Legalization of Marijuana

[shaftyshaft]

edit.

 

[jasoncran]

Hey all.

I'm doing a project for an information literacy class at international academy of art and design and i need some people to answer some questions about weed.
if you want to just reply with an email and i appreciate your effort if you do reply.
1. do you feel like the legalization of marijuana would stimulate the economy?
2. do you think the lagaliztion of marijuana would help the crime rates?
3. do you think smoking marijuana is more harmful to personal health than smoking cigarettes?
4. who do you feel is more of a threat: someone drinking and driving, or someone smoking the herb and driving? why?
5. if marijuana is legalized, do you think it should be taxed?
6. should marijuana be legalized for recreational use and/or just medicinal purposes?
7. what are some of the side effects of smoking marijuana? how did you find this out?
8. do you think you can get addicted to marijuana? why/why not?
9. do you feel that if marijuana is illegal that other substances such as alcohol and prescription drugs should be illegal too?
10. if marijuana is such a harmful drug, then why don't we ever hear of anyone getting seriously injured from being "under the influence" of only marijuana? (meaning in its usually alcohol and or other drugs along with the pot)
thank you so much.
if you have questions lemme know.
and thank you thank you thank you!!!!

answer to 2, no, at first yes, as the crime of marijuana possesion would go away. but then those dealers would just something else to sell and some other drug user to sell to or find another means of getting money illegally. the law makes something illegal and people are tempted to break it, but where do we stop, anarchy. laws contain evil but not the evil within the heart of man always devises mischief.

 

[Lance_Iguana]

.
1. do you feel like the legalization of marijuana would stimulate the economy?

I would stimulate our ecconomy, but very limitedly. It would mostly just filter into the owners of the bussiness and create jobs in growing, packaging, and shipping. IT wouldn't have that big of an impact.

2. do you think the lagaliztion of marijuana would help the crime rates?

As Jason already stated, this would only drop possesion and selling crime rates. Bigger dealers would find somthing else to sell.

3. do you think smoking marijuana is more harmful to personal health than smoking cigarettes?

Its not as addicting, but it still has a ton of cancer agents and you are still inhaling ash, smoke, and tar into your lungs. Big health hazard.

4. who do you feel is more of a threat: someone drinking and driving, or someone smoking the herb and driving? why?

Alchohol. Both are dangerous but marijuana onslows reaction time, while alchohol lasts longer and causes disorientation.

5. if marijuana is legalized, do you think it should be taxed?

Of course, alchohol and ciggarettes already are.

6. should marijuana be legalized for recreational use and/or just medicinal purposes?

Sure. As long as its regulated and has strict laws like alchohol.

7. what are some of the side effects of smoking marijuana? how did you find this out?

Mild iluscianations, tired, hightened sense of touch, taste, and smell, and lessened reaction time. Various medical sights and from friends who smoke.

8. do you think you can get addicted to marijuana? why/why not?

Not chemically, but it can become a crutch like anything else. Food, games, etc. can all become crutches and compulsions.

9. do you feel that if marijuana is illegal that other substances such as alcohol and prescription drugs should be illegal too?

Nto neccessarily. I think there should be a bar that all substances must pass in order to be allowed or banned.

10. if marijuana is such a harmful drug, then why don't we ever hear of anyone getting seriously injured from being "under the influence" of only marijuana? (meaning in its usually alcohol and or other drugs along with the pot)

Because its a depressent. Most depressents just make you want to just sit there. THough, its just as dangerous to drive under both marijuana and alchohol.

 

[Lewis]

No, no, and no again and again. The stuff should not be legal, and the stuff does lead to trying out stronger drugs. Just ask me and millions of others who has been addicted to drugs in our lives. I had no idea what I was doing in my younger years, when I was smoking that stuff everyday all day. I am here to tell you, that I paid for it, for many years. For many, first it's just the reefer, then the next thing you know you are doing other drugs. And then God might let you live, and then again He might not.

 

[Solo]

Agree with Lewis.

Anyone who alters their mind with drugs or alcohol are allowing access to the enemy for destruction.

 

[Nick]

Agree with Lewis.

Anyone who alters their mind with drugs or alcohol are allowing access to the enemy for destruction.

Agree entirly.

Take a read of Proverbs and you'll see the many dangers of indulging in such things.

 

[jasoncran]

for,lance, since you have a psychology degree/background. my wife has bipolar and her psychatrist told her that while pot has no reactions with other drugs it does not help with stabilazation of the brain chemistry but rather adds to it.

dr.gott did an article in the paper last saturday on pot in his daily column, it's a good read.

 

[Lance_Iguana]

for,lance, since you have a psychology degree/background. my wife has bipolar and her psychatrist told her that while pot has no reactions with other drugs it does not help with stabilazation of the brain chemistry but rather adds to it.

dr.gott did an article in the paper last saturday on pot in his daily column, it's a good read.

Thats because Pot has very mild traits of natural LSD. Wich means it cause minor hallucinations. This is caused by messing with the chemicals that fire off the nuerons in your brain.

People with any sever mental dissorder that relates with mood or delusions or has a form of depression should avoid marijuana.

I never said the drug was 100% safe, I just know from my short delving in narcotic studies and chemistry that there are things that are legal that make marijuana look harmless by comparison.

 

[faithtransforms]

I smoked pot daily for about 10 years and I paid for it too. My memory of that time period is almost nill, and it contributed to me becoming mentally ill in later years. And yes, IT CAN BE ADDICTIVE. I was addicted to it for sure. Maybe not in the strict chemical sense, but I would not even go out to see a movie if I didn't have pot. Life was not worth living without it. When I didn't have it, all I thought about was how to get it. I'd say it was more than just a crutch, it was a mental and emotional addiction which in my experience is at least as strong as a physical one. Also, it most certainly did lead me to heavier drugs.

I do however agree that it should be made legal for medical purposes. If smoking a joint is the difference between a cancer or aids patient wasting away or having enough appetite to eat food, it is criminal not to give it to them.

 

[LostSoul]

I'm doing a project for an information literacy class at international academy of art and design and i need some people to answer some questions about weed.
if you want to just reply with an email and i appreciate your effort if you do reply.
1. do you feel like the legalization of marijuana would stimulate the economy?
2. do you think the lagaliztion of marijuana would help the crime rates?
3. do you think smoking marijuana is more harmful to personal health than smoking cigarettes?
4. who do you feel is more of a threat: someone drinking and driving, or someone smoking the herb and driving? why?
5. if marijuana is legalized, do you think it should be taxed?
6. should marijuana be legalized for recreational use and/or just medicinal purposes?
7. what are some of the side effects of smoking marijuana? how did you find this out?
8. do you think you can get addicted to marijuana? why/why not?
9. do you feel that if marijuana is illegal that other substances such as alcohol and prescription drugs should be illegal too?
10. if marijuana is such a harmful drug, then why don't we ever hear of anyone getting seriously injured from being "under the influence" of only marijuana? (meaning in its usually alcohol and or other drugs along with the pot)
thank you so much.
if you have questions lemme know.
and thank you thank you thank you!!!!

1. It likely could.

2. Marajuana if proven indeed useful for medical purposes, should be strictly limited to that. Have not done as much research as I would like, but have come to know that it is believed to reduce some of the discomforts of chemo for cancer patients.

3. Marajuana is no less dangerous than a cigarette. Is it more so? I honestly do not know.

4. Either can prove just as dangerous. For both alcohol and marajuana impair the judgement.

5. Yes.

6. Just medical.

7. I am not too proud to say it, but I have tried marajuana in my younger years. I am not sure about a number of the long term effects, but from my own experience your body no longer has full control of itself. For example: Something as simple as another's hand gestures can make you burst out in an uncontrolable fit of laughter. It is really quite embarrassing. Not to mention foolish.

8. I do believe one can get addicted to the 'high.' Seeing as so many already tend to smoke it legally or otherwise more or less as an escape route. Not sure about actual physical addiction though.

9. As much as I hate saying it....one cannot illegalize immorality.Then if we did not have the freedom to choose, it would not be faith would it?

10. In truth I have known and seen loved ones suffer on account of someone's decisions when it comes to marajuana. These victims being too young to do anything for themselves on the matter are more or less left in their situation. Then....I doubt they are the only ones with a father who would rather smoke the pipe then care for his kids. Have yet to know or meet anyone that would like to have their father play weekend daddy.

 

[Lewis]

I started out with beer reefer then LSD 25, I would walk around high school tripping and hallucinating all over the place, and we would watch each other if one of us was not tripping. I remember almost freaking out at a Black Sabbath concert, and at a Led Zepplin concert. Talk about scary. Then I went to snorting speed to shooting speed, then I went to shooting coke powder to smoking crack. That garbage kept me in pain for 30 something years. I was in love with the LSD though, because it kept me in a visual fantasy, as well as elevated hearing, I have a few friends who never made it back, and they are still impaired to this day, from LSD 25. I look back on my life, and it was a waste of time doing that stuff, nothing good came out of it.

