Letters to the Editor

Marijuana benefit

March 30, 2011


To the editor:

I attend Baker University School of Nursing. The laws against medical marijuana and the complicated rigmarole that lobbyists have had to deal with have always baffled me, yet has become even more compelling since I began my nursing endeavors. One primary responsibility of a nurse is to ensure their patients’ pain is minimized or eliminated. Why should we or the state/federal government deny chronically and terminally ill patients any treatment they desire to minimize their agony? Simply put, medical marijuana should be changed from a Schedule I substance to a Schedule II substance, thereby authorizing physicians to prescribe the drug in certain medical situations.

Marijuana has several therapeutic uses. Many patients have testified to the effectiveness of smoked and ingested marijuana to increase their appetite, reduce nausea, reduce pain and decrease intraocular pressure in patients with glaucoma.

Due to how cheap it is to grow, it would be more affordable and obtainable by those patients in need, not to mention its legalization would lead to tremendous local, state and federal profits due to taxation. The government is spending an inordinate amount of money on maintaining marijuana’s illegality when they could be capitalizing on its sales tax.

It is a fact that marijuana is safer than many medications being prescribed by physicians on a daily basis. Downgrading the schedule seems like a no-brainer, but the federal government is enforcing such strict implementations on the studies of medical marijuana that the progress of its legalization is stagnant. A change needs to be made with our generation.


mmmkisses 3 years, 9 months ago

Yes autie, high is high, whether it’s marijuana or morphine or Oxycontin. But what’s so far-fetched with marijuana being used medicinally when the other two are widely accepted in the medical field?

Liberty275 3 years, 9 months ago

How about we legalize all drugs because it's none of the government's business what we do with our own bodies. That way we won't have to go through the medical pot sham.

Fred Mertz 3 years, 9 months ago

It is okay to use man made drugs with lots of side effects as opposed to use a natural one. Makes no sense.

And why should government prohibit drug use? Drug use is a personal decision and it should be up to the individual as long as their use doesn't infringe upon anyone else's right.

mloburgio 3 years, 9 months ago

Liberty275, "Other than telling us how to live, think, marry, pray, vote, invest, educate our children, gamble, go to nudie bars why would the gop not get involved with what we do with our bodies. Republicans have done a fine job of getting government out of our personal lives..” -- Editorial Page, Portland Oregonian

Liberty275 3 years, 8 months ago


I am on the record supporting the complete legalization of all those things, plus some others like prostitution, polygamy and repealing all nanny-state laws like mandatory seat belt, non-snoking and/or helmet laws. I also support utter free speech that doesn't call for specific acts of violence or are composed of displaying lewd images of persons that haven't (and that includes "could not have")" consented.

Also, if you think it is only republicans that routinely dictate your personal life, you are mistaken. The left is often worse than the right.

On a side note, who cares about an editorial page in Oregon?

jhawkinsf 3 years, 9 months ago

To those suggesting that drugs be made legal, it sounds good but only if the next logical step is made. The freedom to do with your body must be coupled with the responsibility of the consequences. If you need treatment, you pay for it. If you contract a disease, you pay for it. If you become homeless, that too is the natural consequence of your action. And if you pass out on the street, unconscious, overdosed, dead, we will step over your dead body and lend no publicly funded aid.
Freedom and responsibility are two sides of the same coin. You can't have one without the other.

pizzapete 3 years, 9 months ago

You sound kinda heartless. Why not tax the drugs to pay for treatment and those other consequences?

jhawkinsf 3 years, 9 months ago

"pay for treatment" Too often it's a revolving door. Somehow, addiction has been defined as a disease that has relapse built right in. The social safety net has become a trampoline, where a person never really hits bottom and they are routinely picked up, again and again. No, I'll assume that if we give a person the right to control their body and ingest drugs then it's perfectly reasonable to expect that they be responsible for the consequences.

Liberty275 3 years, 8 months ago

"The freedom to do with your body must be coupled with the responsibility of the consequences."

I've always been under the impression that a person is responsible for all of his/her actions. I think that umbrella covers drug use.

akt2 3 years, 9 months ago

Might as well be "high" on marijuana instead of oxycontin, oxycodone, hydomorphone, fentanyl, methadone and the myriad of other pharmaceutical pain meds that are prescribed. Oh wait though, that could seriously cut into the billions of dollars that the pharmaceutical company vultures make while feeding off of people with chronic pain. All highly addictive narcotics that cost a lot of money. Compared to these drugs, medical marijuana is nothing. If it works for some people that would be wonderful. Maybe they could use it when they needed it, instead of 2 pills every 4 hours. For a total of over 300 pills a month, plus another couple hundred if they take something else for breakthrough pain. The sad part is that they become narcotic addicts while trying to ease pain.

pills4profit 3 years, 9 months ago


"Pot heads. Hrrrummppffff. Poppycock and balderdash...high is high is high. I don't care if someone is a pot head, just don't insult my intelligence and promote this medical neccessary bs."

