Essay: Medical Marijuana Part II - 10/23/2008

When I first learned that the proposal legalizing medical marijuana was going to be on the ballot, my first inclination was to be against it. Why? Simple. From a personal standpoint.

I dislike being high. I don‘t like not being focused or in control of my faculties. When I had a painful but minor operation a few years ago, I threw away the Vicodin they gave me.

I also have an extreme prejudice against being killed in a traffic accident. Like virtually everybody else in today‘s world, I have had friends who were killed by drunk or drugged-up drivers.

Adding potheads to the mix of the idiots I dodge on the road everyday has no appeal for me. Of course, I realize perfectly well that I have far more to fear these days from someone sending a text message while driving, but we all have our hang-ups.

Ever since I have started doing these commentaries I have been barraged by messages from people who assumed that I would be eager to urge our politicians to legalize recreational drugs.

No thank you.

Since then, however, I have changed my mind about medical marijuana. The people who support medical marijuana didn‘t move me at all. Curiously enough, I was convinced this was the right thing to do by its opponents. Most of all, I was influenced by someone I respect, State Senator Tom George, a physician from Kalamazoo.

George has been leading the drive to get smoking banned in bars and restaurants, and was instrumental in forcing Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop to allow a vote on the issue. Personally, I think cigarette smoking should be banned on the planet.

Not because of what smokers do to themselves, though they are a tremendous drain on the health care system. I want smoking curtailed because of what secondhand smoke does to the rest of us.

Some studies have shown that marijuana may be even more carcinogenic than ordinary tobacco. Dr. George maintains that any beneficial effects smoking marijuana offers can be provided by taking a pill called Marinol. Maybe so, though other physicians dispute that.

However, we were later talking about the hospice movement, which he, and I, completely support. Back in the 1990s, I interviewed a number of chronically suffering patients who had been driven to seek out Dr. Jack Kevorkian, the famous assisted suicide doctor.

Many of them told the same story. They were terminally or chronically ill. Their doctors seemed to have little interest in relieving their suffering and were only worried they might become dependent on drugs. Dr. George remembers those days too.

That’s why he supports hospice, where the terminally ill can get what they need to ease their pain. So -- if smoking marijuana has a beneficial effect on some very ill people, who are we to deny them that? Conservatives always say that they are against unnecessary government interference in our private lives. That sounds good.

And on this issue, I plan to vote the conservative way.

Hear Audio Story   

Comments

[Jeff]

A very intelligent decision, made by a man with an open and intellectual mind. You are so right in the fact that who are we to deny this relief to terminal or chronically ill patients. I personally live in fear for I suffer from Diabetic Neuropathic Gastroparesis (Paralyzed Stomach.) The symptoms of this disease are delayed stomach emptying causing chronic nausea and vomiting. Marijuana is the only safe drug in exsistence today for the relief and control of chronic nausea and vomiting and its relief is immediate. Metoclopramide/Regalen is the most commonly prescribed drug for this condition, and get this-DAILY USE OF REGALEN CAUSES IRREVERSIBLE PARKINSON LIKE SHAKES AND TREMORS. This is not only legal but reccomended?!?! What is wrong with this picture? If the government thinks I am going to take that poison rather than marijuana, even though it is illegal in my state, they are nuts!!!

[mike]

I have treated you with nothing but respect,

Adding potheads to the mix of the idiots I dodge on the road everyday has no appeal for me.

you have the ability to inflict much pain please use it sparingly

[Irishblue]

Thank you for your commentary on Proposal 1. My daughter, Caprice Wagner, recently passed away from T-cell lymphoma. Unlike the narcotics that doctors prescribed, medical marijuana was the only thing that increased her appetite and reduced her nausea and severe muscle pain. I urge Michigan residents to vote yes on Proposal 1, and to visit www.stoparrestingpatients.org to learn more about this critical issue.