Not strictly P, but definitely VL

[Henry Musikar]

Just as important as the revenue that would enter our economy, legalization of marijuana would stop the killing, sometimes in National Parks, over turf, and wind-down enforcement, interdiction, and incarceration costs.  Cocaine isn't as innocuous as pot, but decriminalization would have many of the same benefits. It works in other countries, and maybe we now have the political capital and the economic need to talk about changes.  Too many lives have been ruined by the "war on drugs," probably many more than by the drugs themselves.  

Just as we are slowly learning to change our presence in geographic wars that can't be won, saving lives and billions of dollars in the process, we need to consider the formerly inconceivable, ending the "war on drugs" that has accomplished very little while costing so much.  

Any war that requires the suspension of reason as a necessity for support is a bad war.
  - Norman Mailer

-----Original Message-----
From: Laura

Could marijuana be the answer to the economic misery facing California? Democratic State Assembly member Tom Ammiano thinks so. Ammiano introduced legislation last month that would legalize pot and allow the state to regulate and tax its sale - a move that could mean billions for the cash-strapped state. Pot is, after all, California's biggest cash crop, responsible for $14 billion in annual sales, dwarfing the state's second largest agricultural commodity - milk and cream - which brings in $7.3 billion annually, according to the most recent USDA statistics. The state's tax collectors estimate the bill would bring in about $1.3 billion in much-needed revenue a year, offsetting some of the billions in service cuts and spending reductions outlined in the recently approved state budget.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20090313/us_time/08599188495600 


Laura