Plainsman1963

Editorial by: John Gray |Troy Record | 10/13/2004

I can recall many days at Channel 13 when he was in excruciating pain, pain so severe, he put his head down on the anchor desk. You never saw this at home; he hid that misery from you.

Ed was all about doing his job well and not distracting you with his pain. Many days his co-workers quietly worried about him and wondered how he was able to come to work every day with arthritis taking hold of his body. It's the pain that eventually drove him from the anchor desk and robbed the Capital District of its smartest and most accomplished journalist. It's amazing he lasted as long as he did. As I said, he's a brave man.

Tomorrow night at the State Museum in Albany, Ed Dague will do something even braver when he comes out in support of the medical use of marijuana. He will also admit publicly that he has used marijuana in the past to ease his pain.
He dropped this little bombshell a few days ago during an interview on WGY radio. I called him at home to make sure he was not misquoted, that he meant what he said. He told me he did. He said it was time someone of his stature talked about this.

I have never been in favor of legalizing marijuana. Like many, I consider it a gateway drug, and the last thing our children need is for the government to make it easier for them to get high and check out of reality.
But the truth is, what Ed Dague is talking about is not "legalizing" marijuana. This is different. He is pushing for the availability of "medical" marijuana.

Right now we have millions of people suffering from cancer, arthritis and a long list of other very painful diseases. Despite the size and success of our pharmaceutical industry, they do not make drugs to help everyone. For them, ingesting marijuana is the only relief. That doesn't always mean smoking it.
Ed Dague told me his brother suffers from the same horrible condition as he does, only worse. He cannot smoke pot, so he crushes it up and eats it with other food.
It's the only thing that helps him. Yet by today's standards and laws, he's a criminal.

Think about that. You have someone in chronic pain who cannot find relief from any doctor, and if they do pursue the one thing on the planet that can help them, they are deemed a criminal.
Montel Williams came to town over the summer to lobby for medical marijuana.
He says we need to take another look at this issue and be honest with ourselves. This paper's editorial page endorsed Williams' message.
Allowing doctors to prescribe it will not send a message that it's suddenly OK for everyone to use it. Just those who are sick and get a doctor's prescription.

I know many people are uneasy about this topic. I also know many of those with reservations have a medicine cabinet filled with little orange bottles and a liquor cabinet lined with larger bottles that they turn to on the most stressful of days.
Americans have no shortage of ways to kill our pain.
I'm still opposed to legalizing marijuana. I don't want to see it sold on every corner store like cigarettes or beer. But if someone is in so much pain they can't get out of bed and this helps, maybe it's time to revisit the issue of medical marijuana.

Politicians are chicken. They won't put their neck or name on the line, even if this is the right thing to do. Ed Dague is willing to do that. I have always had enormous respect for Ed, now I have even more.
The State Museum is a wonderful place of discovery and education. When Ed takes the podium there tomorrow night and talks about this controversial issue, I hope people will really listen. He's the smartest man I've ever met. And I think he's right on this one.

John Gray is the news anchor at Fox 23 News. His column runs every Wednesday.