On 03-03-09, BOB ACKLEY said to MIMI GALLANDT:


BA>Replying to a message of Mimi Gallandt to All:


MG> The DOJ has announced that they will no longer be making raids on
MG> medical marijuana farms in states (like CA) that voters have voted to
MG> accept marijuana as a viable medicine in certain diseases.. I wonder
MG> what you guys think about that.


BA>It's a step in the right direction.  Now if we can get DEA shut down and
BA>all the thugs that work there into the unemployment line the country will
BA>be far better off.


I want to make a couple of comments here.


First of all........marajuana is no more harmful than alcohol. Probably less
so, actually.


Alcohol doesn't just make people die at an early age of various things
because of what alcohol can do to some of the vital organs It also kills
innocent people; Mary Jo Kopeckni is probably the Poster Child of the
peripheral effects of alcohol on innocent people. Or at least she would have
been had I been a politician in Ted Kennedy's state.


Where alcohol will kill you for a variety of reasons if you over-use it, the
same cannot be said of marajuana. Not that a person cannot be `under the
influence' if they are driving while high on pot. But pot is far less
physically harmful to the body than alcohol.


The fact is........neither any actual independent medical science group, or
any independent research group not connected in some way with government, can
show any single case where marajuana was the *direct* cause of a human death.


I'm not talking about driving while wasted on pot and dying in a wreck.... I'm
talking about the death being due to something the marajuana did physically,
to cause someone to die. Not one! And the proof of that is...if there were one
single actual case of someone dying of the effects of marajuana....that case
would be the banner emblem of those opposed to legalizing marajuana!


Secondly.....the government (both state and federal) have, for many years,
fought against the very thing that could have been a huge source of tax
revenue. And people would be utterly amazed at `who' actually uses marajuana;


Teachers.....police officers......members of the judiciary....members of the
medical community......financial world.....auto industry...construction...you
name it. People from all walks of life, on all social stratas, use marajuana.


It ain't that big a thing,


Thirdly, governments (make that read *politicians*) do not ever allow a direct
up or down vote *BY THE PEOPLE* on the issue of marajuana, either come to a
direct national referendum, nor allow one to make it on a ballot anywhere,
without skewering the wording or the ballot in some way as to deny the people
a result that would have decriminalized marajuana. I've lived in two or three
states so far that have tried to legalize the possession and use of marajuana,
where an overwhelming majority of the people of that state voted *yes* to
decriminalize, or legalize, and some state (backed up by the federal court of
the district in question) nullified the will of the people. By either mashing
the `wording' of the choice on the voting ballot (that happened in Arizona
once when I lived over there) so that voting *yes* was later interpreted to be
a *no* vote, or hauling the result into some government court, and getting the
*voter approval* nulified.


There is no reason in the world why marajuana shouldn't be legal, and subject
to taxation, just like alchohol and tobacco. The only reasons it isn't is
first of all; the many government funds and LEO's that would be lost. And
secondly; the `do-gooders' in government who think they have a lock on
deciding whats good for everyone else, will never allow it!








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*Durango b301 #PE*