MEDICAL MARIJUANA'S TIME HAS COME

The tide is turning in favor of legalizing marijuana for medicinal
use -- and it's about time.

Studies have shown that cancer patients and those with other painful
diseases, such as AIDS, can benefit from the substance, which
stimulates appetite, reduces nausea and eases muscle spasms and pain.
These patients shouldn't be criminalized for seeking relief for
maladies hard to fathom unless you've been there.

Thirteen states have legalized medical marijuana and a dozen others,
including Wisconsin, are considering it.

Though the idea has been floated in our state Legislature before,
state Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Madison, and state Sen. Jon Erpenbach,
D-Waunakee, have introduced a bill that may have a chance this time.

It has firm parameters, such as creating a maximum amount of
marijuana a patient may have, and the backing of Gov. Jim Doyle.

Doyle says he supports the bill as long as the users have a doctor's
prescription. That safeguard, while not infallible, should assuage
the fears that legalization for this specific purpose would open the
floodgates to wholesale legalization.

The American Medical Association, once an ally of opponents to
legalizing medical marijuana, recently reversed its policy that
claimed marijuana had no benefits.

Meanwhile, President Barack Obama has made good on a promise to halt
federal prosecutions of medical marijuana use where permitted by state law.

It's time to adopt a law that simply allows the use of small amounts
of marijuana to cope with the effects of debilitating illness.