cannabisnews.com: Hemp Initiative is Foolish and Dangerous Hemp Initiative is Foolish and Dangerous Posted by FoM on October 11, 2000 at 11:14:30 PT Letters To The Editor Source: Anchorage Daily News As parents and participants in public policy issues affecting Alaska families, we appreciate this opportunity to express our views on the so-called "hemp" initiative on this November's ballot. Initiative No. 5 is poorly crafted and poses a danger to our public health and safety. In short, we think it's a bad idea. The initiative legalizes marijuana use for all Alaskans, children and adults. It regulates marijuana in a manner similar to alcohol, opening the door to buying clubs. It requires those incarcerated for previous marijuana-related crimes to be released from prison with restitution for fines paid and time served. And it prohibits state assistance in enforcing federal marijuana laws. Until the Legislature enacts a law specifically prohibiting marijuana use by minors, passage of this initiative would legalize use by minors as well as adults. That's because marijuana use is only illegal for juveniles because it is illegal for adults. If you remove that prohibition for adults, it automatically becomes legal for juveniles. Most Alaskans would agree that, alone, is reason to oppose this measure. By regulating marijuana in the same manner as alcohol, the state would have to license marijuana farms, similar to current brewery licenses and retail marijuana outlets, similar to liquor stores. This would mirror California's scarred history of marijuana buying clubs. Alaskans don't want to provide the next haven for legal drug purchases. Public safety would be endangered under this initiative when it comes to regulating the offense of driving under the influence of marijuana. There is no readily available test to determine the level of active marijuana in a person's system, nor a method to administer such a test, similar to a Breathalyzer for alcohol. For the state to apply this initiative, it would require that convicts be released, have their records expunged and receive reimbursement for their time served and fines paid. This is bad public policy and expensive. The state also would immediately lose hundreds of thousands of dollars in federal drug prevention grants and likely jeopardize millions more. Another implied purpose of this initiative is to legalize possession of industrial hemp -- the fiber from the marijuana plant used to make rope, clothing and other industrial products. That's already legal in Alaska. But this initiative, by specifying legalization of industrial hemp, gives the false appearance that such possession is currently illegal. It is important all Alaskans understand the effects of this initiative before voting on it. Once understood, it will be obvious this proposed law is foolish and dangerous for our state and its citizens. -- Tony Knowles, governor -- Susan M. Knowles, first lady Drug War is Futile Effort: My viewpoint on marijuana is that it should be legalized. Through my study of history, I have come to believe the war on drugs is of no use. Billions of our tax dollars are spent every year on "the war against drugs" to what I see as no avail. My feelings are that it should be decriminalized. If you look at our institutions, how many of those people locked up would be out if marijuana was legal? Take a look at our youth. Teenage years are the time of rebellion. Many teens use marijuana, and a nice number of them use because of the simple fact that it is not permitted. I'm not saying that all use should be granted, because limitations are needed. But I am saying that nowhere in our Constitution will you find anything about drug wars. Legalizing marijuana can stop illegal activities that surround it, and stop the locking up of those who choose to use marijuana and not act out criminally. There has never been a report of a person using marijuana, getting into a car, and killing somebody else on the road, yet alcohol is still legal. I feel we should take the money spent every year for fighting the drug war and use it for more constructive matters, such as education, roads, Social Security benefits, and the Permanent Fund. These are the things we as a community should be focused on. -- Will Cochran Anchorage Save Freedom; Legalize Pot: There's no need to focus on possible industrial usage as a reason to legalize marijuana. As Bob Kelly (Letters, Oct. 9) pointed out, with our short growing season, it might not be very profitable. The fact is that marijuana should be legalized to preserve our personal freedom, and to reduce the harm caused by a black market. Let's say your teen starts smoking weed. The way the laws are now, the only way to get it would be through a dealer, who might also deal in harder drugs. The quality of black market weed can vary; for instance, it could be laced. Besides that, your child would be exposed to the danger associated with criminal activity. On the other hand, if a kid wants to buy alcohol, they try to find an older person to