An Associated Press analysis credits relentless opposition from law enforcement with blocking any movement toward legalizing medical marijuana in Kansas, despite strong public sentiment and growing support in the Legislature.
All surrounding states have some form of legal medical marijuana, and liberal Colorado has led the nation in recreational development.
The story cites the Kansas Health Institute, a nonprofit think tank, as counting 18 medical marijuana bills since 2006. One even got a committee hearing this year, but never came to a vote after law enforcement pounced on it.
I only ask that you give deference to the experience, to the opinions of the law enforcement community, testified Kirk Thompson, director of the Kansas Bureau of Investigation. Weve seen the negative side of this issue.
Indeed, cops believe they are doing the right thing in trying to eradicate marijuana. So did Carrie Nation and her hatchet brigade. The damage in undeniable.
The problem is, and weve proven this several times, prohibition doesnt work. All it does is breed crime and violence as crooks get rich supplying people with whatever the state says they cannot have.
We are making the criminal underworld, from street dealers in the U.S. to the Mexican and Colombian cartels that raise and run the drugs, filthy rich. Weve spent billions, yet were still losing this so-called War on Drugs. Weve filled our jails and created a drug-using, jail-dwelling, welfare-dependent underclass.
Just as we did with prohibition of alcohol.
But on this, the cops are wrong. Oh, theyre right about the social cost of drugs, alcohol and marijuana included. But theyve demonstrated they dont have the solution.
They say, Just give us more money, more men, longer sentences, tougher laws. But more of the same never works.
If theres an answer, it may be in treating addiction as the disease it is, instead of throwing people in jail, branding them for life as druggies and criminals, but doing little to help them get better.
We could be spending the billions wasted on drug enforcement on something that works. We choose not to. But in truth, only two groups benefit from this war. Both would be out of a job if drugs were no longer illegal.
Isnt it time we changed priorities?
We know, this is Kansas, where we didnt let go of the last vestiges of prohibition until 1984.
But we could be doing a lot better job of handling the drug problem, and law enforcement could be dealing with serious issues like domestic violence, drunk and drugged driving, in both cases, much of it fueled by untreated addiction. Jail, of course, would continue to be the last resort for these people.
