PRO-POT FOLKS FIND SLENDOUR IN GRASS

Better living through chemistry, redux.

Last week, we talked anti-depressants. This week, we turn to another
mind-altering matter - marijuana - and the recent debate about its
legalization.

Of course, for some there is no debate.

A recent spate of letters to The Star was overwhelmingly pro-pot, with
writers fuming about how booze and cigarettes are legal, while grass, which
helps AIDS and chemotherapy patients fight nausea and other ills, remains
illegal.

According to a recent poll, 83 per cent of Canadians believe that marijuana
should be legal when used for ``health purposes'' - although, I suppose,
``health purposes'' can mean anything.

And just a couple of months ago, Murphy Brown viewers watched staid old Jim
Dial score - ``I've even got cash,'' he confided to the dealer - to help
his stricken pal battle her breast cancer.

Even the February Shape magazine is onside, with writer Sharon Cohen
detailing how THC, marijuana's primary active ingredient, works for those
suffering from glaucoma, epilepsy, multiple sclerosis and spinal cord
injuries.

Only a token amount of ink is devoted to the downside of dope, the usual
stuff about how smoking causes lung damage.

But, for the straight dope on dope, there's no better source than High
Times, which, for 24 years, has been fighting the U.S. feds and, along with
sister publication Hemp Times, lobbying hard for the legalization of the
wonder weed.

Now, according to news on its Web site, http://www.hightimes.com/ it looks
like its efforts are not going up in smoke.

What's happened is that the U.S. Drug Enforcement Adminstration (DEA) has
``quietly affirmed that, based on evidence that has been published in High
Times magazine, sufficient grounds exist to investigate whether marijuana
should be made available for medicinal use.''

Well, praise the Lord and pass the . . . oh, never mind.

You have to hand it to a bunch of folks who, since 1974, have risked the
slammer for their singlemindedness.

And make no mistake: High Times takes chances, starting with its
centrefold, always a photo of a lasciviously lush green field or a hugely
hunky chunk of hash.

Where do the pictures come from? Who takes them? Don't the narcs want to know?

There's also ``Trans-High Market Quotes,'' which, in recent years, has
become a hotline readers call to learn if they're paying too much cash for
their stash. In fact, this nod to modern technology is just about the only
change High Times has made since its early days. Seemingly stuck in a time
warp, the monthly celebrates '60s stoner culture as if the coked-up '80s
and the cracked '90s never happened.

>From pot profiles to parties to politics, High Times offers hints for home
>growers, tips for tourists and advice on beating drug tests - advice that
>operators of heavy machinery and 747 pilots better not be taking. (If
>you're already flying, that's high enough.)

Mind you, High Times is not the greatest read on the stands. Its
single-mindedness is tiresome, its design boring and its writing not very
interesting.

That said, there's clearly a mighty market for the long-lived High Times
(circulation: 300,000), which, like Hemp Times (circulation: 60,000), is
tightly packed with ads for hempwear and pot paraphernalia.

What you won't find within, however, is a single trendy ad for vodka,
which, although legal, probably has harmed more people, families and
communities than any amount of grass.

But still, according to High Times, U.S. pot busts climbed to more than
600,000 in 1996, the third successive record high. In Canada, police made
29,562 arrests for marijuana offences in the same year.

Not only is this an expensive way to tie up the justice machinery - aren't
there more heinous crimes being committed? - it's also indicative of, for
better or worse, marijuana's growing availability.

Millions of people think governments should wake up and smell the winds of
change.

Maybe we should roll with the High Times, as it were.