[CUGreens] CUGreens Issue Voter Guide

[HALL CYRUS P <cyrus.hall@colorado.edu>]

[Editor's note: I'm about to put this and my spoiler article on the website.
Refer people to http://www.cugreens.dhs.org/ ]

The following document was written by members of CU Students for Green Party
Candidates and informally adopted as a "group stance."  This document is not
endorsed by any candidate, party, or group other than CU Students for
Green Party Candidates.

Green stance on November ballot issues:

Amendment 20

Maybe you haven't noticed, but there has been a new chalking campaign
on campus in the last few weeks, "Vote 4:20," and we must say, we
couldn't agree more.  Amendment 20, "Medical Use of Marijuana," while
not the final answer to marijuana legalization, is a step in the right
direction for Colorado.  The amendment takes after its brethren from
other states, such as California and Washington, and would allow
patients with specific illnesses, such as HIV/AIDS, cancer, MS,
glaucoma and others, to smoke or ingest marijuana, and, in effect,
THC, for their wellbeing.  This is very much a step in the right
direction.  Marijuana has been proven by the medical community,
including the FDA, to be relatively effective in combating symptoms of
many ailments, and Colorado could only do right to let it's citizens
enjoy those benefits.

There are problems with Amendment 20, but none that should stop one
from voting for it.  One, it does not decriminalize the selling of
marijuana, so even if a patient was prescribed medical marijuana, they
could still not buy it legally.  Instead, a patient would have to grow
his or her own plants or buy the marijuana illegally.  There was a
similar such problem with the medical marijuana initiative in
Washington, however, it has been dealt with a NPO that gives the drug
away for free, asking for donations in return; therefore the pot
wasn't actually sold.

Amendment 20 can not fix the federal government's stance on marijuana.
If 20 passes, it will still be illegal under federal law to carry or
smoke marijuana, be it for medical purposes or not.  However, as has
been seen in California, the federal government has been able to do
little to curtail the acceptance of medical marijuana.



Amendment 21

Douglas Bruce has been hard at work once again, and has hand crafted
another amendment that deserves to be shot down in fireball.
Amendment 21, the "Tax Cuts" amendment, is horribly misnamed.  It
should instead be called: "Amendment 21:  Reganomics Returns."
Amendment 21's main thrust it to cut "several" taxes "$25 per year, up
to the amount of the tax paid."  In English: it would cut almost all
taxes (property, income, utility, and vehicle) by $25 a year, untill
the taxes were abolished.  21 lists this as a good thing, as
"Coloradains will have more money to spend or save as they choose."
What Mr. Bruce fails to mention is the major cuts to school budgets,
RTD, open space, fire and police, libraries...the list goes on, but
I'm sure you get the idea.  Here is a sobering number: after the first
5 years under this amendment, nearly $6.0 billion would be cut from
state and local governments, with a majority of that from local cities
($4 billion). 

Colorado's state and local taxes are already the tenth lowest in the
nation.  Our school funding also ranks amongst the lowest in the
country.  These two figures are not separate, and virtually eli
minating local community tax bases, which make up about 1/7 of school
funding, would only compound the situation.  This same train of
thought is true for many other social issues, social issues which
Amendment 21 seems to care little about.



Amendment 22

Closing a long standing loophole in gun background check laws,
Amendment 22, 'Background Checks at Gun Shows,' forces private dealers
at gun shows to perform background checks on their buyers.  However,
22 is a balanced amendment, and doesn't make unreasonable demands upon
private citizens who may want to sell guns on an individual basis.  It
defines a gun show as 'any event or function where 25 or more guns are
offered or exhibited for sale ... or at least three gun owners
exhibit, sell, offer for sale, transfer, or exchange guns.'  Any sale
at gun shows would be recorded, allowing guns used in crimes to be
traceable.
[This amendment also requires that unliscenced dealers perform background
checks on potential customers.  Under the current system, a person with a
criminal record can buy a gun without getting a check, making background
checks essentially useless.  -- ed.]

This is not a gun control measure, and would in no way effect public
safty.  People who choose to own a gun for self defense would still be
able to, and the same weapons that were available for sale before
would still be available.  22 just makes sure that every gun owner is
held responsible, not just those who but from a liceincesed dealer.


Amendment 23

We all know that Colorado schools are desperately underfunded.  Right
now Colorado is 32nd in school funding and 49th in teacher pay.  We
are also a state with lower-than-average taxes.  All that this 23
seeks to do is to raise money for schools in a way that is hardly
noticeable to the average taxpayer.

Taxes for schools would stay almost the same with 23.  They would
simply be adjusted for inflation plus one percent every year until
2011.  Taxes would continue to be adjusted for inflation only after
that.  More importantly, 23 would create a state education fund to be
used for programs such as special education (which is suffering
bitterly in Colorado), gifted and talented, engligh as a second
language, and programs for at-risk youth.  


Amendment 24

No matter which side of the growth issue you may be on, Amendment 24,
the growth initiative is for you.  24 takes the power away from the
non-accountable delevopers, who, in many comunities, have had a
majority of the power, and puts it back where it needs to be: in the
hands of the people.  Amendment 24 has the power to solve two issue:
Affordable housing and low impact growth.  This could help solve the
"Boulder Paradox," of open space verse affordable housing, by letting
the people who know the needs of the community, the people who live in
it, make the desecions.

24 does not limit growth.  It mearly allows the public to have the
input about how their cities grow that should have always had.


Amendment 25

Abortion has always been hotly debated, but has been proven time and
time again to be essential for women's rights.  Curiously enough, the
same people who oppose abortion often also oppose contraception.  If
women were to have so little control over whether or not they become
pregnant and have to carry those children to term, that limits their
options in life.  Once a woman hits a certain stage of pregnancy, she
becomes less and less in control of her own body.  Not letting women
control this most essential aspect of themselves would certainly
result in more 'traditional' women's roles, i.e. cleaning and
conceiving.  

This amendment is designed to trigger immense guilt in women who need
abortions as well as make abortion doctors targets for
fundamentalistic anti-abortionists.  The doctor would need to provide
the woman with anti-abortion propaganda that includes whether the
procedure would cause pain to the fetus (no one really knows that),
what the fetus would look like at this stage of pregnancy, and of
course, the names and numbers of anti-abortion agencies that
specialize in guilt-tripping women into carrying the fetus to term.
If the doctor fails to provide this information, he or she will be
guilty of a felony and subject to an $100,000 fine, three years in
prison, or both.

Most disturbing about 25 is the reporting requirements.  Doctors would
be required to submit a report of how many women they gave the
propaganda to, how many women got a copy of it, how many women refused
to take the propaganda, and how many had an abortion.  The report
would then be published  for all of the public to see.  This would
also have a chilling effect on doctor-patient relationships.  Instead
of women being seen as patients, they would be viewed as potential
statistics.  This disclosure of a very private matter is a complete
violation of the secrecy within which doctors have worked since the
time of Hippocrates.  A court needs an injunction to private
information about a specific patient's records, but if this amendment
is passed, it will be easy for the public to obtain slightly less
specific information.  While one couldn't find out who specifically
got the abortion, it would be easy to find out which specific doctors
are more supportive of the practice.  If this passes, expect to see a
drop in abortion rates for lack of living doctors to administer them.

[Unfortunately, it's unlikely that literature describing all the harm
that unwanted children have done in the world would be distributed under
this amendment.  -- ed.]

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