Thank you for making the case for drug decriminalization in the editorial "Descriminalizacao" (July 26).

There is a misguided effort underway nationwide to replace the punitive drug war with drug courts. This effort is effectively a war on non-corporate drugs funded by taxpayers and carried out with the heavy hand of a bloated criminal justice system. Drug courts use drug tests and the threat of jail to force illicit drug users to switch to legal alcohol or prescription pharmaceuticals, both of which are arguably more harmful than marijuana, the most popular illicit drug.

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The Sunday editorial "Descriminalizacao" on the war against drugs seems to confirm what I've been carrying on about for some time now. The war on drugs is an entirely misguided effort. We keep blaming the Mexican and Colombian cartels for the sale and use of drugs in this country. The fact of the matter is that the American people must take most of the blame for what is happening.

Readers of my letter who don't want to deal with this reality will write me off as being unpatriotic, but the real truth is that the American people have created the demand for drugs. Americans want drugs. We want cocaine, marijuana, meth and anything we can get our hands on. Drug cartels are simply supplying a product to a marketplace we have created.

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It's been a busy couple of weeks in America's futile War on Drugs. It's a war that can't be won, a war that makes billionaires of some of the world's most vicious criminals, a war that began 44 years ago and has cost more than $1 trillion.

It's time to think about what we as a nation are doing wrong. It's time to honestly face the facts.

Yes, we can and should let nonviolent drug offenders out of prison, as President Obama has advocated and some conservative states already have done, and as bipartisan legislation pending in Congress would do.

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As heroin use jumps in Springfield and throughout Missouri, the Show Me State stands alone in not having a prescription drug monitoring program - a key to curbing the drug's proliferation, according to federal experts.

Nationally, heroin use has been on the rise. It has become more prevalent among women and the middle class, and many of its users came to the narcotic after having first become addicted to prescription drugs, according to a recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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We have lost the War on Drugs and are now losing the battle for an emotionally stable society. The National Institute on Drug Abuse reports that 52 million Americans have used prescription drugs for nonmedical purposes, that 54 percent of such drugs are obtained free from friends and relatives, and that 62 percent of teens that abused prescription drugs did so because they are legal, cheap, easy to get and provide plausible deniability when caught. Americans consume 75 percent of the world's prescription drugs even though we only represent 5 percent of the world's population. We also have the world's largest percentage of population incarcerated for illegal drugs.

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Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon has commuted Jeff Mizanskey's life sentence for marijuana offenses, allowing him a parole hearing - an indication of the public and political shift on draconian drug laws.

ATLANTA - Back in the day, Jeff Mizanskey was a bit of a pothead, at least that's how the police in Sedalia, Mo., knew him. The third time Mr. Mizanskey got busted for weed - during a 1993 sting at a Super 8 motel - he lost his case at trial and received a mind-boggling punishment: Life in prison, with no chance of getting out.

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KANSAS CITY, MO. - Shona Banda says she had a clear choice: Live in misery or use medical marijuana to ease her Crohn's disease and risk going to jail.

Turned out to be an easy call for the Garden City, Kan., woman. She said her symptoms eased to the point where she could return to work and once again play with her young son.

But she didn't count on that same son, now 11, speaking out in school recently about the benefits of medical marijuana, including saying that it had saved his mother's life. School officials contacted police, who searched her house and found marijuana and cannabis oil.

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Katie Wightman argues against marijuana legalization (Don't legalize marijuana in Missouri, Dec. 11) on the basis of legal, criminal, and medical consequences. Legalization is designed to remove the criminal consequences. This will free police, prosecutors, courts, and jails to focus on more serious criminal problems and reduce the expenses involved.

The legal consequences Ms. Wightman advances are increased car accidents. Colorado saw a decrease in car fatalities in the first six month after legalization compared the average per month from 2002 to 2014.

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On Nov. 4, voters in Oregon and Alaska passed initiatives legalizing recreational marijuana. This, of course, follows Colorado and Washington state, whose voters did the same not long ago. The trend is obvious - and hardly surprising considering in a recent poll Americans said, by 56 percent to 44 percent, that marijuana should be legalized provided it is appropriately regulated, as with alcohol.

There is a great irony here. Just as the legalization trend accelerates, maybe to the point of being unstoppable, the accumulated medical and scientific evidence proving marijuana is in fact a dangerous drug is overwhelming. Here are some of the studies and useful facts:

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COLUMBIA - A civil liberties expert and a former drug law enforcement officer will weigh in on marijuana legalization during two talks at MU on Thursday.

The events will take place a week after marijuana law reform advocates filed an initiative petition to the Missouri Secretary of State for the 2016 ballot. Both events are free and open to the public.

The first presentation will be by Neill Franklin, national executive director of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, and will be held at 4:30 p.m. in Room 2-07 of the MU Agriculture Building. Franklin is also a former law enforcement officer who oversaw drug task forces with the Maryland State Police.

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Over the past two decades a silent epidemic has swept the nation, killing tens of thousands of people. The health care industry is quietly battling the problem of prescription drug abuse but has yet to make substantial progress. The release of long-acting opioid pain medications by drug companies has led to their use in the management of chronic pain. Though the management of chronic pain is not a direct misuse of the drug, the U.S. has seen a dramatic rise in opioid prescriptions: 402 percent between 1997 and 2007.

