The "Welcome To Madrid" article provided a very extensive accounting of the money and manpower spent to police Santa Fe County in the effort to eradicate marijuana. This is not news. This is the never ending War On Drugs, a very old story, and you didn't tell anybody anything new. The one question that should be asked is, "WHY is marijuana illegal?" This is why...

Congress voted for the illegality of marijuana in 1937 because it would have injured the profits of William Randolph Hearst, the newspaper baron. Invented in 1935, the Decorticator, was the scientific breakthrough that would cheaply process hemp into paper. The devise was unveiled on the front cover of the June 1935 issue of Modern Invention as the "miracle machine" and hemp was forecast as "America's first billion dollar crop." In over 70 years since the criminalization of marijuana most people are entirely unaware that hemp was once an integral commodity that helped build this nation. Both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are penned upon hemp paper. The sails of ships, the ropes that hoisted them into place, and the canvas of the covered wagons were made of hemp. The first Levis were woven from this fiber, which was the major crop grown by Washington, Jefferson, and every other farmer who planted this basic staple of existence. However, William Randolph Hearst produced newspapers and was heavily invested in the sulfuric-pulp process that makes trees into paper. He owned forests, too. He supplied his own businesses with paper and sold paper to other companies across the country. This invention had him very worried so he personally began writing propaganda essays in his papers decrying marijuana as a public health menace that turns normal people into ax-wielding mass murderers. Andrew Mellon, much wealthier than Hearst and also an investor in the sulfuric-pulp paper industry, was the Secretary of the Treasury at the time. Mellon was also chairman of the Mellon Bank, which was the main source of finance for DuPont Chemical, which held the patent on the sulfuric acid wood-pulping process. And DuPont had just invented nylon and rayon and they never wanted to see another rope made from hemp ever again. Mellon was instrumental in creating a new government agency called the Bureau of Narcotics and he placed Harry Anslinger, married to Mellon's niece, as its first director. Anslinger testified before Congress, reading actual Hearst-written articles, about how this dangerous weed drives people insane and turns them into violent animals. Doctors and scientist's testimony contradicted Anslinger's when they provided proven studies that marijuana actually causes users to become quite serene and contemplative. Anslinger then reversed his angle of attack completely and said, "Marijuana causes its users to become so peaceful and pacifistic that in the future American boys will not want to fight in our wars." Congress voted and marijuana has been illegal ever since. The former governor of New Mexico, Gary Johnson, once said... "If you're smoking pot the only thing you're likely to attack is a bag of potato chips." In over 80% of violent crimes, alcohol abuse is a primary ingredient. And here's a bit more info regarding this pulp-sulfide paper making process.... the amount of fiber harvested from one acre of hemp, which takes only one season to grow, is equal to the amount harvested from five acres of trees that take 50 or more years to grow. The sulfide-pulp process is one of the leading contributors to our green-house atmosphere and acid rain problems, while the Decorticator hemp-process adds nothing at all. It is long past time that we legalize hemp, we legalize marijuana, and get over this ridiculous policy that has created half the population of our jails. More than half of the people jailed in America are there because of non-violent drug use and/or sales.