TOPEKA - Dani, a 21-year-old from Wichita, suffers with depression, anxiety and stomach problems.

Marijuana helps her calm down, focus on important aspects of her life, and keep food down. She said it costs her about $20 every two weeks and is more effective than some of the prescription medications that she can't afford to maintain on a waitress' wage.

She recognizes that, in Kansas, smoking marijuana could create expensive legal problems, but she said she has found relatively safe ways to get weed without dealing with stereotypical drug dealers.

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It must be spring, because the pro-pot forces again have come out of hibernation and started to advance medical-excuse pot to the Legislature.

We now have the benefit of seeing the problems that arise in other medical pot states. A striking finding is that about 70 percent of registered medical-excuse pot smokers are young, but they use the excuse of pain in about 70 percent of their cases to obtain pot. Chronic pain outside of the pot community is typically rare in patients under 35.

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I'm troubled about recent articles regarding legalizing marijuana. Wake up and smell the ink on your reality check. If you ingest marijuana, the bill of self-destruction will come due.

Marijuana is the third most common recreational drug in America, second to alcohol and tobacco, and is the most commonly abused illicit drug. Its strength has increased 10 times since the 1970s. One form, cannabis, contains 400 chemicals.

Nicotine and carcinogens, key components that cause cancer, are found in marijuana. Its ingestion leads to distorted perception, impaired coordination, lowered intelligence, and difficulties with memory, learning, thinking, concentration and problem solving. It also reduces reaction time while driving. Family, work and school times are affected.

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To the editor:

Guatemala is one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere. Drug dealers, chiefly the especially nasty Zeta cartel, more and more are dominating both the economy and the political structure of the country. The drug trade and inter-cartel battles, infiltration of the governments, etc., are destroying Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras and is a serious danger to other Latin American countries.

We have spent billions attempting to keep illegal drugs out of the U.S. and we have failed. So what else can we do? When asked how we could help, President Colom of Guatemala suggested Americans could stop buying cocaine.

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I'm responding the the outstanding letter from Sherrod Greene, headlined "Pain solution."

I'd like to add that one of the medications prescribed by my personal physician for my arthritis pain and inflammation has the rare potential side effect of death. In other words, if I take this medication as prescribed, I can die as a result.

On the other hand, marijuana has never been documented to kill a single person in the 5,000-year history of its use.

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A bill that would allow people suffering from debilitating illnesses to use marijuana as part of their treatment was introduced in the state House this year, but didn't get out of committee.

Supporters said they will try again next year.

"If we regulate it and provide oversight, I think we can do it in a very controlled manner, and it would be beneficial for Kansas," said the bill's sponsor, Rep. Gail Finney, D-Wichita, who suffers from lupus.

Finney's bill, HB 2330, is in the Health and Human Services Committee and not expected to be considered in the wrap-up session that starts next week.

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I attend Baker University School of Nursing. The laws against medical marijuana and the complicated rigmarole that lobbyists have had to deal with has always baffled me, yet has become even more compelling since I began my nursing endeavors.

One primary responsibility of a nurse is to ensure that his or her patients' pain is minimized or eliminated. Therefore, why should we or the state and federal government deny those chronically and terminally ill patients with any treatment they desire to minimize their agony?

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Support for the drug war would end overnight if whites were incarcerated for drug offenses at the same rate as minorities ("War on drugs has been a disaster," Aug. 1 Opinion). Racially disproportionate incarceration rates are not the only cause for alarm.

Children of inmates are at risk of educational failure, joblessness, addiction and delinquency. Incarcerating nonviolent drug offenders with hardened criminals is the equivalent of providing them with a taxpayer-funded education in anti-social behavior.

Declare peace in the failed drug war and begin treating all substance abuse, legal or otherwise, as the public health problem it is. Thanks to public education efforts, legal tobacco use has steadily declined, without any need to criminalize smokers. 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 Policy analyst Common Sense for Drug Policy Washington, D.C.

[end]

To the editor:

I attend Baker University School of Nursing. The laws against medical marijuana and the complicated rigmarole that lobbyists have had to deal with have always baffled me, yet has become even more compelling since I began my nursing endeavors. One primary responsibility of a nurse is to ensure their patients' pain is minimized or eliminated. Why should we or the state/federal government deny chronically and terminally ill patients any treatment they desire to minimize their agony? Simply put, medical marijuana should be changed from a Schedule I substance to a Schedule II substance, thereby authorizing physicians to prescribe the drug in certain medical situations.

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In the background of a state-wide debate over legalization, about 50 students gathered Wednesday evening to hear about the effects and possibilities of medical marijuana.

Wichita doctor Jon Hauxwell spoke to students at Stauffer-Flint Hall about the benefits and drawbacks of medical pot.

"Any substance that is capable of altering human physiology in a good way is usually capable of altering it in a bad way," Hauxwell said.

Hauxwell, who kept his comments exclusively about medical marijuana use, spoke about two common ways of consuming marijuana -- by inhalation or eating. Inhaling marijuana, which is usally done by smoking it, helps individuals quickly determine their optimal dosage for relieving pain, he said.

