LET 'EM SMOKE

No doubt some might think it heresy for us to suggest how Jesus
himself would come down on the medical marijuana issue, which state
Sen. Steve Cohenpromises to bring to the legislature in the new year.
But we're going to do it anyway. Frankly, we think he'd offer a light
to sick people who can't get pain relief any other way. Then he'd pull
a roach clip from his robe so they could finish the joint without
burning their fingers.

We bring Jesus into this conversation because this is, after all, the
Bible Belt, and opposition to Cohen's play for legalizing medical
marijuana would come from religious conservatives and those who simply
can't stop fighting the futile drug war. But precisely how some dying
woman with cancer taking a hit while tucked in bed-just to stave off
misery for a little while-would amount to wickedness and cultural
degeneration is beyond us.

We say let doctors and patients decide the best treatment for those
whose symptoms are otherwise inconsolable. It's a medical issue. It
should not be the business of government-especially the federal
government-to decide who lives in pain and who doesn't.

Considering the facts, this isn't all that controversial a position.
Studies show medical marijuana is legitimate, and by some estimates as
many as 80 percent of Americans support doctor-prescribed pot. Ten
states have passed laws to make medical marijuana legal. And just two
weeks ago, Democratic U.S. Sen. Richard Durbin introduced a bipartisan
Senate bill that would allow patients in states where medical
marijuana is legal to mount a medical necessity defense in federal
court, countering prosecution efforts to present them as common
dime-bag criminals.

That we even need this federal intervention is frightening. But as it
is, federal law defines marijuana as a substance without "accepted
medical use," which means defendants are gagged from demonstrating at
trial that their marijuana use was medicinal and/or in compliance with
state law. (There's clearly a compelling states' rights issue here
too.) "We cannot sit back passively as the federal government wages
war on the sick and dying," the Marijuana Policy Project's Steve Fox
recently wrote in a letter to supporters. "It is time to increase
pressure on Congress to pass legislation that will protect patients
who legitimately require medical marijuana."

In Tennessee, politicians as politically divergent as Al Gore and
Lamar Alexander have supported its use. Gore told reporters in 1999
that his sister was prescribed pot when she underwent chemotherapy in
1984. Her doctor was the former head of the American Lung Association,
hardly some nut job without credibility. And when Alexander was
governor, he signed a law making medical marijuana, provided by the
federal government for state research programs, legal in Tennessee
(though that law was repealed in 1992).

Now Cohen is on the march, saying he's seen too many of his friends
suffer the ghastly side effects of cancer treatments. We can hear the
debate on the state Senate floor now-that is, if the bill even makes
it to the floor. Lawmakers will stand up and offer testament about
their addiction problems, they'll say such a law would set a bad
example for kids, and they'll insist that there's no medical evidence
to support marijuana's legalized use. And they'll be dead wrong.
Finally, they'll invoke God-some for political exploitation, and
others out of genuine belief that pot use is inherently
unchristian.

We won't be so presumptuous as to malign these God-fearing folks. But
we can say with utter confidence that if they really believe He would
frown on the compassionate legalization of pot, then we don't know the
same God.