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Half of Canadians Say Legalize Marijuana

Submitted by Phillip Smith on (Issue #661)

Exactly 50% of Canadians support legalizing marijuana, according to poll results released Monday by Angus-Reid Public Opinion. Some 44% oppose legalization, with 6% undecided. 

Support for legalization has declined slightly when compared to Angus-Reid polls in 2008 and earlier this year. In both those polls, support for legalization was at 53%. But the difference is within the poll's +/- 3.1% margin of error.

Support for pot legalization was highest in Manitoba and Saskatechewan (61%), British Columbia (54%), and Ontario (51%). Support was weakest in Alberta (45%).

The poll also asked about support for legalizing drugs other than marijuana. In no case was support for legalizing hard drugs higher than 10%. 

The poll also queried respondents on whether Canada has a "drug problem" and how serious it is, as well as their positions on several drug policy-related government proposals. Slightly more than a third (37%) thought Canada has a drug abuse problem that affects the whole country, while 41% thought the drug abuse problem was reserved for "specific areas and people." Only 11% thought Canada did not have a serious drug problem, and 10% had no opinion or didn't know.

When it came to policies, there was strong (81%) support for a National Anti-Drug Strategy, including a national youth awareness campaign to keep kids off drugs. But the Conservative government's push against harm reduction measures, such as needle exchanges and Vancouver's safe injection site was supported by only 35% of respondents and its scrapping of the previous Liberal government's pot decriminalization proposal was supported by only 33%.

But somewhat paradoxically, while half of Canadians support pot legalization and nearly as many (47%) support the Liberal decriminalization plan, nearly two-thirds (64%) support the Conservatives' bill to impose mandatory minimum sentences on people growing as few as five pot plants, as well as people convicting of selling other drugs. That number may, however, be an artifact resulting from the question design, which conflated "marijuana grow operators" and "drug dealers."

It appears that marijuana is indeed related to schizophrenia--at least in the Canadian political psyche.

Permission to Reprint: This content is licensed under a modified Creative Commons Attribution license. Content of a purely educational nature in Drug War Chronicle appear courtesy of DRCNet Foundation, unless otherwise noted.

Comments

had enough (not verified)

it is amasing how even the most marjauna lax countries stiill can't do anything right.. even in amsterdam it's only "tolerated" because nobody has the balls to stand up the the USA prohibitionist regime.

only california had the balls so far and they only lost by 4%. if they win in 2012, the snowball effect will come into fruition.

Tue, 11/30/2010 - 11:25pm Permalink
RichardSievert (not verified)

If I had a pile of rocks with the names of corporations I would love to stone I could build a mansion for the poor 'With them all 'And each stone naming the poor child they killed! 'When Value was placed over humans with money "(Yea ) 

 'So now pick your representatives now!
"And place his or her name on that rock and mail it to them!
Science does not protect there women!' as it is we are not protected the terrorists go get there weapons directly from a sub that sent a scuba supply to shore if parachutes are not installed in planes you will never be safe ! (((((EVER))))
EVER Up 2000 feet in the sky your all idiots for flying!Threw ground roads' Yes people 'It is the path our current roads are on you just dig them out. 'Ok it's already state property so you use it to build up the state threw the ground there are resources gold silver iron and we could use all of it to pay the debts completely off in America than you pressurize them and water goes out you do this by simply applying a roof over them and you use the pressure to drive the water out then you install pumps to regulate the water first the foundation of a house has to be first made before the house. 'Than you start your design with a pressurized pathway 'Placing mirrors onto the walls your roof would reflect light to the walls and you would not even know that you where threw the ground! 'You could use air to move things around fast 4000 miles and hour! and beyond you could power each city with solar abilities just like on the roof of a house only this would be the cover of the threw ground roads! part one^''Part two would be so that trains could also use this great force and no more children would have to die on the tracks! no more freeway accidents and you could travail faster than planes threw the ground!Is that clear enough for you! Also it would give a safe place for everyone to go everywhere if there was ever a national threat! and a quick way to evacuate them all as it is look at, 'Katrina it would all be worse than that if another catastrophe hit! Now I am not one to stand on railroad tracks to prove my point, so how can I do this how do I get threw to you people work is what we need!Pilots have parachutes in jet fighters right? 'Is our public so expendable that you cannot give them a seat also with one. 'All they would need to do is have the roof 'Open, 'And shoot everyone safely away from the plane, 'Up straight up and the shut would open just like the air force jet pilots, 'Which in some cases are going mach ten no commercial airliner can do mach ten 'Ok and the frightening experience would be better than death, 'For any and all people so yea if you wonder why I use the population control catch, well they just don't think your worth the dime. I do!or you can just all pave paradise and forget my plan and give everything away on our above ground of hate if that's your choice no un patrolled roads where police lie in wait to 'Entrap even there own children, and yourselves for there own security plan! 'I want a new one we have been running of this old warn out system way to long people 'You "Truckers I need you we have ten trillion tones, of threw ground dirt to move! "So lets start those end loaders skidders and haulers It's  to give American infrastructure a make over!    "Stick sub machine guns in towers and if they ever do that again just chain link the plane to pieces it's better than two innocent deaths ! And start building planes with remote control seats with shuts that way if the terrorist gets a plane fine eject the passengers and let the sucker go down in flames! equipped with it's own detonation button!'I am tired of science and stinking rotten banks that finance ignorant projects like 'THIS!'  Plants where here before us making them, ' Illegal is killing us!'
Wed, 12/01/2010 - 12:54pm Permalink

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