Joel Connelly on "The real reefer madness: Medical marijuana regulation"

Joel Connelly (seattlepi.com):

"I support allowing the medical use of marijuana," Gregoire said. Almost in the next breath, however, she noted that possessing cannabis to relieve pain is "still a federal crime," adding that this is an issue of "extreme complexity."

But a few basic truths need recognizing: Medical marijuana users cause no pain to society. They are about relieving pain. Pain knows no boundaries of political climate or geography. Does one set of policies apply in the city where Gregoire went to law school, and another on this side of the Cascade Curtain?

We still see about 800,000 drug possession arrests in America each year. The "War on Drugs" is a miserable failure, perpetuated only by the bureaucracy it spawns. The 40-year war hasn't stopped people from smoking cannabis -- use among teenagers is up of late -- and succeeds only in wounding reputations. MORE...