get it from a licensed shop that sells a federally regulated product. Sales to minors are far easier to track. There is no real danger involved other than getting caught. Of course no one wants their child drinking or smoking, but the fact is that most will at least experiment. Regulating marijuana would be far more effective in keeping our kids safe. Legalizing weed, an herb that is safer than caffeine, would separate it from harder drugs. It would legally allow medical patients to use the medicine Alaskans already voted to let them have. It would take marijuana off the streets and out of the hands of criminals. It would make the statement that Alaskans take their freedom seriously. -- Cheryl Goodrich Anchorage Keep Marijuana Illegal: In the news lately, we have seen a great deal of outrage over the destruction caused by driving while impaired by alcohol. We have also seen a billion-dollar judgment against the tobacco industry for the damage smoking has caused. Is marijuana more or less harmful than alcohol or tobacco? It is certainly a fact that alcohol has caused much tragedy due to its causing mental and physical impairment to the body. Tobacco has certainly caused a great deal of death due to the carcinogenic effects caused by smoking it. Marijuana, however, does both. It alters and impairs the mind and body while, at the same time, it is ingested by smoking and contains more known carcinogens than tobacco. Not only that, but unlike cigarettes and alcohol, marijuana is smoked for one reason only: to intentionally become high from it, not for its taste as a casual drinker will do. So should we then legalize marijuana just because these other two destructive substances are legal? Only if three wrongs make a right. -- Chris Anderson Big Lake Anchorage Daily News Letters To The Editor:http://www.adn.com/letters/0,2654,,00.htmlSource: Anchorage Daily News (AK)Published: October 11, 2000Copyright: 2000 The Anchorage Daily News Contact: letters adn.com Website: http://www.adn.com/ Related Articles & Web Sites:Free Hemp in AlaskaAl Anders, Chair2603 Spenard RoadAnchorage, Alaska 99503 (907) 278-HEMP E-mail: freehempinak gci.netVisit their Web Site: http://www.freehempinak.orgHemp 2000R.L. Marcy, ChairP.O. Box 90055Anchorage, AK 99509907-376-2232 (p)Fax: 907-376-0530 (f)E-mail: marcy hemp2000.orgVisit their Web Site: http://www.hemp2000.org Alaska's Voters to Decide On Legalizing Marijuana: http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7305.shtmlVote For Tolerance, Vote For Pot: http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7300.shtmlVote No on Ballot Measure 5: http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7299.shtmlHemp Draws Dollars:http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7314.shtml END SNIP --> Snipped Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help Comment #7 posted by FoM on October 13, 2000 at 11:12:51 PT: Letters To The Editor Source: Anchorage Daily News (AK)Published: October 13, 2000Copyright: 2000 The Anchorage Daily News Contact: letters adn.com Website: http://www.adn.com/ Knowles Uses Pot Scare Tactics: The governor and the first lady have weighed in on Proposition 5, and surprise, surprise, they are against it. It seems that no politician can resist the urge to control the public. It might be impossible to find an example of government relaxing its power over the people it is supposed to be serving. Just like all the other anti-personal freedom crusaders, they wax apocalyptic on the possibility of citizens' making their own choices. The governor would have us believe that Proposition 5 will allow elementary school children to smoke pot and release "convicts" onto the streets. This is a pathetic and obvious attempt to use inflammatory language to scare any undecided voters away from supporting the initiative. How can they in one sentence worry about little kids smoking pot and then turn around and admit that the initiative would have marijuana regulated as alcohol, which is available only to people over 21? Then there is the ultimate scare tactic of comparing our situation with California's. What better way to frighten people than to tell Alaskans that they might be in a situation comparable to California's. On Nov. 7, don't let these scare tactics keep you from voting for personal freedom and choice. They have no argument against legalizing pot, so they resort to gloom-and-doom fantastical lies to change your mind. How sad. Vote yes on Proposition 5. -- Chip Dennison Anchorage Pot Less Harmful Than Booze: In the United States: A woman cannot vote or own property, including the jewelry she wears. A black person can be bought, sold and made to work without benefit of wages. No person is allowed to drink spirits at any time, not even in his own home. This is some of our history. These conditions were enforceable by our laws and made sense to people at their respective times. Paradigms change in the United States as we grow in cultural diversity and gain tolerance for new ideas. What makes sense to us today