Pot measure on ballot in Columbia, Mo.

Associated Press ^ | 1/28/2003 | SCOTT CHARTON

[The FRugitive]

COLUMBIA, Mo. - Voters in this college town will go to the polls in April to decide a ballot measure that would legalize medical marijuana and greatly reduce penalties for possession of small quantities of the drug.

Under Proposition 1, doctor-prescribed marijuana use would be legal in Columbia and other possession cases involving 35 grams or less of pot would be handled in city, rather than state, court. Offenders could be punished with misdemeanor-level fines starting at $25, but no jail time.

The ballot issue represents a new approach to the old battle to decriminalize pot, said Keith Stroup, executive director of the Washington-based National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

"This is the first example I've seen where they're joined medical marijuana with arguments about penalizing college students," Stroup said Friday. "It's a very smart idea to combine these and let the people vote on not scarring any of these folks with arrest records."

Supporters of the proposal hope to propel it into the law books on April 8 by simultaneously appealing to the seriously ill, senior citizens, college students and baby boomers who sneak joints on weekends.

"This isn't just about potheads," says University of Missouri law student Anthony Lee Johnson, the proposal's author.

Johnson and his allies gathered the required 1,191 signatures of registered voters to get the proposal before the Columbia City Council. The council last week decided to place the proposal on the ballot.

Medical use of marijuana is legal in nine states, but not Missouri.

Columbia Police Chief Randy Boehm strongly opposes the change, insisting that law enforcement needs to keep its discretion about whether to prosecute marijuana cases in city or state courts.

"For example, if it's not a first offense, that should be dealt with in state court," he said. "What if there are additional charges from the same incident? That should be handled by one state prosecutor."

He noted that Proposition 1 imposes a maximum $500 fine for the fourth and subsequent offenses, but no risk of going to jail.

"We try to send the message that substance abuse is not a good thing and this undermines that," Boehm said.

Boehm and other critics also say local governments cannot enact laws that are less stringent than state law.

[VaBthang4]

Hahaha...oops.

"GIVE ME LIBER...err....LICENSE OR GIVE ME DEATH!!!"

[philman_36]

And you've chosen "license" and not liberty?

[radioman]

Even in the House, they lied to them about what they were voting on. It was supposed to be a simple tax on hemp production. Anslinger didn't tell them he was going to use it to prohibit anyone from growing hemp by refusing to accept payment of the tax.

Our appointed drug czars have the power to mandate morality. Where is the Free Republic in that?

Poor old Henry Ford had planted thousands of acres of hemp to make fuel for his cars. He claimed he could make motor fuel from hemp seed oil cheaper than gasoline. He didn't pay any attention to what was going on in Washington because he didn't know marijuana and hemp were the same plant! He actually believed there would be a hemp tax the same as a gas tax.

[MrLeRoy]

pot validation [sic] is a major tenet of the American radical left.

The American radical left is big on breathing air, too; so as a good conservative you should stop breathing air.

[MrLeRoy]

"I don't beleive in democracy as an institution"

Neither did the Founders---that's why they designed not a democracy but a constitutional republic.

[radioman]

Once again you make the error of introducing FACTS into this debate.

I just love doing that!
It does seem to kill threads though...

[Britton J Wingfield]

I'm pro-pot, and also hope to have my boots on Iraqi soil in the near future.

[Dane]

It was the radical left that began this War on Marijuana. The attack on marijuana was opposed by the American Medical Association and the Republicans. Republicans were an endangered species after the FDR socialist regime took over and ramrodded this law thru without debate or vote in the Senate.

And it was in the 60's(you know that decade that Libertarains always "convienently" forget) that the radical left counterculture embraced pot and other drugs.

Sorry that you don't like the truth but since the 60's drug validation has been a major tenet of the radical American left and that is a fact.

[Dane]

I'm pro-pot, and also hope to have my boots on Iraqi soil in the near future.

Thank you for your service, but please leave your bong at home. It may help save a fellow serviceman's life.

[Britton J Wingfield]

I'm completely sober, I just don't support forcing others to live that way as well. Don't worry, I'm sure I'll be piss-tested repeatedly before any deployment.

[Dane]

I'm completely sober, I just don't support forcing others to live that way as well. Don't worry, I'm sure I'll be piss-tested repeatedly before any deployment.

Good for you, the thought of a pot head army whose main thoughts are looking for a 7-11 in Baghdad for a munchy hunt is a scary one.

[MrLeRoy]

I'm completely sober, I just don't support forcing others to live that way as well.

Amen!

[tpaine]

---- "pot validation is a major tenet of the American radical left."
-dane-
---- "since the 60's drug validation has been a major tenet of the radical American left and that is a fact."
-dane-

It is also a fact that since the 60's the drug 'war' has been a major tenet of both the radical American right & left, -- a sort of socialist/statist political cabal.


The 'rad left' is under the delusion that they can live in liberty under socialism.

-- The 'rad right' is under the delusion that they can live in liberty under statism.

Both are wrong. - And dupes like you, - on both sides, - are ruining our free republic.

[Dane]

The 'rad left' is under the delusion that they can live in liberty under socialism

Then denounce the American radical left tenet of drug validation.

There will be snowballs in hell when that happens.

[tpaine]

Then denounce the American radical left tenet of drug validation.
There will be snowballs in hell when that happens.
54 -dane-

I've never sought to 'validate' drug use or abuse any more than alcohol use/abuse.
- So sure, I denouce it.

Melts your imagined hell, doesn't it dane boy?
I can at the same time however, denounce an unconstitutional 'war' on 'drugs' because it is, in effect, a war on liberty, far more than being a war on mere substance use/abuse.
Can ~you~ denounce this war on our liberties dane?
-- That'll be the day...

[Dane]

-- That'll be the day

When I die.

The day when tpaine denounces the modern(1960's-present) American leftist drug culture.

[jenny65]

The day when tpaine denounces the modern(1960's-present) American leftist drug culture.

The George Soros thing didn't get the response you hoped for, so now you're trying the "American leftist drug culture" angle huh?

Do you oppose EVERYTHING the left supports? Must all issues be exclusively left or right? It must be so comforting to simply follow the official party line and never have to seriously consider the issues.

You see Dane, there are those of us who can actually see past "left vs. right" and look at an issue objectively without first having to consult the party checklist. Support for decriminalization goes across party lines. Does the REASON for that support have to be the same across the board?

If, in your view, the "left" wants it decriminalized so they can get high, fine. I can't speak for them. But can you possibly fathom the possibility that those of us on the "right" want it decriminalized because it's a massive waste of taxpayer money, that our justice system is so overburdened that violent criminals are released early just to make room for "dopers", or that most importantly, we'd like the government to just stay the F out of our private lives?

I'm about as far removed from the "American leftist drug culture" as you can be, as I'm sure everyone else here is. If it makes you feel more secure calling us a bunch of leftist dopers, good for you. But I can assure you the reality is a bit more complex, and you won't be able to hide from the truth much longer. The rest of the nation is finally coming to its senses, and realizing how counter-productive the war on drugs really is. We're getting close to a dead heat right now, and the momentum is not going your way. What will you do when you're in the minority?

[Dane]

We're getting close to a dead heat right now, and the momentum is not going your way.

Huh, it looks like the three major pro-drug intiatives(Arizona, Nevada, and Ohio) the pro-drug lobby were pushing in the last election all went down to defeat. The only place where a pro-drug initiative won was in that "conservative" bastion called San Francisco.

[Cultural Jihad]

LOL! Maybe the Boards of Health should investigate these apparent cancer clusters around the nation's liberal arts colleges.

[Cultural Jihad]

But we dishonor the worth and value of human beings only to our own peril, for the very basis of our human rights is our worth and value in the eyes of God, Who came down and suffered a horrible death, for us. That means we all have some worth and value, and cannot just throw us into jail to torture or mutilate us, or use us for cannon fodder to make the ruling classes richer. And this is a huge change from the ancient world's ideas, that each and every human being has worth, and it's really our only worth, in the fact that God loves us.

A corrupted people will never install virtuous leaders into positions of power. Hence if we want to end corruption in government we must work also to end the corruption of people, rather than embrace, preach, or proselytize the toleration of those corrupting influences.

We can see the terrible results of allowing the culture to drift for the past 30 years into such a moral-liberal mindset, with over 40 million abortions, a nation's blood supply polluted, self-inflicted diseases, sterility, abuse, the health care and research budgets all bloated and broken, unfettered drug abuse with destroyed lives in its wake, and half the children living in broken homes with broken hearts, all because our culture drifted into this brave new world of freedumb and licentiousness.

So take care on your moral-liberal crusade to bring a new solum consentio paradigm, lest you bring about the very tyranny you claim now to loathe. Know well that the tyrants are waiting in the wings, hoping for your success. The jaded and inured citizens of your future might even welcome their inalienable right to enslavement.