Campaign for Oregon legal marijuana announces $2.3 million in TV ads

Posted on August 19, 2014 by admin
Comment: $2.3 million in pot advertising will hit the airways in Oregon in the next 2 months – selling the idea to kids and young adults that pot is a “pretty benign drug” that should be legalized for recreational use. Whether the ballot initiative is successful or not, how many years of drug education will it take to undo $2.3 million in pro-pot propaganda?
It won’t happen with a single Red Ribbon talk – or a week-long drug unit in health class. It will take a massive readjustment in drug prevention to counteract what the drug culture is spewing forth. Ultimately, it will require the general public (and clueless politicians) to wake up to the fact that surrender to the drug culture (like we saw in the 60′s and 70′s) will spawn a host of unintended consequences, and that fighting back from that quagmire will require a massive investment in education, prevention and treatment (again).
The federal government could stop all of this instantly if they simply announced that existing federal laws would be applied to MANUFACTURERS AND DISTRIBUTORS (without a single pot user being arrested). It is the commercialization of pot, with its swarm of dispensaries, slick advertising, and impacts upon the popular culture that comprises most of the real harms of drug legalization. Under the guise of “leaving pot smokers alone”, the feds have allowed people to violate every federal statute passed by Congress and signed by the President – spreading disrespect for laws and a lack of confidence in the rule of law.
Let’s hope that the good citizens of Oregon, who are already suffering from widespread fraud and abuse of a medi-pot system, will reject recreational pot again, and send the pot industrial complex packing. In the meantime, efforts to educate the public on the real harms of substance abuse will fall upon the shoulders of many of you. Community drug education works when we do enough of it. Keep the faith, and keep up the great work. Monte Stiles

Campaign for Oregon legal marijuana announces $2.3 million in TV ads

SALEM, Ore. (AP) – The campaign behind an Oregon ballot measure that would legalize marijuana for adults said Monday it will buy $2.3 million worth of television advertising in what is shaping up to be a lopsided debate.

The former head of addictions and mental health for the Oregon Health Authority urges voters to support marijuana legalization in a YouTube video that proponents say will form the basis for their first television commercial. Richard Harris says marijuana “is a pretty benign drug” compared with drugs like alcohol and heroin, and efforts to control it through the criminal justice system have failed.

Support from addiction experts like Harris can help legalization advocates rebut charges that decriminalizing the drug would fuel addiction problems. Marijuana has been legalized in Colorado and Washington state.

Other mental health experts and the law enforcement community oppose legalization, but nobody with deep pockets has stepped forward to make the case against it.

The proposal will appear on the November ballot as Measure 91. It would allow adults 21 and older to use marijuana recreationally and give the Oregon Liquor Control Commission the job of creating a regulated system to distribute the drug.

Peter Zuckerman, a spokesman for the Yes on 91 campaign, said the ad will first appear on the Internet, at the start of online videos.

Records submitted by television stations to the Federal Communications Commission indicate the ads will start airing on broadcast stations on Sept. 22 in Portland and Eugene, and a few weeks later in Medford and Bend.

The records show the campaign has reserved at least $1.3 million worth of television time out of the $2.3 million the group says it’s spending. The records exclude cable television, which isn’t publicly disclosed, and two Portland broadcast stations that haven’t reported yet.

Oregonians rejected a marijuana legalization measure two years ago after the proponents struggled to mount even a basic campaign.

 

http://www.king5.com/news/local/Campaign-Oregon-legal-marijuana-TV-ads-271833381.html

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