Leonard Pitts Jr. says the move to extend clemency to nonviolent drug offenders may be Barack Obama's most transformative legacy.

It swallowed people up. That's what it really did, if you want to know the truth. It swallowed them up whole, swallowed them up by the millions.

In the process, it hollowed out communities, broke families, stranded hope. Politicians brayed that they were being "tough on crime" -as if anyone is really in favor of crime - as they imposed ever longer and more inflexible sentences for nonviolent drug offenses. But the "War on Drugs" didn't hurt drugs at all: Usage rose by 2,800 percent - that's not a typo - in the 40 years after it began in 1971. The "War" also made America the biggest jailer on Earth and drained a trillion dollars - still not a typo - from the treasury.

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Forget about going after the sellers of all the dope, meth, pills, illegal drugs. Why not arrest the users?

I'm really tired of all the rhetoric about drug users being the abused ones or victims. Understandably, some are born into the drug culture, but the fact is that most people choose to take illegal drugs. Seriously, the people buying and using these drugs are the ones causing such great damage to our country. They should all be punished. Let the drug users pay the price with being in jail or prison and not in rehab centers.

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Re: "Joint celebrations on 4/20 - Pot holiday was once underground; now it sees the lighters of day," Monday news story.

As I read my morning DMN, I ran across a story called "joint celebrations." The story itself was disgusting in the fact that there are that many potheads in America. More disgusting was the photo that accompanied the story. The picture of the pothead known by the street name "NJ Weedman" carrying a cross adorned with marijuana leaves is an insult to Christians everywhere.

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Re: "Heroin overdoses on rise - Crackdown on access to pills has fueled trend," Sunday news story.

Pictures DO speak louder than words in your story. Pictured just under the title is an addict with her starter drug - the one we know as tobacco. Indeed, tobacco leads to abuse of other drugs, including alcohol, marijuana, cocaine and heroin.

One solution to decrease drug usage would be to ban the tobacco drug, which kills 14,000 addicts and another 1,800 innocent people (who were exposed to toxic tobacco smoke) around the world, every day.

In the U.S., the tobacco pushers and their lethal drug cost our economy $200 billion every year. The solution is to eliminate this drug from society and prosecute the people who still push the killer weed.

Dave Johnson, Arlington

[end]

Our society can be better protected against crime, uncleanliness and otherwise despicable acts by getting rid of prohibition: a fallacious policy wanting of wishful thinking. Such policy has proven ineffective, inefficient and more troublesome than preventive. The 1920s era of prohibition ended in failure due to its creation of black markets, gang activity and crime; our current war on drugs does not conceptually differ.

These events are useful in that they show humans, by nature and whether we choose to accept it or not, are often times attracted to vice. Only a campaign of containment can eradicate the host of problems created by the policy of prohibition; just as a controlled fire is allowed only to burn certain areas of underbrush, we can control violators' choices by disallowing them the right to choose. Simple logic and empirical evidence provide that prohibition creates a black market where tax is not paid, behavior is not regulated and crime flourishes.

Additionally, prohibition does not discourage lawlessness but rather encourages it, resulting in substantial amounts of money being illegally made from which Big Brother will not see a dime, and taxpayers will bear no relief.

Blake Fowler, Paris

[end]

Colorado Governor Departs From Divisive Politics

At a time when ballot box success seems increasingly defined by alignment with the political extremes, Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper strikes us as the kind of centrist leader the nation's politicians could learn from. It's not so much his politics but the thoughtful, measured method of his delivery.

We didn't immediately identify Hickenlooper's party - he's a Democrat - - in hopes that readers of all political persuasions will read on. He's no liberal, especially when it comes to the biggest issue driving news from Colorado these days: marijuana legalization.

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Legal marijuana is spreading like a weed across the land, but it has yet to take root in the place where people might benefit most from inhaling: the U.S. Capitol.

