MARIJUANA DOES NOT CONTRIBUTE TO TERRORISM

After watching yet another commercial stating that the purchase of
marijuana supports terrorism, I realized that I had to write a column
illustrating my disdain for the Bush administration, DEA, and inefficient
prohibition in general.

If I were not to write this column, I would be engendering the victory of
ignorance, religious fanaticism, and the general desire by authoritarian,
poorly endowed madmen to tell other individuals how to manage their
personal activities.

Enjoy and please read with an open mind...

Unlike the racist religious right who criminalized marijuana in the first
place (Harrison Act of 1916), I would like to point out that while
marijuana does not contribute to terrorism, the purchase of cocaine does
serve to fuel the senseless, decades-long war in Columbia. Right-wing
paramilitaries, as well as the brigands who claim to be Marxists, offer
protection for drug lords who in turn supply these groups with money and
weapons.

The drug lords then use the profits from the cocaine trade to literally buy
the government, who in turn looks the other way as insurgency,
counterinsurgency, and terrorism occurs. Not only does cocaine cause
long-term damage to one's body and mind, but it also perpetuates a bloody,
potentially irrevocably damaging war.

The majority of marijuana, on the other hand, is cultivated domestically,
with the two largest foreign suppliers being Mexico and Canada. While there
may be large cartels that produce vast amounts of marijuana in any of these
three countries, they do not contribute to terrorism.

These cartels are about making money just like any other businessmen, and
the less criminal activity they engage in outside of cultivation, the
better. The fact is, according to the US Department of Labor, only 40
percent of cultivators are these large-scale operations. The fact that
marijuana is the most lucrative cash crop on the continent leads to the
other 60 percent of cultivators being made up of individuals and small
operations in both rural and urban areas.

A recent statistic shows that the approximate worth of marijuana
cultivation to growers is between $15-20 billion. The street retail value
on the other hand is between $40-50 billion, and that is were the small
businessmen and women come in. Anybody working a dead-end job in the
service sector can get a piece of this market through a relatively minor
investment and a little patience.

Purchasing marijuana encourages sustainable development within our own
country by keeping United States currency in circulation within the
country. For example, a Mexican cartel that controls a large operation in
California is going to keep their profits within the United States rather
than laundering large sums back home.

Also, according to the USDL, the employees of these operations make far
more than any other manufacturing industry, and 50 percent of them possess
a bachelor's degree or higher. Their wages stay here, benefiting local
economies across the country. The marijuana industry makes money for people
through non-violent means - unlike cocaine, crystal meth, heroin, crack,
and other amphetamines, which not only squander the economy, but support
terrorism and sometimes engender domestic violence.

Why then does the government waste $10 billion a year just on efforts to
eradicate marijuana? This $10 billion is only a fraction of the entire "War
on Drugs" budget, which is between $40-200 billion in both real and
opportunity costs.

It just seems sensible to decriminalize a harmless plant so as to not only
make incredible profits from taxation, but to also decrease expenditures,
and quit ruining relatively innocent people's lives in an experiment that
has gotten way out of control.