cannabisnews.com: Wisdom Stopped Prop. 5 Wisdom Stopped Prop. 5 Posted by FoM on November 12, 2000 at 07:18:24 PT Letter To The Editor Source: Anchorage Daily News I have heard many people complaining that Ballot Measure 5 did not pass and I am amazed at the reasoning behind the protests. Arguments have been made about saving money for education, privacy in the home, fixing the roads, etc. Personally, I think these arguments are bunk. Practical and responsible thinking tells us that we will not save money. How do we save money by paying law-breakers? Why would we set these people free anyway? When incarcerated, they had willingly broken the law and they had to bear the consequences. Also, "saving money" to better educate our children would do no good if the bus drivers and teachers are habitual smokers. I do not want my grandchildren hauled around or supervised by someone who is impaired. As far as the privacy issue, there are a lot of things that are not allowed under the law in the privacy of the home, the most prevalent being abuse. Do we always base our decisions on what the dysfunctional elements of our society do? Worst of all, our children are being used as pawns in this debate. We need to set aside our adult desires and think of them. If we want educated, moral, and respectful children who will grow up to be good leaders in the community, then we need a clear head to guide them and teach them. We need to be able to keep them safe. We do not need to be stoned with the blessing of the state. -- Carol A. Madison Anchorage Source: Anchorage Daily News (AK)Author: Carol A. Madison Published: November 9, 2000Copyright: 2000 The Anchorage Daily News Contact: letters adn.com Website: http://www.adn.com/ Related Articles & Web Sites:Free Hemp in Alaskahttp://www.freehempinak.orgHemp 2000http://www.hemp2000.org Proponents' Greed Brought Hemp, Tax Cap Downhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7613.shtmlPot Fans Spottyhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7610.shtmlVoters Dump Pot Proposition 2-to-1http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7603.shtml END SNIP --> Snipped Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help Comment #8 posted by Josh on December 10, 2000 at 21:58:13 PT: right... "Children who will be good moral leaders?" How will they know freedom and their own rights if their taught that all evil people use drugs,and it's okay to watch police helicopters fly over your neighborhood,day and night,because they catch "bad" people,like I've had to see for ten years? To grow up w/ that as a child is okay,is that's what I need to be a good moral leader,and be "productive" in society? Well congratulations,if that's it,then u just lost a citizen of this "utopia." [ Post Comment ] Comment #7 posted by RAS JAMES RSIFWH on November 12, 2000 at 14:19:18 PT HOLY HERB cannabis sativa is the sacred TREE OF LIFE promised in REV: 22:1&2...IT IS NOW MAINFESTING and everyone can see that fact. leaves/medicine; fruiting each month; & crystal clear water flowing down the streets in bottled spring water....give all praise and thanks to JAH RASTAFARI...and tell the children mankind has finally entered the CITY OF GOD. [ Post Comment ] Comment #6 posted by freedom fighter on November 12, 2000 at 13:14:30 PT Faces of real people "Why would we set these people free anyway?" http://www.freehempinak.org/pow.htmhttp://www.november.org/wall.html http://www.freehempinak.org/pow.htm [ Post Comment ] Comment #5 posted by kaptinemo on November 12, 2000 at 11:40:33 PT: Wisdom versus 'wisdom' Everytime I hear some anti blathering like this, I can't help but look back and think of the things that used to pass for 'conventional wisdom'. Like:"We can't let the women vote! Why, if they vote, they'll vote for the wrong things! They'll be swayed by emotional arguments and not be able to rationally deal with the real problems of the day!"Or, such 'gems of conventional wisdom' like:"Emancipate the n*****s? You must be insane! They are fundamentally incapable of self-governance, being wholly driven by base and animal appetites! (Oh, BTW, you'll need a bigger gun to kill them with if they get to snorting coke while chasing white women, too! )"Or:"Elect a Catholic President? Impossible! He'll be nothing but a handmaiden of the Pope, doing his bidding!"Uh-huh. So much for conventional wisdom. The same kind as dispalyed by this anti. I have a challenge to make. For all those