legalize all drugs - free money and freedom

Truck drives often use caffeine products like No-Doz and that adversely effects their driving as well but we allow it.

 

Here's what my statements would be in response.

Not everybody that smokes cigarettes ends up dying in the hospital with lung cancers. Not everybody who drinks alcohol ends up with cirrhosis or cancers. Does this mean that smoking cigarettes and drinking alcohol does not result in some cancers for some persons? Absolutely not!

However, just because some people may not be negatively affected by some substances, this does not mean the other users of that substance may not be negatively affected by that very same substance.

Some pot smokers get permanent and chronic short term memory problems. Just because Barack Obama has lucked out and some of your friends that you knew in college that smoked pot has lucked out and their pot smoking didn't damage their cognitive abilities at all, this does not show at all that some other people aren't negatively affected by their pot smoking habits. Do all alcoholics end up with cirrhosis? Nope, but this doesn't mean that some of them actually do end up with cirrhosis. Just like with pot smoking and those chronic short term memory problems, which result from smoking marijuana.

 

Whenever I drink some coffee, it doesn't impair my motor skills or my judgement. I honestly don't see how caffeine may impair somebody behind the wheel of a vehicle.

 

Depends on how much caffeine. It can make you quite hyper and even aggressive. But Shiva's example of truckers isn't the only drug of choice that comes to mind.
Cold pills, antihistamines, fatigue....but that is another story.
Point it, plenty of people do things and take things, and when I compare some who don't even have an excuse for driving while stupid with the average pot smoker, I get in the car with a pot smoker any day.
It all boils back down to personal responsibility. Some think they can drive while drunk, putting on make up, eating, smoking, while the pot smoker may have both hands on the wheel, making sure not to cause any problems or driving while happy.

 

.... and the government cannot legislate personal responsibility.

The fact is that we have tens of millions of people smoking marijuana in the United States and that won't change. Overwhelmingly they are responsible people and we don't have any statistical problems related to crime or driving under the influence which would endanger others and that's not going to change.

 

Regardless of how smoking marijuana affects somebody's driving abilities, how about it's physical health effects? Smoking one joint of marijuana does just about as much damage to somebody's lungs as smoking five tobacco cigarettes does. This means that smoking marijuana is way more harmful than smoking tobacco is, and therefore, since it's more harmful than some legal substances actually is, therefore we should not legalise cannabis.

As well as this article that I have recently just found, that's over here in this link, which proves that pot smoke is way worse than cigarettes smoke.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1603611/posts

 

An interesting post but it fails to account for one fact. A moderate high on marijuana can typically be achieved with one small bong hit today which equates to less than 1/4th of a joint. We can also note that in the study they used cigarette rolling machines to manufacture the "joints" which would result in about double the amount of marijuana contained in a hand rolled joint. Finally there are smoking systems (vaporizers) where the tar and carbon monoxide are not delivered to the person which remove the harmful toxins.

http://marijuanavaporizer.com/vaporizer-benefits.html

So when addressing this issue we have to note that the results of the study don't represent normal marijuana use even when marijuana is smoked and there are suprerior methods on the market today because of technology where marijuana is used without any smoke being produced at all.

All of the toxins noted are related to the smoke created when marijuana is burned but vaporizers don't burn the marijuana and there is no smoke.

 

Well that's true, since vaporizers actually eliminate the risks that come from inhaling the smoke. But since smoking is the most popular and since it's also the common method used for marijuana consumption, well then maybe the vaporizing won't really become all that popular and widespread-used where marijuana has been legalised.

However, since that study has also stated that cannabis leaves and resins contains seven times more tar and carbon monoxide than the stuff which is in the tobacco's smoke, is "the cannabis resins", a reference to hashish, or not? Maybe that study was only about how poisonous hashish smoke was compared to the tobacco's smoke (but the hashish smoke is not regular marijuana smoke).

I have actually heard somewhere that the marijuana bud's smoke contains only 33% the tar that tobacco smoke contains. I have also heard that one joint=five cigarettes. Who's telling the truth? Who's lying? All of these studies and claims do not seem to be very consistent at all to me.

Second of all, is smoke in and of itself carcinogenic? Pot smoke is not radioactive like tobacco smoke is, so does that mean that pot smoke doesn't cause any cancers at all?

 

Ah, but if legalized then we could be using our resources to promote the advantages of vaporizors. Remember that not only do they remove the toxins because the don't burn the marijuana they also improve the "high" obtained for the users. Its a win-win-win situation that can only be acheived through legalization.

BTW these vaporizers are prohibited in several states that still ban any marijuana use. They are considered to be "drug paraphernalia" that many states prohibit.

 

That's incorrect. THC is broken down by the liver in roughly the same amount of time as alcohol, and it's mind altering effects are gone when the THC is gone. The THC metabolites, however, are stored in fat cells, and depending on the frequency of use, can still be detected 1-4 weeks later. But those metabolites are only useful for detecting prior drug use in a drug test, and have no "high" associated with them.

