Soon our Illinois Legislators are going to be asked to vote to make marijuana a legal recreational drug. Their stated reason is so much illegal drug is already being used, we might as well legalize it and tax it. I knew making medical use legal was letting the camel’s nose under the tent. Would cocaine be nest?

Many of those same people that are now looking to vote Aye have professed moral issues in the past. Voting to legalize an illegal drug just so the state can get more tax money is immoral. Our legislators have used taxes to keep us from hurting ourselves. Heavily taxing tobacco products is good and put $353 million into the treasury in 2017.

People are going to drink alcoholic beverages in spite of some people damaging their livers and their lives. The state taxed us for $171 million for getting drunk. The police have a road side test to check for consumption.

Gambling is considered a sin but we have allowed a fleet of riverboats to ease the feeling by taking a piece of the action for $270 million. Why a riverboat is less of a sin than a casino in Chicago is a mystery. The lottery netted the state $720 million that wasn’t spent as promised.

The four taxes totaled over $1.244 billion in 2017. Some of the proponents of legalizing marijuana say it will net the state over $250 million, either the taxes are going to be extremely high or Illinois has a lot more druggies than believed.

Now we are considering throwing another moral out the window for taxes. This time we should consider the possibility of netting a few million while creating tens of thousands more users isn’t a good trade. Marijuana users get used to the high and many will go on to other illegal drugs.

The marijuana plants of today are not the potency of twenty years go. It has been genetically enhanced. The edible drug was just credited with being the reason for a husband killing his wife. Many other instances have shown today’s drug is dangerous. That is not what Illinois needs with all the guns in the hands of so many cowboys.

My niece and her extended family voted no in Colorado and they cite the same results as a documentary. The taxes haven’t offset the costs by law enforcement, traffic accidents, and emergency room visits. The citizens have been paying higher insurance premiums. Illegal marijuana is still available and at a lower cost than legal.

The winners in legalized are the grow companies, the retailers, and those with overflowing campaign chests. Let’s do something right and moral for Illinois and tell your legislators to vote Nay!