people who are involved in the bio sciences: instead of concentrating on pathologies, how about this idea: A sanity plague? A phage that would cause fundamental restructuring of a sheeple's cortex, which would enable them to truly cogitate rather than indulge in specious rationalizing? That would do more good than just making it so they could live longer, propagate, and spread sheeple genes to the children they profess to love so much... [ Post Comment ] Comment #4 posted by ripper on November 12, 2000 at 10:40:36 PT propoganda (I have heard many people complaining that Ballot Measure 5 did not pass and I am amazed at the reasoning behind the protests. Arguments have been made about saving money for education, privacy in the home, fixingthe roads, etc. Personally, I think these arguments are bunk. ) What, you don't want to save money for the education of our children? You don't want privacy in your home? The money you want to spend to lock up responsible users could definently be used better. (Practical and responsible thinking tells us that we will not save money. How do we save money by payinglaw-breakers? Why would we set these people free anyway? ) Practical and responsable thinking tells us building more prisons and inforcing an uninforcable law is a waste of money that could go to schools and treatment. Why should we keep them in jail if they are non-violent users? Set them free becouse this is a free country and the punishment should fit the crime.( I see no crime in smoking) Sex offenders and rapist and murderers are let out while non-violent pot smokers are kept in. Would you jail all pot smokers? That would be a trick since 70,000,000 people in the USA have smoked it. (When incarcerated, they had willingly broken the law and they had to bear the consequences.) If the law changes, They should be let out. When slavery was abolished, they let the slaves free. They didn't say, you were a slave before we changed the law so you will have to go ahead and keep being a slave. You where guilty then, so your guilty now even if the laws are changed go's against everything this country stands for. Which is FREEDOM.(Also, "saving money" to bettereducate our children would do no good if the bus drivers and teachers are habitual smokers. ) Or drunks, or hung over, or on prescreption medication, or just had a fight with the wife and still mad, or convicted sex offenders , or a smoker having a nic fit. You seem to forget that most people who would smoke pot allready do and do it responsibly. (I do not want my grandchildren hauled around or supervised by someone who is impaired.)I don't either.(As far as the privacy issue, there area lot of things that are not allowed under the law in the privacy of the home, the most prevalent being abuse. Do we always baseour decisions on what the dysfunctional elements of our society do? )Apparently, you do. All you have wrote is based on the small amount of "dysfunctional elements" that abuse drugs. You completely ignore the major portion that smokes responsibly. (Worst of all, our children are being used as pawns in this debate.) You are the one playing the children in this and if you are really as concerned as you say, you would be working to get the children out of jail and back to school. Instead, you work to keep them in jail. I wonder about your motive for doing this.(We need to set aside our adult desires and think of them. )Yes we do. What kind of a life is jail for a child. What kind of a life is it for a child if mom and dad are in jail for 10 years. (If we want educated, moral, and respectful children who will grow up to be good leaders in the community, then we need a clear head to guide them and teach them.)Yes, we most certainly do. Not someone who is having delusions of grandure. Someone who can teach freedom not oppresion.