Detroit comes through for MMJ

It's funny how much of my life is centered around Motown. I've never actually been there but since I started daily blogging at the Detroit News, it seems like the city is always coming up and I spend a lot of time following their local scene.

I'd like to think I'm having a positive effect on the politics there, it is a swing state you know, but I doubt I have that many readers. Nonetheless I'm happy to report that the Motor City has opted for compassion and passed a medical marijuana resolution. Pete at Drug WarRant is reporting the final numbers to be 59% for and 41% against. For such a volatile issue I'd say that's a very respectable plurality. And while it has no practical effect on the law against cannabis, it speaks volumes for the voters' preference in allocating resources in the war on some drugs. As they say you can't buy press like that.

Of course not everyone is happy about it. Those who profit from the prohibition are (unsurprisingly) complaining.

Drug Enforcement Agency special agent David Jacobson said the medical marijuana campaign is a veiled push to legalize the drug.

Advocates of medical marijuana ``are preying on the compassion of people across the United States . . . but there is no value to smoking marijuana'' he said.

Have these people ever actually tried the plant before they decided to make it a criminal act to consume it? I doubt it. I think he's just pissed off because he would be out of a job if this country did the sensible thing and legalized cannabis altogether or at the very least would have to work a lot harder to arrest actual high level drug dealers selling dangerous drugs, rather than hauling the terminally ill out of their wheelchairs and hospital beds for using a natural herb to ease their pain.