THE TRUTH ABOUT POT

(Re: "Keep your laws off patients' brownies," Uncensored, Feb. 17.)
When this legislator says that there aren't any studies about dosing
with cannabis, she is dead wrong. She just hasn't done any research.
In 1988, DEA Judge Francis Lawn had the gall to hold hearings on
cannabis, and he released his findings after nearly three months of
testimony. What he found was that it is virtually impossible to
overdose on cannabis, that one would have to smoke 1,500 pounds in 15
minutes to actually overdose, and that the smoke inhalation would
kill you long before that. He stated that cannabis is one of, if not
the, "safest therapeutic substances known to man" and that it should
be made legal immediately. He was canned the next day, his ruling overturned.

Before 1900, a full 50 percent of all medicines in this country were
made from cannabis, including children's cough medicines. When the
prohibition of cannabis got to the federal level in 1937, the AMA was
one of two groups that found out about the hearings and went to
testify against the proposed ban. After it was passed, the first
three years of prohibition saw 10,000 doctors arrested and jailed for
continuing to prescribe it. It wasn't until the AMA relented and took
cannabis out of the American Pharmacopeia that the arrests stopped.

Cannabis has been the single most studied plant in the history of
mankind. It's been used as medicine since 2,737 B.C., when it was
first prescribed by the Chinese emperor. Its use has been verified as
far back as 10,000 years, and in all that time, no one has ever died
from its use. The seeds are also a 100 percent nutrition source, and
50 percent of the weight of the plant can be in seeds.

With worldwide starvation a serious issue, can we really afford not
to use every available resource to feed the people?

Water can kill you. Aspirin kills 150 people every year just from bad
reactions, and prescription drugs as a class kill 200,000 Americans
every year. Meanwhile, we in this state seem to have one growth
industry, and it's cannabis. And, yet, even though they have used the
funds from it for two years to balance the state budget, the
legislators seem intent on killing it off. And they do so without a
single thought to the lives of those they are constantly trying to
upset. And for what? Safety? B.S.

The legislators need to get the hell out of the way and let people do
their business. That is what they are supposed to be about, isn't it?
Especially the Republicans. They keep talking about how we can't have
single-payer because that would put the government in between you and
your doctor, and yet, here is another bill to put the government
directly in between people and their doctors. And how many have there
been already? I hesitated for several years to get my medical card,
because I don't trust the state, the cops, the DAs, or anyone else in
power to not use it against all of us in the future.

And I still believe they will. But the pain in my back outweighs that
fear, and thanks to the plant, I can sleep at night again. Why should
I have to be told what form I can use it in by a politician? Where is
her medical degree?

Since I'm pretty sure she doesn't have one, I suggest that someone
file charges against her for practicing medicine without a license.
That is still a crime, is it not?

Also, name one other drug of any kind that you have to get a special
permit to have. I can get a prescription for Oxycontin in a
heartbeat, and that stuff is not only addictive (which cannabis is
not), but can make you deaf or kill you if you take too much. But
that is perfectly legal, as are all kinds of other drugs that you can
get without a special permit. Cannabis is safer than anything the
pharma companies put out, but I have to get a special permit every
year to have it. This is shameful at the least.

Sorry for the novel, but this really gets to me in a way I can't
describe. The stupidity and hypocrisy of those in power is both
amazing and astonishing. The fact that they are trying to kill off
the one industry that we have that is working shows that they truly
don't want us to have jobs, or a working government at all. They want
to make us Somalia, where they can rule in hell rather than to have
to serve in heaven.

Thanks for the article. You're right on with it. Hopefully it won't
fall on deaf ears. But I suspect that it will, seeing as how we have
idiots in office throughout the state, nowadays.

Will Morrison/via Internet