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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 21, 2018)
Page 16 February 21, 2018 New Prices Effective April 1, 2017 O PINION Martin Cleaning Service Carpet & Upholstery Cleaning Residential & Commercial Services Minimum Service CHG. $50.00 A small distance/travel charge may be applied CARPET CLEANING 2 Cleaning Areas or more $30.00 each Area Pre-Spray Traffic Areas (Includes: 1 small Hallway) 1 Cleaning Area (only) $50.00 Includes Pre-Spray Traffic Area (Hallway Extra) Stairs (12-16 stairs - With Other Services) : $30.00 Area/Oriental Rugs: $25.00 Minimum Area/Oriental Rugs (Wool) : $40.00 Minimum Heavily Soiled Area: $10.00 each area (Requiring Extensive Pre-Spraying) UPHOLSTERY CLEANING Sofa: $69.00 Loveseat: $49.00 Sectional: $109 - $139 Chair or Recliner: $25.00 - $49.00 Throw Pillows (With Other Services) : $5.00 ADDITIONAL SERVICES • Auto/Boat/RV Cleaning • Deodorizing & Pet Odor Treatment • Spot & Stain Removal Service • Scotchguard Protection • Minor Water Damage Services SEE CURRENT FLYER FOR ADDITIONAL PRICES & SERVICES Call for Appointment (503) 281-3949 The Racist and Disastrous War on Pot Federal laws are broken and need fixing J esselyn m C C urDy If polling is correct, pot no longer gives Americans fits. Recent Gallup polls indicate that 64 percent of Americans approve of legalizing marijuana — the highest level of public support in almost 50 years. Nevertheless, we have an administration that is tone deaf to the will of the people and in- sists on reinstituting failed policies of decades past. But there are members of Congress who are listening. Reps. Barbara Lee, D-Calif. and Ro Khanna, D-Calif. Recently introduced the Marijuana Justice Act in the House of Rep- resentatives. Both agree that legalizing mar- ijuana under federal law is an important step to confronting and eroding the harms that the failed war on drugs has had on people across the country, disproportionately on black and brown communities. In addition to legalization, the bill would cut federal funding for state law enforcement and prison construction if a state dispropor- tionately arrests and incarcerate people of color for marijuana offenses. It also would retroactively apply to those currently serving sentences and allow people in federal prison by for marijuana offenses to go to court and ask a judge to reduce their sentence. When Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., intro- duced the bill in the Senate last summer, he acknowledged “our country’s drug laws are badly broken and need to be fixed. … [T]hey don’t make our com- munities any safer.” Booker, like Lee and Khanna, un- derstands that laws that do not make communities safer must be questioned, and in this case, stricken. Currently more than one in five Americans live in the eight states and the District of Columbia that have le- galized small amounts of marijuana for recreational use, not to mention the 29 states that approve medical use. The federal govern- ment should follow the states, and the people, and legalize pot. In a groundbreaking 2013 report, the ACLU documented that black people are almost four times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than white people, despite comparable usage rates. Even more disturbing, in the District of Columbia in 2013, where black people make up 49 per- cent of the population and whites and people of other backgrounds make up 51 percent, nearly 91 percent of the people arrested for marijuana offenses were black. These stun- ning statistics led D.C residents to support marijuana legalization in 2016. They should likewise spur people to support the Marijua- na Justice Act. As John Ehrlichman, former domestic poli- cy chief for Richard Nixon, has confirmed, the war on drugs was never about the stated pur- pose of protecting the health and safety of the American people. Instead, it was really about undermining the black and anti-war commu- nities. “The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two ene- mies: the antiwar left and black people,” Eh- rlichman told journalist Dan Baum in 1994, “We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with mari- juana and blacks with heroin, and then crimi- nalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities.” He continued, “Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.” Unfortunately in 2018, we have an attor- ney general who is stuck in the past and has embraced these divisive Nixonian policies and tactics. Last month, Attorney General Jeff Sessions rescinded several Obama-era poli- cies that recognized states’ rights to legalize marijuana for recreational and medicinal pur- poses. Although this administration does not recog- nize or seem to care about the harm that antiquat- ed drug policies have caused to communities of color, it is refreshing to see that some members of Congress — like Cory Booker, Barbara Lee, and Ro Khanna — do. They are fighting back with the Marijuana Justice Act, which lives up to its name and would be important to criminal justice reform for our nation. Jesselyn McCurdy is a deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Union in Wash- ington, D.C.