The Maryland General Assembly finished work Monday on a marijuana decriminalization bill, joining two dozen other states and the district in some form of legalization. Colorado and Washington allow recreational pot, while most others have legalized only medical marijuana, but the combined campaign has redefined the meaning of a grass-roots movement.

[continues 655 words]

State House Panel Seeks To Curb The Trend

AUSTIN, Texas - Beyond the always illegal drugs that come through back alley deals on street corners, Texas has another drug problem: illicitly used prescription medication.

A state House committee in Austin met Monday to hear testimony on an issue House Speaker Rep. Joe Straus, R-San Antonio, laid out for lawmakers to address before the next legislative session.

The House Public Health Committee is looking to "recommend strategies to curb emerging substance abuse trends among children, pregnant women, and adults, as well as to reduce health care costs and mortality," according to the speaker's interim charge.

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Two high-ranking police lieutenants who were relieved of duty last year for alleged sexual harassment of female employees under their command have quietly retired with full benefits from the Houston Police Department.

Both officers previously had been disciplined for serious violations that could have resulted in their dismissals but were allowed to keep their jobs, HPD personnel records show.

Lt. Carl Gaines, 50, whose retirement in January still allows him to get his $87,675 yearly paycheck, admitted to harassing a number of women, both officers and civilians, at his post at the city dispatch center. One civilian employee was subjected to various physical contacts, and Gaines made a lewd gesture to a female police officer, city records show.

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DALLAS (AP) - Some states, including Texas, are reporting a rise in heroin use as many addicts shift from more costly and harder-to-get prescription opiates to this cheaper alternative. A look at what's happening in Texas:

Heroin overdose deaths have more than tripled in Texas during the last 15 years.

Drug smugglers use Texas' 1,200-mile border with Mexico to transport heroin that ends up in cities and rural towns all over the state.

While use of so-called "cheese heroin" - a mix of heroin and over-the-counter pills such as Tylenol PM - that was popular in the last decade has faded, cities across Texas are seeing higher uses of Mexican "black tar" heroin. It's a gummy substance that users dilute and inject, but can also smoke or snort.

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Re: "Don't let Colorado's pot experiment draw in kids" by Steve Blow, Thursday Metro column.

While I agree with Mr. Blow and his other commentators that keeping marijuana and other drugs away from teenagers is critically important, I strongly disagree with the idea implicit in his column that legalization works against this goal.

The nature of a black market, like that for drugs, is that nobody is turned away. Anyone who wishes to buy is constrained only by the morals of his chosen dealer. There is nothing now that keeps Texas teens, and indeed younger children, from buying pot or any other drug their dealer is selling. A legal market, on the other hand, allows for regulation at the source and makes it much harder for children to take part. We've already learned this with cigarettes and alcohol. Ask your teenage children which is easiest for them to get: pot, beer or cigarettes?

I don't know how the experiments going on in Colorado and Washington will work out, but if properly operated they will reduce black market sales, and concomitant access by teens.

Paul Miller, Lewisville

[end]

Colorado has legalized marijuana, and I'm glad. We need to try some new approaches to drug policy in this country, and if Colorado is willing to be the guinea pig, we should be grateful.

But here at home, we need to be careful that Colorado's experiment doesn't blur one very important fact.

Here, there and everywhere, teens should not be smoking marijuana.

Tina Clemmons is a prevention specialist for the Dallas Council on Alcohol and Drug Abuse. She has been hearing more and more parents dismiss concerns about their teens' drug use.

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Momentum Builds for Lone Star Legalization of Marijuana

For more than a decade, Austin Democratic state Rep. Elliott Naishtat has brought to his Capitol colleagues a modest proposal: Create an affirmative defense to prosecution on pot possession charges for seriously ill Texans.

For seven sessions now - that's every other year since 2001 - he's either authored or sponsored a measure that would give bona fide patients - those suffering, for example, from AIDS, multiple sclerosis, glaucoma, cancer - the ability to have a judge decide if a criminal charge for pot possession should be dismissed.

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I am one of few people alive today who lived through the days of Prohibition in the 1920s when the sale and consumption of alcohol was illegal.

With Prohibition in force, murderous Sicilian Mafia gangs controlled the illegal alcoholic beverage trade. When that law was repealed, Mafia kingpins like Al Capone disappeared from the American scene.

Now the so-called Mexican Mafia controls the marijuana trade, and their crimes against innocent civilians and children make the Sicilian Mafia look like a benevolent organization.

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Re: "Legalization will create monster," by Gary Schornick, and "Compare liquor, pot prohibitions," by Kent Kelley, Saturday Letters.

Schornick's letter is one of the most irrational circular arguments against legalization I've ever heard. His argument is that legalizing weed will simply cause the black market to push other illegal drugs in its place.

Schornick's reasoning is actually one of the strongest arguments one could possibly posit for the decriminalization of all drugs, not just marijuana.

When Prohibition was overturned in 1933, they didn't just legalize gin or just vodka, they legalized ALL alcoholic beverages.

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I read with much amusement all the articles and letters recently about legalizing marijuana and how legalizing pot will somehow end the drug war. If you believe that, you must be smoking way too much of the stuff.

People much smarter than you and me recognize the drug war as a chess match. If we legalize marijuana, then the cartels will simply start dumping cheap meth and black-tar heroin on the market and an entirely new generation of users will be created. You've solved one problem and created a whole new monster, another unintended consequence of feel-good policy.

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Kinky Friedman, Democratic primary candidate for Texas Agricultural Commissioner, visited Texas A&M on Monday to discuss his main campaign platform -- the end of marijuana and hemp prohibition in Texas -- with members of Texas Aggie Democrats.

At the student organization's meeting last night, Friedman expounded on the positive effects he hoped to bring to Texas through the legalization of marijuana and hemp and explained how he believes his policies would fortify Texas agriculture against drought, end the war on drugs and change cancer medicine.

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Re: Feb. 9 article, "Experts contemplate end of smoking."

I enjoyed the irony of the headline juxtaposed with a picture of a young woman puffing on her marijuana in Colorado. It made me think. Will "Big Tobacco" be supplanted by "Big Marijuana"? Will we see hashish cigarettes for sale at convenience stores? Will the packs carry the warning: "The President of the United States has determined that smoking dope is no worse for you than drinking alcohol?" Will it be OK for Bill Clinton to inhale now? Will there be THC patches to help those who want to quit, or e-buds with THC for those who want their fix without exposing others to secondhand high? The product and marketing opportunities seem endless!

Jonathan Dahm

Austin

[end]

I remember reading in an older article that Mark Davis warned if cannabis were legalized, the streets would be filled with drug-addled zombies. I called it the Bob Dylan retort - to paraphrase, "everybody might get stoned" - and it looks like he still believes that fallacy.

I'll concede that there would be more people sampling cannabis if it were legal, but I seriously doubt it would be more than a small percentage.

Mr. Davis also asserts that "the freedom to get high is nowhere in the Constitution, but this is: the right to aggregately pass laws to allow or disallow whatever we wish toward the goal of a better nation." Are you saying, Mr. Davis, that you espouse the progressive interpretation of the Constitution, that just because it says "promote the general welfare," "regulate commerce" or "necessary and proper," that the government has permission to make any laws it wants?

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Mark Davis' latest column, summed up: "I am a libertarian when it suits me, and not when it doesn't." In a piece stunningly devoid of logic, Davis regurgitates 1930s-style Reefer Madness "thinking" in arguing against marijuana legalization.

Now, I am not advocating for people to spark up, nor would I want my kids doing so. However, those at the "table of rational thought" (a phrase Davis invokes on his radio show) realize both that (1) people are going to use it anyway, and (2) according to polls, pot is easier for underage students to get than is alcohol.

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Mark Davis would get agreement from the world's experts on the fact that marijuana is not harmless. Combining 15 different scales, the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs ranked it the 8th most dangerous drug in The Lancet in 2010. They also ranked alcohol as the most dangerous drug by a wide margin over second-place heroin.

I have studied volumes of often obscure drug data from our government closely for 20 years. Most of the claims by Davis are not supported by the facts. It's difficult to imagine any significant increase in use when extensive surveys by Monitoring the Future, funded by the National Institutes of Health since 1975, report that 79 percent of those now aged 50 have tried marijuana and that marijuana has been "universally available" to teens for 40 years.

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Re: "Libertarians, you've lost me on weed - Name one societal benefit of legalizing marijuana, Mark Davis challenges. You can't." Wednesday Viewpoints.

At last, after more than a decade of columns from Mr. Davis (no relation), he has finally come down on the same side of an issue as me. No, not the one in his column's title, the isolationist policy of libertarians he mentions as the only two issues keeping him from whole-heartedly embracing their philosophy.

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EL PASO - It was not long after Gov. Rick Perry's remarks that states should enact their own marijuana laws that social media sites began wondering if the theory of relativity was a sham or whether Pink Floyd's estranged founder would finally rejoin the band.

"Don't be surprised when gravity partially reverses itself so people can fly and doctors finally find a cure for death," Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, a group seeking change in American drug policies, posted on Facebook in response to Mr. Perry's comments at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Mr. Perry spoke on a panel on incarceration, where he reiterated his support for Texas' drug courts, which were created in 2001 and are an alternative to prison for drug-related convictions.

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I try to be tolerant of other people's ignorance. I really do. However, when I read this Mark Davis column, it seriously taxes my goodwill.

How anybody, much less a person who writes for a living, can offer the argument that there's not a single social benefit to legalizing drugs, especially weed, leaves me struggling for words to articulate my level of disbelief.

Mr. Davis, do you honestly lack the intellectual capacity to understand that the criminalization cure is 100 times worse than the ill? Intrinsic contraband comes with a thousand negative liabilities to all of society, including the possibility drugs might be planted on innocent people.

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Police informant Lawrence Chapa begged for his life as he scurried into the sleeper section of his 18-wheeler. He tried to hide from the two gunmen who had opened the driver's side and passenger doors and were shouting at him to get out.

Moments later, the 53-year-old was killed in a hail of gunfire, shot at least eight times by two different guns.

"He panicked, started talking about his family and said he didn't want anything to happen," one of the alleged gunmen calmly testified Thursday. "He was petrified."

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Thank you to The Eagle for the Sunday editorial pointing out the dangerous folly of sending paramilitary units to do such routine police work as serving arrest warrants for non-violent charges.

Thousands of SWAT raids are carried out every year. When innocent people are shot or killed by mistake the practice is scrutinized briefly. Few in-depth studies of the long term effects have been made.

At the very least, routine use of SWAT raids cause the police to look at the general public as the enemy, not people they should protect and serve -- and the public to look on police as unhelpful and frightening.

If Washington County Sheriff Sgt. Investigator Adam Sowders' tragic death serves a purpose, it will be to cause other sheriff's departments to reassess the way they do their jobs.

Dallas

[end]

There is no question that the events near Snook in the early morning hours of Dec. 19 were tragic. What is equally clear is that 31-year-old Burleson County Sheriff Sgt. Investigator Adam Sowders didn't have to die. There was no need for the "no-knock" search warrant that law enforcement officials served on Henry "Hank" Magee that terrible morning.

Deputies were acting on a report from a jailed informant that Magee was growing marijuana plants inside his home off County Road 278. Further, the believed, Magee might have had possession of stolen weapons.

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Name One Societal Benefit of Legalizing Marijuana, Mark Davis Challenges. You Can't.

Libertarians are an odd bunch. I should know, because on many issues, I am one. But I've always identified two things that will keep them from full participation in the American mainstream.

One is the profound ill wisdom of isolationist foreign policy. The other is weed.

With the collapse of our national will to act as a force for good in the Middle East, libertarian energies are freed to pursue their other pet project, which accrues to our detriment: the notion that legalizing marijuana is a good thing.

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UTA student arrests in connection with marijuana possession have doubled since the fall semester, according to UTA Police.

Last semester, eight nonstudents and two students were arrested in connection with marijuana possession. This semester, five nonstudents and five students have been arrested in connection with possession, according to UTA crime logs.

"I can't necessarily say there is an increase in use, but we are seeing an increase in enforcement, an increase in coming into contact with violators and of course we're going to take action against those violators," assistant police chief Rick Gomez said.

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HOUSTON (AP) - A Houston man who once portrayed McGruff the Crime Dog has shown his commitment to crime-fighting apparently wasn't very deep.

John Morales was sentenced this week to 16 years and three months in federal prison on drug and weapons charges after police found more than 1,000 marijuana plants and 27 weapons, including grenade launchers, at two indoor farms.

Morales wore the McGruff costume for the Harris County Sheriff 's Association in the late 1990s.

A real crime dog - the drug-sniffing variety - detected pot plants in Morales' trunk after he was stopped for speeding in Galveston in 2011. Authorities say officers found a clipboard with maps to the indoor farms.

Defense attorney Ken Fesler II said Morales entered the drug trade to help sick relatives.

[end]

Last week I was thrilled to be offered a position with a local company and was instructed to complete a drug screening. I filled up with water so that I would be able to produce a sample only to find that it would be "about an hour" even though there were only 5 or so folks in the tiny waiting room. I was told that I could not leave the building nor use the restroom during this time.

I lasted about 15 minutes and begged the attendant to let me use the restroom so that I could start drinking water and be ready in 45 minutes. She repeated her original instructions and I was forced to demand my driver's license back and quickly find the nearest public restroom.

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Dear Editor,

Decriminalizing marijuana is inadequate ["Perry Chills on Pot Decriminalization," News, Jan. 31]. It's time to completely re-legalize the plant.

Another reason to stop caging responsible, adult cannabis users that doesn't get mentioned is because it's biblically correct, since God created all the seed-bearing plants, saying they're all good on literally the very first page of the Bible. A sane or moral argument to continue cannabis prohibition doesn't exist.

Stan White Dillon, Co.

[end]

With Severe Health Issues, State's Strict Laws, Some Feel It's Their Only Option

After calling Texas home for 30-plus years, Amber Loew plans to move her family in March from near Houston to Colorado Springs. Her 3-yearold, Hannah, has Dravet syndrome, a rare form of epilepsy that causes her more than 50 seizures a day.

"She's gone into respiratory failure twice at home in the last six weeks," Loew said. "We've tried just about everything. She's on 12 anti-seizure medications."

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N. Texans Getting in on High-Flying Industry's Action

"Come on in the store. We've got everything you could want. We got uppers, we got downers. We got laughers, we got screamers. We got sodas, we got edibles. We got light chocolates, we got dark chocolates. Whatever you want, we got it." - Sales spiel by "bud-tender" A. J. Walsh at Denver marijuana dispensary MMJ America

DENVER - Here in America's Amsterdam, even locals are still getting used to the idea that they can be open about purchases once made in secret.

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During a panel discussion last week at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland, Gov. Rick Perry made national headlines by saying not only that Washington and Colorado had every right to legalize pot, but also that he's long been a supporter of drug decriminalization policies in Texas. Oh, if it were only that simple.

Perry's comments, made on a panel with Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos and former United Nations Secretary Gen-eral Kofi Annan, reiterated his traditional "states' rights" stance.

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Editor:

Decriminalizing cannabis (marijuana) doesn't go far enough ("Perry defends states' right to legalize marijuana," Jan. 24). It's time to completely re-legalize the plant. Another reason to stop caging responsible adult cannabis users that doesn't get mentioned is that it's biblically correct since God (the Ecologian) created all the seed-bearing plants, saying they're all good on literally the very first page of the Bible.

A sane or moral argument to continue cannabis prohibition doesn't exist.

Stan White Dillon, Colo.

[end]

Regarding your thoughtful editorial "Growing up" (Page B8, Friday), there is a big difference between condoning marijuana use and protecting children from drugs.

Decriminalization acknowledges the social reality of marijuana and spares users criminal records. What's really needed is a legally regulated market with age controls. Separating the hard and soft drug markets is critical.

As long as violent drug cartels control marijuana distribution, consumers will come into contact with sellers of hard drugs like cocaine, meth and heroin. This "gateway" is a direct result of marijuana prohibition.

Taxing and regulating marijuana may send the wrong message to children, but I like to think the children are more important than the message.

Robert Sharpe, policy analyst, Common Sense for Drug Policy, Washington, D.C.

[end]

Cartels Will Remain Strong in Dysfunctional Nation, Says Alejandro Hope

Since Jan. 1, Colorado has had a legal marijuana market.

The same will soon be true in Washington state, once retail licenses are issued. Other states, such as California and Oregon, will probably follow suit over the next three years.

So does this creeping legalization of marijuana in the United States spell doom for the Mexican drug cartels?

Not quite.

The illegal marijuana trade provides Mexican organized crime with about $1.5 billion to $2 billion a year. That's not chump change, but according to a number of estimates it represents no more than a third of gross drug export revenue.

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Washington's and Colorado's legalization of recreational marijuana and President Barack Obama's recent comments in The New Yorker have reignited a marijuana legalization debate in Texas. The president's words were perfectly banal to anyone who has studied drug policy - "I don't think marijuana is more dangerous than alcohol;" I don't think it's a "good idea;" minorities are disproportionately punished; it's "a vice," etc.

In fact, academic research consistently finds that the health consequences of problem marijuana use are far lower than problem alcohol use. The president was actually understating the case.

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WASHINGTON - Cheap, low-quality Mexican marijuana is facing increased competition in Texas from Colorado's higher-potency pot, federal law enforcement officials say.

When it was legal to buy Colorado pot for medical use only, Texas was a favored destination - but now that Colorado has made personal use completely legal as of this year, state and federal law enforcement officials expect the smuggling into Texas will increase.

Texas ranked fourth among states as destinations for marijuana trafficked by highway in 2012 from Colorado, according to a Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking area (HIDTA) report. The report recorded 18 seizures in Texas of Colorado pot grown for the medical marijuana market.

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On a rare blessed Monday when I arrived home from my medical practice in time to watch the 5:30 p.m. news with my precocious 13-year-old daughter, I abruptly found myself engaged in a conversation that, as an American father, I never expected to have: Explaining to her why the president of the United States was wrong to tell us that marijuana use is "no more dangerous" than alcohol "in terms of its impact on the individual consumer" and "not very different from cigarettes."

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Legalization Rejected, but Lesser Sentences, Drug Courts Backed

Texas Gov. Rick Perry said Thursday that he favors decriminalizing marijuana use and lessening punishment for minor offenders as the nation moves toward a more moderate approach to pot use and two states have legalized the drug.

Perry's comments surprised some, since the governor has repeatedly criticized the Obama administration for not stepping up border enforcement to counter the power of Mexican drug trafficking cartels. Perry has also supported legislation that would mandate drug testing for Texans seeking unemployment benefits or public housing.

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The Harris County district attorney is wrong about which mind-altering drug is most widely used by young people: It's alcohol, a much more dangerous drug than marijuana. And because of its destructive effects, we once tried Prohibition. That really worked out well, didn't it? It made two-bit thugs like Chicago's Al Capone into rich and powerful men with lots of police and judges on his payroll. It also made Prohibition agent Eliot Ness use methods that were as violent and ruthless as Capone's in his version of the war on drugs. Sound familiar?

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Politicians Should Stop Treating Voters Like They're Kids When Discussing Drug Policy.

The fact is that the war on drugs has failed to reduce consumption by kids, and the prohibition on marijuana only encourages the rise of deadly drug dealers.

There eventually comes a point in life when parents start to tell the truth. The noble lies of parenting fall away - no, your face won't actually stay like that - and children are addressed as adults. Playing the chief executive's role as national father figure, President Barack Obama crossed that line with America in his recent interview with The New Yorker magazine editor David Remnick. After generations of a drug war mentality and "Just Say No" rhetoric, the president essentially admitted that our current laws against marijuana don't make sense.

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Regarding "DA: Obama's comments on pot reckless" (Page B1, Tuesday), the president's comments have greatly undermined my job as a parent to teach my children to stay away from drugs. A joint as harmless as a beer? How does a parent respond now? One more vice that the president recommends his daughters "avoid." Good for him, as the federal law still stands that it is still a crime to possess, smoke or deal marijuana. Or can his children experiment with this "not such a good thing" and, if caught, have the privilege of immunity?

[continues 70 words]

Says That States Should Be Able To Set Own Policies On Abortion, Gay Marriage And Marijuana Legalization.

AUSTIN - The Republican governor of Texas supporting less jail time for pot users?

Gov. Rick Perry, a staunch conservative, riled the Lone Star state Thursday when he told an audience at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that he supports the decriminalization - though not the legalization - of marijuana use.

"As the governor of the second-largest state in the country, what I can do is start us on policies that can start us on the road towards decriminalization" by introducing alternative "drug courts" that offer treatment and softer penalties for minor offenses, Perry said during an international panel on drug legalization at the summit.

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Regarding "DA: Obama's comments on pot reckless" (Page B1, Tuesday), Lloyd Oliver, a Democratic candidate for district attorney, said "I could sell a person a beer and it's a gateway to what: good Scotch whisky? Marijuana is simply a gateway drug."

I have an opinion based on 55 years of observation. I have lost two immediate family members due to drinking and driving. I watched three friends/neighbors literally drink themselves to death.

The tally for marijuana leading to other harder drugs, at least in my middle-class world, is a big, fat zero. To believe that alcohol is harmless is ignorant bliss. To believe marijuana is a bigger threat than alcohol to our youth is simply not true.

Ruth Dodson, Montgomery

[end]

Time to Decriminalize Marijuana, Ex-Toker Kathleen Parker Says

Everybody's doing it - confessing their youthful, pot-smoking ways - so here goes. I don't remember. Kidding, kidding. Anyone over 30 recognizes the old adage: If you remember the '60s, you weren't there. Nyuk-nyuk-nyuk.

It is true that marijuana smoking tends to affect one's short-term memory, but the good news is that, while stoned, one does relatively little worth remembering. At least that's my own recollection.

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The funds Kilgore police officers seize from local drug dealers eventually make it back to the community, reinvested in efforts to fight the drug trade here.

It turns criminals' illicit activities against them, Kilgore Police Chief Todd Hunter says, here and elsewhere.

"We're not in this for the money. It doesn't cover our cost of being involved as a task force participant," Hunter explained. "We're involved to impact the drug trade. One of the reasons you want to seize these funds is all about disruption of the drug organization. One of the ways we can disrupt them is remove the funds they have to operate.

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President Barack Obama's comment that marijuana is less dangerous than alcohol was a reckless statement that could encourage use of a harmful drug, Harris County District Attorney Devon Anderson said Monday.

"I adamantly disagree with the president," Anderson said in a news release. "According to a 2012 Drug Use and Health survey, marijuana is the number one drug that citizens over the age of 12 are addicted to or abuse. The negative effects of marijuana use on a developing brain can be permanent, and our president is recklessly giving what amounts to parental permission to our most impressionable citizens to break the law. Marijuana is creating deadly situations right here in Harris County."

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