By Tom Patterson, retired physician, former state senator | East Valley Tribune
Republicans should get out front for once and lead the movement to legalize marijuana. It makes sense any way you look at it.
“Medical marijuana” has turned out to be the farce that many of us suspected. Patients with glaucoma, AIDS and cancer were shamelessly paraded as the poster children for the initiative, yet they make up less than 10 percent of the patients at the marijuana dispensaries. The bulk of the clientele is 18- to 30-year-old males with “pain” and “mood disorder” problems that can’t be proved or disproved.
One naturopath alone has written thousands of prescriptions. High school students are ending up with a lot of the pot. The feds won’t promise not to prosecute and when state legislators discuss doing something about this mess, the howl of “defying the will of the people” starts up.
So what could be a better time to take a different tack and do what a growing number of Americans want anyway: legalize, regulate and tax it. Policymakers seem still influenced by “Reefer Madness”, the movie that ludicrously exaggerated claims of marijuana’s supposed tendencies to turn users into crazed maniacs.
In fact, marijuana is safer and has fewer bad consequences than alcohol. Alcohol claims an estimated 76,000 lives per year while marijuana advocates claim that pot has “never killed anyone.”
If you’d like to discuss medical marijuana, contact Ryan Hurley, director of the Rose Law Group Medical Marijuana Dept., rhurley@roselawgroup.com
