Comments on: Top Ten Reefer Madness Stories of 2008 http://stash.norml.org/top-ten-reefer-madness-stories-of-2008 The Growing Truth About Cannabis Sun, 12 Feb 2012 16:08:57 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Tom D. http://stash.norml.org/top-ten-reefer-madness-stories-of-2008/comment-page-1#comment-3628 Tom D. Tue, 06 Jan 2009 08:17:10 +0000 http://stash.norml.org/?p=2143#comment-3628 What I don't understand is how Harkin, who is otherwise a pretty decent guy from what I've seen, is such a rabid, bloodthirsty hawk when it comes to pot. This isn't the first time he's spewed some ridiculous crap that has no basis whatsoever in reality. You want to know what really makes people sell their children? Poverty. The kind of poverty that more and more people are getting closer to in this country every day, while Washington does little or nothing to fix the root causes of this growing myriad of problems. Why don't you fight you war against poverty instead? Invest in communities instead of SWAT teams to raid and destroy greenhouses, homes and lives. Strive for constructive, positive change instead of destructive, oppressive warmongering. Senator Harkin, if you don't like pot, stop fighting it and just put a nice big tax on it instead. That seems to have been pretty effective with cigarettes, why wouldn't that have a similar effect on pot? Besides, think of the amount of money that would be raised by sales, to cover budget shortfalls at all levels of government, not to mention the benefit of utilizing law enforcement personnel to actually protect and serve our country, instead of persecute its citizens. Asset forfeiture must stop as well, after all, who's gonna have either money or credit to buy any of those seized assets these days? I don't imagine a whole lot of hands are going up. The fact of the matter is that prohibition is an utter and complete failure and it will never be able to achieve its ultimate goal, resulting in a never-ending predatory war against millions of people worldwide every year. Do we want to continue the mistakes of the past, of hunting other humans beings like hyenas stalking their prey, all for this insane war on drugs? I, for one, say as Barack Obama did: ENOUGH! Enough of this madness, we need to return to sanity. It is time to pursue a new, decriminalized, harm-reduction-based drug policy and signal the start of a more constructive, productive and ultimately beneficial chapter in our nation's history, and hopefully the history of the world as well. THIS - this is the change we need. What I don’t understand is how Harkin, who is otherwise a pretty decent guy from what I’ve seen, is such a rabid, bloodthirsty hawk when it comes to pot. This isn’t the first time he’s spewed some ridiculous crap that has no basis whatsoever in reality. You want to know what really makes people sell their children? Poverty. The kind of poverty that more and more people are getting closer to in this country every day, while Washington does little or nothing to fix the root causes of this growing myriad of problems. Why don’t you fight you war against poverty instead? Invest in communities instead of SWAT teams to raid and destroy greenhouses, homes and lives. Strive for constructive, positive change instead of destructive, oppressive warmongering.

Senator Harkin, if you don’t like pot, stop fighting it and just put a nice big tax on it instead. That seems to have been pretty effective with cigarettes, why wouldn’t that have a similar effect on pot? Besides, think of the amount of money that would be raised by sales, to cover budget shortfalls at all levels of government, not to mention the benefit of utilizing law enforcement personnel to actually protect and serve our country, instead of persecute its citizens. Asset forfeiture must stop as well, after all, who’s gonna have either money or credit to buy any of those seized assets these days? I don’t imagine a whole lot of hands are going up.

The fact of the matter is that prohibition is an utter and complete failure and it will never be able to achieve its ultimate goal, resulting in a never-ending predatory war against millions of people worldwide every year. Do we want to continue the mistakes of the past, of hunting other humans beings like hyenas stalking their prey, all for this insane war on drugs? I, for one, say as Barack Obama did: ENOUGH! Enough of this madness, we need to return to sanity. It is time to pursue a new, decriminalized, harm-reduction-based drug policy and signal the start of a more constructive, productive and ultimately beneficial chapter in our nation’s history, and hopefully the history of the world as well. THIS – this is the change we need.

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