The Jan. 26 editorial cartoon by Steve Sack, depicting the relative numbers of grave sites necessitated by deaths due to alcohol, tobacco and marijuana, made this reader unsettled - not so much by what it said but by what it did not.

No, few deaths are attributable to marijuana in this country, but hundreds die brutally every year south of our border providing this product to U.S. consumers. Our country could end this "outsourcing" of death by legalizing marijuana (we grow some of the best pot in the world), capturing tax revenue from the legal sale of a homegrown product, and reducing the pain and suffering of chemotherapy patients by making marijuana available to those who need it. Prohibition of alcohol gave rise to organized crime in this country. Prohibition of marijuana has done the same in Mexico.

Benjamin Cherryhomes

Hastings

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It's obvious that Sack has never smoked pot, or he would know that you can get just as "drunk," so to speak, on marijuana, as you can on alcohol. I experimented with marijuana as a younger person and have indulged in drinking, as well. I know from both experiences that when you have enough of either drug, you are unable to drive safely. How does Sack know how many traffic deaths have been caused over the years by a stoned driver? I'd like to know where he's getting his figures in showing zero deaths from marijuana.

Mound

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Aristotle, by thought alone, concluded that women have fewer teeth than men. Don't make the same mistake about marijuana intoxication. Instead of just thinking, look at data and studies. You'll conclude that Sack's cartoon was on target.

St. Paul

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Before drug-testing welfare recipients ("Welfare drug tests challenged" Jan. 30), Minnesota might want to look at Florida's experience. Before the law was struck down, Florida tested 4,086 applicants, and 108 (2.6 percent) failed. Before Florida Republican U.S. Rep. Trey Radel resigned this week for cocaine possession, at least one out of 17 Florida Republicans in the U.S. House bought cocaine (6 percent). The odds favor testing House Republicans rather than welfare recipients.

JOHN SHERMAN, Moorhead, Minn.

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Some county officials insist the drug-testing mandate applies to such a tiny sliver of the welfare population that it's not worth the cost to administer. One legislator says that all truck drivers have to be drug-tested to keep their commercial driver's licenses. Note that word -"all." Is it worth it then, perhaps, to test all welfare recipients instead of a "tiny sliver"? Or, to use the administration cost viewpoint more broadly, why don't we tell our police agencies to not investigate burglaries and thefts using well-paid officers and detectives and prosecutors, and instead just subsidize victims for their losses? Given the millions of people in just the metro area and the probable fact that a "tiny sliver" or so are robbed or burgled, it sure seems to make sense, on a cost basis, not to pursue violators of the public peace and security. Sounds good to me, but then again, I just got off the potato boat.

MIKE AUSPOS, Ramsey

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An Unlikely Coalition Stands Poised to Fight for Legalization of the Natural Remedy

Joni Whiting runs a hand through her long, graying hair and pets the top of a rose-colored box that contains the ashes of her daughter Stephanie.

Spread out along Joni's couch in Jordan are the photographs detailing Stephanie's decline. The first one stars a bubbly teenage girl, and it's shot at such an angle as to make the mole on her pale cheek look like a mere shadow.

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DENVER -- Minnesota's drug laws have torn the Botker family in half.

Seven-year-old Greta Botker suffers from a rare, aggressive form of epilepsy. Seizures wracked her body a dozen or more times a day, and nothing -- not drug regimens, not special diets, not even brain surgery -- helped for long.

Then the Botkers heard that in Colorado, where marijuana is sold legally, a cannabis strain known as Charlotte's Web appeared to dramatically decrease seizure rates in children like Greta.

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Any astute observer of the American sociocultural scene cannot ignore the increasing popular momentum for the realistic, practical acceptance of a broad range of non-violent human behavior, whether it be sexual preference or the decriminalization of the sale, possession and use of marijuana as a "recreational" narcotic, comparable to the use of alcohol.

A growing number of states are legalizing weed, and I reflect upon my own experience in another age when I zealously became involved in the drug issue.

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The First Time Amelia Weaver Had a Seizure, at 18 Months Old, Doctors Said It Was Likely the Consequence of a High Fever.

HIBBING -- The first time Amelia Weaver had a seizure, at 18 months old, doctors said it was likely the consequence of a high fever.

Keep an eye on her when she has a fever, doctors told the Hibbing infant's parents, Angie and Josh Weaver, but it's probably nothing to worry about.

Amelia didn't have her next seizure until a year later. After that, she had so many that her mom stopped counting after she got to 1,000.

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I read the Jan. 19 editorial (Our View: "Medical marijuana measure not yet right for Minnesota"). I realize it was on the Opinion page, but holy cow, did the News Tribune leave its journalist hat at home when writing this? The editorial was nothing but anecdotes and statistics without context; it showed a complete lack of critical thinking.

Decriminalize marijuana and you eliminate the alleged crime around medical marijuana dispensaries or any shop because, unlike the synthetic crap, anyone can grow a plant.

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A Jan. 3 commentary was headlined "Marijuana use dulls the mind" and argued that marijuana is a gateway drug as well. Both of those statements are also true for alcohol, especially in regard to young users, and alcohol is a legal drug for adults.

I'm neither in favor of nor opposed to marijuana legalization. I do know this, though: If we had spent as much money and time and energy on eliminating poverty and making education better as we have on trying to stop the use of marijuana (including what we've spent on drug agencies, prisons and housing prisoners, and on drug enforcement agencies) we would've greatly reduced the pockets of poverty in our country. Not only that, but in doing so we would most probably have done a better job of reducing drug use and or crime.

