Now that the impeachment mess is winding down, look for Washington politicos to get back to the business of screwing the American people.

Clinton Administration officials, including Al Gore (who used marijuana well into his thirties), recently announced the president’s "more of the same" anti-drug plan that proposes wasting another $18 billion of our money this year alone.

The plan offers no new ideas, nor any indication that officials have learned anything from decades of pursuing failed policies that have harmed our nation and the world.

The strategy of deceit that portrays marijuana, one of the safest substances known to man, as dangerous, remains unchanged. Alcohol, tobacco and prescription drug dangers are largely ignored. Law-abiding tax-paying marijuana users are demonized and their civil liberties are threatened as the government ratchets up the penalties for not buying into their ideological doublespeak.

Federal attempts to suppress marijuana have denied relief to thousands of sick and dying Americans who could be helped by a drug policy based on compassion, sanity and common sense. Instead, patients are targeted for arrest even in states where voters have passed medical marijuana initiatives into law.

The effects of these policies fall hardest on the poor and minorities. Over 1.8 million people are currently behind bars in the United States, the highest per capita incarceration rate in the world. Enacting this plan will certainly lead to more lives wasted, families destroyed, and ever-increasing public health problems.

The only beneficiaries of these failed policies are the drug barons and the prison-industrial complex.

If this is any indication of what Mr. Gore plans to offer in the way of new vision for his campaign for president in 2000, we can only hope for a credible third-party candidate to lead us out of this madness. Any Republican candidate can only be expected to pursue even harsher and more harmful policies than this draconian plan.

Emailed 2/23/99 3:48:23 PM

Dear Editor,

That the U.N. has recommended research into medical marijuana to end the 'debate' over it's efficacy is somewhat of a good sign, but I fear it does not go far enough.

Millions of sick and dying people worldwide need legal access to medical marijuana today. Research is good, but for the people who can be helped today, it is just another cruel stall that has been used far too long to deny access to this medicine

There is plenty of evidence that marijuana has considerable therapeutic utility. Research yes, but give us legal access NOW!

Gary Storck

(243 words) emailed to Capital Times 24 May, 1999

The Clinton administration's new regulations making marijuana more easily available to scientists who want to study its medical effects represent a timid step that ignores the recommendations of its own report.

While the new guidelines will encourage more research, they will not help patients who have an immediate need for medical marijuana. They do not allow single-patient compassionate use as the Institute of Medicine had recommended in its March 1999 report. The IOM report documented marijuana's vast medical utility and debunked lies used to justify its prohibition.

The guidelines state the government does not intend to approve "single-patient requests for marijuana," because they do not "produce use useful scientific information."

In effect, the Clinton administration is supporting the continued criminalization of these patients while research drags on. Research is great, but it should have been ongoing for years. This action appears to be an implicit admission that the government has blocked most research into medical marijuana for political reasons for at least two decades. Further research does nothing for those suffering today.

Congress could end the impasse by passing medical marijuana legislation, of which Tammy Baldwin is a co-sponsor, that would reschedule marijuana so physicians can prescribe it.

At the state level, lawmakers can fill this gap by passing medical marijuana legislation here in Wisconsin. Call 800-362-9472 and ask your state legislators and the governor to co-sponsor Rep. Frank Boyle's medical marijuana bill. Let's stop criminalizing sick people for their choice of medicine!

31 May, 1999 emailed to Capital Times

Last November 3, residents of the District of Columbia cast ballots on a medical marijuana initiative. Exit polls showed the measure passing with the support of 69% of voters.

Now, six months later, the votes remain uncounted because legislation authored by Rep. Bob Barr (R-GA), and included as an amendment on the FY 1999 D.C. budget prohibits the certification of these election results. The matter remains tied up in court.

In the history of the Republic, Congress has never suspended an election. Even in wartime, this nation adheres to the democratic process and principles it promotes and defends throughout the world.

This assault on democracy has still not been rectified. Despite the findings of its own Institute of Medicine report detailing marijuana's medicinal benefits, the Clinton administration joined with Rep. Barr, (strange bedfellows indeed!) and filed briefs supporting this attack on our democratic principles.

If this nation is truly the democracy our leaders claim it is, legislation authorizing the certification of these election results must to be enacted immediately.

(169 words)

Emailed to The Capital Times Saturday, August 14, 1999

Instead of donating to President Clinton's legal defense fund, state residents should consider donating funds to the many medical marijuana patients being prosecuted at his behest, "Wisconsinites donate $18.000 to Clinton defense", August 14, 1999.

