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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 3, 1993)
member 3,1 )stei cause of his f : A in thed h a 20.25 E{| received d ( J Opinion Friday, December 3,1993 The Battalion Page7 on wasc illy after Id Series wa!;| rsly in didn't run ftt, i all thecrifc h less of him; arsona. 5 so easy to li s just as ii it there andk s is looking it Collins was ast season ar; iams, is Series wi exciting, Fro Vt a lotofgi yke's headt for the at ha! Bowl ets eketsforthe -Vi will go or an day, Dec.; lows in froi White, ich and abet: available, 10 tickets cai ' one studr • each ticket e half of the ie of graduate ification on ilar student vill follow lursday. ront of the ill not be pproximatel e of the Lad; tournamer ir more info PRO CON Should the United State legalize the use of marijuana? ,i I: KYLE BURNETT Photo Editor ns or z. Cans ties ■li Fresh 1-Inch stores. Inc. he reason for legalizing marijuana is imple — the Unit- id States needs it. To begin with, narijuana has sci- mtifically docu mented medical merit. This non- iddictive, non-tol erance building drug allows glau- oma patients to Bceep their eyesight by keeping intraoc- lar pressure low. n addition, mari juana use alleviates the nauseating symp- :oms associated with chemotherapy and ZT treatments. Ironically, the govern- lent allows use of morphine in medical practices, which is an opiate and a very addictive, dangerous drug at that. Marijuana also has scientifically docu- lented environmental uses. Just one icre of hemp can produce as much paper pulp as four acres of trees. Moreover, lhat one acre of hemp can be cultivated bur times a year, at a one-fourth the cost and one-fifth the pollution created in the :urrent wood-based process. The hemp plant can also be used to reate a stronger, warmer and cheaper al ternative to cotton, and the current cot ton production process could convenient ly be used to produce hemp fibers. I Combine the first two arguments and the third is bound to surface — legalizing arijuana is financially advantageous, he $840 million spent annually on mari juana related arrests could be spent at- :acking real crime which is a continually rowing problem in the United States. If marijuana was taxed at the same rate tobacco, within one year, close to $1 jbillion would be raised on the production md sale of marijuana in Texas alone. The grade of hemp plant to be used in industry is non-intoxicating and not mokable. Why doesn't the government :apitalize on this? They don't even have Jo make the intoxicating form of the plant legal. Will marijuana ever be legalized? Well, not for at least another 20 years. It is go- tg to take a complete change in the way merica views marijuana. Americans |have been programmed to believe mari- lie U.S. can no longer IJblindly follow the fear longering lobbyist that r ould have you believe tarijuana is evil. Ameri cans must realize that mari juana, though a sedative , does not make one lazy. Buana is bad, even thought it's non-ad- ; dieting, non-tolerance building and its : hde-effects are minimal when compared to currently legal products. Former Surgeon General Everett C. oop said himself that the most addictive rug known to man is nicotine. But the U.S. has no problem keeping that legal. And we all know the evils of alcohol, nd yet we learned from prohibition that it is to our advantage to keep it legal and regulate the industry. I Currently, 30 million Americans are ■casual users. Are the streets lined with ^azy, drug-crazed losers, quoting "Beavis nd Butt-Head" and begging for hand outs? No. The United States can no longer blindly follow the fear mongering lobbyist that Ivould have you believe marijuana is evil. ‘ mericans must realize that marijuana, hough a sedative it is, does not make one ■azy or destroy the drive to succeed. The government needs to act on the 20-year- Ipld debate and legalize marijuana. Kyle Burnett is a senior journalism major FRANK STANFORD Columnist arijuana is an interest- .ing thing. It's not only a very abundant, useful and wild plant, but when a natural chemical contained within it is ingested into the bloodstream, a eu phoric sensation takes place. Al though there are many other plants and naturally flour ishing organic mat ter available for hu man use which have some mood altering or medicinal capacity, none is quite so controversial as marijuana. In principle, laws are created by gov erning bodies in order to protect their citi zens. We happen to be in a country where freedom is as much a part of the legal system as protection, so legislators The legalization of marijua na would be chaos in this particular country, due to our puritanical attitude and probable irresponsibility of its use. Our culture just wouldn't know how to han dle it. have to decide whether a law is fair re garding these two ever-conflicting parts. Do we need protection from the use of marijuana? There are distinct cultural characteristics of our nation that suggest we do. There are many fundamental reasons for marijuana to be made legal: economic principles, commercial and medicinal purposes, and even morality. However, there