And I see you continue to ignore the point that a free person owns their own body and should be able to do risky things absent government interference. You keep making false claims about this risk or that risk, or withdrawal effects, or whatever other nonsense you wish to spew, but even if it's true (and most of it isn't), it doesn't matter. Just as I have a right to risk death by jumping out of a perfectly good airplane, I equally have a right to risk death by taking whatever substance I damn well feel like taking.

 

If that's so true, well then why do some pot smokers report still having some problems in their short term memory and learning skills, even long after (sometimes even some days) their intoxication wears off? Are the THC's metabolites just some less intense version of the THC, which lingers in their body and harms their cognitive abilities?

Why doesn't the metabolites from alcohol stay in somebody's body for 1-4 weeks, also? Nobody gets drug tests for alcohol consumption.

And to answer your last few statements, I must say this. I don't believe in an "everything-goes" society. Society must have rules to protect its citizens from dangerous stuff. This is not so much an argument against the legalisation of marijuana, as it is an argument against the legalisation of ALL drugs, including those harder drugs.

 

As an occasional user of marijuana who knows dozens of other occasional, and a few heavy duty users, I have never experienced nor seen that affect. And no, metabolites of a substance are not a "less intense" version of the substance. They are metabolites. They are what the liver turns THC into. They are inert and get stored in fat cells and eventually excreted via urine.

Well, I don't know how long they stay in the body, but certainly there are alcohol metabolites that can be, and are tested for. http://scienceblog.com/community/older/2003/C/2003254.html

However, generally, when a test for alcohol is done, it is to check for current intoxication, not to see if a person drank yesterday, last week, or last month. It is irrelevant to a suspected DUI on Tuesday if the person was, in fact, drunk on Saturday. Only if they presently are.

I don't believe in "everything goes" either, but if using a substance is harmful, or at least potentially so, only to the user of that substance, than I have no standing to object. And if I have no standing to object, then neither does anyone else, ergo it is none of society's business.

 

This requires an understanding of what a motabolite is.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/metabolites

So no, a THC metabolite is not THC and does not contain any THC. It is what our body produced in our body as a result of the THC.

By way of example the photosynthesis of a plant might be used.

http://www.biology-online.org/11/9_plant_metabolism.htm

The sunlight produces simple sugar molecules in the plant and the sugan molecules could, by analogy, be referred to as the "metabolite" of the photons in sunlight.

Many drugs are consumed by the body so rapidly that actual traces of the drug don't exist even minutes after the but the "metabolites" do exist. For example cocaine cannot be detected by tests but the unique metabolites related to cocaine metabolism can be detected for several hours. LSD is such a small quantity and absorbed so rapidly I don't believe it can be detected at all because I'm unaware of any signature metabolites it creates. It's metabolites, from what I understand, are naturally occuring metabolites in the human body so we can't detect any changes with testing.

So not only does a motabolite need to exist but it also must be a unique metabolite before it has any significance.

 

Anyways, when do you think marijuana will become legalised nationwide?

 

Why do you think that it's your duty to protect people from themselves? That's the same view the Southern slavers had, and how they excused suppressing the rights of the black man.
What ethical code do you follow that lets you order people about when they have neither hurt you or others, nor intend to do so?

 

That is the whole point of my "liberal" propaganda and rhetoric. When is the right going to get enough moral cajones to bear true witness to our own laws regarding Regulating forms of Commerce (well) among the several States of the Union? What form of reefer-less madness impedes their progress now?

 

Wow, I'm probably the wrong person to ask because we (i.e. those of my generation that grew up in the 1960's) believed that it would be legalized in the 1970's.

It's also interesting that while I'm a libertarian my parents were (are) Republicans and they opposed the drug prohibition laws when I was growing up. As they put it, it took a Constitutional Amendment to prohibit the production, distribution, and sales of alcohol so how could the US government prohibit drug production, distribution, and sales of drugs? It wasn't that they supported the use of the drugs but instead they believed that it was an unconstitutional expansion of power by the federal government.

It is also interesting that Bill Maher has suggested this should be the new "civil rights" issue embraced by the Republican Party. The Republican Party missed an opportunity to embrace same-sex marriage as a civil rights issue but the issue of legalizing the use of marijuana is still an open issue where they could step forward and lead the political charge. The laws really violate the inalienable right of Liberty of the People that is expressly enumerated in the Declaration of Independence. What better opportunity is there for the Republican Party to address the over-reach of the federal government into the personal lives of the People is there today?

 

That's a very good question, and I'm glad that somebody has brought this issue up.

Here's what some pro-drug legalisers may not understand. Alcohol was only legalised because it was way too popular and ingrained into this society and this culture to ban this substance, unlike with some other substances, such as marijuana, heroin, crystal meth, cocaine, PCP, and LSD. If alcohol was discovered today, which means that it would not be so popular and ingrained into this society, then it would never have been a legalised substance. Here's why.

http://www.alternet.org/if-alcohol-were-discovered-today-would-it-be-legal

So, there's no logical way to make any comparisons between legalising drugs and the prohibition of alcohol, since alcohol is only a legal substance nowadays due to it's widespread popularity which made the prohibition of alcohol almost impossible to enforce.