Your comments show how ignorant and hypocritical you are on the subject matter of medical marijuana. I can literally name off more than a dozen drugs that get your "high is high is high." And that is not with abuse, that is with regular prescribed use as defined by the manufacture. akt2 listed several of them, however, since he probably didn't feel like listing off 25% (exaggeration) of all pharmaceuticals he kept it short and sweet.

Also, medical marijuana already exists in the pill form. It's called Marinol. What is marinol you may ask? Marinol is THC, the active, and therapeutic chemical element found in marijuana. The only difference between MARInol and MARIjuana is that fact that Solvay Pharmaceuticals applied for a new drug application so they could patent this "new" chemical and sell there product as a BRAND drug and make HUNDREDS off of every bottle dispensed. The market for Marinol, and several other pharmaceuticals, would dry up instantly once medical marijuana got approved.

So, to sum it up autie, the smart people at the pharmaceutical companies have already pulled the wool over your head and got medical marijuana approved. They just got it approved in a cute little pill that doesn't work nearly as well (I don't feel like getting into the pharmacodymanic and pharmacokinetic differences between the two), under a trademarked name that allows them to make millions off of a compound that exists natural, and in a much less expensive form.

irvan moore 3 years, 9 months ago

you will be my first choice when i have to pick a nurse.

BorderRat 3 years, 9 months ago

We got a ton of the shops in Denver. My favorite name is Karma-Ceuticals.

rockchalker52 3 years, 9 months ago

re: roe's poll on bbq - get yourself a 'script & you can eat a lot more of it, no matter where you go.

Liberty275 3 years, 8 months ago

They didn't have a butt-kicking team of lobbyists like the alcohol and tobacco and caffeine industries'.

mloburgio 3 years, 9 months ago



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Cait McKnelly 3 years, 9 months ago

In 2000, Peter McWilliams, a writer who suffered from AIDS and cancer, died. Although he lived in CA and had a prescription to use medical marijuana to control unrelenting nausea and vomiting related to his disease, he was the focus of a federal DEA investigation and was convicted in Federal court of violating Federal marijuana laws. During his sentencing the judge made a highly ironic statement. "No one has ever died from not getting marijuana." While out on bond, and unable to get access to his marijuana for fear of losing his mother's house (Federal authorities had told him if there was the merest trace of it in him on drug screening they would take away his mother's home, which had been used as surety for his bond) he went into a constant state of nausea and vomiting. He choked on his own vomit and died. I am a chronic pain sufferer with an actual diagnosis of "chronic pain syndrome". The medications I take do not take away my pain but control it so I can remain halfway functional. I do not use marijuana. But I can guarantee you that if I lived in a state that had legalized MMJ the first thing I would do is request a prescription as an adjunct to my current therapy. The fact that I can't do this is cruel and inhumane and people that joke about it have no understanding whatsoever. I truly and honestly hope that they never do.

Cait McKnelly 3 years, 9 months ago

I suggest you read this. Indeed, McWilliams was targeted. He was a writer and even spoke at the 1998 Libertarian Convention regarding it. During his 2000 trial he kept a blog about it. He gave financial support to another cancer sufferer and because of that he was arrested as a "drug kingpin" (which was pretty ridiculous). Any number of people have said that McWilliams death was sanctioned murder by the Federal Government, but this was the Bush years so I don't find that surprising. John Ashcroft, Bush's first Attorney General, was a real piece of work. As for your stats and stories regarding underage use of MJ there is a solution to that by legalization and regulation. Taking it out of the hands of the black market is, in itself, a step in the right direction. You might also take a look at stats re: underage drinking. Alcohol, in my opinion, is a far worse drug than MJ and, in the hands of the underage, just as illegal.

geekin_topekan 3 years, 8 months ago

Just as soon as the genetics are unraveled to where a terminating species can be patented and laws that make possession of unauthorized strains illegal, only then we can expect congress to take it seriously and not a moment sooner.

Too many wild strains out there. Once the multinationals are able to isolate their own unique genetic signature, it will pass through congress faster than a Bush-era earmark.

Mark this day on our calendars folks, the day geek prophesied this truth unto thou.

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