4 PUB LTES: MARIJUANA'S RELIEF, ETC.

Marijuana's relief:

Regarding Dr. Linda Bayer's Dec. 8 Op-ed page article "Drug 'legalizers'
make a weak case":

Every marijuana "legalizer" isn't some anti-government anti- establishment
anarchist! I love my country, but that doesn't mean I have to agree with
every single law on the books. Some laws are ridiculous and some are
unjust. Some were implemented in an effort to protect citizens, some
successful, some not. The laws regarding marijuana are highly unsuccessful,
locking up fine, otherwise law- abiding citizens; especially laws regarding
the medical use of the drug.

Why does Bayer have to clump every marijuana "legalizer" into a little
group of immature, ill-educated, confused teenagers with their heads in the
clouds about the 1960s?

I completely agree that marijuana should be thoroughly tested before
attempting to legalize it for medical purposes. But the U.S Drug
Enforcement Administration doesn't want it to be, nor do law enforcement
offices across the country - they make too much money busting marijuana users.

It is extremely hard for research institutes to obtain marijuana for
federal medical research because of the DEA. Something has to be done.
Researchers are capable of doing something good and right, and doing it
through the established governmental agencies too!

Also, the FDA's process of approving drugs doesn't fit well with marijuana.
Case in point, the "double-blind" test. This is where a drug is
administered to a patient and the patient isn't told if it is the real
thing or a "control" drug (one that has no effect on the patient). This
test is meant to take away the mental bias of the patients, so they can't
make a decision based on what they think they "like" and a true physical
analysis can be performed.

With marijuana, though, the patients obviously can tell if they are smoking
it or if it is in a pill form. And since the "smoking" of marijuana is what
actually gives the medicinal benefits, it's hard for researchers to come up
with a procedure for testing marijuana that the FDA will approve of.

Bayer's talk of Marinol as a medical marijuana alternative is simply false.
Marinol isn't nearly as effective to AIDS patients and chemotherapy
patients who suffer from extensive nausea and pain as is the smoked form of
marijuana. Some patients can't take the pills because they cough them back
up due to their nausea. Marinol also hasn't been very effective at treating
spasms as a result of spasticity either.

Bayer's article was vague and uninformative, but was a fine piece of
propaganda. That is what the Office of National Drug Control Policy {where
Bayer works} is for, I imagine.

Jason Rudisill

Raleigh

Once we were free:

Regarding "Drug 'legalizers' make a weak case":

The term should be "re-legalizer." Drugs of all sorts were legal for most
of the history of the United States. A more peaceful and affirmative place
it was, too, a place where people were heard to exclaim, "it's a free
country."

The "war" analogy in the "drug war" was introduced by Richard Nixon and
followed up by all those who have led the enforcement effort since.
Methinks they use the analogy to justify the casualties, the thousands of
peaceful people who get hurt in their war, people whose "crime" is that
their choice of habit is different from the majority's choice.

Linda Bayer argues against "medical" marijuana as if she had a study
supporting the medical benefits of putting sick people in jail. In fact,
the prohibitionists have long prevented any real study of the medical
benefits of marijuana. Bayer ignores the blatant fact that thousands of
sick people choose to risk arrest for the smoked, whole form of this
medication rather than obtain prescription "legal" Marinol. Why do they do
that? Is it that the intimidating tactics of the prohibitionists make a
fiction of Marinol's "legal" status for most people? Or maybe people too
nauseous to keep their medication down also can't use nausea medication in
pill form?

We libertarian re-legalizers don't fear a controlled study. Why do the
prohibitionists fear it?

Drug prohibition, like the failed alcohol prohibition, does not decrease
usage. Instead it drives use to more concentrated forms - whiskey and crack
instead of beer and marijuana. Prohibition also makes criminals of honest
people, makes opportunities for real, violent criminals and corrupts our
police and courts.

Join Libertarians and seek to end prohibition with the century that began
it. After all, "it's a free country!"

Tom Howe

Oxford

Strong backing:

Dr. Linda Bayer argued from emotion and failed to provide hard facts
regarding the controversial subject of medical marijuana legalization.

Bayer argues that since an equally effective drug, Marinol, has been
available along with newer drugs such as Ondansetron and Genisetron, there
is no need to legalize "medicinal marijuana." Wrong! These drugs are used
only as anti-emetics and anti-nausea agents. They do not have anywhere near
the wide range of therapeutic uses of marijuana.

Marinol does not provide the same medical value as marijuana. It does not
contain all of the compounds found in marijuana that provide therapeutic
value. Clinical tests show that not only is marijuana more effective than
Marinol in reducing nausea, but when given the choice between the two,
patients opted for marijuana because it is easier for them to get the
proper dose.

Many highly respected medical organizations including the American Medical
Association, American Academy of Family Physicians, Kaiser Permanente, New
England Journal of Medicine, American Cancer Society and even our state's
N.C. Nurses Association advocate the use of medical marijuana and/or
further research into medical marijuana.

I would advise Bayer to consider the following and take the advice to heart:

"Doctors are not the enemy in the 'war' on drugs; ignorance and hypocrisy
are. Research should go on, and while it does, marijuana should be
available to all patients who need it to help them undergo treatment for
life-threatening illnesses. There is certainly sufficient evidence to
reclassify marijuana as a Schedule II drug. . . . As long as therapy is
safe and has not been proven ineffective, seriously ill patients (and their
physicians) should have access to whatever they need to fight for their
lives." - The New England Journal of Medicine, Aug. 7, 1997

By making medical marijuana unavailable to victims of the illnesses listed
above, the federal government forces patients and their physicians to
substitute a less effective and more expensive alternative treatment in
many cases where the use of marijuana is indicated. The current policy
makes criminals out of otherwise law- abiding citizens whose only crime is
to use marijuana to reduce their suffering.

Jesse Thorn

Raleigh

It's a war, all right:

The op-ed article by Linda Bayer was extremely biased. Why is my government
wasting money on self-righteous paper-pushers?

Bayer is completely out of touch with the current activity occurring in our
country as a result of the drug war. She goes so far out of touch that she
states that the war on drugs is not a war at all.

My taxes pay this woman? What are they smoking up in Washington? The drug
war on a daily basis confiscates property and assets from citizens kind of
like the Nazis did from the Jews. The drug war on a daily basis releases
violent criminals to make room for nonviolent drug offenders. This in turn
makes our streets more dangerous - kind of like a war zone.

I believe it is time for the General Accounting Office to hunker down on
the money we are throwing away on a war our country has launched against
its own citizens. By making our streets a war zone every American citizen
is under attack from our government.

J.L. CUNNINGHAM

Raleigh

Checked-by: Mike Gogulski