PRESIDENT OBAMA: A PLEA FOR PEACE AT HOME

In my opinion, the Nobel Peace Prize is well awarded. It may also be
the strongest-ever political act of the premier peace-forwarding
organization in the world. They offer the prize to President Obama
not only for his achievements but also as an allotment of authority
to work on the world stage, at a time when he needs it.

Here the Nobel Prize is not a symbol of recognition but a vehicle to end wars.

Many were surprised by the announcement. But I think we lose
perspective on how momentous it is for an African American to be the
leader of our powerful nation. Our President has shown himself to be
quite adept at his job. His time in office so far, less than a year,
has hinted at an influential presidency. The world looks at all of
this, rightly so, as a major shift in the global political landscape.

As a journalist and radio broadcaster I have intensely covered the
conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. In 2005 I interviewed Mozzam Begg,
a British citizen who was one of the first people actually released
from Guantanimo Bay. The interview with Begg on his nightmare memoir
Enemy Combatant: My Imprisonment at Guantanimo, Bagram and Kandahar
was one of the most haunting conversations of my life. Mozzam is an
innocent man who had endured some of the ultimate tortures of the
body, mind and soul at the very hands of our country.

That interview and interacting with dozens of soldiers from both
conflicts instilled a deep desire in me for our nation to end our
large scale involvement.

But one ongoing conflict I covered as a journalist then became an
advocate for takes place all around us every day: The so-called 'war
on drugs' where marijuana smokers are the main target.

About 850,000 Americans are arrested for marijuana violations each
year. More than for all other drugs combined. Most of the pot
arrests (89%) are made for simple possession by state and local
authorities. Disturbingly, in urban areas, minor marijuana violation
enforcement is racially disparate. New York City and Philadelphia
are dire examples of this trend with 90% and 75% of pot arrests
respectively being young men of color.

Underground, domestic marijuana production remains this nation's top
cash crop. Over 100 million Americans have admitted to trying
marijuana and there could be from 25-70 million regular consumers.
Currently thirteen states have authorized medical marijuana programs.
Some states such as California and Rhode Island allow for the sale of
medical marijuana. Now, California is in the midst of a serious
political drive to legalize cannabis outright for general production
and sale to adults.

Instead of embracing this vast untapped economic and healthcare
resource, we continue our iron fist of federal prohibition. In 1972
the Presidential Commission on Marihuana recommended that pot be
removed from Schedule I in the Controlled Substances Act and that
personal use be decriminalized. President Nixon knew that marijuana
enforcement could be used as a tool of force and ignored his own commission.

President Obama could enact a new commission to re-evaluate the
issue. Perhaps he could make a more informed decision from the White
House about this vital social justice policy.

We oppress tens of millions of our citizens each day and coldly
ignore the benefits of cannabis. Marijuana prohibition has now
become the most wasteful and harmful domestic government policy in
American history. The billions of dollars we expend each year on all
levels of government makes the vast scale of the marijuana policy
tragedy reach into every single household in the country.

We make refugees of the sick and dying. Those with serious medical
conditions, who can afford to do so, tear themselves away from their
homes and families to flee to the states that do not persecute their
citizens for choosing cannabis therapy. They run to a proven
treatment for pain, cancers, MS, HIV and other conditions.

The out-of-step laws of prohibition are used to terrorize tens of
thousands of our own otherwise law-abiding citizens each year, most
of them are the youth of this nation. We bring down all of our
precious modern criminal justice resources on our fellow Americans
who choose to partake in a substance less harmful than alcohol. . The
conflicts around the globe will take a major strategic effort to
untangle. Yet the issue of our backward marijuana policy is something
that has clear and easy solutions.

Some US States already lead by example and can showcase the positive
effects of abandoning marijuana prohibition. Other countries such as
Mexico, Portugal and Argentina have now decriminalized cannabis and
we must look carefully at their new approach.

President Obama, please work at ending marijuana prohibition in the
United States.

Please end this senseless war on our own citizens.

Changing cannabis policy can bring us tangible peace on our own ground.

Please let this Nobel Peace Prize work here at home.