Logically speaking, if it wasn't for alcohol's millennias old cultural status, and also if it wasn't for William Randolph Hearst's smear campaigns during the 1930s, the legal statuses of alcohol and marijuana should have been reversed nowadays. Alcohol was only legalised because the ban on alcohol was just impossible to enforce due to alcohol's vast popularity, it was not legalised because of Constitutional reasons.

Although yes, I do believe that the feds should just stop arresting people that follow their state's own drug laws. Marijuana should be one of those issues that the states make all of their own rules on (such as gay marriage, which is another one of those states rights issues.)

 

I did notice that the article was from the UK that is not a nation founded upon the Inalienable Rights of the Person and doesn't even have a Constitution to protect the Rights of the People. Comparing the US and UK is an attempt at comparing of apples and oranges. The UK grants "privileges" to the subjects under statutory law while in the US we have "inalienable Rights" as citizens that government is prohibited from violating with statutory law. There is a huge difference between the two.

I also question some of the claims. The US of alcohol during the 19th Century diminished significantly. While I was unable to find estimates of the actual number of people using alcohol I did find that alcohol consumption declined from 4 gal/person in the early 19th Century to 1 gal/person but the mid-19th Century. It continued to decline throughout the 19th Century which finally lead to so few using alcohol that eventually all but two states (Connecticut and Rhode Island) ratified the 18th Amendment.

Under prohibition the consumption of alcohol was dramatically reduced initially where estimates range from a 50% to 70% reduction in the number of people drinking alcohol when compared to pre-prohibition drinking. Drinking did increase later until consumption finally reached about 70% of the preprohibition levels but it never came close to equaling the preprohibition levels.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eighteenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution

The 18th Amendment was repealed by the 21st Amendment and I will contend that it wasn't because of the widespread use of alcohol, which was actually reduced after ratification of the 18th Amendment as noted, but predominately related to the crime and corruption that prohibition created.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-first_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution

John D. Rockefeller, Jr was correct in that alcohol consumption had increased from a low under prohibition but as noted it never approached the preprohibition levels.

But here is a difference because marijuana use per capita has increased from preprohibition levels to today. In the 1930's when the federal government generally banned marijuana only a very small percentage, probably 5% or less, of Americans that used it. Today the estimates run at about 20%-25% of adults in the United State using marijuana at least once a year. Well over 1/2 of young people by the age of 20 have tried marijuana although most don't continue to use it as adults.

What marijuana does have in common with alcohol prohibition is that the laws are generally ignored by so many Americans as to make them uninforceable and that the prohibition laws have created a huge criminal problem for America today.

I will also point out an interesting fact related to the effects of the 21st Amendment. When the 18th Amendment was repealed the only authority the US government retained was it's constitutional authority to regulate interstate transport. If that is the only Constitutional authority the US government has related to alcoholic beverages, and alcohol is unquestionably a drug, then it is the only Constitutional authority is has for any other drug.

Finally I disagree with the proposition that a State has the authority to violate the Inalienable Rights of the Person as those are protected by the 9th Amendment even when there are no enumerated protections elsewhere in the Constitution. The prohibitions against the use of "drugs" is a violation of the Right of Liberty which is expressly identified in the Declaration of Independence. While the States do have the authority to address actions that are represent an issue of "public safety" such as driving under the influence of any substance the State does not have the authority to prohibit the use of the substance and the use itself is not an issue of "public safety" that would justify the prohibition. The government has no authority related to the "personal safety" of the individual. "Public Safety" yes, "Personal Safety" no.

 

Well here's the problem, however.

The usage of drugs harms the public's safety, so it's not just some matters of personal liberties to harm oneself.

 

By 2020.

 

Which statistics supports this?

 

It's not a scientific analysis, it's my opinion. It's legal in 2 states today, and a dozen or so others for medical purposes. Once government realizes they can STOP spending fighting it AND make money from it, and that it's not the horrible thing that the propagandists say it is, they'll come to their senses.

 

How?

What a person does that may harm themself like cliff climbing, base jumping and sky-diving all present a threat to the personal safety of the person. The only "public safety" issue related to these types of activities might be something like base jumping off a downtown building were the person landing could cause a car accident or they might land and injure people walking on the sidewalks. For those "public safety" issues the government has a ligitimate reason to restrict or regulate the personal activity. There probably isn't a "public safety" issue related to base jumping off of a bridge over a canyon so the government doesn't have a ligitimate reason for prohibiting it. The person may kill themself but they don't present a danger to anyone else.

The exact same criteria is applicable to the use of drugs. If a person sits at home and does heroin they're not endangering anyone. Now if they go out in public and drive a car while under the influence of heroin then they would be creating a "public danger" and the government does have a ligitimate "public safety" issue to deal with. The person sitting at home doing heroin can certainly be endangering their personal safety because they could overdose and die but the government has no authority to address that because its not a "public safety" issue. It's a "personal safety" issue.

Pragmatic limitations on our Right of Liberty are justifiable related to the "public safety" but such infringements are unjustifiable related to the "personal safety" of the individual. We have a Right to Risk Our Neck if we want to so long as our actions don't endanger someone else.

 

Actually, medicinal marijuana is legal in 21 states by now, which is somewhere around 40% of all American states.