The War Against Citizens

This country is in the grip of an internal war. Two very powerful factions are fighting over a small segment of our society. One group only wants our money; the other group wants our freedom. The money group doesn't want to rob us; they only want to sell what people voluntarily buy anyway. The problem is that the other group has made this particular trade illegal, so the money group has to charge higher prices to offset the risk. This has given rise to an ever-more powerful criminal industry. A small segment of society still buys, though, even at the inflated prices.

The majority of the people making up this small segment of society are basically average, tax-paying citizens, not much different from anyone you'd meet on the street. So why would the two most powerful factions in our society be interested in regular people?

Most of these people don't hurt anybody. They go to work, eat, sleep, and play just like our neighbors. In fact, any number of them could very well BE your neighbors. Many of them don't look any different than anyone else. The thing that makes this small segment of society so special is the recreational drug they use. They use cannabis.

For various reasons, the federal government is at war with cannabis users. In 1996 there were almost 642,000 prisoners taken by government forces. Around 546,000 of those taken were guilty of simple possession of cannabis. People of all walks of life have had their lives turned upside-down because they use cannabis. Families have been destroyed and businesses ruined, all in the name of the Drug War.

The federal government says that these people are sick and should be in treatment or in jail. The federal government says that these people are harming "our children" by using cannabis. But the federal government is doing far, far more harm by its drug war than was ever caused by cannabis use.

Cannabis has been in use for over 5,000 years. Ancient texts from many areas of the world mention the healing properties, as well as the spiritual and recreational uses of cannabis. No one with any credibility would say that cannabis use is harmless, but the most recent study on the subject concluded that cannabis use was less harmful than alcohol or tobacco use. In fact, every major study on the subject in the last 100 years has come to the same conclusion, that even long-term, chronic cannabis use does little permanent physical harm.

How long are we going to let the federal government continue? They have been lying to American citizens for over 60 years. I don't know what kind of "secret agenda" the government may have, but there is no logical reason for the continued war on cannabis users. The only purpose the war has served is to make a few people very, very rich at the expense of 642,000 hapless citizens.


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