THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
MONDAY, DECEMBER 3. 2012
NATIONAL
PAGE 7A
Marijuana legalization campaign hopes to reach other states
ASSOCIATED PRESS
SEATTLLE — In the late-1980s heyday of the anti-drug "Just Say No" campaign, a man calling himself "Jerry" appeared on a Seattle talk radio show to criticize U.S. marijuana laws.
An esteemed businessman, he hid his identity because he didn't want to offend customers who
— like so many in those days — viewed marijuana as a villain in the ever-raging "war on drugs."
Now, a quarter century later, "Jerry" is one of the main forces behind Washington state's successful initiative to legalize pot for adults over 21. And he no longer fears putting his name to the cause: He's Rick Steves, the travel guru known for his popular guidebooks.
"It's amazing where we've come," says Steves of the legalization measures Washington and Colorado voters approved last month. "It's almost counterculture to oppose us."
A once-unfathomable notion, the lawful possession and private use of pot, becomes an
American reality this week when this state's law goes into effect. Thursday is "Legalization Day" here, with a tote-your-own-ounce celebration scheduled beneath Seattle's Space Needle — a nod to the measure allowing adults to possess up to an ounce of pot. Colorado's law is set to take effect by Jan. 5.
How did we get here? From "say no" to "yes" votes in not one but two states?
The answer goes beyond society's evolving views, and growing acceptance, of marijuana as a drug of choice.
"...There's sort of this untapped desire by voters to end the drug war.."
In Washington — and, advocates hope, coming soon to a state near you — there was a well-funded and cleverly orchestrated campaign that took advantage of deep-pocketed backers, a tweaked pro-pot message and improbable big-name supporters.
Good timing and a growing national weariness over failed drug laws didn't hurt, either.
"Maybe ... the dominoes fell the way they did because they were waiting for somebody to push them in that direction," says Alison Holcomb, the campaign manager for Washington's measure.
Washington and Colorado, both culturally and politically, offered fertile ground for legalization advocates — Washington for its liberal politics, Colorado for its libertarian streak, and both for their Western independence.
Both also have a history with
BRIAN VICENTE
Lawyer
story with marijuana law reform. More than a decade ago, they were among the first states to approve medical marijuana.
Still, when it came to full legalization.
activists hit a wall
Since the 1970 founding of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, reform efforts had centered on the unfairness of marijuana laws to the recreational user — hardly a sympathetic character. Holcomb notes.
That began to change as some doctors extolled marijuana's ability to relieve pain, quell nausea and improve the appetites of cancer and AIDS patients. The conversation shifted in the 1990s toward medical marijuana laws. But even in some states with those laws, including Washington, truly sick
people continued to be arrested.
Improved data collection that began with the ramping up of the drug war in the 1980s also helped change the debate. Late last decade, with Mexico's crackdown on cartels prompting horrific bloodshed there and headlines here, activists could point to a stunning fact: In 1991, marijuana arrests made up less than one-third of all drug arrests in the U.S. Now, they make up half — about 90 percent for possession of small amounts — yet pot remains easily available.
"What we figured out is that your average person doesn't necessarily like marijuana, but there's sort of this untapped desire by voters to end the drug war," says Brian Vicente, a Denver lawyer who helped write Colorado's Amendment 64. "If we can focus attention on the fact we can bring in revenue, redirect law enforcement resources and raise awareness instead of focusing on pot, that's a message that works."
With a potentially winning message, the activists needed something else: messengers.
Steves, who lives in the north Seattle suburb of Edmonds, was a natural choice — the "believable, likeable nerd," as he calls himself. He openly advocated in 2003 for a measure that made marijuana the lowest priority for Seattle police.
"Something is happening, and it's not just happen in Washington and Colorado," says Andy Ko, who leads the Campaign for a New Drug Policy at Open Society Foundations. "Marijuana reform is going to happen in this country as older voters fade away and younger voters show up. Legislators see this as something safe to legislate around.