(We need to be able to keep them safe. We do not need to be stoned with the blessing ofthe state. ) Or drunk, or smoke cigs. or on prescription drugs with the blessing of the state.' ' Health officials in Geneva have suppressed the publication of a politically sensitive analysis that confirms cannabis is safer than alcohol or tobacco. ' ' What the WHO doesn't want you to know about cannabis http://marijuana.newscientist.com/nsplus/insight/drugs/marijuana/news.html ' ' . . .Meanwhile, a report by the U.S. Department of Agriculture assessing the potential of hemp growing has made the rounds of the federal government. The report's beige cover is stamped "Classified." ' ' BIRD FOOD IS A CASUALTY OF THE U.S. WAR ON DRUGS http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v99.n1077.a10.html " ... because underage smoking and alcohol use typically precede marijuana use, marijuana is not the most common, and is rarely the first, "gateway" to illicit drug use. There is no conclusive evidence that the drug effects of marijuana are casually linked to the subsequent abuse of other illicit drugs." [ Institute of Medicine Report, 3/99, This study was supported under contract No. DC7C02 from the Executive Office of the President, Office of the National Drug Control Policy. ] see http://www.drugsense.org/iom_report/ , http://www.marijuananews.com/executive_summary_of_the_iom_rep.htm etc. "When Cops Become the Gangsters" by Joseph D. McNamara, Retired Police Chief of San Jose http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v99/n1033/a04.html etc. Cops Against The Drug War http://www.drcnet.org/cops/ Decrying that adults are thrown in jail for using drugs is very different from pushing drugs on our children. If you can't see the difference then you should take off your rose colored glasses and look at the facts and truth instead of using propaganda liesto further your prohabishnist opinon of Marijuana.Drug Czar Lies Again About the Dutch http://www.marijuananews.com/drug_czar_lies_about_the_dutch_a.htm Is Truth a Casualty of the Drug War? http://www.csdp.org/ads/pinocchio.htm , http://www.csdp.org/ads/ etc . If you don't have the facts, don't write about it. Get your facts straight and then try writing the truth. Truth and compassion are good things to teach our children. Lies are not. My child is a prisoner of the war on drugs. James Stevens [ Post Comment ] Comment #3 posted by Carlo B. Madosin on November 12, 2000 at 09:12:20 PT Hypocrite >> Worst of all, our children are being used as pawns in this debate. Now isn't that the pot calling the tea kettle black. The only people using the children as pawns are the prohibitionists. >> We do not need to be stoned with the blessing of the state. NO, Just drunk and driving. [ Post Comment ] Comment #2 posted by Robbie on November 12, 2000 at 08:53:57 PT: These people really believe these things > ..."saving money" to better educate our children would do no good if the bus drivers and teachers are habitual smokers.Bus drivers are teaching now?! That would be cool, he/she could teach while driving. But, hey, maybe we could get rid of bus drivers and have teachers driving the buses.By the way, I second the nomination of Captain Planet!! Dammit Bill! I'm a voter not a partisan hack! [ Post Comment ] Comment #1 posted by legalizeit on November 12, 2000 at 07:53:19 PT Wake up, o woolen one! Time for a shearing! >Worst of all, our children are being used as pawns in this debate. We need to set aside our adult desires and think of them. If we want educated, moral, and respectful children who will grow up to be good leaders in the community, then we need a clear head to guide them and teach them. We need to be able to keep them safe. We do not need to be stoned with the blessing of the state. OK, if children are the most important concern, exalted over any adult desire, then let's outlaw gambling, pornography, alcohol, tobacco, sex, R & PG-rated movies, George Carlin, credit cards, skiing and the 6 o'clock news!!Let's vote Barney for President, Teletubbies for Senators, He-Man for Secretary of Defense, and Captain Planet for Secretary of the Interior!! These bleating, brainwashed sheep cannot accept the fact that millions of people use marijuana in a responsible manner. It's either total prohibition, or everyone and his momma is driving around perpetually stoned, offering joints to toddlers!>Do we always base our decisions on what the dysfunctional elements of our society do? If you are a politician, nark or DARE officer, yes. You are blind to the fact that most use responsibly the natural substance you have arbitrarily singled out for condemnation.Until we can get under the skin of these people and somehow convince them they've been fed a ration of BULL all these years and are supporting an irrational, racist and immoral law, we'll have comments and votes like these and prohibition will continue to perpetuate itself. [ Post Comment ] Post Comment Name: Optional Password: E-Mail: Subject: Comment: [Please refrain from using profanity in your message] Link URL: Link Title: