For or against legal mar1juana?

Hahahaha, and then you went and quoted it so that it's in your post too.

 

I think as long as they don't hide and later deny data that it causes cancer for 20+ years, don't add chemicals that do things like supress the gag reflex, and don't add others and then run experiments to maximize the addiction potential of their products--they will be just fine from lawsuits. It is the same reason Busch, Miller and McDs are likely to come out in the end pretty unscathed from lawsuits IMO.

 

Rockets2K, read this response.

My sentiments exactly.

 

If they legalize it i would be pissed, i dont want a bunch of pot heads walking around, and as the years go by the graduation percent in schools would decrease because kids grades would be lowering.

 

this makes no sense...

What does that have to do with the pros or cons of legalizing pot?

This is based off the supposition that everyone will be buying it from some big multi national company. Thing is, I could just as easily grow it in my backyard. Pot is easy to grow yourself and doesn't require the manufacturing process that cigarettes do.

All I want is the ability to grow it myself without having the dea or local law enforcement taking my house for it.. It hurts noone, and should be treated as just another herb. It grows naturally and needs no artificial processing to be used, whereas, alcohol, tobacco and other drugs need chemical treatments or a manufacturing process to make them what they are.

If the government would get off of pot smokers bacvks, they could devote all the money they spend to more needed areas, education, tretment, and social issues..instead of the huge governmental empire now known as "The War on Drugs".

 

What would happen if pot was legalized?

1. All the pot dealers would start dealing other drugs. Do you think that every pot dealer is going to just stop making easy money? They will start dealing more hardcore drugs which will make them more available and the more available an illegal drug is, the lower the cost.

2. We have enough drunk drivers killing people with slower reflexes and impaired judgement and if pot became legal, we could add pot smokers to the highway killers aswell. One life lost due to the legalization of pot is one too many. How are police officers going to check if a driver is high?

3. Pot will be more available to children. Just imagine joints laying around the house legally. Who is going to make sure parents legally possessing weed are going to be responsible with it? I don't want to hear about toddlers getting high when mommy or daddy take a quick shower and I'm not going to even get into pregnant women.

These three reasons alone would be enough to convince me to keep mar1juana illegal. I know alot of people are still going to smoke pot, but if they do, they should face the consequences. What benefit would legalization serve? Money for our government? Would there be any money left after the gov. paid for the increase in medical bills? If you do not believe that mar1juana is harmful to your health, look it up, if you remember to.

 

Uh, but all the resources that are currently devoted to busting mar1juana operations would be focused on hard drugs. All the money and time we spend on education to drive down hard drug use would be more effective because the government has CREDIBLE arguments that heroin and cocaine, for example, are actually physically addictive and massively destructive to the human body. And the price is dependent on the demand, not the supply. Any increase from price competition would be minimal compared to the two pronged increase of effective education and enforcement.

More than one life is lost a year because of the ILLEGALITY of mar1juana. The WOD simply factually INCREASES the criminal element in our society. I could easily say the opposite. One person killed by senseless prohibition is too many. Especially considering mar1juana is NO WHERE NEAR the killer either cigarettes or alcohol are. How are police officers checking to see if you're drunk? Or without enough sleep? Or had too much coffee? Or suffer from road rage?

No more available than any other substance like alcohol or cigarettes. Who makes sure parents don't leave that lying around? Its less dangerous so I think this objection must be a moralistic one.

Freedom. Privacy. Money. Credibility. Better education. LESS hard core use. Better relations internationally. Lives. This debate in an objective forum is so one sided as to be absurd.

Please site what you are referring to (or reefering to ). Pot as a substance is absolutely NOT harmful to the human body. That is simply FALSE. Only the smoke is bad, as is any OTHER smoke you put in your lungs. But even that would be better in a legalized world as the decrease in price would allow non-smoking consumption.

 

It is much easier to get intoxicated from pot. That is my point. You could theoretically stop off at a convenience store, pick up some pot, take a couple of hits, and be impaired. This process would take maybe 10 minutes. This is versus stopping off at a bar, sitting there for a couple of hours and ordering maybe 6 drinks. I'm sure there are many people, possibly getting off work, who would love to be intoxicated but the latter option is just not feasible. Now you can just take a couple of legal hits of a joint and get the same effect. You don't think that this could increase the level of intoxication in society? Particularly on the roadways. This makes it a huge public safety issue. Besides that, alcoholic beverages are already treated differently based on the amount of alcohol they contain. It is much harder for an establishment to get a liquor license than it is a beer/wine license, isn't it? You can only sell liquor until 9pm in Texas, but you can sell beer until midnight or 1am. So in answer to your question 'what difference does the drug make?', society says it already makes a difference just within the genre of alcohol.

Hayes, I wouldn't mind seeing some of those studies you speak of.

 

No, I really don't think so. For instance, plenty of people DO go to happy hour right after work and drive home, right? Do you think the solution is to ban alcohol or to make the penalty for drunk driving so stiff that people won't do it? I think you should punish those who are irresponsible, not those who are not. You think you should punish everyone because some are irresponsible. But you do not seem to think so when the drug is alcohol. I cannot fathom why. There is NO logic to that way of thinking. Furthermore, if I WANT to get intoxicated to a level that I cannot drive normally, it does not take two hours. How many martinis does it take? I say it takes two, and I'm 6'2 and 200 lbs. I can still drive but I doubt my relflexes are as quick. I can drink two martinis after work in about 20 minutes. So no, I don't think your example of 10 minutes versus the time to get impaired from alcohol is big enough to make a difference. Now, lets also add to that the fact that you are much more likely to want to sit and smoke a cigarette or chill after you've gotten high, and much less likely to be brazen on the roads after you've gotten high. No matter how you stack it, legalize it.

Those rules are not based on drunk driving problems. Those are based on old school religious morality driven laws. Sorry, but those are just holdovers from the old blue laws. In Lousiana you can buy liquor at the grocery store, 24 hours a day, except on Sundays. Is that because statistics and society say you are MORE dangerous on Sundays? No. On Sundays you can go to the drive through daquiri stand that puts a piece of tape over the straw so its not 'an open container.'

I saw that particular claim on a documentary but I will see if I can find a link for you. But I would add my own experiences to that in the meantime and say it is my expert opinion as a drunk and an ex-serious pot smoker that we are way better off with potheads on the road than drunks. Drunks are way more likely to be MORE aggressive than normal while pot smokers are way more likely to be docile. (of course, 'way more' is not the scientific terminology but you know what I mean)

 

My friends and myself are all proof that you can get postgraduate degrees while regularly smoking pot, just as you can get postgraduate degrees while regularly drinking alcohol. As Hayes says, there *is* such a thing as responsible usage.

 

Hayes, we already have ways of punishing those who aren't responsible with alcohol. As I already said you can have multiple drinks and not be legally intoxicated. I have questions about that with pot however. In my experience, a couple of hits gets you pretty impaired. I think that's the appeal of the drug. Do you think people would be doing it if you had to sit there and smoke joint after joint for a couple of hours to get any effect? With that smell and the dry mouth?

Hayes, good news, you can drink a lot more than you think and still drive. (although I don't endorse it)

http://www.insure.com/auto/baccalc.html

You could have FOUR martinis in 1 hour and still only be at .06 BCA. SIX in 2 hours puts you at .09. I'm not sure if the legal limit is .08 or .10 nowadays. So your 2 martinis after work are perfectly fine. Wuss.

Gee, that's all well and good for the experienced pot smoker, isn't it? I don't know that drunk driving laws are in place for the alcoholic. Probably not. It's the inexperienced ones and kids who are more of a danger.

I think Lousiana was one of the last states to have their drinking age at 18, weren't they? I don't know if I'd use them as an example. Regardless, I need to get down there. You probably have a point there on the laws.

What would be your "legal pot-smoking age"? Surely not under 21, right? I'd be curious to see what percentage of pot-smokers are under 21.

Well, I question whether or not you're a 'drunk' when it only takes two martinis to get you impaired.

 

I didn't say I couldn't walk, I say I thought I was impaired. And I'm sorry but that is bull**** that you can drink four martinis and are not impaired at all in an hour. Sorry that just is not true. At least, the way they make martinis in Manhattan...

This is really my main problem with your contentions. Yes, there may be more people stoned but that is the exact same problems as with alcohol. I think if you did jail time for driving drunk we probably wouldn't see it so much. My point is that the way to reduce that problem is NOT to ban the drug, its to attack the irresponsibility.

If you are right about how long it takes to get drunk, why are there so many drunk drivers if this above statement is true?

Wuss

Not sure. I've always thought if you were old enough to sign a contract and die for your country (18), you were old enough to monitor your own alcohol intake. I'd probably say the same for pot, although I will admit I drove drunk a lot at 20 and never do at 32.

 

I'm not going to list the thousands of websites and medical books, studies, etc.. that will tell you that pot is bad for you, if your so interested just as you physician, he/she will fill you in. Of course all the pot heads and "high times" magazine know more than an MD right

 

I'm sure those martinis are pretty good...what are they, 12 bucks a pop?

I'm pretty sure you WILL do jail time for a DWI. A DWI will ruin your life. So I don't know what you mean there. I don't see how legalizing pot 'reduces the problem' of people driving while stoned. Cmon now. I think you will have more people driving stoned and I don't even think there's any doubt about that.

This fact should discourage you from legalizing pot, not encourage. Your point is that people will drink and drive no matter what. My point is that legalizing pot will make it worse, not better. Why do you want to add to the level of intoxication on the roadways?

Hey, I'm fully aware.

Hayes, do you have any info on the level of crime (particularly things like child abuse, but others as well) and intoxication? Basically I'd like to know what percentage of certain crimes are committed by people that are stoned. This is something that hasn't been talked about yet and it would seem to be important. I'm sure people that are drunk commit a lot of crime, so you don't need to worry about bringing that up.

Remember that I believe in decriminalization. I don't have any interest in punishing responsible (of age) users. My concerns are similar to DCKid's, it would appear.

 

Uh, yeah. Except that there is a REASON to want to stem the supply of heroin and cocaine. So there are legitimate concerns with legalizing those hard drugs, but not pot. AND to get the effect of your argument here, you have to advocate that the WOD is bad. Oops.

Already answered this. Better education and more focused enforcement crushes any minimal increase from increased supply. Again which is a flawed argument anyway because dumping supply onto a saturated market is NOT going to see a real increase.

The substance itself has NEVER caused a death from consumption. The substance itself has only caused a recorded death from the nature of the illegal trade. Therefore legalizing it will automatically DECREASE the deaths from it illegality by definition. It cannot INCREASE deaths from its consumption since you CANNOT smoke or eat enough pot to kill you. It MIGHT cause harm from some kind of Freak-style argument on the roads but as I contend with him the answer is not a ban anymore than the answer to drunk driving is to ban alcohol.

Oh, and I have a crystal ball.

The answer is NOT for the state to ban pot. This is such a ridiculous argument. If you applied the same standard LOGICALLY and OBJECTIVELY you would also advocate a ban on alcohol, cigarettes, salt, draino, aspirin, robitussin, and anything else POTENTIALLY dangerous to children in the hands of irresponsible parents.

Uh, no. I steal your TV is not the same as I smoke pot. I get intoxicated is not the same as I have the freedom to kill you. Your analogy is idiotic.

Yeah, and you have no argument.

What? You've made NO salient point on how education is MORE credible and hence MORE effective when we LIE and say pot is the same as heroin and cocaine, and WORSE than alcohol and cigarettes. That is stupid. Drug education would clearly be MORE effective if kids didn't learn right off the bat that it was horse**** propaganda.

Again, you have no argument, only assertion. Do you think S American countries fail to find hypocracy in the fact that we spray their land with pesticides, aid repressive regimes, and sanction their governments for drug trading when it is OUR DEMAND that fuels the drug trade? Grow up.

What? Oh, right. REEFER MADNESS, man. Those stoners become zombies who will kill for their fix, man. We have to stop this scourge, lol. Try and make a coherent argument.

All the countries we intervene in and pressure now because of our silly mar1juana prohibition. Please do some reading on the subject before you protest so vehemently.

Post one, slick. Let's go to town. It is undeniable that if legal it would be cheaper. So I could eat it. Find one study that says ingesting mar1juana is bad for you. GO FOR IT, toughguy.

 

My point is that the way to reduce that problem is NOT to ban the drug, its to attack the irresponsibility.


And that has worked oh-so-well with alcohol.....

So lets legalize more substances that impair drivers, so we can get more people impaired on the road, and have thousands of more innocent deaths on the roadways.

 

Or let's attack the problem of impaired driver's in a completely ineffective manner, while destroying our own credibility as people who can be trusted to give the facts in the process. That makes sense.