 

[jasoncran]

i think this editorial by george will says it all.
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | DENVER — Inside the green neon sign, which is shaped like a marijuana leaf, is a red cross. The cross serves the fiction that most transactions in the store — which is what it really is — involve medicine.

The Justice Department recently announced that federal laws against marijuana would not be enforced for possession of marijuana that conforms to states' laws. In 2000, Colorado legalized medical marijuana. Since Justice's decision, the average age of the 400 persons a day seeking "prescriptions" at Colorado's multiplying medical marijuana dispensaries has fallen precipitously. Many new customers are college students.

Customers — this, not patients, is what most really are — tell doctors at the dispensaries that they suffer from insomnia, anxiety, headaches, premenstrual syndrome, "chronic pain," whatever, and pay nominal fees for "prescriptions." Most really just want to smoke pot.

So says Colorado's attorney general, John Suthers, an honest and thoughtful man trying to save his state from institutionalizing such hypocrisy. His dilemma is becoming commonplace: Thirteen states have, and 15 more are considering, laws permitting medical use of marijuana.





Realizing they could not pass legalization of marijuana, some people who favor that campaigned to amend Colorado's Constitution to legalize sales for medicinal purposes. Marijuana has medical uses — e.g., to control nausea caused by chemotherapy — but the helpful ingredients can be conveyed with other medicines. Medical marijuana was legalized but, Suthers says, no serious regime was then developed to regulate who could buy — or grow — it. (Caregivers? For how many patients? And in what quantities, and for what "medical uses"?)

Today, Colorado communities can use zoning to restrict dispensaries or can ban them because, even if federal policy regarding medical marijuana is passivity, selling marijuana remains against federal law. But Colorado's probable future has unfolded in California, which in 1996 legalized sales of marijuana to persons with doctors' "prescriptions."

Fifty-six percent of Californians support legalization, and Roger Parloff reports ["How Marijuana Became Legal" in a September issue of Fortune] that they essentially have this. He notes that many California "patients" arrive at dispensaries "on bicycles, roller skates or skateboards." A Los Angeles city councilman estimates that there are about 600 dispensaries in the city. If so, they outnumber the Starbucks stores there.

The councilman wants to close dispensaries whose intent is profit rather than "compassionate" distribution of medicine. Good luck with that: Privacy considerations will shield doctors from investigations of their lucrative 15-minute transactions with "patients."

Colorado's medical marijuana dispensaries have hired lobbyists to seek taxation and regulation, for the same reason Nevada's brothel industry wants to be taxed and regulated by the state: The Nevada Brothel Association regards taxation as legitimation and insurance against prohibition as the booming state's frontier mentality recedes.

State governments, misunderstanding markets and ravenous for revenue, exaggerate the potential windfall from taxing legalized marijuana. California thinks it might reap $1.4 billion. But Rosalie Pacula, a Rand Corp. economist, estimates that prohibition raises marijuana production costs at least 400 percent, so legalization would cause prices to fall much more than the 50 percent assumed by the $1.4 billion estimate.

Furthermore, marijuana is a normal good in that demand for it varies with price. Legalization, by drastically lowering price, will increase marijuana's public health costs, including mental and respiratory problems, and motor vehicle accidents.

States attempting to use high taxes to keep marijuana prices artificially high would leave a large market for much cheaper illegal — unregulated and untaxed — marijuana. So revenue (and law enforcement savings) would depend on the price falling close to the cost of production. In the 1990s, a mere $2 per pack difference between U.S. and Canadian cigarette prices created such a smuggling problem that Canada repealed a cigarette tax increase.

Suthers has multiple drug-related worries. Colorado ranks sixth in the nation in identity theft, two-thirds of which is driven by the state's $1.4 billion annual methamphetamine addiction. He is loath to see complete legalization of marijuana at a moment when new methods of cultivation are producing plants in which the active ingredient, THC, is "seven, eight times as concentrated" as it used to be. Furthermore, he was pleasantly surprised when a survey of nonusing young people revealed that health concerns did not explain nonuse. The main explanation was the law: "We underestimate the number of people who care that something is illegal."

But they will care less as law itself loses its dignity. By mocking the idea of lawful behavior, legalization of medical marijuana may be more socially destructive than full legalization.



i think that they should be a little more stringent on the doling out of mj, for aches and pain. shoot if i was an addict and they mr.will puts it, i could go to doctor complain of pain long enough and get a perscription to mj. i wonder if those docs are really checking those patients, i hope so,