cannabisnews.com: Voters Favoring Medical Marijuana





Voters Favoring Medical Marijuana
Posted by FoM on October 05, 2000 at 08:30:35 PT
By Karen Auge, Denver Post Medical Writer 
Source: Denver Post 
The opponents of Amendment 20 have some impressive big guns on their side - the American Medical Association, the American Cancer Society, law enforcement leaders. But for now at least, proponents of legalizing marijuana for medical use have the voters on their side.A Denver Post/9News/KOA News Radio poll found that 67 percent of likely voters support Amendment 20, while 28 percent oppose it. "I'm very pleased," said Julie Roche, campaign director for Coloradans for Medical Rights 2000. 
Spokespersons for the main group opposing the amendment, Coloradans Against Legalizing Marijuana, could not be reached for comment.Amendment 20 would create a registry of seriously ill patients who, with a physician's approval, would be issued a card entitling them to use marijuana for medical purposes. The amendment does not create a system for distributing marijuana to the patients.Opponents say the effort to legalize medical marijuana is a first step toward legalizing the drug overall; and they argue its medical effectiveness hasn't been proven and that legalizing it would send the wrong message to youth.A proposition to legalize medical marijuana was on the November 1998 ballot, too. But because of a fight over whether signatures gathered to put the issue on the ballot were valid, the votes - they called it Amendment 11 that time - were never counted. But exit polls showed the amendment probably would have passed.According to Roche, the exit-poll margins were about the same as the Denver Post poll results, conducted late last month with 500 likely voters.So far both sides have run a fairly low-key campaign.A Web site operated by Coloradans Against Legalizing Marijuana is under construction - it reportedly will include a letter from Gov. Bill Owens explaining why he's opposed to legalizing medical marijuana.Roche said her group's campaign has largely been a grassroots one up to now. They just recently bought some television and radio time, Roche said.Source: Denver Post (CO)Author: Karen Auge, Denver Post Medical Writer Published: October 5, 2000Copyright: 2000 The Denver PostContact: letters denverpost.com Address: 1560 Broadway, Denver, CO 80202Fax: (303) 820.1502Website: http://www.denverpost.com/Forum: http://www.denverpost.com/voice/voice.htmRelated Articles & Web Sites:Coloradans For Medical Rights http://www.medicalmarijuana.com/Drug Policy Forum of Coloradohttp://www.drugsense.org/dpfco/ Marijuana Laws an Election Issue in Many W. States http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7195.shtmlTwo States Vote On Marijuana http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7186.shtmlColorado To Vote on Marijuana Uses http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7018.shtmlCannabisNews Medical Marijuana Archives:http://cannabisnews.com/news/list/medical.shtml
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Comment #1 posted by mungojelly on October 05, 2000 at 12:20:16 PT:
the infamous opening wedge
The legalization of medical marijuana is not an opening wedge for legalization in general -- would that it were, for we would then be seeing complete legalization trailing the heels of this present wave of medical marijuana reform -- but perhaps this experience of the rapidly advancing state of medical marijuana reform will give us some clues as to what to expect from the politics of full legalization, and how to best encourage that political situation to rapidly develop to its full fruition. As I see it, the wave of medical marijuana reform we are experiencing is the tip of an iceberg. It may seem that it started in one particular place (prop 215) but in fact that was just the first emergence of what in fact was a gradual sea change in the public opinion of marijuana. The public's acceptance level for medical marijuana -- mostly unconscious, as they were not confronted with the issue -- had been gradually increasing, until a few years ago it had passed over the majority line and over a certain margin of error, so as to produce a critical mass. This is not to say that the work of those who championed medical marijuana was unnecessary. Someone needed to bring the issue to light and put energy into turning this latent popular sentiment into an active political change. Yet I feel that the basic condition of society had to undergo a gradual systemic change before the conditions were ripe for this political presentation to succeed. If we look at the present state of recreational marijuana prohibition, it is clear that the percentage in support of legalization is below the majority line. It is not insignificant, in fact it may be as high as 30% to 40%, but only in small isolated pockets -- in many college communities for example -- does it actually pass over the majority line. This is the fundamental obstacle to legalization. Unless perhaps (imitating the loggers and polluters and monopolists) we throw huge amounts of money at politicians, we will be unable to enact legalization legislation while it is an unpopular position. On the bright side, once the sentiment for legalization passes over that magical majority line -- allowing for a certain period of time for the system to catch up -- there will sooner or later (and probably much sooner than we might think) be a change in the law. Our focus should be therefore on reaching the public, not playing political games. We need to open the marijuana debate, not on the national political stage (where it is unlikely to be productive even if it does happen), but with our family, friends and acquaintances. The most potent political statement we can make for marijuana legalization is "I smoke marijuana." Each person who stands up and takes a stand for their personal rights -- not just our right to smoke marijuana, but our right to speak honestly and freely about our activities -- adds another nail to the coffin of prohibition. It's time to stand up and fight. 
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