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Dakota County Attorney James Backstrom should stick to his role: enforcing, not writing, the law ("Backstrom firmly against medical use of marijuana," Dec. 1)

Perhaps his most insulting claim is that marijuana is not medicine.

While it's true that marijuana has not gone through the Federal Drug Administration approval process, that's due to federal obstruction of research, not its lack of medicinal value.

Studies have shown marijuana is effective at treating several debilitating conditions, including wasting, intense nausea and intractable pain.

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County Attorney Says It Would Be a Mistake for Minnesota to Legalize Marijuana for Medical Use.

Expecting some state legislators to try again next year to legalize marijuana for medical uses, Dakota County Attorney James Backstrom has reaffirmed his position against it.

Backstrom, joined by Dakota County Sheriff Dave Bellows, held a forum and a news conference in West St. Paul Nov. 20 to oppose the legalization of marijuana for medical use as a danger to public health and safety.

"Minnesota law enforcement officers and prosecutors have significant empathy for anyone suffering the ill effects of the serious medical diseases and conditions that 'medical' marijuana legislation is claimed to be needed for, but we also experience on a daily basis the pain and suffering that is directly and indirectly attributable to the illegal cultivation, distribution and possession of marijuana," Backstrom said.

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An important aspect of the story about Gophers head football coach Jerry Kill's predicament has gone unreported. If Kill were coaching at Michigan or Oregon or back in his previous job in Illinois, his doctors could take advantage of laws in those states to see if marijuana could successfully control his seizures.

Marijuana is a natural herb, and in my view far less toxic than commonly prescribed anti-seizure pharmaceutical medications. For many patients it can be more effective. Wise physicians listen to what patients have learned. Scientists have shown the anti-convulsive properties of marijuana.

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Rich Stanek's priorities are wrong. Some 1,300 smokers died today because of cigarettes. Some 225 alcohol drinkers died today because of the alcohol or alcohol related accidents. It's likely that no one died today because of marijuana use. Let's get our priorities straight and quit spending more than $30,000 a year to lock up some marijuana offenders. The only two entities that benefit from outlawing marijuana are the drug dealers and the prison systems.

RICHARD BREITMAN, Minneapolis

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I have to chuckle a little, then shake my head in amazement at the letters sent in by people who think they know the drug world better than the people who work in it and fight against it, in this case Hennepin County Sheriff Rich Stanek ("Lax marijuana enforcement puts us on a dangerous road," Sept. 18).

The folks who wrote in and explained how legalizing marijuana would cut down on crime (Readers Write, Sept. 20) reminded me of a street person going into a bakery and explaining how dough rises to the baker. Some people just don't have a clue and need to leave this area to the experts.

MARILYN MANGAN, Mound

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At Least It Was for Me, Until It Was Put Out of Reach.

Though Minnesota has proven to be a progressive state, in the area of medical marijuana legalization it remains anchored in the past. I have been an MS sufferer for 35 years, and have used medical MJ for more than 20 - until this December past, when I became institutionalized. Its benefits are now forbidden to me.

It offered me relief from pain, inflammation, stress, cramps and insomnia, and since I have stopped using it, my pain level has increased from 2 to 6, along with the severity of other symptoms that make my challenging life much less bearable. I have had no withdrawals or ill effects, nor have I been desirous of taking even stronger forbidden substances since stopping its use. Of course, I am able to use legal chemical painkillers (which have side effects and are much less effective) and one Valium in the evening for cramps.

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In August, Attorney General Eric Holder signaled a striking change in federal narcotics policy.

For the first time in decades, the Department of Justice took concrete steps to reduce the use of long-term prison sentences in the fight against illegal drugs.

Holder seems to really believe in the cause, too; in an Aug. 12 speech to the American Bar Association, he asserted that "widespread incarceration at the federal, state, and local levels is both ineffective and unsustainable."

The bare fact that the attorney general of the United States is taking such a strong position would be more remarkable but for the fact that several states have already acted to reduce the long-term incarceration of nonviolent narcotics defendants. Even Rick Perry's Texas has already done the hard work of thinning the ranks of low-level drug offenders in Lone Star State prisons.

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You'll see plenty of politicians, parties and politics at the Minnesota State Fair. But keep walking up Cosgrove Street and you'll find the one fairground exhibit that tries to strip the partisanship out of politics to give visitors a bipartisan glimpse of the people in the People's House.

At side-by-side House and Senate exhibits in the fair's Education Building, visitors can touch a crumbling chunk of the Capitol facade; pose for a picture, gavel in hand, behind a model of the speaker of the House's podium; take a poll; and meet a lawmaker.

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Prosecutors Will Not File Criminal Charges Because the Hutchinson Officer Made the Disclosure With Immunity From Prosecution.

A Hutchinson police officer admitted to superiors last fall that he gave people marijuana as part of a state training exercise in Minneapolis, a month after prosecutors declared they lacked sufficient evidence to charge him.

The officer, Karl Willers, also told his department that between 30 and 40 percent of his training class distributed narcotics in order to perform observations, and that a coordinator of the program told them to get rid of the drugs after the allegations went public, according to a Hutchinson investigative report obtained through an open records request.

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