Pubdate: Fri, 30 Oct 2009
Source: Bismarck Tribune (ND)
Copyright: 2009 The Bismarck Tribune
Contact: http://www.bismarcktribune.com/forms/letters.php
Website: http://www.bismarcktribune.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/47
Author: Del Snavely

LEGALIZE MEDICAL CANNABIS

President Obama released a policy statement recently  "that it's not a
good use of time to go after users and  distributors of medical
marijuana in the 14 states that  allow such usage, while encouraging
that illegal pot  operations involving violence, firearms and sale to 
minors still be pursued."

Each year there are more states that show compassion  for patients by
allowing the use of cannabis for  medical purposes. That number has
risen since 1997, and  this time the president has chimed in as well.

Politicians are finally falling in line with what  science has been
saying since 1974, when the first  reports were published that
cannabis reduced cancer  without damage to living cells. Since then,
there have  been more and more studies showing cannabis to be one  of
the most useful substances of all time in the  medical field.

Cannabis is shown to be one of, if not the, safest  "drugs" on the
planet, the use of which is less harmful  than the legal ramifications
from the government.

In North Dakota, we just don't seem to get it, or we  are deliberately
lying to ourselves so we can keep  jailing patients. Do we really need
to keep spending  our tax dollars to jail MS, cancer, chronic pain and
 other patients, so that we can say we are "hard on  drugs?" I don't
think so. It's time to make the medical  use of cannabis legal in
North Dakota and show that we  are compassionate, intelligent people,
as well as not  stuck in the '60s with "reefer madness." Let's acquire
 the tax revenue from legal medicinal cannabis and stop  spending our
tax dollars by prosecuting and jailing  medical cannabis users.

Del Snavely 

Crosby
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MAP posted-by: Richard R Smith Jr