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A Persistent Scourge

Today we return to a continuing failure of American policy that is primarily responsible for illegal immigration troubles and criminal violence on our southern border -- the utterly failed U.S. war on drugs, which produces the world's most active black market and provides funding for murderous cartel traffickers in nations to our south.

Four-star Marine Gen. John Kelly, who heads the U.S. military's Southern Command, says homicide rates in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador are higher than in recognized combat zones like Afghanistan and the Democratic Republic of Congo. The Central American region has become a "killing zone" mainly because of the U.S. black market in drugs and "because of the insidiousness of the vast resources of kingpins. It's the malignant effects of immense drug trafficking through these non-consumer nations that is responsible for accelerating the breakdown in their national institutions ... and eventually their entire society, as evidenced today by the flow of children north and out of the conflictive transit zone."

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To the Editor:

In response to the letter encouraging us to support legalizing/decriminalizing drugs, I'll address the last point first-if the majority of prison inmates are incarcerated for drug offenses, it seems we are not losing the drug war.

Next-yes, society and alcohol have come to an understanding-alcohol purchase and usage require laws to protect us from drunk drivers and underage drinkers. We spend millions of dollars to rehabilitate alcoholics. The damage to their families is often not fixable. I think it would be difficult to convince the Missouri families of the 19 people killed July 4, 2013, plus those injured due to alcohol-related accidents that use of alcohol is under control.

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Springfield City Council members believed that they could work around the democratic process because they knew what was best for the city.

That arrogance has cost nearly a quarter-million dollars.

The city agreed to pay $225,000 to a group of marijuana activists in a settlement City Attorney Dan Wichmer called "in the best interest of all parties." In exchange for the payment, most of which will go to the plaintiffs' lawyer, petition sponsors Maranda Reynolds of Springfield, Show-Me Cannabis Regulation and American Victory Coalition will drop their lawsuit against the city.

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Missouri's marijuana laws made an inch of progress last month, but they are still among the strictest in the nation and yes, you can still get arrested for a joint. However, people with severe epilepsy will have better access to medicine and the severest marijuana penalty in the country has been somewhat taken off the books. In the omnibus crime bill that passed both the House and Senate and is now awaiting Governor Jay Nixon's signature, the most progressive change is a law that will allow patients with severe epilepsy to use cannabis oil for treatment. The bill passed unanimously in the Senate (32-0) and overwhelmingly in the House (130 to 12). One reason for the easy passage could be that patients can only use it after a doctor has recommended three other medications that have proven not to work effectively.

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Medical Extract to Treat Their Seizures Legal in Colorado

KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Otis Reed will soon move to Colorado so he can get marijuana every day.

No hurry. One night last week, he happily chomped on string cheese and broccoli. Well, spit broccoli out anyway, the florets landing on the toy frog in his lap.

Otis is 2. He and little ones like him have become the new face of America's discussion about marijuana. Forget Bill Maher and Willie Nelson for now - that's old weed thinking.

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SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (AP) - Springfield officials said they have reached an agreement in a lawsuit filed by groups trying to decriminalize possession of small amounts of marijuana.

However, neither side is disclosing the terms of the settlement until it is signed by all interested parties. The details are likely to be revealed in the next few weeks, The Springfield News-Leader reported.

City Attorney Dan Wichmer said the City Council approved the settlement during a closed session April 15. All court proceedings in the lawsuit were put on hold April 17.

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Attendees at the Missouri Cannabis Conference, held Saturday at the University of Missouri campus, agreed that simply by talking about marijuana they are benefitting the legalization movement.

The daylong conference - sponsored by several groups, including Show-Me Cannabis, NORML and the MU student chapter of NORML - included speakers ranging from a state legislator to national marijuana legalization advocates.

Mason Tvert, communications director for the Marijuana Policy Project, offered the keynote address. He said multiple times during his address that his experience is that the more people talk about an issue, the easier it is for them to understand and come to accept change.

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Otis Reed will soon move to Colorado so he can get marijuana every day.

No hurry. One night last week, he happily chomped on string cheese and broccoli. Well, spit broccoli out anyway, the florets landing on the toy frog in his lap.

Otis is 2. He and little ones like him have become the new face of America's discussion about marijuana. Forget Bill Maher and Willie Nelson for now - that's old weed thinking.

Now it's about kids who suffer hundreds of seizures every day because of epilepsy and other neurological disorders. A growing number of health professionals, buoyed by new research and positive results, say medical marijuana, specifically an oil extract called Charlotte's Web, can help those children.

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The Barry County Connections Coalition will host a town hall meeting, Think Again, this month in Monett.

The Wednesday, April 30 discussion will center around facts and myths about underage alcohol and drug abuse. The event will feature food, prizes and games, including an impaired driving simulator.

Guest speaker Chuck Daugherty, executive director of ACT Missouri, has more than 30 years of experience in prevention, intervention, treatment and recovery support to at-risk youth, adolescents and special needs populations in community-based and clinical settings. He is a national trainer for the National Alliance for Drug Endangered Children, and is chairman for the Missouri Alliance for Drug Endangered Children.

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