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Canada's National Post Says Legalize It
DRCNet.org Drug War Chronicle #353
Friday 10 Sep 2004 Canada's National Post, whose position as Canada's national newspaper of=20 record is challenged only by the Toronto Globe & Mail, called Tuesday in an= =20 editorial for the legalization of marijuana. The newspaper cited two=20 contemporary cases and the contradictory way in which they are being=20 handled as providing the latest compelling reason to not fool around with=20 the halfway measure of decriminalization, which the government of Prime=20 Minister Paul Martin is prepared to move on this year. The Post noted the case of Vancouver's Da Kine Caf=E9, which has been= selling=20 marijuana in an Amsterdam-style coffee house setting for four months. Caf=E9= =20 owner Carol Gwilt hoped to advance the cause by forcing a crackdown on her= =20 open pot sales, but it didn't happen. So she turned to the media to expose= =20 what she was up to in what the Post referred to as "a slightly ridiculous=20 play for attention." Even with the publicity, Vancouver police and political figures had not=20 gotten around to bothering her by the time the Post wrote its editorial.=20 Gwilt finally got her wish, though, on Thursday evening. According to=20 Canada's CTV, more than 30 police cars surrounded the caf=E9 and arrested= six=20 people as an angry neighborhood crowd jeered and smoked joints defiantly.=20 The large number of police was there to protect the police, Vancouver Police spokeswoman Sarah Bloor told CTV. Still, it took two weeks of intense media scrutiny to force Vancouver's=20 police to finally make arrests at Da Kine. Contrast that reluctance to=20 enforce marijuana laws with the harsh 90-day sentence meted out to=20 marijuana seed entrepreneur and leading Canadian pot activist, who=20 currently sits in the Saskatoon Jail. Vindictive authorities there charged= =20 him with drug trafficking after he shared a joint with bystanders at the=20 end of a pro-pot rally there. The Post did, and it didn't like what it= found. "Even on its own, the indifference to the activities of the Da Kine Caf=E9= =20 would speak to the absurdity of a criminal law that few people --=20 including, it seems, some police forces -- have any interest in enforcing,"= =20 noted the Post. "But it is all the more telling when contrasted with the=20 case of Marc Emery, the marijuana activist recently sentenced in=20 Saskatchewan to three months in prison on a trafficking conviction for=20 passing a joint at a rally. When our drug laws are enforced so arbitrarily= =20 that one individual is imprisoned for trafficking when he did nothing of=20 the sort, even as another feels compelled to contact the media in order to= =20 draw attention to the fact that her establishment has sold the same drug=20 over the counter for months without any consequences, the need for reform=20 is obvious." Decriminalization would not go far enough, said the Post. "The only=20 sensible course of action is to end the pointless prohibition of a=20 substance that is neither more dangerous nor more addictive than alcohol or= =20 tobacco, and one that has reportedly been smoked by more than 10 million=20 Canadians at some point in their lives," the editorial concluded. "It's=20 time to make official what Vancouver's authorities have evidently already=20 accepted, and legalize marijuana." The editorial, "Pointless Prohibition," is available online to National=20 Post subscribers only at http://www.nationalpost.com. DrugSense's Media=20 Awareness Project has an archived copy posted at=20 http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v04/n1267/a08.html?140656 online. -- END --
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