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About The Clackamas print. (Oregon City, Oregon) 1989-2019 | View Entire Issue (May 26, 1993)
Opinion Wednesday, May 26, 1993 Th^packamas Print Pg. 3 Hemp should be made legal in United States Cann ¡bus, marijuana, weed, pot: 'makes a crime out of things that are not crimes' by Daniel J. Mala Staff Writer an While doing abundance of research for this article I explained to my mother that I was working on a story that would explain why cannabis hemp should be made legal to grow in the United States. My mom, who “almost smoked a marijuana joint once at a party” (but chose not to), found it odd that a plant which grew wildly in the forests of Wisconsin where she was brought up was “illegal to grow.” In order to clarify the mentality of outlawing the growth of a plant, it is important to follow the industries that have the most to gain. During the 1930s mechanical hemp fiber stripping machines and machines designed to conserve hemp’s high-cellulose pulp had become “state-of-the- art.” What this meant is that all timber paper and large newspaper holding companies stood to lose billions of dollars and possibly be out of business. DuPont, in 1937, had just patented a new sulfate/sulfite process to make paper from wood. This has accounted for 80perecent of DuPont's profits since that time. If hemp was left intact, DuPont and associated^ companies would stand to lose billions in potential profits. Cannabis hemp had to go. Two major studies had been doneon theeffectof smoking hemp leafs; onedoneby the British government and also a U.S.- sponsored study utilizing servicemen smoking during off- duty hours. Both studies concluded that no problems were created and recommended that To the Editor: I am responding to a Letter to the Editor written by Brian Wilson in last week’s Print I am a Senator on the Associated Student Government and felt that the students of Clackamas deserved to hear the truth instead of some unfounded complaints coming from a guy who sounds like he wants everything handed to him on a silver platter. Let me clarify, first of all, why we have an ASG on campus. It is not to “serve” you. It is not to supply little half rate bands every week so students will skiptheirclasses. Entertainment is a bonus, not by any means the most important thing ASG has to do. Most, if not all, of the entertainment that we have had this year has been very successful. Our motto is “Encouraging student growth and upholding student rights.” Our job is to be a link between the students and the administration, to be the voice.of the students who have a complaint as to the way the school is being run or the decisions that are made concern ing student s and education. Let me give you an example. The administration tried to push a flat-rate tuition increase through the system for next year. Well, thanks to your ASG President, Shauna Barnett, and the vote and input of ASG, we still have somewhat of a window left in which you don’t have to pay for credits. Sometime back in the fall, a number of students had complaints that there was nooutdoor“sheltered”fumitu re forthem to sit on when it rained. So ASG took this complaint to the appropriate administration, and if you will notice, there criminal penalties need not be applied. Assistant Surgeon General Walter Treadway stated that, “It (cannabis) may be taken for a relatively long time without social or emotional breakdown. Marijuana is habit-forming... in the same sense as sugar or coffee.” But William Randall Hearst’s newspapers stood to loose a lot of money so they painted a different picture: lazy Mexicans unwilling to work because of their marijuana usage, “marijuana- crazed Negroes raping white women,” “Reefer Madness” and “Marijuana- Assassin of youth.” In 1937 through the use of racism and lies, the Marijuana Act passed and the farming of cannabis hemp was prohibited. This prohibition is literally responsible for the destruction of our environment and the economy. As we continue to bum fossil fuels we burn up the atmosphere and pollute the planet. The cheapest substitute is using the sun to grow biomass. I tarp. biomass as an energy source also and other non-hemp goods, we the planet and suffer economic protects the environment. While could expect to see real economic setbacks. But this doesn’t stop it grows, it breaths in carbon stimulus. cannabis hemp from being dioxide; and when it’s burned for Federal, state, and local smoked and doubtfully ever will. energy, it releases carbon-dioxide, governments would see an I feel that Abraham completing an ecological cycle. increase in tax revenues without Lincoln responded best to this Theproblems associated raising taxes; and billions of twisted mentality in December of with the forestry industry could dollars that normally would be 1840 in saying: be alleviated. Hemp could be wasted on criminalizing those that “Prohibition... goes grown much more efficiently to choose to smoke the plant would beyond the bounds of reason in produce paper than wood. One be saved. that it attempts to control a acre of cannabis hemp in an annual HOW DANGEROUS IS MARIJUANA... rotation over 20 IN COMPARISON TO OTHER SUBSTANCES? years could NUMBER OF AMERICAN DEATHS PER TEAR that result directly or primarily from the following selected causes produce enough nationwide, according to World Almanacs, Life Insurance Actuarial (death) Rates, and the last 20 years of U.S. Surgeon Generals* reports. (Figures are for 1988 from the federal governments Bureau of Mortality Statistics and the National Institute on Drug Abuse, et al.