POT PARTY CAN'T BE DISMISSED

Despite the easy jokes about Cheech and Chong, the Marijuana Party is
carving out a real niche in B.C.'s crowded political playing field.

The party isn't going to elect any candidates. But - like the Reform Party
- - the Marijuana Party is finding support from the disaffected and
disgruntled, the people who simply want less government in their lives.

And that's a large group.

Party leader Brian Taylor is a likable man, the right kind of leader for
the new party. He's a former mayor of Grand Forks, a 55-year-old who looks
more like a cowboy than a Rastafarian and talks more about the economic
aspects of the party platform than the miraculous benefits of all things
cannabis.

He ran for the NDP in 1983, against Bill Bennett. He lost, but he got
12,000 votes. On the day I caught up with him, he'd had a root canal in the
morning and was sitting down to write a eulogy for his father, who had died
of heart failure while Taylor was campaigning in northern B.C.

But Taylor set the work aside to talk about the party's election campaign,
surprising both for its success and the kind of supporters the party is
attracting.

Mixed in with the expected college students and aging hippies are
businesspeople and libertarians attracted by the Marijuana Party's
determination to kick government out of peoples' lives.

The party has attracted conservatives - including some senior Canadian
Alliance supporters - angry at everything from the health care
establishment to police anti-drug programs to bicycle helmet laws.

"Government is interfering in our lives everywhere," Taylor says. "What are
we doing telling some little old men riding bicycles to the store that they
have to wear funny looking hats?"

The most recent polls show the Marijuana Party running at three and four
per cent support; in most of the province it's ahead of the Unity Party.
That will translate into at least 60,000 British Columbians who opt for a
protest vote on May 16.

Only the Marijuana Party, Liberals and NDP have candidates in all 79
ridings. Eli Sopow's not surprised, and says the party's success is a
preview of days of protest that lie ahead. Sopow is a consultant, a former
reporter who worked in the last days of the Socred government.

He says the Liberals will face a difficult time governing a population
that's growing increasingly distrustful and resentful of institutional
authority.

He's prepared a report called Ticking, Clicking and Ready to Explode:
Middle-Aged Militants in British Columbia, that is based partly on a
provincial survey done in March. Sopow found the middle-aged masses have
lost faith in big government, big corporations and even big environmental
groups.

"They're like the guy in the movie," he said. "They're mad as hell and
they're not going to take it anymore."

And he found the mistrust isn't confined to the young or those on the fringe.

There was almost willingness to protest among those between 35 and 55 as
among students, and almost across the board people reported that they were
both more disgruntled and more militant now than they were a decade ago.
Those are the people the party is reaching.

Party president Marc Emery is a marijuana entrepreneur. He's running for
the party, but more importantly he's putting up most of the $250,000 in
funding. The Marijuana Party isn't seeking the left-wing vote, he says.

"Our theme is choices, options, tolerance," he said. "We're promoting
heavily in rural areas our opposition to Ottawa's gun registration scheme."

The Marijuana Party won't elect any members. But it may speak for people
who expect the government to do less, explain better and allow more choice.

And that's a movement the mainstream parties need to embrace, not ignore.