Brandon Smith
Professor Gregor
ENGL 1102
21 April 2014
Legalization of Marijuana: the financial, social, medical, and political benefits. The legalization of marijuana has been a topic of debate for many years. This may be because of the cultural diversity that the United States of America is known for. Recently, bills were passed in Colorado and Washington to implement the legalization and regulation of recreational marijuana use. These events along with the ever growing popularity of the drug in society, media, and entertainment are proving to be more than anti-marijuana advocates can handle. In this paper, I explore the financial, social, medical, and political benefits of legalizing marijuana. Pro legalization advocates stand
Dovetailing with this article is, Five Reasons Cops Want to Legalize Marijuana, a piece written by Kristen Gywnne that reveals that even police officers are some of the major lobbyists for the legalization of marijuana. Gywnne introduces us to the organization LEAP (Law Enforcement Against Prohibition) whose members say that loosening laws against marijuana would help control it. She goes on to list the five biggest reasons why cops are advocating for its legalization: public safety, put focus back on crimes that hurt real victims, cops want strong relationships with the communities they serve, war on pot encourages bad police practice, and cops want to stop kids from abusing drugs. “In the past decade, police made more than 7 million marijuana arrests, 88 percent of them for possession alone. In 2010, states spent $3.6 billion enforcing the war on pot…That’s a lot of police time and resources wasted, says former Seattle Chief of Police Norm Stamper” (Gywnne). While showing that in recent years many states have loosened their laws and views on marijuana, Christopher Matthews illustrates the calculated numbers attached to how Americans feel about pot and whether or not they feel it should be legal. In his article How America learned to Stop Worrying and Love Marijuana, Matthews explains that the biggest question now is not whether pot will