Opinions should NOT be made into law.

and here's why; below is an article full of senators and the higher mucky-mucks of our government stating why marijuana should NOT be legal. To clarify this post:

anything in RED is opinion
anything in BLUE is just plain bullshit
and finally, anything in PURPLE is actual factual information

now lets take a look at the kids that are running out country.



LEGALIZE POT AND TAX IT? NO WAY, SAY LAWMAKERS
\t\tby Mannix Porterfield, (Source:Register-Herald)

West Virginia
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You can call it by a plethora of names -- pot, herb, weed, boom or even the popular 1960s-born slang term, "Mary Jane."

Whatever moniker is applied to the leaves and flower of the hemp plant Cannabis sativa -- some 200 are available -- there's one thing you're not apt to call marijuana in West Virginia -- legal.

Or a source of revenue.

Yet, new research conducted at the university level suggests West Virginia is shelling out mega-bucks each year in a futile war to dry up fields of marijuana, long considered the state's biggest cash crop, while missing out on a potential tax windfall.

"The use of criminal law to control the availability and use of marijuana is a federal policy that is dependent on local law enforcement for its implementation," says Jon Gettman, a senior fellow at George Mason University's School of Public Policy.

Gettman is quoted in a report prepared by Ronald Fraser, a writer of public policy issues for DKT Liberty Project, a Washington-based civil liberties organization.

Fraser quotes another academic, Boston University economics professor Jeffrey Miron, as saying the nation invests some $5 billion a year in its enforcement of marijuana laws.

In this state, that shakes out to some $5 million for police, $12 million in the courts and another $2 million for offenders winding up behind bars.

Miron feels the state not only could spare the $19 million price tag in enforcement costs, but reap some $5 million in taxes a year by regulating and taxing marijuana in the same fashion as other legal drugs through the Federal Drug Administration.


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Legislators in this region, however, are hardly eager to inhale that idea.

"I feel that any kind of drug is wrong," says Delegate Tom Louisos, D-Fayette. "It's a crutch for people to take the wrong direction. It's like alcohol."

The idea of legalizing marijuana and taxing it is not a new one in West Virginia. Actually, says Louisos, some lawmakers had discussed this a couple of decades ago.

"We need people to be more responsible, not just take drugs like that," Louisos said.

"I've had people tell me it's not that bad, just like beer, but I never felt I needed to."

Louisos said legalization would only create more societal woes, since the state, once addicted to its revenue like gambling, would wind up promoting it, and one result would be more highway tragedies.

"You'd just be creating another problem," the Oak Hill businessman said. "I'm absolutely opposed to it."

Sen. Russ Weeks, R-Raleigh, views marijuana as "the gateway drug," one that ushers its users into the world of narcotics.

"It's just like people getting started on beer and moving on to hard liquor," he said.

"West Virginia's got enough problems with alcohol and prescription pills. We certainly don't need another addiction. We don't need another legal product out there that's going to be abused and be a detriment to society."

Delegate Sally Susman, D-Raleigh, likewise is adamantly opposed to making marijuana legal.

"It's not supposed to be that horrible a drug, but people who do use seem to graduate to tougher drugs," she said. "Can you imagine seeing tiny kids smoking that stuff?"

What's more, Susman feels any tax revenue the state would derive from regulating legal marijuana would be greatly offset by the social costs of dealing with more drug addicts and the attendant health problems of using stronger drugs.

"I wouldn't be for that at all," she said of proposed decriminalization. "There are too many social issues involved."


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Gettman's research was conducted for the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

On that group's Web site, a well-known advocate of decriminalization is country singer Willie Nelson.

Marijuana busts doubled in the 1990s but failed to meet desired goals, instead resulting in an increase in both usage and availability, Gettman said he learned.

Pot arrests soared to 662,000 two years ago, contrasted with 260,000 in 1990.

Gettman also is quoted by Fraser as saying teenagers are arrested in disproportionate numbers. Nearly 17 percent of those busted on simple possession were 15 to 17, while 26 percent fell into the 18-to-20 category.

Fraser writes that the expenditure of millions in West Virginia's own war against marijuana is failing, at least by virtue of statistics. For instance, the state notched 1,929 arrests in 2002, but the ranks of users keep swelling. In 1999, he says, 3.6 percent of the population were considered users, but in three years, the figure had climbed to 4.9 percent. That compares to 4.9 percent in 1999 and 6.2 percent nationally.

"Overall supply of marijuana in the U.S. is far too diversified to be controlled by law enforcement," Fraser quotes Gettman.

Legalization would diminish illegal activities, allow the government to control quality, keep a better handle on underage access and erase the profit motive that lures peddlers, among them teenagers who sell to their own genre, Fraser says.


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Such arguments fail to sway legislators in southern West Virginia, however.

One of them, Delegate Ray Canterbury, R-Greenbrier, questions the legality of a state legalizing marijuana, pointing to a recent federal court ruling striking down an attempt by California.

"And you've got to remember, most of what I've read, marijuana is harder on the lungs than cigarettes," he says.

"It has more carcinogens than cigarettes. What would be the public cost of dealing with the health issues that would arise from it? That would probably exceed the $5 million you'd get from taxes. Marijuana has problems of its own."

Delegate Ron Thompson, D-Raleigh, is "absolutely" opposed to making it legal to own and smoke the weed.

"If you did something like that, you would be encouraging something that's obviously harmful to society and harmful to individuals, and that kills people," he said.




The last time i checked, laws were made for the people by the people. When did it stop being both?