POT LAWS POINTLESS

Enough is enough. Canadian's continued prohibition against the
production and sale of marijuana needs to be lifted. It's simply pointless.

That much was driven home when police raided so-called "compassion
clubs" in Montreal and Quebec City last week.

The clubs had been set up to supply marijuana to sick individuals for
whom marijuana provides a respite from either pain or symptoms of
their illness.

Now, Canada has allowed medical access to marihuana since 2001,
Ottawa having determined at the time the drug could, in fact, be used
to help people. But people who want permission to legally smoke the
drug must first go through Health Canada.

The compassion clubs had been established to make marijuana available
to anyone who said they needed it and who may not have granted
permission by Health Canada.

Law enforcement officials, speaking to reporters after the raids,
said that while the clubs had no links to organized crime, what they
were doing was still illegal, contending that the people who came to
these clubs were not sick.

The raids underline the poverty of our thinking. Study after study
has shown that marijuana is no more detrimental to one's health than
alcohol and is less so than tobacco. Both those drugs are legally
produced and sold in Canada.

Most Canadians, moreover, would agree. Polls show that Canadians
would like to see simple possession decriminalized and, in fact, legalized.

What most Canadians understand is that marijuana use in our society
is prevalent and has resisted efforts at prohibition. The truth of
the matter is that the war on drugs was lost many years ago and we
are wasting our money fighting something that too few deem an offence.

Marijuana came close to being decriminalized under the Liberals, but
decriminalization has little to no chance under the Conservatives.
But while the Tories may be philosophically opposed to
decriminalization, they ought to appreciate that not everyone who
might benefit from marijuana is winning permission from Health
Canada. The compassion clubs, while technically illegal, were
nonetheless serving a purpose.