25 Years in Prison for Pot? Drug Warrior Congressman's Idea Is Way Obsolete

By Paul Armentano, NORML. Posted June 15, 2009.

3) Survey data gleaned from cannabis consumers in the Netherlands—where users may legally purchase pot of known quality—indicates that most cannabis consumers prefer less potent pot, just as the majority of those who drink alcohol prefer beer or wine rather than 190 proof Everclear or Bacardi 151. When consumers encounter unusually strong varieties of marijuana, they adjust their use accordingly and smoke less.

Of course, if Rep. Kirk (write him here!) was really concerned about potential risks posed by supposedly stronger marijuana, he would support regulating the sale of drug (as opposed to jailing first-time pot sellers for a quarter of a century) so that its potency would be consistent and this information would be publicly displayed to the consumer. This same advice applies to the members of the Lake County Sheriff’s Department and the Waukegan Police Department — who claim “we don’t make the laws; we just enforce them” — yet seem to have no problem whatsoever lobbying for increased federal pot penalties while on company time.

Fortunately, the likelihood is that Rep. Kirk’s proposed legislation will be all bark and no bite. One, I suspect that few if any of Rep. Kirk’s colleagues in Congress will even consider supporting such an asinine measure. Two, even if such legislation were to become law (and it won’t) — who would test each and every seized marijuana sample for THC potency and who would pay for it? Currently, only the University of Mississippi engages in such potency testing, which is highly expensive and requires the use of a gas chromatography mass spectrometer device. In short, it appears that the misguided Congressman from Illinois is simply trying to make headlines.

One can’t blame him for trying. After all, across the pond, unsubstantiated claims regarding the dangers of often-talked-about-but-never-actually-defined supposedly “lethal” ’skunk’ weed caused a national frenzy and resulted in Parliament hastily deciding to reclassify pot possession offenses from a verbal warning to up to five years in jail. Never mind that, under Britain’s short-lived experiment with decriminalization, marijuana potency actually fell — as did the number of adolescents using the drug.

Of course, as the latest actions of the so-called “pro-science, pro-personal liberty” Congressman show, facts play virtually no role in political drug policy debate, and ignorance hardly disqualifies someone from holding elected office.

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Paul Armentano is the deputy director of NORML (the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws), and is the co-author of the book Marijuana Is Safer: So Why Are We Driving People to Drink (2009, Chelsea Green).

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