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After being shot down several times in the past, legislation to legalize medical marijuana was filed again Feb. 15 in the Kansas House of Representatives.

The new bill, known as the Cannabis Compassion and Care Act, calls for the legalization of owning and using marijuana plants for those with "debilitating medical conditions," such as cancer, glaucoma, AIDS, hepatitis C and Crohn's disease. The bill was referred to the House Committee on Health and Human Services for debate.

Fifty-eight percent of adults in Kansas support the legalization of medical marijuana, according to a poll conducted last year by SurveryUSA and sponsored by KWCH, a Wichita-based TV station.

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If the Mexican government spent as much time and energy protecting its citizens from human traffickers and drug dealers as they do race-baiting the United States, maybe a lot of suffering could be avoided.

If you are worried about the Mexican people, ask the Mexican government what they are doing to protect their citizens. The answer is zero.

The fact is the Mexican government is selling its citizens out for cold hard U.S. cash. That's it in a nutshell - money. Mexican men, women and children are being abused, degraded and murdered by fellow Mexicans, all done with the complicity of the Calderon administration.

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Dear Editor,

Jillian Aramowicz hit the bull's-eye with her Dec. 2 column entitled, "Marijuana not as dangerous as most legal drugs." Marijuana should be legalized.

One way to legalize the relatively safe, extremely popular, God-given plant cannabis is to remove it from being a Schedule I substance alongside heroin, while meth and cocaine are only Schedule II substances.

Another reason to stop caging responsible adults who use cannabis that doesn't get mentioned is because it's biblically correct. God, the ecologician, indicates he created all the seed-bearing plants saying they are all good on literally the very first page (see Genesis 1:11-12 and 29-30). The only Biblical restriction placed on cannabis is to accept it with thankfulness (1 Timothy 4:1-5).

Truthfully,

Stan White

Dillon, Colorado

[end]

I sat on my couch for more than 30 minutes, trying to come up with a great introduction to segue into my actual argument for this column, but I really have no other way to start this than to just come out and say what I think: the federal government needs to legalize pot.

There. Now that I can officially be branded a stoner, a hippie, young liberal trash or a drug advocate -- none of which I actually am -- I can present a few reasonable, mature points as to why marijuana should be made legal for the good will and sake of American society, not because it just sounds like a fun thing to do.

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Imagine a society where marijuana, cocaine or heroin are free to ingest at any person's own discretion -- a country where all drugs are made legal.

"It would give us more personal freedom and personal choice on what we do with our bodies and our minds," said James Jacobs, a law professor at New York University.

Jacobs told audience members during a debate on the issue Wednesday night at Washburn University that the legalization of drugs would reduce racism, lower prison populations, slash organized crime and create a less intrusive government.

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It's been a long time since Nancy Reagan first spearheaded the first battle in the War on Drugs.

We've learned a lot of things since then.

Like Paris Hilton being a celebrity for, well, being a celebrity -- marijuana is bad, because it JUST IS, OKAY? And until America (and especially Lawrence -- yeah, that's right, I'm looking at you, Bloodshot Eyes) realizes this, puts down their hilariously named bongs and pipes, and picks up a brewsky instead, I will not stop.

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WICHITA, Kan. - A federal jury Thursday found a Kansas doctor and his wife guilty of conspiring to profit from illegally prescribing painkillers to dozens of patients who later died, in a case highlighting medical treatment of chronic pain sufferers and prescription drug abuse.

Dr. Stephen Schneider and his wife, Linda, were charged in a 34-count indictment with unlawful dispensing of drugs, health care fraud and money laundering. Jurors convicted them of a moneymaking conspiracy that prosecutors linked to 68 overdose deaths. They were directly charged in 21 of the deaths.

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"If it helps people, it should be legal. I don't believe it causes as much harm as people say it does." - Alexis Filippo, freshman in secondary education

"I would say yes, if it can help." - Matt Bane, senior in fine arts

"Yes, I do think it should be legalized for medicinal purposes. I've seen it first hand; my grandmother had cancer. I think there's overwhelming studies showing the benefits outweigh the negative impacts." - Brittany Smith, senior in social work

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The push for legalization of marijuana is becoming more of an issue lately with many states potentially having questions on their ballots this November regarding the legalization of the illegal drug. If you see a question about legalizing marijuana on your ballot this November or any other time, you should vote against it without a second thought.

Those who support legalizing the drug argue two points: first, that the extra taxes collected from sales revenue will help the U.S. economy, and second, that marijuana is not addictive or harmful. However, these notions are far from the truth.

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I never thought I would say this, but it is high time for the state of Kansas to consider legalizing marijuana.

Since graduating from the D.A.R.E. program in elementary school, my train of thought has always been this: drugs are bad, marijuana is a drug, marijuana ought to be illegal. End of story.

My right-of-center political ideology, which developed as I matured, closed my mind further. I saw marijuana users as hippie, peace-loving liberals. Reggae fans. Potheads.

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