HEMP MAKE TROUBLES GO UP IN SMOKE?

If you could end global warming, fix the environment, provide a source of
income for farmers and rural communities everywhere, provide raw materials
for numerous uses and get this all out of one little plant, would you jump
at the chance to use it? Boy, when you put it like that, who wouldn't?

The only problem with all of this is that the plant required to provide all
the answers to world problems is hemp, i.e. marijuana. At least all of
these benefits are being claimed by the proponents for hemp. Oh yeah, I
almost forgot, you can also get really high on it.

Recently I received a packet from the proponents for hemp. And before the
Pendleton Police want to come checkout this package, let me assure them
that it was only a packet of documents they mailed me. Within these
documents are some pretty impressive claims. However, before I was through
reading it I had the munchies, blood- shot eyes and a strange desire to
listen to reggae music.

They make one heck of a case for using hemp in the propaganda they sent.
Hemp has uses in clothing, paper, power generation, etc. It's easy to
grow, and would be a boon to farmers. It'd also give the bong and
cigarette paper industry a much needed shot in the arm. I imagine the
potato chip industry also would benefit.

Before the pro-hemp folks out there write to tell me that the kind of hemp
used for ll the wonderful things they write about cannot get you high, I
understand all of that. I also understand that many of the people pushing
hemp as an environmental wonder also partake in firing up a big doobie when
the time is right, such as just about anytime.

I find it humorous that the people who make such a serious and legitimate
case for hemp often look like they just stepped out of a Cheech and Chong
movie. That doesn't make their claims illegitimate, but it's why
politicians distance themselves from the movement. If they had people in
three piece suits on Capitol Hill carrying brief cases and campaign money,
perhaps the movement would gain momentum.

While I might question how much some of the hemp proponents really might
want to save the world and how many just want some good smoke. I do
wholeheartedly agree with the folks who want to use marijuana for medical
purposes. If a joint relieves the terrible side effects of chemotherapy,
glaucoma or whatever. for goodness sake, fire it up. I'd feel the same way
about any substance that provides such benefits. But is pushing hemp is
just a way to try to make marijuana more acceptable, then I probably
wouldn't be so enthusiastic about it.

On the other hand, I do think plenty of legal drugs are just as
dangerous-if not more so-than pot. I've known people who smoked pot and
people who drank alcohol, and I'd have to say that alcohol had a much worse
effect on those folks' driving, lives, ability to hold jobs and tendency
toward violence. Also, alcohol abuse, too, is clearly bad news.

The downside of marijuana is that it does lead to harder drugs. If people
who use drugs honestly as themselves how they first got started illegally
altering their mind, they'll most likely say they smoked pot first. But
I'll admit that this conclusion probably isn't fair because someone with
the tendency to artificially "feel Good" would probably find the other
drugs sooner or later. Oh well, a drug expert I'm not.

As for hemp, though, if what they say is true, why not? I'd just like some
advance warning from Washington, D.C., on if they're going to make
something like growing hemp legal.

If so, I have some changes to make in my investment portfolio. Out goes my
stock in polyester, oil and coal, and in goes all my money in paper-Zig Zag
cigarette papers to be exact.