can seem ludicrous years from now and vice versa. There will come a time when marijuana is legal to use for adult recreation. In hindsight we will wonder why we so favored alcohol and demonized a milder alternative. As for the "gateway drug" theory, kids typically try marijuana around the age they experiment with alcohol, before they graduate from high school. If they try both and discover how much milder the effects of marijuana are compared with those of alcohol, they may assume that either (a) adults don't know what they're talking about when it comes to recreational substances or (b) they've been lied to about the "danger of drugs" so adults can keep them from having fun. Kids rebel. Those who feel they were duped on the ramifications of marijuana use may be more inclined to experiment with other, seriously harmful substances. The "gateway theory" has become a quagmire and defeated its own purpose. -- Vanessa Emerzian-Peters Anchorage Pot Destroys Kids' Futures: I am not willing to sacrifice the children and youths of Alaska by voting to legalize hemp. People voting for the marijuana issue are only showing the ignorance and/or self-centered need to get high. Hemp will never become a realistic useful commodity, and in all reality the people supporting such an issue have not thought out or researched the practicality. Yes, in some ways hemp may be useful in small scale, but the millions of dollars it will take to produce a realistic and usable product or fuel are not there. There is, however, another issue that is not being looked at, and I submit evidence in the form of statistics on youths and crimes. A 1998 Portland, Ore., study showed that at the time of arrest in violent offenses, 48.2 percent tested positive for marijuana, 88.9 percent arrested on weapons crimes tested positive for marijuana, 46.9 percent arrested in assaults tested positive for marijuana and 73.7 percent arrested in vehicle theft tested positive for marijuana. When you legalize a product that lowers youthful inhibitions, all you do is run the risk of damaging or destroying the future Alaska youths. One needs only to visit the McLaughlin youth facility, North Star, Charter North hospitals or state jails to see the damage that pot has done. -- Dave Fredericks Anchorage Letters To The Editor:http://www.adn.com/letters/0,2654,,00.html [ Post Comment ] Comment #6 posted by FoM on October 12, 2000 at 07:49:29 PT: Pot Smokers Don't Deserve Jail Source: Anchorage Daily News (AK)Published: October 12, 2000Copyright: 2000 The Anchorage Daily News Contact: letters adn.com Website: http://www.adn.com/ I am in my forties with a son in his mid-twenties who has smoked marijuana since he was about 14. I did not want him to and don't want him to now, but he is an adult and makes his own choices. He has his own business, has a nice relationship, and is otherwise a respectful citizen. He is a good person. I am voting for Proposition 5 because I do not want him to go to jail. I don't want him to go through the nastiness of the criminal justice system simply because of his choice of which molecules he uses to relax at night. Talk of "protecting children" makes me boil when the politicians won't fund schools. You want to do something "for the children," try fully funding schools. You have a minority of businessmen making a lot of money by persecuting a large segment of our society. That money would be better directed toward giving our children a real drug education and not just trying to scare them. It didn't work for my son and now I fear the government won't recognize that it failed my son if they arrest him. When you are alone in that voting booth, can you vote to continue a system that offers nothing to protect kids, but keeps in place a system that simply fills prison beds after they turn 18? If you or someone else's adult child is making these choices, ask yourself: Do they belong in prison for it? -- Dianne Geissinger Anchorage Anchorage Daily News Letters To The Editor:http://www.adn.com/letters/0,2654,,00.html [ Post Comment ] Comment #5 posted by Phyro on October 11, 2000 at 23:33:09 PT Scarred Stuped!! If Hemp is made legal he might go and smoke the EVILWEED then He would have ReferMadness & Halft to be Put Down like a Rabbid Dog..... NOT at all He will Gust Half to Live with HEMP Now wont HE. Buy the way : Get reday For the SMACK DOWN GOV...:) [ Post Comment ] Comment #4 posted by mungojelly on October 11, 2000 at 17:01:48 PT: a bald-faced lie It would be possible to give this so-called governor of Alaska the benefit of the doubt and suppose that he was merely misinformed (or more likely completely uninformed), disrespectful, and cruel. I do not give him the benefit of the doubt. I suspect him of being all these things and additionally a corrupt liar. mungojelly [ Post Comment ] Comment #3 posted by MikeEEEEE on October 11, 2000 at 16:52:11 PT Oh No! Tony Knowles, the Governor, would actually have to get off his behind and do something if marijuana were legalized. I would love to see marijuana legalized