READERS RESPOND TO DEBATE OVER LEGALIZING MARIJUANA

BILL: Dave, our column last week on legalizing pot got us more e-mail
response than any in the last two years.

DR. DAVE: Mostly for or against legalization?

BILL: Mostly for. What impressed me was the quality of the pro
arguments. For instance, here's the famous writer/comedian, Elayne
Boosler (www.elayneboosler.com): "If marijuana had been invented in
a lab at Merck," she wrote us, "it would have been fast tracked to
the market in six days so the chemist could rest on the seventh.
Madison Avenue would write an ad that says, 'Relieves migraines,
glaucoma, nausea, chronic pain, OCD, sleep disorders, anxiety and
depression. Also elevates appreciation of: Clapton, Monty Python,
colors, friends, architecture, Twinkies and your dog Spot. Warning:
Do not drive, propose, or sign anything until tomorrow.' Instead, we
pay half our monthly salaries for patented poison prescriptions that
are going to kill us in the end."

DR. DAVE: Were all the "fors" like that?

BILL: Here's one from addiction specialist Lynn Telford-Sahl. "In the
years I worked as an in-patient counselor," writes the author of the
book "Intentional JOY," "one of the toughest recoveries I ever saw
was a Vietnam vet with a 30-year pot addiction; one month into
treatment, he was still foggy and bewildered. This did not surprise
me - medical evidence shows that pot creates fissures in the brain
that look just like those from cocaine or meth. Nevertheless, while I
long believed pot was best kept illegal, I now believe it should be
treated the same as alcohol. Yes, this will lead some to try it who
otherwise would not. However with our tax money spent not on putting
people in jail after, but on preventative education before, we can
save not only money but lives."

DR. DAVE: But you yourself never went in for pot, right, Bill?

BILL: Back in the days when I lived three martinis on the other side
of the moon, I wanted the lights brighter, the music louder. Pot
slows you down. It never interested me at all. Which shows I bring no
prejudice to this discussion.

DR. DAVE: Which shows how little science, or even experience, you
bring to the discussion. And being a Seattleite myself, a night of
Elayne Boosler at the Improv is my idea of comic nirvana. But her
scientific argument really boils down to "some nights I'd rather get
high on pot than get a Budweiser buzz on."

BILL: She does point out that there are medical benefits.

DR.DAVE: Oh, please! If we are going to swap out non-intoxicating
medications for those we can get loaded on, I can think of better
medical drugs than pot. Borrowing from Boosler's list, how about
heroin for pain, cocaine for depression, ecstasy for anxiety, and you
can relieve nausea altogether through smoking some meth. However,
she's in very exalted company. No less than Sigmund Freud himself,
the founding father of psychoanalysis, believed in the positive power
of a snort or two of cocaine to add sparkle to his day. The argument
for legalization comes right back to adding another recreational drug
to the available options for adults.

BILL: And inevitably finds its way into use by teenagers?

DR. DAVE: Once you and Elayne have your way, and marijuana is
legalized, we will be left with two legal and marketed intoxicants in
our society instead of one. One of our goals in this column is to
encourage educated debate that will LOWER the rates of all addictions
in our youth.

BILL: You know, Dave, I hear a lot of talk about President Obama
being a stealth "pro marijuana" politician. Do you believe there's
any truth in that?

DR. DAVE: My bet is that with his mother-in-law living in the White
House and two young daughters entering their pre-teens, there isn't
any chance you will see him siding with NORML.

BILL: Is that your last word?

DR.DAVE: Except to invite readers who disagree to send in their best
arguments about why legalizing marijuana won't cause an even greater
youth substance abuse epidemic than we Americans are suffering right now.

BILL: A debate that became even more urgent last week when voters in
Oakland, Calif., overwhelmingly passed the first community tax on
medicinal marijuana.

DR. DAVE: Meaning that communities in America are now becoming
financially invested, through their city budgets, in the successful
marketing and increased sales of marijuana.

Dr. David Moore is a licensed psychologist and chemical dependency
professional who is a graduate school faculty member at Argosy
University's Seattle campus. Bill Manville is a Book of the Month
novelist; he teaches "Writing To Get Published" at
http://www.writers.com/manville.html. Sober now for over 20 years,
his most recent nonfiction work, "Cool, Hip & Sober," is available at
online bookstores.