Pot issue is about freedom, fairness

Your recent editorial "What's the rush" on legalizing pot is so predictable.

After all, kicking the can down the road is a tradition in this state. Time out to do some studies...? C'mon. It's like taking the long way to the mechanic to fix your car, or a state in this case.

Apparently decades of pot use and a couple generations of people to draw upon aren't enough to make a decision. There are people up and down every street in America that smoke a little weed and get along with life and family just as well as anyone, thank you. And become skilled at their job or profession, exercise regularly, volunteer their time, be good neighbors and any other measure of success, including car driving.

Whether you use pot or not, do you want to put someone in jail and take their money over it?

If we're so worried about health, outlaw cigarettes. Outlaw booze. Period. We won't have to search hard for data; it's killed millions. And it's for sale on every corner in town. That is what this is all about. fairness and freedom. The rest is over money.

So, come on, Illinois. There's a bay open at the garage. We've been waiting a long time for an opening. Maybe, just maybe, we can fix a few other busted things on ol' Illinois "Bessie" while she's up on the rack. She needs fixin' bad. If we wait another year to get her in, we might have to make a run for the state border in that old clunker. And leave it there and follow the rest of the folks out of here in a new cheaper state ride. One that won't dollar and dime us to death or arrest us.

Steve Patzer

St. Charles