there; the experiment would work. Poor Tony Knowles will have to work with a new law, don't you feel sorry for him?From Chris Anderson:Not only that, but unlike cigarettes and alcohol, marijuana is smoked for one reason only: to intentionally become high from it, not for its taste as a casual drinker will do. This guy is ill informed, if he did some research he would find out about the Cannabis Cup. People do aquire a taste for the herb. [ Post Comment ] Comment #2 posted by observer on October 11, 2000 at 15:49:44 PT Know-Nothing Knowles The initiative legalizes marijuana use for all Alaskans, children and adults. ... Until the Legislature enacts a law specifically prohibiting marijuana use by minors, passage of this initiative would legalize use by minors as well as adults. That's because marijuana use is only illegal for juveniles because it is illegal for adults. If you remove that prohibition for adults, it automatically becomes legal for juveniles. Most Alaskans would agree that, alone, is reason to oppose this measure. What an outrageous spreader of falsehoods. (Typicial polotician.) INITIATIVE PETITION 99HEMP - AN ACT TO LEGALIZE HEMP. BE IT ENACTED BY THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ALASKA: I. Add the following section to the criminal code of the State of Alaska, any laws or policies to the contrary notwithstanding: (1) Persons, 18 years or older, shall not be prosecuted, be denied any right or privilege, nor be subject to criminal or civil penalties for the possession, cultivation, distribution, or consumption of: (a) Industrial hemp products. Hemp farmers and manufacturers of industrial hemp products shall not be subject to any special zoning or licensing fees that are discriminatory or prohibitive. (c) Hemp products for nutritional use. (d) Hemp products for personal use in private. No permit or license may be required for non-commercial cultivation, transportation, distribution or consumption of any hemp product. . . .http://www.freehempinak.org/billtext.htm The initiative only applies to "Persons, 18 years or older". Knowles obviously hasn't even read it, and/or is counting on the readers of his alarmist screed to have not read it. The initiative starts right out saying it applies only to those 18 or over. That's not "children", those are draftable adults. Public safety would be endangered under this initiative when it comes to regulating the offense of driving under the influence of marijuana.More scare mongering by a master scaremonger...see:UK: Cannabis May Make You a Safer Driver (Aug. 2000)http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread6717.shtmlAustralia: Cannabis Crash Risk Less: Study (1998)http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v98/n945/a08.htmlAustralia: Study Goes to Pot (1998)http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v98/n947/a06.htmlMany many not like this fact, but it is a fact nonetheless: drivers with cannabis in their blood are safer drivers.Drug-free drivers caused the accidents in 53.5 per cent of cases. Injured drivers with a blood-alcohol concentration of more than 0.05 per cent were culpable in nearly 90 per cent of accidents they were involved in. Drivers with cannabis in their blood were less likely to cause an accident, with a culpability rate of 50.6 per cent. http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v98/n947/a06.html For the state to apply this initiative, it would require that convicts be released, have their records expunged and receive reimbursement for their time served and finespaid.Freeing prisoners that have done nothing that they should be caged like animals, prisoners who are tortured with rape http://www.spr.org and have their property stolen by thugs http://www.fear.org , is a good thing. This is bad public policy and expensive.Cheaper than continuing to lock up these vicious, hardened, wicked, evil, horrible, terrible ... pot smokers year after year.The state also would immediately lose hundreds of thousands of dollars in federal drug prevention grants and likely jeopardize millions more.I.e. Lose federal dollars going to police forces to eradicate marijuana and arrest pot smokers? Since (if it passes) marijuana will no longer can be eradicated by government nor will pot smokers be arrested, then Alaska won't be needing those police state funds. Arguing that people should be locked up because one governmental entity might lose some funding from another governmental entity is ethically challenged, to say the least. But such is how politicians like Knowles are corrupted. [ Post Comment ] Comment #1 posted by drfist on October 11, 2000 at 14:17:13 PT "for Taste" sure Scotch tastes like iodine, Vodka like gasohol, they drink this poison for taste? RIGHT !!Chris, wake UP ,your 3 wrongs have nothing to do with Cannabis. it appears that you are the foolish and dangerous one in this discussion [ Post Comment ] Post Comment Name: Optional Password: E-Mail: Subject: Comment: [Please refrain from using profanity in your message] Link URL: Link Title: