THE GREAT DIVIDE

There are two sides to every story, the cliche tells us. However, the
real loser in today's ultra-polarized political climate is the truth.

Take last week's murder of four RCMP officers at an Alberta farm.
Proponents of an American-style "war on drugs" were quick to use this
national tragedy's emotional impact to further their cause. This is
not to say there isn't a kernel of common sense in a call for higher
penalties for those who choose to flaunt the laws on growing an
illegal drug. But to link a mad man's tirade against four unsuspecting
law enforcement officers to illegal marijuana growing simply because
the man had what police confirm are a few plants in a building on his
property is nothing short of ludicrous.

An equal stretch is the pot proponents' call for complete
decriminalization and legalization of marijuana use and growing in
this country. According to this side, these deaths are more 'concrete'
proof that the prohibition of pot leads to tragedies such as this one.
Somehow, the logic goes, if this man was allowed to have his 20 plants
he wouldn't have gone on a rampage with an assault rifle.

Hogwash.

This growing prevalence of extreme polarization will do nothing but
create wide gaps in credibility on both sides. And examples run the
gamut. B.C. premier Gordon Campbell justified a government employee
who called a phone-in radio show under a false name by saying
"everybody does it." Conservative leader Stephen Harper played loose
and fast with the facts as he tried to link the federal Liberals, and
in particular Prime Minister Paul Martin, to pedophilia during the
last election. Now, some are using the deaths of the four RCMP
officers as fodder to recall the death penalty. They want you to go
against what every study known to man proves - that penalties are not
linked in any way as deterrent in cases of first degree murder or the
killing of law enforcement officers.

Someone can rescue the truth; that someone is you. Question, read,
open your mind to other points of view and, most important, be willing
to change as you discover more facts about the world in which you live.