There’s been quite a few great moments in comics recently, along with some not so great. Yes, I’ll admit, I’m an avid comic reader. I honed my vocabulary on old Lee/Kirby issues of Thor, Fantastic Four and Lee and Buscema’s Silver Surfer. I expanded my horizons with Miller’s Dark Knight Returns and Batman: Year One as well as both Ditko and Cowan’s versions of The Question, gaining a taste for dark, noirish tales that led me to explore underground and small-press comics. I learned to respect Manga not for the frenetic artwork (although it can be killer), but for the positive message most of them carry. (more…)
This was originally a school paper of mine which I’d previously published both on my deviantArt gallery, and on Helium.com (still at #1, after over a year…). Since it’s done so well for me in the past, I thought I’d re-publish it here, in my own blog. Enjoy.
Did you know that over a third of the population of the United states belongs in jail, according to the law of the land? It’s true, in a 2002 survey, 37% of all adults surveyed claimed to have tried (or currently use) marijuana (Roper). Keep in mind that the survey did not include the 77,000 or so individuals currently incarcerated on marijuana offenses. The war on marijuana consumers costs American taxpayers around $12 billion dollars, annually (Marijuana Prohibition Facts), and breeds an atmosphere of paranoia among users, who, if exposed, risk losing their jobs, inability to find work, loss of driver’s license, imprisonment, and deprivation of the right to own firearms and vote. What kind of country would this be, if a third of our nation could not be allowed to vote, because they’d rather smoke a joint after work than drink a beer? My argument is for the complete legalization of marijuana for reasons of social viability, economic expense to the taxpayer, and ethical value.
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