A WAY FOR GOVERNMENT TO DEAL WITH DOPE

Last week, Quebec police departments busted five "compassion clubs"
that were selling "medical marijuana" to anyone with a doctor's note
- -but that's just a whiff of what's going on elsewhere.

I was in California recently, the loosest U.S. state for marijuana
laws, where 1,000 "compassion clubs" were operating legally while I
was there. Sometimes it was hard to believe my eyes.

On the famed boardwalk at Venice Beach, I passed the "Kush Doctor's
Marijuana Club," a beachfront store with a long lineup beside a big
sign saying MEDICAL MARIJUANA AVAILABLE HERE! As thousands of bikers,
bladers and tourists streamed by, bikini-clad "nurses" handed out
"Kush Doctor" pamphlets and shouted: "Get your legal pot here!"
Meanwhile, police just sauntered by.

A girl of maybe 18 handed me a pamphlet and told me how to get some.
"Ya just go inside like I did and tell the doctor ... you know, your
problems .. and he'll give you a prescription and, uh, you know ...
like then you get your stuff."

Under California law, doctors can prescribe marijuana if you suffer
from "sports injuries, auto accidents, anxiety, insomnia, asthma,
cancer or any ill for which marijuana provides relief" -like a stubbed toe.

Once you get your doctor's letter, you choose from a counter display
of designer pot with names like Purple Kush, Sour Diesel, Juicyfruit
and Trainwreck. There are also granola marijuana bars and chocolate
pot turtles "for medicinal use only."

It's all legal in California, as long as you pay the 8.25-per-cent
sales tax. Last week, state police did close down several hundred
clubs deemed to be dicey, but hundreds remain legally open, including
mine on Venice Beach. This November, California will hold a state
referendum to legalize marijuana -and a recent Los Angeles Times poll
predicts a large majority will vote yes.

My own grass-smoking days are long behind me, but I think
legalization is the right way to go. Fighting marijuana is an endless
battle that sends many innocent users to jail. It's also spawned a
massive crime industry with gang battles, drug kings and a drug war
in Mexico that kills more 10,000 people a year.

Why not decriminalize it -as 53 per cent of Canadians say they want?
The only devil is in the details. Even if we do decriminalize pot,
how would we do it? We don't allow public drinking on the street, so
we wouldn't encourage people to roam around smoking joints at Ste.
Catherine St. benches and bus stops.

Maybe we'd follow Amsterdam, the European drug capital where you must
go to a "cannabis cafe" with "pot menus" featuring stuff like Lebanon
Gold and Afghan Supermellow hashish. But unlike Amsterdam, Montreal
law makes it illegal to smoke in cafes -and if you can't smoke
inside, or outside, where's left? Inside your car with the windows
up? Or maybe at special "grass picnics," on the grass?

These issues pale compared with how marijuana would be sold.
Presumably, government would become the only legal dealer, bringing
the usual problems of any government monopoly. In Quebec, the SAQ
could set up a Maison du Marijuana with designer shelves like their
wine stores and civil service "weed consultants" offering advice like
SAQ sommeliers.

"May I recommend the Rene Levesque superstrong independantiste ganja,
or the Pierre Trudeau homegrown lite, for the elderly."

But that might encourage more public use, so the government would
probably create gloomier dispensaries, like the SAQ did back in the
'60s, when all liquor was hidden in a back room. You'd have to line
up for your marijuana at a clerk's desk and order by its generic Latin name.

YOU: Hi. I'd like some marijuana, please.

CLERK Sorry, sir. Will that be Cannabis sativa Linnaeus, subspecies
sativa var. spontanea? Or would you prefer Cannabis indica var.
kafiristanica forma afghanica?

YOU: Uhh ... you don't just have some vodka, do you?

Once the bureaucracy was set up, we'd see the same problems as
everywhere in government. Quebec Marijuana Board executives would be
caught spending too much money on expenses while flying off to sample
products in Morocco, India and Jamaica. The province's Director of
Dope Sales would be charged with submitting $500,000 in rolling paper
and water pipes as a business expense.

There'd be more trouble when the Quebec Marijuana Board decided to
support certain festivals like the SAQ does. There'd be the B.C. Bud
Montreal jazz fest and the Ganja Grand Prix -but a scandal would
break out when they sponsored a children's AfghanBhangBlack
Supermellow Shakespeare in the Pot Park.

On the plus side, marijuana would no longer cause a criminal offence
or waste trillion of hours of police effort. On the downside, when
government takes over the marijuana business, you can bet medical
compassion clubs will lose their compassion.