FACE TO FACE: SHOULD CANADA (PASS THE CHEETOS) LEGALIZE MARIJUANA?

It seems my colleague opposite and I both agree that the current laws
and regulations that deal with marijuana are not working.

The laws, which prohibit cultivation, distribution and use of the
drug, have led to high rates of gang violence and huge expenses
associated with growing enforcement costs and expensive legal proceedings.

Where my colleague and I differ, however, is on how to move forward.

My colleague suggests the solution to these problems is
decriminalization. While decriminalization is a good first step, it's
only a half-step and will not stop the gang violence.

According to a recent report commissioned by Stop the Violence BC,
incidents of drug market violence are on the rise despite a
continent-wide "war on drugs" that has collectively cost North
American taxpayers more than $240 trillion over the last 40 years.

Neill Franklin, who heads Law Enforcement Against Prohibition,
recently told The Province newspaper that the criminalization of pot
is the direct cause of most murders in British Columbia.

The only solution to alleviate the crime, associated with the pot
trade, is to legalize the drug. We need to treat marijuana like we do
alcohol and tobacco.

Certainly, as police officers and health professionals will tell you,
smoking marijuana can have many adverse effects. But there are also
adverse effects associated with drinking and smoking, and we don't
prohibit booze and tobacco. Instead, we regulate and promote
responsible consumption.

Legalizing marijuana would allow governments to regulate the growth,
production, distribution and possession of the substance. It would
also give governments the added benefit of earning tax revenue from its sale.

The Fraser Institute pegs the value of Canada's illegal cannabis
market at approximately $7 billion annually - at minimum, that could
mean upwards of $2 billion in tax revenues for federal and provincial
governments.

That would mean hundreds of millions of dollars a year to invest in
our health care system and hundreds of millions of dollars to promote
responsible use of pot.

Simply put, prohibition of marijuana has been an abject failure in
this country. It's time to put the gangs that make money from weed out
of business.

Legalize marijuana? Now that my Led Zeppelin, Retinal Circus
generation is in charge, there is more enthusiasm for this idea from
far beyond the Cheetos-munching crowd.

While I agree that filling our jails with pot smokers is pointless and
that we should immediately stop doing this, it seems to me that
legalizing cannabis might be opening a can of Pringles for which we're
not prepared.

Weeding (sorry) through the reasons for legalizing marijuana, one
argument resonates with most of us: Were pot legalized, governments
could tax its sale and control its quality and strength. Sounds good.

But let's think it through.

Who would sell the legalized pot the government would supposedly tax
and monitor? Whether sold publicly or privately, we would need
assurance that pot sellers paid taxes and that their marijuana met
government standards for purity and strength. We would need a cannabis
quality control bureaucracy. Pot sellers would need a sales licence
and growers a growing licence. We would need a marijuana licensing
board. Police would need to sleuth and prosecute unlicensed growers
and... wait, I don't like where this is going.

We might actually need more laws to legalize marijuana than we
currently have prohibiting it. And of course, where one has laws,
taxation, licensing and quality control, one has organized crime.

The black marketing of pot wouldn't even skip a beat should we
legalize it. Criminals would offer tax-free, higher quality pot for
cheaper than one could get in the local legal weed shop, thus
maintaining or even increasing the attraction of the illicit drug.

Let's keep pot smokers and growers out of our jails and get organized
crime out of our schools.

Don't make marijuana legal; decriminalize it. It's a plant. Stop
prosecuting people for possessing or growing it. Let people grow it on
their back porch or get it from their cousin's farm in Langley. Unlike
alcohol, which takes expertise and equipment to make, marijuana is
comparatively easy to produce for oneself.

Unfortunately, decriminalizing marijuana wouldn't make the government
piles of tax money. It might, however, stand a chance of reducing
pot's illicit cachet - the only way to reduce our reliance on
organized crime as cannabis suppliers.

The answer is within our roach, I mean reach. Let's toke, er, take the
easy way out.