Local medical marijuana dispensaries recently came under fire as the federal government began cracking down on illegal marijuana growing and dispensing operations across the nation.

Itʼs time to put an end to this massive waste of government resources. Hundreds of billions of dollars have been wasted on marijuana prohibition, and for what?

All prohibition has done is ensure that profits have remained underground while marijuana itself has been unregulated and unsafe.

On June 29 a memo was released by Deputy Attorney General James M. Cole, warning of the federal governmentʼs intention to shut down the illegal marijuana operations.

According to the National Drug Control Strategy released by the White House in July, marijuana is addictive and unsafe. Reports have been made that the use of marijuana is at its highest itʼs been in eight years.

Marijuana patients that voted for Obama in 2008 are upset with him for breaking a promise. Before he was inaugurated, Obama

heavily publicized and promised to respect the state medical marijuana laws.

Once Obama was in office his views changed, his attorney general announced that it would be the administrations official

policy to crack down on the marijuana dispensaries.

Though medical marijuana is legal in California, it is illegal in the United States, according to the federal government.

On June 23 the measure entitled the Ending Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act of 2011 was introduced. The bill prohibits

the federal government from prosecuting adults who use or possess personal use amounts of marijuana.

With the passage of this bill, it will be decreasing the number of people who receive criminal records for nonviolent drug offenses, and respecting the personal freedom of adults to consume marijuana responsibly.

Many marijuana dispensaries offer free chiropractic, yoga and acupuncture to their patients, people who otherwise might never have had an opportunity to experience those healing treatments.

It seems unlikely that spending scarce federal dollars during a recession on a medical marijuana prohibition is an efficient

use of government resources.

We recommend the bill to pass and the same provisions that we use for cigarettes and liquor should be used on medical

marijuana.