—the last hurd for making complete year at the time of this writing.) paper as 4.1 acres TOBACCO.............. ............................................................................................ ........ 340,000 to 425,000 ALCOHOL (Not including 50% of all highway deaths and 65% of all murders)........... 150,000+ of trees. ASPIRIN (Including deliberate overdose) ......................... 180 to 1,000+ The CAFFEINE (From stress, ulcers and triggering irregular heartbeats, etc.)...... 1,000 to 10,000 process for making ‘LEGAL* DRUG OVERDOSE (Deliberate or accidental) from legal, prescribed or patent hemp paper uses medicines and/or mixing with alcohol—e.g., Valium/alcohol...............-........... 14,000 to 27,000 one-fourth to one- ILLICIT DRUG OVERDOSE (Deliberate or accidental) from all illegal drugs .... 3,800 to 5,200 (Pharmaceutical drug legally prescribed for asthma) .......................................... 50 seventh the amount THEOPOLINE Theopoline is also responsible for 6,500 Emergency Room admits and 1,000 cases of permanent brain damage per year of polluting sulfur MARIJUANA ........... O based acid Marijuana users also have the same or lower Incidence of murders and highway deaths and accidents than the general non-mari- Juana using population as a whole. Crancer Study, UCLA: U.S. Funded ($6 million), First & Second Jamaican Studies, 1968 to chemicals that 1974; Costa Rican Studies, 1980 to 1982: et al. presently pollute LOWEST TOXICITY 100% of the studies done at dozens of American universities and research facilities show pot toxici our rivers. ty does not exist Medical history does not record anyone dying from an overdose of marijuana I (UCLA, Harvard, Temple, etc.). jAb" J&k Hemp fibers are also extremely useful in making clothing of high quality and strength. Hemp in a similar manner makes excellent rope and canvas (originally named after cannabis). But with natural hemp prohibited, we are forced to pay for more expansive and more scale, is the most energy-efficient plant and is annually renewable. By farming only 6 percent of the U.S., America could have enough oil and fuel to supply all our present energy needs, thus ending our dependence on fossil fuel and foreign countries. / Growing hemp for is now outdoor sheltered furniture outside the CC Mall and there’s still more coming. We have also been very active on the Food Service Committee so that hopefully, in the future, students will have more of a choice when they want to eat on campus instead of having just one food source to choose from. There are many other comm ittees that we sit on and many other th ings we are involved in besides. As far as our weekly meetings go, we cannot, nor should we have to, schedule our meetings around, certain students' schedules. You have the choice to attend our open meetings, and we welcome it. Your right to be informed falls on vour own shoulders. We do what we can to inform the students about what’s going on and what we are doing through way of The Print, Today Bulletin, posters, word of mouth, etc. If you aren’t getting informed then you need to seek out the information. I understand, Mr. Wilson, that you were in the ASG office “demanding” to know why the minutes from our weekly meetings were no longer posted. Well, let me shed some 1 ight on it for you. We had the minutes posted, then we found out that the case we were using belonged to someone else. You wil 1 see that there is only one case open for use now, which we use for announcements for entertainment and other ASG-sponsored events. (And if you haven’t seen anything in there then OH WELL. Other students do. It sounds like you’re not in school very much anyway since you can’t make it on Mondays for our meetings or Fridays.) It is also my understanding that you were told that all of the minutes were in a folder right on the front desk for anyone to polluting plastic fibers (nylon/ rayon) derived from coal tar and petroleum (and mass produce by DuPont). Hemp oils and extracts can also be used to make biodegradable plastics and explosives. The end of this prohibition would put money back into the farm lands and with farmers investing in equipment look at anytime they like, and if you want a copy I’ll make you one. There are hardly any, if any, students that come in and want to see our minutes, so, in this time of funding depreciation I suggest that we save wherever we can, and wasteful copies is one area in which we can save. If you would have treated me with the same overbearing hostility that you treated the young lady at the front desk, I would have walked to the back of the room also. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” or don’t you remember that one? I’m positive, that if you had been more courteous and patient with the young lady she would have been more than happy to find out the information you were seeking. As far as electing new officers, if it was that important to you, you would have taken the time to pick up the handout on the candidates or maybe scheduled an appointment for an interview during some time when you were on campus. But obviously it wasn’t that important to you Most students could give a rip about ASG elections. All of us were out there trying to get students to get out and vote. A lot of them just weren’t interested. And thanks to the ones that voted, I admit, ASG has not been perfect this year. We have had a large number of turnover in office and that* seriously affects the flow of things. I guess I’m justdisturbed and tiredof the nit-picking people have been doing, when they really have no idea what we do or have done (and I know you’ve been on ASG before so you should know all this). It’s easy for people to jump on the bandwagon of “let’s persecute ASG” taking into consideration the information But even though there has never been a recorded death as a direct result of smoking marijuana, hemp is illegal. Even though cannabis hemp was used medically for many years for several different ailments, it remains illegal. Even when compared to alcohol, tobacco and caffeine, hemp is far less detrimental and is yet still illegal. But though it is illegal I feel the best slang name for hemp is “weed,” for it grows like a “weed and is available to anyone who chooses to partake in smoking this particular “weed.” By illegalizing hemp, we lose a valuable resource, pollute man’s, appetite by legislation and makes a crime out of things that are not crimes... A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government is founded.” The potential of cannabis has yet. to be released, but the needs of solving economical and environmental problems will inevitably cure the world of the disease called “drug-hysteria.” For a look into a better future find a copy of “The Emperor Wears No Clothes,”by JackHerer, (Powel 1 's Book Store has copies) and learn in greater detail how cannabis hemp can save the planet. they’ve been fed, starting with Mr. Kemp’s one-sided article. But no one but us really knows what’s gone on this year. So don’t be so quick to judge unless you have come in and talked with us first-hand. Thank you. Kristi Mabon officers were not willing to respond to questions regarding entertainment. My research indicated that a lot of ASG officers were never even asked. Reference was made to the fact that the Community Center isn’t ready to embrace entertainment with open arms. I bel ¡eve that is because staff located in this building are disturbed by noisy events and I really don’t see that ASG has anything to do with that. The article gave me the impression that students expect an event every week. According to my research, we have averaged one event every 5.5 days this last school year (number of events divided by actual number of class days). John Hooley was quoted as saying that we didn’t get much for our money. In reality, we got 36 shows. Entertainment, as everything else,has been subject to inflation and in my opinion, we have gotten quite a bit for our money. As for Campus Views ... I happen to know Steve Towler and he is not a student As a non-student, non-staff person, would he have been on campus often enough to see what entertainment has been available? I don’t know where these people have been but entertainment has been there fof those of us walking around with our eyes open. Last, but not least, I wonder why our student newspaper seems to present only negative views in regard to ASG. It seems to me that The Print should be more cooperative and perhaps, just maybe, a little more supportive of student government. Pamela Brown CCC student ASG To the Editor: This letter is in response to the April 28 article titled “$13,000 Worth of Entertainment: Not!” I am not a part of the Associated Student Government but I work in the ASG/ Student Activities Office as a work study student so I witness a lot of what happens behind the scenes in ASG and, of course, with entertainment. Afterreading the article regarding entertainment, I asked fora list of entertainment (LOE)forthe 1992-93 school year and did a little calculating on my own. For starters, it was stated in the article that there was no money left for entertainment during Spring Term. According to the LOE, five events have already taken place during Spring Tenn and there are fourevents remaining that are eithersponsoredby orco-sponsored by ASG. According to my calculations, as of May 6-, we have 25 days of classes left this term which means we will have one event every 6.25 days. That’s awfully close to one event per week! The article questioned the lack of low-cost events. According to the LOE, we had eight Family Night Movies, with each one showing two times, and 15concerts. We only had five major events. ASG also co-sponsored the fountain dedication and the Roads to Opportunity barbecues. The article also stated that ASG