Highly decorated Vietnam veteran B.E. Smith, convicted in Sacramento for cultivation of 87 marijuana plants for medical use, legal under California law, and sentenced to 27 months in federal prison, could use help funding his appeal. News reports indicated that the decision to prosecute Smith came from the White House, perhaps Clinton himself.

At his sentencing, Smith told the judge, who also handled the Unabomber case, "Every day I'm in prison will be seen by me as another day in service of my nation."

In southern California, author and AIDS patient Peter McWilliams and cancer patient Todd McCormick face ten years to life on federal marijuana charges. One of the government witnesses is the director of a Los Angeles medical marijuana club, which continues to cultivate and dispense marijuana, while McWilliams and McCormack are forbidden to even use it while on bail.

Also caught up in that case is Rene Boje, who federal authorities are trying to extradite from Canada to face ten years to life. In November, she will try to quality for refugee status in Canada.

President Clinton's legal problems are due to his own malfeasance and character flaws. Sick people being prosecuted for their choice of medicine and political beliefs is a human rights issue.

(243 words)

Emailed to The Capital Times Monday, August 30, 1999 Also Eau Claire Leader-Telegram leadertelegram@ecol.net

George W. Bush's cocaine question has ignited a long overdue discussion of our nation's drug policies.

The legal status of psychoactive substances needs be based on their potential for harm rather than the personal prejudices of lawmakers.

America tried alcohol prohibition but found it to be a dismal failure. The government decided it was better to trust people to make the right choices in their alcohol use than ceding control of the manufacture and distribution of this substance to criminal enterprises.

For sixty-plus years, our national drug prohibition policies have led once again to criminal enterprises serving the immense demand for illegal drugs by Americans.

If we examine the potential for harm of various drugs, clearly alcohol and tobacco represent the top two in terms of health problems, with alcohol often a trigger for increased crime, violence and accidents.

The most benign of the recreational drugs widely used in our culture is marijuana. Yet, it is the main thrust of a brutal anti-drug campaign that bleeds $50 billion per year of our tax dollars. Even sick and dying medicinal users are not exempted from this cruel suppression.

If our leaders were rational beings, common sense would say that since we trust our citizens to use alcohol, we should be able to trust our citizens to use marijuana, a substance with a much lower potential for harm.

These irrational, harmful and costly policies that target ordinary citizens for their choice of recreational substances must go.

(244 words)

Emailed to Cap Times Monday, September 27, 1999

Your article on Relenza, the new anti-flu drug failed to note a couple salient points. Firstly the medicine costs about $50 per dose. Secondly it was approved against the recommendation of the FDA's own advisory panel. This appears to be another situation where the media repeats a company's press release without questioning the content.

Relenza might lessen the severity of flu symptoms, but at $50 a pop is it worth it? A flu shot certainly gives more bang for the buck. Just another example of how the FDA is routinely used by pharmaceutical companies to approve expensive, often dangerous medications so they can make huge profits at sick people's expense.

Prescription medications kill over 100,000 Americans annually. Meanwhile, a medicine with over 5,000 years of demonstrated safety, marijuana, remains illegal for medical use, despite reams of proof to its medicinal efficacy, including the government's own Institute of Medicine report, released last March.

Who is the FDA really looking out for, patients or the profit margins of large corporations? While the market is flooded with expensive pharmaceuticals of dubious safety and minimal efficacy, a medicine with proven safety and efficacy, marijuana, remains illegal.

(192 words)

I am writing in reference to your article, "Thalidomide aids some cancer patients", 11/18/99. The item illustrates that despite the once banned drug’s record of causing birth defects, it still has medical utility in treating some conditions.

If potentially harmful drugs like thalidomide are legal for medical use, then marijuana, with its long history of safe use as medicine, should also be available to treat patients.

In 1988, after reviewing all available medical data, the Drug Enforcement Administration's chief administrative law judge, Francis Young, declared that marijuana is "one of the safest therapeutically active substances known" and recommended making marijuana available by prescription.

To justify the prohibition of medicinal marijuana, this ruling, and every other study ascertaining its medicinal utility, up to and including the Institute of Medicine Report, released last March, have been routinely suppressed.

Allowing narcomaniacs to make medical decisions means sick people who could benefit are forced to suffer and do without, or risk arrest and jail if they choose to employ it. Why are most state legislators paralyzed with fear at the thought of doing the just and compassionate thing? Give yours a call at 800-228-2115 and ask them.

(193 words)

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