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In a few weeks, we will go to the polls. As informed voters, we'll make intelligent, well-informed choices. At least that's the hope.
In recent years, California's electoral process has turned into a fiesta of special-interest double-speak. It's hard for anyone to know what is right, what is genuine, and what will work. Nowhere are we likely to see more political confusion than in the case of Proposition 19, the initiative to legalize marijuana.
In a nutshell, Proposition 19 would allow personal possession and consumption of marijuana and would largely treat marijuana as a legal equivalent of alcoholic beverages. It would allow persons over age 21 to grow and consume small quantities of marijuana in their homes. It would also allow the state and local governments to determine places of sale and to tax marijuana.
Despite what some are saying, Proposition 19 would not allow marijuana consumption in any public area, any more than we currently allow people to swig down vodka. It would not allow people to drive or operate machinery while under the influence of marijuana. And it would NOT allow the sale to or use of marijuana by anyone younger than 21.
Regrettably, this proposition is likely to be embraced by the usual flotsam and jetsam of radical politics: the shrieking anarchists, the in-your-face socialists, the dreadlocked stoner brigades, and people who view anyone with a long-term job as vaguely suspect and certainly boring. They can usually be recognized by their rainbow-colored clothing and their lack of tax returns. When they are FOR anything, I am usually OPPOSED.
And, unfortunately, this proposition will be opposed by traditional social conservatives. They will argue – correctly – that marijuana is potentially an addictive scourge which ruins lives. This verity will then be accompanied by excessive fictional visions of "Reefer Madness" in which flocks of virginal youth are ruined on the pyre of Demon Weed.
Politicians, many of whom have themselves undoubtedly ingested prodigious quantities of pot in their formative years, will emerge to excoriate the evils of dope. To do otherwise would allow opponents to label them "soft on crime." Thus we see Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger opposing this proposition a week after signing a new law which makes the penalty for marijuana use equivalent to a speeding ticket.
Mothers Against Drunk Driving is also obviously pressing for a "no" vote, as is – and I'm not making this up – the Association of California Beer And Beverage Distributors.
I am a conservative. Yet I will be voting "yes."
I've never intentionally smoked marijuana in my life. But I have gone running at Central Park and smelled the pungent smoke of a burning joint, and walked past the coffee houses of Oldtown Salinas and caught a whiff of something other than tobacco. From San Juan Bautista to Santa Cruz, from Toro Park to King City, I've been blessed with the stench of someone else's second-hand smoke. And I've seen marijuana growing everywhere from a bathtub of an upper-middle-class home to the Los Padres National Forest.
I do not use marijuana. But many, many people must crave it. Otherwise, I would not encounter it as often as I do. That's in keeping with our other great failed experiment in banning the use of an intoxicant, the United States' prohibition of alcohol from 1920 to 1933.
Alcohol abuse is at least as deadly, addictive and costly as marijuana abuse. Yet we were unable to eliminate alcohol during our social experiment in temperance, and we are clearly unable to eliminate marijuana use now. Indeed, just as I mention my own olfactory experiences with marijuana, some of my father's fondest memories of childhood were the popping sounds and aromas of a neighbor's basement beer stash exploding during summer heat waves of the 1920s.
One of the great economic realities is that a reduced supply with stable demand equals a higher price. That higher price created the wealth of truly evil men during the Prohibition of alcohol during the 1920s: Al Capone, "Bugs" Moran, all of the Mafia, and so many more.
Our current prohibition is clearly not working, either. After 40 years of effort, our many millions of dollars spent on law enforcement, eradication and incarceration seem to be assisting this century's gangsters by driving up price in the face of stable demand. Some studies estimate that 60 percent or more of the gangs' cash flow is provided by marijuana sales. This represents many millions of dollars.
As Salinas police Chief Louis Fetherolf wrote in a July 2010 web comment, "Gangs are at the heart of most crime in Salinas. We cannot overemphasize this point ... WE NEED YOUR HELP!"
One of the greatest helps we can give our law enforcement personnel is to impoverish the criminal gangs of Salinas by using the irrepressible realities of economics. As in the rest of American life, no money = no power. We can break the gangs financially in the same way that we impoverished them back in 1933: by de-criminalizing what makes them rich.
Certainly what we have done hasn't worked. It's time for something different.
Just say "no" to the gangs. Vote "yes" on Proposition 19.
NewsHawk: MedicalNeed:420 MAGAZINE
Source:thecalifornian.com
Author: Peter Luke
Contact: thecalifornian.com | Salinas Contact Us | The Salinas Californian
Copyright: 2010 thecalifornian.com
Website:Peter Andresen: The conservative case for legalizing marijuana | thecalifornian.com | The Salinas Californian
In recent years, California's electoral process has turned into a fiesta of special-interest double-speak. It's hard for anyone to know what is right, what is genuine, and what will work. Nowhere are we likely to see more political confusion than in the case of Proposition 19, the initiative to legalize marijuana.
