[Mpls] Stop blaming marijuana for violence

[Laura and lloyd]

On Monday, May 2, 2005, at 02:56  AM, rhalfhill at juno.com wrote:

>
>  If marijuana were legal, it wouldn't place any "drain on our police 
> department.  Then the police could use those drained of resources on 
> arresting murderers, rapists, armed robbers, etc and we would have the 
> prison space needed to hold all the people who should be held in 
> prison to protect the rest of us.

>    Since marijuana only effects the people who use it and some people 
> even have to use it for medicinal purposes and users are not hurting 
> you or anyone else, legalization seems to offer all benefits and no 
> harm.
>     Robert Halfhill   Loring Park

Whether one is for legalizing marijuana sales or not, there are issues 
of addiction and behavior that can put users or intoxicants  into a 
police inter action resulting in arrests. There are also issues of 
driving while intoxicated that can and do involve innocent bystanders 
and other drivers.

Unlike cigarettes, there will likely be a standard of intoxication for 
legal marijuana and driving or machine operation will be precluded.

The spectrum of users is also likely to be broad enough to include 
those who are otherwise engaged in criminal activities.

I think legal marijuana will add another layer to police responsibility 
as well as adding new  laws to handle the various situations. True, 
use/possession will be more defined and there will be fewer arrests or 
none for mere use or legal possession, but when this happens will be 
far in the future after law passage.

Adding marijuana to cigarettes will pose additional health issues to 
the system (and costs) which all of us will have to cover one way or 
another. The (post-mortem) shrunken brains of addicted marijuana users 
shows that this is not a harmless pastime. I've not kept up with the 
lung damage studies, but I am sure they are out there, too. Hot smoke 
from any source is damaging to lung tissue.

I think the drug dealers are counting on marijuana being illegal for 
some time to come. What do we do in the meantime?

Best wishes,

Laura

Laura Waterman Wittstock
Minneapolis, MN
612-387-4915
www.laurawatermanwittstock.com
http://laurawatermanwittstock.blogspot.com/