RE: COLUMN--THE DRUG DEAL

Adults have failed to keep kids away from drugs, and failed to keep
drugs away from kids. The main reason is our gangster-subsidizing
drug prohibition laws. In a completely unregulated market, drugs are
easier to get than booze or tobacco. Many people worry that if we
were to suddenly legalize and regulate drugs like we do with alcohol,
it may 'increase availability'. Kids buy drugs at school! Inmates use
heroin! How could the public possibly have more access than they do now?

When it comes to educating kids about drugs, the police have zero
credibility! When one considers that junk food will kill many times
more Canadians than all illegal drugs combined, it is difficult to
think of any drug as the 'epidemic' that the media, government, and
police have hyped them into. We all live in a 'drug culture' that
glamourizes sex, power, fun, thrills, and risk-taking! Then we tell
kids not to do drugs?! Drugs of all kinds are all over TV and around
us in public - it is the cornerstone of our consumerism society!

As long as we advertise beer, fast cars, and Viagra during Hockey
Night In Canada, we are doomed to being hypocrites when it comes to
drug education! In the US, during the 1930s, alcohol was prohibited
much as drugs are today. Children had easy access to bootleg liquor
that blinded or killed more than a few. Gangsters ruled the streets
with machine guns, police became less and less effective as the
gangs, wealth and power grew, and government corruption was rampant.

Mothers, grandmothers, and teachers lobbied the government to
regulate alcohol so that it would be out of the hands of children.
They understood then when we criminalize a popular substance, we
create a black market than preys on children. How is it that people
from 70 years ago were so much smarter than we are today? Easy! They
didn't believe the police, government, school, and church balderdash
that says the only way to control drug use in society is with strict
criminal sanctions. And since we know for a fact that prohibition is
doing far more damage to users and society than the drugs themselves
ever could, who or what exactly, are the police trying to protect?

Russell Barth

Federal Medical Marijuana License Holder

Ottawa, ON