In a nutshell, Proposition 19 would allow personal possession and consumption of marijuana and would largely treat marijuana as a legal equivalent of alcoholic beverages. It would allow persons over age 21 to grow and consume small quantities of marijuana in their homes. It would also allow the state and local governments to determine places of sale and to tax marijuana.
Despite what some are saying, Proposition 19 would not allow marijuana consumption in any public area, any more than we currently allow people to swig down vodka. It would not allow people to drive or operate machinery while under the influence of marijuana. And it would NOT allow the sale to or use of marijuana by anyone younger than 21.
Regrettably, this proposition is likely to be embraced by the usual flotsam and jetsam of radical politics: the shrieking anarchists, the in-your-face socialists, the dreadlocked stoner brigades, and people who view anyone with a long-term job as vaguely suspect and certainly boring. They can usually be recognized by their rainbow-colored clothing and their lack of tax returns. When they are FOR anything, I am usually OPPOSED.
And, unfortunately, this proposition will be opposed by traditional social conservatives. They will argue – correctly – that marijuana is potentially an addictive scourge which ruins lives. This verity will then be accompanied by excessive fictional visions of "Reefer Madness" in which flocks of virginal youth are ruined on the pyre of Demon Weed.
Politicians, many of whom have themselves undoubtedly ingested prodigious quantities of pot in their formative years, will emerge to excoriate the evils of dope. To do otherwise would allow opponents to label them "soft on crime." Thus we see Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger opposing this proposition a week after signing a new law which makes the penalty for marijuana use equivalent to a speeding ticket.
Mothers Against Drunk Driving is also obviously pressing for a "no" vote, as is – and I'm not making this up – the Association of California Beer And Beverage Distributors.
I am a conservative. Yet I will be voting "yes."
I've never intentionally smoked marijuana in my life. But I have gone running at Central Park and smelled the pungent smoke of a burning joint, and walked past the coffee houses of Oldtown Salinas and caught a whiff of something other than tobacco. From San Juan Bautista to Santa Cruz, from Toro Park to King City, I've been blessed with the stench of someone else's second-hand smoke. And I've seen marijuana growing everywhere from a bathtub of an upper-middle-class home to the Los Padres National Forest.
I do not use marijuana. But many, many people must crave it. Otherwise, I would not encounter it as often as I do. That's in keeping with our other great failed experiment in banning the use of an intoxicant, the United States' prohibition of alcohol from 1920 to 1933.
Alcohol abuse is at least as deadly, addictive and costly as marijuana abuse. Yet we were unable to eliminate alcohol during our social experiment in temperance, and we are clearly unable to eliminate marijuana use now. Indeed, just as I mention my own olfactory experiences with marijuana, some of my father's fondest memories of childhood were the popping sounds and aromas of a neighbor's basement beer stash exploding during summer heat waves of the 1920s.
One of the great economic realities is that a reduced supply with stable demand equals a higher price. That higher price created the wealth of truly evil men during the Prohibition of alcohol during the 1920s: Al Capone, "Bugs" Moran, all of the Mafia, and so many more.
Our current prohibition is clearly not working, either. After 40 years of effort, our many millions of dollars spent on law enforcement, eradication and incarceration seem to be assisting this century's gangsters by driving up price in the face of stable demand. Some studies estimate that 60 percent or more of the gangs' cash flow is provided by marijuana sales. This represents many millions of dollars.
As Salinas police Chief Louis Fetherolf wrote in a July 2010 web comment, "Gangs are at the heart of most crime in Salinas. We cannot overemphasize this point ... WE NEED YOUR HELP!"
One of the greatest helps we can give our law enforcement personnel is to impoverish the criminal gangs of Salinas by using the irrepressible realities of economics. As in the rest of American life, no money = no power. We can break the gangs financially in the same way that we impoverished them back in 1933: by de-criminalizing what makes them rich.
Certainly what we have done hasn't worked. It's time for something different.
Just say "no" to the gangs. Vote "yes" on Proposition 19.
NewsHawk: MedicalNeed:420 MAGAZINE
Source:thecalifornian.com
Author: Peter Luke
Contact: thecalifornian.com | Salinas Contact Us | The Salinas Californian
Copyright: 2010 thecalifornian.com
Website:Peter Andresen: The conservative case for legalizing marijuana | thecalifornian.com | The Salinas Californian
LIVE FREE - - - 
SMOKE FREE - - - - DIE FREE
