DRUG WAR, NOT BALLOT MEASURE, IS MENACE

Ann Donnelly's July 12 column, "Just say no to marijuana legalization," is
very interesting. I would like to clear up a few of the many factual errors
she writes as fact.

First, Donnelly complains about the lack of age restrictions in the
Compassionate Use Act of California. Unfortunately, there are no age
restrictions on terminal illnesses, either. Until Congress passes a law that
makes it illegal for children to get cancer, would Donnelly suggest not
treating children?

A law against childhood cancer would certainly be more productive than the
law against marijuana use. When the United States passed the marijuana tax
act in 1937, there were approximately 55,000 users in the country, according
to the Federal Bureau of Narcotics. As of last year, after 60 years of
prohibition, the federal Drug Enforcement Administration estimates there are
70 million users.

Donnelly writes that under Washington's Initiative 692, marijuana would be
legalized for medicinal use without restrictions. In the next sentence she
writes that a doctor's recommendation would be required. A doctor's
recommendation isn't a "restriction"? All of the physicians I know take
their jobs very seriously and would no sooner prescribe marijuana to someone
who doesn't need it than they would Valium.

Donnelly claims that Arizona's medicinal marijuana campaign never made clear
the measure could also have legalized medical use of illegal drugs other
than marijuana. Is she suggesting that Arizona voters are too stupid to read
a ballot measure? The measure won by landslide, but Donnelly writes,
"Arizona lawmakers subsequently had to pass legislation to undo the damage."
What really occurred was that the legislature acted against the will of the
voting public.

Donnelly asks, "Is this movement fundamentally about expanding the U.S.
market for drugs?" We already have such a movement, led by the DEA, the U.S.
Customs Service and the CIA. Without the U.S. government' s policy of
prohibition, drug cartels wouldn't have the funds or the motivation to
corrupt entire countries like Mexico, Columbia, the Bahamas. Personal drug
use is bad, but compared to the wholesale corruption that billions of drug
dollars bring, it seems like a lesser evil.

Donnelly describes George Soros, a backer of medicinal marijuana
initiatives, as "harder to categorize." Apparently she doesn't realize that
Soros is probably the one person in the world most responsible for the end
of communism in Europe. He is highly intelligent, motivated and generous and
will go against political tides to push what is right, not what is expedient
or traditional.

Regulation and taxation

Despite Donnelly's implication, Soros doesn't support legalization of
marijuana. He just doesn't understand why we must allow participants in the
only unregulated market in the world to profit beyond the capabilities of
even the major regulated multinational corporations. He understands that the
illegal drug market could be crippled in one swift move, by regulating and
taxing it.

Donnelly suggests that anyone against driving under the influence of
intoxicants should be against the medical marijuana movement. Why? Would the
initiative remove restrictions against driving under the influence? No. Did
alcohol prohibition decrease driving under the influence of that substance?
No. I have a number of prescriptions in my medicine cabinet right now that
warn against using heavy machinery under the influence. What is so different
about marijuana?

In the course of my business, I spend a lot of time in Vancouver, B.C.,
Amsterdam, Germany and the New York City area. When I am in countries that
allow their citizens more freedom and that don't support the drug dealers, I
am much safer. I can walk on the streets of Amsterdam at 3 a.m. and not fear
for my life, yet there are coffee shops selling hashish, marijuana and
psychedelic mushrooms on every corner, sometimes up to six places in a
block. It doesn't lead to crime; it decreases crime.

In the past two years, Italy, Australia, France, Germany, Spain, and many
other countries have stopped enforcing personal possession drug crimes. As a
result, they live in safer communities. I challenge Donnelly to walk the
streets of Portland at 3 a.m. and tell me how safe she feels in a country
that spends $26 billion a year to fight the "drug menace."

Even police officers and FBI agents can see that the war on drugs is
fruitless and actually causes more damage that the drugs themselves. Using
anti-drug rhetoric to deny sick people access to a substance that the
American Medical Association was against making illegal in 1937 -- and which
the AMA announced just last week is helpful in treating stroke victims,
Alzheimer's patients and Parkinson's disease sufferers -- is beyond asinine.

Let's admit we have made mistakes, and fix them before it really is too
late.

Copyright 1998 The Columbian Publishing Co.

Checked-by: Don Beck