Pubdate: Thu, 15 Oct 2015
Source: Toronto Sun (CN ON)
Copyright: 2015 Canoe Limited Partnership
Contact: http://www.torontosun.com/letter-to-editor
Website: http://torontosun.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/457
Author: Robert Sharpe
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v15/n566/a06.html

HARPER'S DELUSIONAL

Ken Robertson seems to think the best way to protect children from 
drugs is to abdicate the responsibility of regulating drug sales to 
organized crime ("Trudeau wrong on marijuana", Oct. 7). That's the 
status quo. Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau has the right idea with his 
proposal to tax and regulate marijuana and create age controls. 
Legally regulating marijuana sales would close the gateway to hard 
drugs by taking distribution out of the hands of criminals that sell 
cocaine, meth and heroin. It's Prime Minister Stephen Harper who is 
delusional about marijuana, not Trudeau. Marijuana prohibition is 
dangerous, but the marijuana plant is less harmful than legal alcohol 
or tobacco. Former U.S. surgeon general C. Everett Koop famously 
described tobacco as more addictive than heroin. Thanks to public 
education, legal tobacco use has declined dramatically, without any 
need to arrest smokers or imprison tobacco farmers. Mandatory minimum 
prison sentences, civil asset forfeiture, random drug testing and 
racial profiling are not the most cost-effective means of 
discouraging unhealthy choices.

Robert Sharpe, MPA

Policy Analyst

Common Sense for Drug Policy

(This idea that legalizing pot is going to be a magical solution is 
absurd. Ever heard of cigarette smuggling?)
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom