POT-POURRI

69 - Percentage of Canadians who want an easing in Canadian laws against
marijuana (27 per cent recommend outright legalization, 42 per cent prefer
decriminalization).

4 - Estimated millions of Canadians who have tried marijuana at least once.
Most surveys indicate approximately 2.5 million Canadians currently
indulge.

30 - Percentage of Canadian pot smokers more than 30 years old.

10 - Estimated percentage of regular marijuana users who indicate their
habit affects their work or school life in some way. Similar figures have
arisen from studies of alcohol users.

40,000 - Estimated number of joints an individual would have to smoke in a
single sitting to provoke a lethal reaction.

75 - Percentage of drug users in the United States who are white.

75 - Percentage of drug prisoners in the united States who are black.

60 - Total number of "strokes of the paddle" ordered against six men
convicted at a marijuana trial in Vancouver in November, 1952. Canadian
press reported it to be the first time drug offenders were sentenced to
prison whippings.

10 - Days that cutest Beatle Paul McCartney spent in a Tokyo jail after his
arrest for marijuana possession.

37 - Number of marijuana cultivation charges laid by Toronto police in
1999. In the first eight months of 2000, 48 such charges have been laid,
double last year's rate.

2,600 - Number of marijuana possession charges in Toronto for 1999. In 1998
there were 2,100. This year, police have charged 2,000 people with
possession to the end of August, on pace for a total of 3,000.

3 - Estimated trillions of U.S. dollars invested in former U.S. president
Ronald Reagan's war on drugs during the first 12 years of the campaign.

35 - Average load, in pounds, of "B.C. Bud" smuggled into the U.S. by
hikers with backpacks. Law enforcement agencies on both sides of the border
peg the value of high-strength B.C. weed travelling south at more than $1
billion. But nobody really knows.

16 - Tonnes of hashish smuggled by ship from Beirut through the U.S. 6th
Fleet by Belleville import king Robert "Rosie" Rowbotham in early 1981.

200 - Different strains of marijuana seeds available by international mail
order from controversial Vancouver activist/entrepreneur Marc Emery, who
subscribes to the mantra "Overgrow the government."

200 - Estimated millions of U.S. dollars in annual sales for the fledgling
industrial hemp industry for products ranging from fabric to paper, animal
bedding to lip balm.

50 - Minimum number of candidates Canada's newly formed Marijuana Party
vows to field in the upcoming federal election. The single-issue
organization is running to promote decriminalization.

$35 - cost per half ounce of "legal alternative marijuana," as advertised
on the Internet. An independent study by Vancouver-based Cannabis Culture
magazine determined such products contain various blends of tightly pressed
nutmeg, catnip, peppermint, mullein and other inexpensive herbs. Each
sampling gave rise to a headache when smoked.

$2,500 - Going rate in Canadian dollars for a pound of high-quality
hydroponic "bud." An ounce averages $300.

$300,000 - Minimum bid price, in U.S. dollars, for the domain name
wesellmarijuana.com, recently offered on eBay. There were no offers.

[Newshawk note: the following appears in a sub-box in this boxed article.]

2800 B.C. - Approximate year of the first recorded reference to cannabis.
Chinese emperor and physician Shen-Nung recommended a hemp elixir for
treatment of beriberi, constipation, malaria, rheumatism, menstrual cramps,
postpartum depression and gout.

1798 - Year in which Napoleon Bonaparte's army, stranded in Egypt, acquired
a taste for hashish, eventually transporting the habit to France. The
scenario would be played out again 170 years later by Vietnam vets
returning to the United States.

1845 - Year Parisian notables Dr. Jacques-Joseph Moreau and writer
Theophile Gautier established the Club de Hashishins, dedicated to
exploring the non-medical value of cannabis. Arthur Rimbaud, Paul Verlaine
and Charles Baudelaire were among those drawn to the circle's bohemian
battle cry of "art for art's sake."

1936 - Year of the film Reefer Madness, the pre-eminent icon of anti-pot
propaganda, in which marijuana stars as the villainous agent in a downward
spiral of insanity and death.

1948 - Year in which the U.S. Federal Bureau of Narcotic drug czar Harry
Anslinger told a Senate committee that musicians were the primary target of
a no-holds-barred war on marijuana. "And I'm not speaking about good
musicians, but the jazz type," Anslinger railed.

1976 - Year of The Great Paraquat Scare, in which U.S. President Gerald
Ford ordered the powerful Vietnam-era defoliant sprayed by air assault on
Mexican marijuana fields. The raids gave a major boost to the grow-your-own
movement.

SOURCES: Centre for Addiction and Mental Health; Canadian Centre on
Substance Abuse; Lindesmith Center; Highlights: An Illustrated History of
Cannabis; Toronto Star archives; NORML; New York Times; Canadian Press;
Marijuana: The First Twelve Thousand Years; I Want To Take You Higher: The
Psychedelic Years.