are more important reasons for it to remain illegal: politics and practicality. Marijuana's commercial and medicinal purposes are numerous as they are in oth er illegal drugs. The Novocaine your den tist uses, and Benzocaine — found in many over-the-counter topical ointments — are all synthetic clones of cocaine. Should we legalize cocaine? The fact that marijuana is a drug, does not make it harmful. But there is another factor that does. Marijuana can't be immoral because it's just a plant and doesn't do anything malicious. We do. Humankind, and par ticularly Americans, are the enemy in this battle because we as a society do dumb things. We get "buzzed" on our drug of choice, operate cars or machinery, and kill each other or ourselves. Our government can't allow "pot" to be legally involved with the likes of alcohol, and here's why. Although alcohol and cigarettes are by far more dangerous than marijuana, we've been using them gleefully in this country since its founding. They are more or less socially acceptable, and therefore have remained legal. Pot, on the other hand — through the puritanical nature of the U.S. — has been associated with the foulest segments of society and has been deemed innately evil as a result. In Holland marijuana is legal and not a problem for its citizens. Crime stemming from the drug is almost nonexistent. In Jamaica, "Ganja" is illegal due to pressure from the U.S., but it is socially acceptable. Sweet little old grandmothers smoke and sell it. It's as much a part of their past as alcohol and tobacco is to ours. The legalization of marijuana would be chaos in this particular country, due to our puritanical attitude and probable irre sponsibility of its use. Voting for it would be political suicide. Our culture just wouldn't know how to handle legalized marijuana. Frank Stanford is a graduate philosophy student Bring us your poor ... your poison FDA fails to control contaminated food imports JASON SWEENEY Columnist T he U.S. Food and Drug Administra tion has failed greatly in recent years to halt the importation of Central and South American pro duce contaminat ed by pesticides banned in this country. Despite the FDA's efforts to forestall this problem, three factors allow the tainted products to reach domestic markets and Ameri can dinner tables. Only one percent of the one million plus shipments of food that enter Amer ican ports annually are able to be in spected by the FDA. This is the result of low manpower in the face of perpetual ly increasing imports. Due in part to an inadequate and non-growing number of inspectors, FDA inspections netween 1991 and 1992 dropped a staggering 13 percent, a five year low. The import levels will only continue to grow, especially with the passage of NAFTA. Since 1987, Central American imports have tripled. Mexican produce imports alone are presently worth an estimated $1.2 billion. A second factor to consider revolves around how the FDA ineptly deals with guilty parties. When produce is halted in port, the FDA inexplicably allows the importer to retain custody of the pro duce while samples of it are being ana lyzed. During this layover many im porters simply unload their wares in spite of the FDA. Others merely bounce from one port to another until they have located a place where such impedi ments do not exist. Elsewhere, the fines and monetary losses that importers must sometimes sustain are negligible when compared to the profits seen upon sale of the pro duce. For instance, importers must all post a bond with the Customs Service to import here. This bond is set commen surate with the value of the produce in the originating nation, and those found in violation of FDA regulations must forfeit this bond. To illustrate the in significance of this bond forfeiture, peas in Central America may be worth only 15 cents per pound, while the same peas are worth perhaps 85 cents more per pound here. It is easy then to see why importers would risk losing this bond. A third factor smacks of simple idio cy. Many of the pesticides that are ille gal to use in this country are legal to manufacture here. Chemical companies sell their products abroad, and the chemicals we'are supposed to be pro tected against are ultimately reaching us. In the past two years, for example, heptachlor — a pesticide banned for use in the U.S. but produced in Illinois — has been found in Costa Rican can taloupes, Mexican carrots, and Guatemalan squash bound for the U.S. The greatest concern in all this per tains to the possibility of health risks. Between November 1991 and August 1993, the FDA discovered more than 400 produce shipments from Latin America to be tainted by pesticides ille gal in the U.S. One such inspection last year in Dallas revealed Mexican pep pers with two types of DDT, which was banned over a decade ago. According to Dr. Bill Plapp, professor of insecticide toxicology at Texas A&M, DDT has been found in recent studies to be a po tential carcinogen in humans. Since late 1991 alone, the FDA has recorded over 60 instances of the pesti cide endosulfan being used in six Latin American nations. Endosulfan contains the hormone