OPPOSITION TO MARIJUANA UP IN SMOKE

A few years ago, US politicians who dared to suggest anything other than
jail time for marijuana users were considered pro-drug fringe candidates.

Not anymore. Now all the major Democratic presidential candidates are
offering more lenient stands on medical marijuana, and White House hopeful
Ron Paul, a Texas Republican, has made ending the federal drug war a
centrepiece of his campaign.

"There has definitely been a change in the political climate for
liberalisation," says Tim Lynch, a criminal justice expert at the Cato
Institute, a Washington-based think tank. "I think the people are ahead of
the politicians, especially of the Washington, DC, politicians, on this issue."

Polls have consistently shown that Americans support marijuana for
medicinal purposes: a whopping 80 per cent said so in a 2002 Time/ CNN
survey. In the same poll, about a third approved total legalisation, but 72
per cent said recreational users should be fined, not incarcerated.

Even in Texas, where medical marijuana legislation has never got off the
ground, the legislature recently passed a law that allows prosecutors to
bypass the jail booking process for certain marijuana offenses. It doesn't
change the penalty, but the legislation marks Texas' first lenient approach
to marijuana in years.

Experts say the more tolerant approach has its origins in California, where
in 1996 voters made it legal for people to smoke marijuana with a doctor's
recommendation.

More than a decade later, 12 states permit some use of medical marijuana,
and several others, including Michigan, Arizona, New York and Illinois, are
likely to consider initiatives in 2008, says Bruce Mirken, spokesman for
the Marijuana Policy Project.

A ballot initiative in Massachusetts aims to go further by decriminalising
possession of small amounts of marijuana, making it similar to a traffic
ticket.

"I think in 10 years, people will look back at the laws that prevented
people from using marijuana as a medicine and say, 'What the hell were they
thinking?"' Mirken says.

Of course, not everybody is leaping on the bandwagon. All of the top
Republican presidential candidates have expressed opposition to the use of
medical marijuana, and the White House drug czar continues to sound the
alarm about making it legal under any circumstance, much as it was before
California voters approved the landmark referendum.

Research has shown that teen drug use has declined steeply nationwide. A
study released in December showed that illicit teen drug use has dropped
sharply from levels a decade earlier, with marijuana use in particular
showing steep declines.

In testimony before Congress last year, Dr David Murray, chief scientist in
the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, hailed the positive
trends among teens but said medical marijuana had sparked violence and
robberies in California. He also warned about the negative health effects
from inhaling smoked marijuana.

Murray described marijuana as "a substance without medical utility" and
expressed concern about the wave of state referenda allowing its use.

"The medical marijuana movement is at best a mistake, at worst, a
deception," Murray said. "The people pushing for this are cynically
manipulating tragic tales of suffering."

Don't tell that to Tim Timmons. The Garland, Texas, resident, who has
multiple sclerosis, says politicians are the ones manipulating the
marijuana issue to appear tough on crime.

Though he takes $US3,000 ($A3,380) worth of prescription drugs a month -
between 18 and 23 pills a day - he says marijuana is the only thing that
calms the debilitating spasms in his legs and lets him sleep at night.

Timmons has sent scores of letters to state lawmakers, inviting them to see
for themselves how marijuana visibly calms his spasms.

Otherwise, he has repeatedly issued this public challenge to state
lawmakers who oppose medical marijuana: take him to jail themselves if they
think what he's doing is wrong.

"Come arrest me. I'm here waiting for you," Timmons says, after smoking
marijuana from a pipe at his home. "You can put the handcuffs on me."