ENFORCE LAWS EQUALLY

Editor:

Our prime minister says he's tough on crime, but there seems to be a
contradiction here. I, like many other Canadians want dangerous and
repeat violent offenders to do real time in jail, not at home easy living.

I remember a judge telling me the law is the law and it's enforced
and obeyed. We have, I believe, police officers dispensing justice on
the street without the authority of a judge. People are caught with
marijuana -- apparently some are charged, some are not charged. If
the law is the law all people caught with marijuana must be charged,
no exceptions, regardless of the amount caught with. Laws are put in
place to benefit the general public and show a demonstrable benefit
to the public.

It is quite apparent that current marijuana laws have no demonstrable
benefits. There are more people charged now, courts are burdened with
these charges. When justice is decided by the street cop, the
validity of marijuana laws is void. Enforce it all the time or not at
all. You cannot have a part time law enforced by the whim of the individual.

Our prime minister says "no" to a marijuana plant God provided man to
use. Governments overstep their authority when making laws to prevent
use of a God-given plant. Our governments make money off taxes form
alcohol. God did not provide the whiskey bush, vodka tree, or beer
berries for governments to earn billions of tax dollars from at the
expense of society.

Governments, presuming to know what God's intentions are for certain
plants, are overstepping their authority and it is quite a mystery to
many, who see that you can have an abortion in Canada but can't have
marijuana. You can have heroin injections, but not marijuana. You can
drive drunk but can't have marijuana. Give your neighbour one joint,
get caught, and it's a lifetime ban on handguns, 10 years on rifles
and shotguns -- yet no one is injured like in the daily use of alcohol.

But I digress. The real question here is if the law is the law, why
is our government afraid to charge Marc Emery with selling marijuana
seeds in Canada. For more than 10 years, with apparent impunity, Marc
Emery has broken the law in Canada. A law Canadian authorities either
find too absurd to prosecute, or they realized the futility of
marijuana laws and realized public support for the current law is not
there. Our government is cowardly in its choice to let a foreign
government charge a Canadian citizen with a crime our government does
not want to get tough on.

Is integrity in Mr. Harper's government a word or reality. The
Conservative government, like prior governments, picks and chooses
what to do based on partisan politics, not what the average Canadian
would want.

What should concern Canadians is that your citizenship, passport, and
life are now being compromised. You can live here politically silent
and safe, or you can live like Marc Emery, breaking the law for
living in a country that considers what he's done not a crime or he
would be charged. Now America says we'll charge that politically
motivated pot crusader and extradite him to the U.S. for decades in jail.

What utter horse apples. There are hundreds of violent murderers,
rapists, child molesters here in Canada wanted everywhere else for
serious crimes. They're still here but we are ready to extradite an
activist with no violent record, because of a plant that promotes
peace and harmony and that Marc Emery says should be legal.

It would appear that "pile" in Ottawa is the same, just different flies.

Mike Orr

Riske Creek