advertiser, Insight, June 14).

Legal marijuana is not a "new idea in the world." Marijuana has been 
safely used by humans for millennia. Marijuana prohibition is the new idea.

The first marijuana laws were enacted in response to Mexican 
immigration during the early 1900s, despite opposition from the 
American Medical Association. Prior to the federal Marihuana Tax Act 
of 1937 (sic), marijuana use was limited to border migrant 
communities and black jazz musicians in New Orleans. Dire warnings 
that marijuana inspires homicidal rages in dark-skinned minorities 
have been counterproductive at best.

White Americans did not start smoking marijuana until after our 
federal government began funding reefer madness propaganda.

The criminalization of Americans who prefer marijuana to martinis is 
a failed cultural inquisition, not an evidence-based public health campaign.

Robert Sharpe

Policy analyst, Common Sense for Drug Policy

Washington, D.C.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom