Regarding "Marijuana isn't necessarily safe to treat what ails us" (Page B13, Sunday), before David Murray, the senior fellow in the Center for Substance Abuse Policy Research, condemns using marijuana medically, he should ask, "What is marijuana?" The federal definition of "marihuana" is over 100 words long, but does not mention either THC, CBD or smoke.

He should know that there has been a bait-and-switch to advance a political agenda. It occurred about 44 years ago, when that definition was enacted into law, then temporarily placed into Schedule 1, thus precluding the studies he requires for validation.

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Re: =93Lower Sentences for Drugs =AD Commission right to offer reduced penalty,=94 Monday Editorials.

For the 50-year period spanning the 1920s to early 1970s, there were about 110 state and federal prisoners per 100,000 in the United States.

In 1973, President Richard Nixon created the Drug Enforcement Administration by executive order, thereby ushering in the modern war on drugs. State and federal prisoners now number about 700 per 100,000.

After release, these prisoners can be legally discriminated against for the rest of their lives. They can be refused employment, housing, education, government benefits and the right to vote.

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Reports repeatedly conclude habitual drug use in the United States is the root cause for children from Central America to illegally come here. The drug cartels there use violence to make them leave, or the children can stay and be killed.

The armed forces, several thousand law enforcement employees, miles of fences and walls, electronic and air spying, jails and deportation proceedings - all of these combined will not greatly alleviate this latest immigration problem we bring upon ourselves. Besides, all of them are a great waste of time, money and manpower except for those among us who want to make money by these means.

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Commission Right to Offer Reduced Penalty

America's effort to use our prisons to stem the illegal drug problem has largely failed. Incarceration of drug offenders has seen prison and jail populations skyrocket, even as public opinion has shifted away from harsh sentences for nonviolent drug crimes.

That's why the U.S. Sentencing Commission was right to decide this month that some 50,000 federal drug trafficking offenders could be eligible for reduced sentences. The amendment to federal sentencing guidelines, approved in April, is already in effect for offenders facing sentencing in the future, creating an issue of fairness: Why should the length of a sentence be determined by the date of sentencing?

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No one seems to want to face up to the bad policies and laws that have created our latest immigration problems on our southern border. Starting in 1937 with the prohibition of marijuana and all other recreational drugs thereafter, America has funded all the drug cartels in Mexico and Central and South America to such an extent that they are more powerful than the governments in those countries.

These cartels have destroyed the economies in these countries and created such violence and lawlessness that the refugees from these countries are fleeing here for safety and economic opportunity. Remember that alcohol prohibition fueled organized crime in America previous to this prohibition of drugs. We didn't seem to learn from the previous mistake. Easy, feel-good legislation is not always a good thing. We created this problem!

Gilbert White, Ennis

[end]

Good governance is about good stewardship. Government executives always should consider how best to use the government's vast assets, including personnel, money and materials.

In this light, continued opposition by the Drug Enforcement Administration to the legalization of cannabis - marijuana - is not only a losing battle but a waste of taxpayer money, particularly when the president, Congress and an increasing number of state legislatures are responding to the will of the people by decriminalizing nonviolent marijuana use and possession. Our federal tax dollars would be better spent by responding to the current widespread increase of heroin use in ways that will prevent continued abuse, reduce harm to users and provide for greater public safety.

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How much longer will it take before the United States declares a truce in the Drug War?

Without federal leadership, you can count on marijuana legalization to keep spreading one state at a time.

This latter-day prohibition is taking an immense toll. And the stakes ought to be low, given that mostAmericans don't want anyone jailed for being caught with small amounts of pot.

But it does require some courage to pipe up. So thank you, former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, for joining the swelling chorus that wants to see marijuana legalized.

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As a former educational professional, I've witnessed the negative social impacts and negative opportunity costs of cannabis prohibition. I observed these negative impacts while working with inner city youth; I also took note that these effects existed in my own suburban neighborhood. The world is our backyard. I began to observe how easy it was for teens to access cannabis on the illicit market and how many are left to endure life-altering criminal convictions. I examined the constant draining of tax dollars, all the while watching the expansion of violent criminal cartels.

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The measure, approved unanimously by the council, is symbolic.

The city has very little influence over whether the Legislature legalizes marijuana and it's considered unlikely to gain approval in the 2015 legislative session.

Only two speakers testified about the measure to the council, and both were in support.

In a sign of how non-controversial this issue is in left-leaning Austin, it was approved with no council discussion or debate as part of the consent agenda.

Council Members Bill Spelman and Mike Martinez, who sponsored the resolution, cited a Scripps-Howard poll that found 75 percent of Texans would support legislation allowing people with serious illnesses to use marijuana to treat themselves.

Supporters consider it an important step in the effort to legalize marijuana for medical use. Currently all forms of marijuana are illegal in Texas.

More than 20 states, including Colorado and California, have taken steps to legalize the use of marijuana for medical ailments, such as muscular dystrophy.

[end]

Re: June 9 commentary, "Pot isn't harmless; making it legal would be a disaster." I agree that legalizing cannabis would be a disaster for professional drug war cheerleader Calvina Fay because she would be unemployed. I'd like to add that the cannabis legalization issue is not whether cannabis is completely safe for everybody, including children and adolescents; it is not. The issue is freedom of choice for adults. Children have died from eating peanuts and peanut butter but we don't cage peanut growers, sellers or consumers. One in thirteen children suffer from food allergies, yet we have no foods that are outlawed. And the voters of Colorado and Washington state have decided that we should not cage cannabis growers, sellers or consumers. Texas adults have the freedom of choice of whether or not to consume legal alcohol. Shouldn't they have the same freedom of choice regarding legal cannabis?

MESA, ARIZ.

[end]

Re: June 9 commentary, "Pot isn't harmless; making it legal would be a disaster."

Calvina Fay is right about one thing. Like any drug, marijuana can be harmful if abused. Marijuana prohibition doesn't make the plant safer though. Prohibition opens up a gateway to hard drugs by granting a marijuana monopoly to drug cartels that also sell meth, cocaine and heroin. Like alcohol prohibition before it, marijuana prohibition has given rise to a youth-oriented black market. Drug cartels don't ID for age.

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A Texas teenager could face up to 99 years in prison for making and selling brownies infused with cannabis, despite the product being legal elsewhere in the United States.

Jacob Lavoro, 19, was arrested on April 14 after a neighbour smelled suspiciously pungent smoke and called the police. The authorities allege that after entering his apartment they found an illicit baking operation that included the brownies, a pound of cannabis, hash oil and US$1675 (NZ$1900) in cash.

His case is more serious because prosecutors can charge him based on the entire weight of the brownies' ingredients, which amounted to 660 grams, instead of just the weight of the oil, a substance that is more tightly controlled than ordinary cannabis buds. In Texas, possession of more than 400g of hash oil with intent to deliver can yield up to life in prison.

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If Cannabis Works, We Owe Our Veterans Access to This PTSD Treatment Option.

Post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, plagues many veterans in this country. The depression, anxiety and flashbacks typical of this disorder can make vets' adjustment back to civilian life difficult.

Some veterans say that marijuana helps alleviate symptoms of the disorder and may pose fewer long-term health risks than present treatment options such as opioid painkillers, antidepressants and sleeping pills. Some experts agree. "Legalizing cannabis for medical use won't restore missing limbs or heal skin scarred by fire, but it can help wounded veterans live a more normal life," William Martin, director of the drug policy program at Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy, maintains. Yet, right now in Texas, a vet who is suffering from PTSD and who uses marijuana to self-medicate is committing a crime.

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Police Were Allowed in Apartment by Resident, Arrest Warrant Says

GEORGETOWN- The case against Jacob Lavoro, who could face a steep sentence for allegedly making and selling pot brownies, should be thrown out because police never had a warrant to search his apartment, his lawyer said Thursday as supporters rallied outside a court hearing at the Williamson County Justice Center.

Police were responding in April to a tip from a neighbor complaining about marijuana smoke coming from Lavoro's Round Rock apartment when they arrived at his door announcing they were maintenance men, said Jack Holmes, Lavoro's lawyer. Even after someone opened the apartment door, police had no evidence that there were illegal substances inside, but they entered anyway, Holmes said.

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Re: "My bad trip on edible marijuana - Colorado coming to grips with darker side of legalizing pot for the public, says Maureen Dowd," Friday Viewpoints.

Naive marijuana users like Maureen Dowd may be in for an unpleasant surprise if they choose edibles as a means of experimenting with legal marijuana in Colorado. The delayed onset effects can be overpowering. Colorado should require warning labels. First-time users should be discouraged from trying marijuana in edible form. The horror stories coming out of Colorado obscure the fact that marijuana consumption is safer under legalization.

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Arkansas AG Approves Ballot Title for Proposed Constitutional Amendment

Come November, Arkansas voters could be the first in the South to decide whether or not to legalize marijuana for recreational use. Last week, Attorney General Dustin McDaniel certified the wording of a proposed state constitutional amendment called "The Arkansas Hemp and Cannabis Amendment."

The amendment would allow the "cultivation, distribution, sale and use of the cannabis plant" and all products derive from the plant throughout the state.

The Legislature would have the authority to regulate, but not ban pot in the state. Now all supporters have to do is gather more than 78,000 signatures of registered Arkansas voters to secure the proposal a spot on the November ballot. Not an easy task. But not impossible, either. Two other ballot initiates regarding legal marijuana could end up on the ballot as well. Both would legalize marijuana for medicinal purposes, not recreational.

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Radical shifts in public policy are far-reaching and have everlasting effects that may not be foreseen. Marijuana legalization is an extreme measure of policy reform and a dangerous social experiment. Policies should be implemented with public health and safety in the forefront. However, marijuana legalization seems to only benefit those who stand to profit.

Following the legalization of marijuana, Colorado and Washington have seen increases in drugged driving and marijuana use. Colorado experienced an infestation of "drug tourism."

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You might find yourself racing to the eye doctor if you picked up your newspaper and read "Governor Perry and the ACLU agree."

When the discussion is about marijuana, though, you'd be wasting your co-pay. In January, at an international conference in Switzerland, Perry said he supports softening penalties for pot users. He correctly pointed out that our state has been in the forefront of the movement to implement policies that provide sentencing alternatives such as drug courts and rehabilitation programs outside the prison setting.

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Colorado coming to grips with darker side of legalizing pot for the public, says Maureen Dowd

The caramel-chocolate-flavored candy bar looked so innocent, like the Sky Bars I used to love as a child. Sitting in my hotel room in Denver, I nibbled off the end and then, when nothing happened, nibbled some more. I figured if I was reporting on the social revolution rocking Colorado in January, the giddy culmination of pot Prohibition, I should try a taste of legal, edible pot from a local shop.

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FORT WORTH - Move over, GOP convention-goers, the marijuana reformists are in Cowtown, too.

The Dallas-Fort Worth chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws is hosting the second annual Texas Regional NORML Conference this weekend in downtown Fort Worth. More than 300 people are expected to attend.

A few blocks away, thousands of Republicans are attending the state party convention at the Fort Worth Convention Center. NORML organizers decided that this weekend was the ideal time to broach the issue, saying the stage is set for reform.

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