GOVERNMENT WINS WITH REPEAL

If the Montana Medical Marijuana law is not repealed, who
loses?

The black market loses. There are thousands of pounds of illegal pot
constantly coming into the United States from Mexico and other
countries. The illegal drug trade is run by gangs and the mob, and
accompanied by the murder, corruption and violence inherent to the
underground sales of drugs. If, as some legislators and law
enforcement officials have suggested, the medical marijuana industry
in Montana is providing for all the illegal pot in the state now, then
the black market is being displaced here and losing millions of
dollars. If the law is repealed, do you think they will be back and
the kids will be safe from them?

Law enforcement and related agencies lose. People like Fred Van
Valkenburg and Police Chief Mark Muir have fewer people to arrest and
prosecute. They have smaller staffs because there are fewer
"criminals" out there, and their budgets are smaller. There are fewer
people in county jails and eventually state prisons.

People who support large government with lots of taxes paying for
county detention centers, county attorneys, police officers, drug
counselors and treatment centers, state prisons, etc. lose in this
scenario. They won't be able to justify raising and collecting the
additional taxes from the Montana citizens to provide the
infrastructure needed to deal with the marijuana abusers.

Those who want government to be able to interfere with one's personal
freedoms are also losers. They will no longer have the power to impose
their own moral beliefs on others. They will no longer be able to
interfere with an individual's constitutionally guaranteed freedoms.

Hmm. I wonder if any of these groups could have been involved with the
planning and execution of the raids on medical marijuana businesses by
federal agents last week?

Anne Ward

Corvallis