"They see the writing on the wall."
ASSOCIATED PRESS
In this Nov. 19, 2012 photo, two women smoke marijuana together behind a home in the woods near the small Rocky Mountain town of Nederland, Colo. On Nov. 6, 2012, Colorado and Washington state legalized the recreational use of marijuana. The two states, both culturally and politically, offered fertile ground for legalization advocates - Washington for its liberal politics, Colorado for its libertarian streak, and both for their Western independence.
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ART
ASSOCIATED PRESS
In this Wednesday, Nov. 28 photo, Karen Mallet stands by her Alexander Calder print in her home. Mallet bought the print for $12.34 at a Goodwill. It turned out to be by the American artist Alexander Calder worth $9,000.
Lithograph print bought by Milwaukee woman at Goodwill actually worth $9,000
ASSOCIATED PRESS
and the workers aren't art experts.
MILWAUKEE — "Red Nose" just meant a reindeer named Rudolph to Karen Mallet until she bought a print by that name for $12.34 at a Goodwake store in Milwaukee. It turned out to be a lithograph by American artist Alexander Calder worth $9,000.
Mallet's good fortune is at least the fourth time in six months that valuable art has turned up at Goodwill, where bargain-hunters search for hidden treasure among the coffee cups, jewelry, lamps and other household cast-offs.
Last month, a Salvador Dalis sketch found at a Goodwill shop in Tacoma, Wash., sold for $21,000. Last summer, a North Carolina woman pocketed more than $27,000 for a painting she bought for $9.99 at Goodwill. And last spring, a dusty jug donated in Buffalo, N.Y., was discovered to be a thousands-of-years-old American Indian artifact — it was returned to its tribe instead of being offered for sale.
When told of the Milwaukee woman's find, a Goodwill spokeswoman said workers at its 2,700 stores try to spot valuables and auction them on the organization's online auction site to net more money for the charitable group. But things slip through the cracks
"That's kind of part of shopping at Goodwill — the thrill of the hunt," said Cheryl Lightholder, communications manager for Goodwill in southeastern Wisconsin. "You never know what you're going to find."
Mallet, a media relations specialist for Georgetown University and others, didn't even like "Red Nose" when she first spotted it during one of her frequent Goodwill shopping trips in May.
But the graphic black-and-white picture was striking. In low-browed terms, it might be described as an abstract image of an ape with a hangover, with spiral swirls for eyes like the ones in cartoons when someone gets punched. A large red nose is the only color.
"The big find that day was this great set of steel knives, in a block, for $18.99" by Wolfgang Puck, she said.
Then she saw the Calder signature.
"I thought, I don't know if it's real or not but it's $12.99. I've wasted more on worse things," she said. Her Goodwill loyalty card brought the price down to $12.34.
Once home, she searched the Internet and found similar lithographs by Calder, who died in 1976 and is widely known for his mobiles and abstract sculptures at
airports, office towers and other public places. Mallet's piece was No. 55 of 75 lithographs and was made in 1969.
Jacob Fine Art Inc., in suburban Chicago, recently set its replacement value at $9,000.
"This happens very frequently — you can't imagine," the company's owner, Jane Jacob, said of treasures found at thrift stores. "They don't know what they have. They're just not set up to understand art history."
Lauren Lawson-Zilai, a spokeswoman for Goodwill Industries International Inc. in Rockville, Md., gave these examples of art that Goodwill staff spotted and sold through the auction site:
— In 2008, a Baltimore-area Goodwill store netted $40,600 from a Parisian street scene painted by Impressionist Edouard-Leon Cortes.
— In 2006, a Frank Weston Benson oil painting donated anonymously in Portland, Ore., brought in $165,002 — Goodwill's top haul so far.
— In 2009, a painting by Utah artist Maynard Dixon donated, in Santa Rosa, Calif., sold for $70,001.
Mallet has no immediate plans to sell her "Red Nose."
"It grew on me," she said. "Now I love it."
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