estrogen which at high concentrations is believed to be a poten tial cause for breast cancer. This problem worries many who see the potential for a real public health dis aster. J. Kevin Donohue, of the General Accounting Office, said, "With adulter ated food coming into this country, sooner or later we're going to have a major problem ..." The National Acade my of Sciences announced this summer that current pesticide residue levels were of risk to children, and that the government must examine ways in which to lessen this threat. Somehow, the FDA seems inclined to sidestep and belittle this issue. FDA of ficial Gary Dykstra said, "We do not see any public health problem now with produce coming into this country..." If these pesticides were non-problemati- cal, then why were they made illegal by Dykstra's own agency? This matter seems to be a perfect scenario in which to "reinvent govern ment." Expanded appropriations must go to agencies like the FE)A so that they can more effectively perform their all- important role. Jason Sweeney is a senior political science major ^ /AfVWv\ CALL Want to light up? Go to the Regents' office One of William H. Mobley's final .acts as president of our fair university was to declare the entire campus a smoke-free environment. All buildings, offices, dor mitories, etc. are now off-limits to smok ers. Smokers were thrown outside into the heat of summer and the cold of win ter. For better or worse, Texas A&M Uni versity is now completely smokeless, ex cept for the Board of Regents office. On Wednesday, Nov. 24,1993, Ross D. Margraves, chairman of the Texas A&M University System Board of Regents, did the unthinkable, twice. On two separate occasions, Mr. Margraves lit up within five feet of the scion of smokers on the A&M campus. Dr. William H. Mobley. Was the reprisal swift, terrible, unmerci ful? No. Margraves enjoyed his cigarettes in the comfort and warmth of the Board of Regents office, located on west side of the Memorial student Center. Therefore, to all the students, faculty, and staff members who do not like to sit outside in the heat, cold, or rain to enjoy their few minutes of pleasure, feel free to make your way to the regents' office. You will find ashtrays in abundance, along with central heat and air and plenty of seats. Heck, if enough smokers complain, maybe we can get the regents to rescind Mobley's mandate; we have a friend in the chairman. I wonder if the flights to New York, courtesy of Barnes and Noble, were non-smoking flights? Elizabeth F. Broxvn Class of'93 Condoms do not protect spiritual life In John Scrogg's Nov. 23 column he implies that mere factographic education about the disease, tunneling more and more money into the vaccine research and distribution of condoms is adequate in dealing with the AIDS problem. Since the virus nowadays spreads mostly sexually, it is often wrongly as sumed that having protected sex is risk free. John and many others forget that humans, unlike the animals, also have a mental and spiritual life (often called their soul), which condoms cannot protect. This spiritual life can easily be ruined or damaged by any sex outside marriage, particularly by a promiscuous one. The intensity of pre- and extramarital sex of young people in the U.S. is unsurpassed in any other civilized country in the world, and so is the instability of relation ships, particularly that of marriage. The American people reach a sad record of having about every other marriage de stroyed by a divorce, in which intensive pre- and extramarital sex of the divorced people is one of the heaviest factors. What does it help you protecting your physical health by a regular use of a con dom if you are headed towards destroy ing your psychological and spiritual life? A wise person will not only protect his or her body, but the "soul" too, and for this the only reliable protection known is chastity and abstinence. Many people in the public media and in public education forget that humans do not have to act according to their basic instincts, sex being one of them. To stop the advance of AIDS we need a little self discipline and not the distribution of more condoms in public places. Instead of blaming governments, re search institutions and communities for not doing enough to stop AIDS, every body should start with himself. Daniel Grohol Graduate student Editorials appearing in The Battalion reflect the views of the editorial board. They do not necessarily reflect the opinions of other Battalion staff members, the Texas A&M student body, regents, administration, faculty or staff. Columns, guest columns, cartoons and letters express the opinions of the authors. The Battalion encourages letters to the editor and will print as many as space allows. Letters must be 300 words or less and include the author's name, class, and phone number. We reserve the right to edit letters and guest columns Tor length, style, and accuracy. Contact the opinion editor for information on submitting guest columns. Address letters to: The Battalion - Mail Call 013 Reed McDonald Mail stop 1111 Texas A&M University College Station, TX 77843 Fax: (409) 845-2647