As long as we're changing, make pot legal.

Paraphrased from a Wikipedia article: “Salvia Divinorum, also known as Diviner’s Sage, or by the genus name Salvia, is a psychoactive herb which can induce strong effects. It is a member of the sage genus and the Lamiaceae mint family. The Latin name Salvia Divinorum literally translates to “sage of the seers”.”

Cannabis Sativa is so far the onlyherb outlawed in the United States. Because of it’s similarity to Cannabis, hemp is nearly as illegal though the only thing smoking hemp will do to you is cause you to smell like burnt rope. Hemp was outlawed because the cotton lobby didn’t want competition. It isn’t fair when hemp won’t rot like cotton. Cannabis Sativa is illegal for a number of stated reasons, but the basic is because it was the favorite drug of blacks, and making their favorite drug of choice illegal was one of the ways to control a populace the powers that be wanted kept at a rung below theirs.

Tobacco contains a drug far more powerful and addictive than Cannabis or rather marijuana could ever deliver, even with laboratory help. Nicotine is so powerful and so dangerous that in other forms it is used as an insecticide. One drop placed into the mouth of an animal kills, and yet cigarettes, a nicotine delivery system are legal and tobacco growers are protected and subsidized by Washington. Talk show hosts continuously complain about the anti-smoking lobby and the damage they are doing to our freedoms. So where are these people when it comes to an herb far more innocuous than nicotine, alcohol or salvia?

Let me tell you about salvia. It is legal in most states and cheap. Some forms of the herb have been engineered to the point where smoking it can produce effects even more powerful than LSD. It delivers a dissociative high that makes marijuana seem like a couple of aspirin. John Kennedy’s father made his fortune smuggling bootleg alcohol and then cornered the market on scotch imports. Isn’t it interesting that JFK was one of the loudest voices in maintaining the marijuana strictures? The thought of regulating and taxing the herb never entered into their minds.

We are missing a bet here. More than enough medical and scientific evidence has been entered into the record to prove that if anything Cannabis Sativa should not be outlawed. It is not even close to methamphetamine as a danger and in fact, alcohol is more of a gateway drug. Tobacco could also be considered as such and yet Washington smiles and cashes those tax receipts. So why not do the same with pot? One sure bet is that our prison system and the courts would become less crowded if the more innocuous drugs were legalized, regulated and taxed the same as alcohol and tobacco. The monies collected could go into giving teachers a much-needed pay raise with perhaps a few billion bucks left over to do some other needed jobs.

There would be a blow back, but not from American citizens. The loudest complaints will come from organized crime outside our borders. Mexico, whose income is largely derived from illegally feeding addictions, would consider it an act of economic war. So would Indonesia. So what? It is high time America cared more for Americans than it did for those who consider us ill-mannered at best. For far too long we have shipped our income overseas and garnered small returns. We had our revolution. Let them have theirs if they ever find out they have a spine. America has long been a nation of free choice. We have the right to be stupid or not to be. We should not, as citizens, be forced to pay for the stupidity of others or the damage they do to themselves. If you choose to get high and then turn yourself into a vegetable, that should be your choice and your cost, not mine.

For disclosure purposes, I don't smoke anything, never have and don't want to. Neither do I like being around people who do. In my opinion the scent is nauseating, but more nauseating is the abridgment of freedom of choice. I outgrew nannies when I was in elementary school. I don’t need one now.