YOU'RE, UM, BUSTED, MAN

Did I ever tell you about the time I impersonated a cop? Relax, sergeant -
it was several years ago, in another provincial jurisdiction.

I lived in the sticks at the time, the hour hand had long passed midnight
and some Party-Hearties in a house down the road were making noise. I took
it for an hour and a half and then I called the cops. A bored dispatcher
informed me that, as it was the weekend and due to cutbacks, no police were
actually on duty, but an officer could be summoned from a nearby
jurisdiction 'in an extreme emergency'.

I slammed down the phone, said some bad words, then put on my police hat
and loaded my police dog into my car. A word about my police hat. And my
police dog: The hat was a nylon mesh cap I picked up after a charity soft
ball game between a rural police detachment and the radio station I worked
for. The crest on the front of my new cap read Ontario Provincial Police:
South Porcupine.

My 'police' dog Rufus was, in truth, a mangy border collie-indeterminate
mix, but I hoped that in the dark and from a distance he might pass for an
Alsatian on duty. I hammered on the front door, which was ajar, walked in,
and in my best Lorne Greene voice of doom, boomed, "We've had several
complaints about the noise you people are making. If you can't tone it
down, I'm gonna have to lay charges."

What I did was totally illegal, not to mention surpassingly stupid, but it
worked like a charm. Know why? Because it was a pot party, not a booze party.

The place reeked of grass, and as I delivered my speech people all over the
room were surreptitiously divesting themselves of baggies, stubbing out
roaches and desperately trying not to exhale in my face. What's more, they
were all stoned. Instead of seeing me as the ridiculous impostor I clearly
was, they figured the dope they were smoking was unusually excellent.

Know what would have happened to me if that had been a booze party instead
of a pot party? There's a good chance I'd have been stomped into a carpet
stain. And I'm not exaggerating.

That very thing happened to a lawyer in Squamish, B.C. two summers ago. He
went to a booze party at a neighbour's house to ask them to pipe down. Two
of the knuckle-dragging juiceheads in attendance kicked him to death on the
spot.

All of which is a long-winded way of getting to my point, which is: why the
hypocrisy about marijuana?

The federal New Democrats are doing backflips to distance themselves from
their leader Jack Layton's rather brave endorsement of the substance.
Politicos of other stripes are puffing themselves up to solemnly intone how
they've never touched the stuff.

Well, I did - and what's more I don't personally know a single adult - not
one - who hasn't tried pot at least once. It's no big deal, folks.

Let's finally admit it.

Am I advocating that everybody smoke pot? No. I don't smoke it any more
because it's too expensive, not worth the hassle and it makes me stupid.
All I'm saying is: let's stop being two-faced about it.

Booze causes a hundred times the grief, bloodshed and property damage that
pot does, but we turn a blind eye because through a fluke of justice and
thanks to the twisted interpretations of seedy old perverts like J. Edgar
Hoover and Alberta's own Emily Murphy, alcohol is legal and marijuana isn't.

The Canadian legal system is woozily staggering towards righting this
absurdity, but it's not there yet, so think twice or even three times
before you flout the law, even if the law is, to paraphrase Dickens, a
demonstrable ass when it comes to weed. And if you must smoke, keep it
down. Because I don't want to have to put on my police hat and come over
and bust you.