Right in the Centre - No way to justify bad decisions

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Published on Thursday, October 19, 2017

By Ken Waddell
Neepawa Banner & Press 

The federal government has embarked on a hell-bent for leather approach to legalize marijuana. It is a pet project of our Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

He’s put about as much thought into this as he does everything else he has done. His test of in-depth policy making is does it sound great in a 20 second sound clip? I get it that marijuana may well have some medicinal benefits, that it may cure or ease some sicknesses. I get that. Because marijuana has some benefits isn’t a good reason to open it up to general usage. The greater question is how do you deal with the effects? Lots of substances deliver medicinal benefits. That claim can be for everything from tobacco to brandy to wine to morphine.

A case can be made that marijuana is no worse than any of a long list of substances.

The deeper thinking is how does the government control the usage. Deeper problems are not a strong point of the current federal government and least of all our prime minister. Legal or not, how will impaired driving be controlled? It probably won’t be controlled but legalization of marijuana will almost certainly lead to increased usage and therefore to more impaired driving. Just what we need, a longer list of impaired drivers to add to the list of what we already have.

Government imposed control is not likely to have much more effect than prohibition did in the early part of the 1900s. People taking responsibility for their own actions may be the answer. We could do with a bit more leadership on that front. The Christian church has pretty much abandoned the fight against alcohol and pot. Even the so-called evangelical churches have largely withdrawn from the fight. Once fervently preached and fought against, alcohol is now acceptable and even promoted by many Christians and churches. And we used to think that our law enforcement would carry the torch for us. Not so much as we have seen more than one police group over-indulge in alcohol. The most recent allegations come (again) concerning the Winnipeg police department and a drunk driving death after a police party. Apparently the police call these drinking events a “shifter” to celebrate the end of a work shift.

The above paragraphs show a steady decline in our society. Churches and police forces used to at least pretend that alcohol and drugs were things to avoid or at worst to keep in moderation. We used to expect better from our christian people, from our police forces and in fact, all our leaders.

I believe in fun as much as the next person but when fun destroys individuals and families, when death’s dark path leads young people to death’s door and beyond, when can we say, “Enough already!” Our society has never been able to control the effects of drugs and alcohol, probably never will. We should, however expect better of our governments, of our leaders and ourselves. Given all the vile evidence of traffic deaths and all of the destruction, I have little sympathy for impaired driving or any other impaired activity.

May God guide us, direct us and have mercy upon us to lead us to a greater good as neither government nor substance abuse seems to be able to do so.