BLOG NUMBER 56; NOVEMBER 30, 2012;POT

THEME: America has gone to to POT?

WHAT'S THE TRUTH?

• Smoking pot may cause testicular cancer, trigger schizophrenia, lower IQ and lead to infertility, science says. Why aren't we listening?
• If you smoke pot morning, noon and night, you will live an average of two years longer than if you don't.
• Marijuana hurts memory and cognition.
• Chronic marijuana use has been associated with anxiety, schizophrenia, bipolar disorders and depression.
• Smoking pot could be affecting your social life and your work life
• pot smokers are thinner than nonsmoker

Following is an excerpt from an opinion piece by Tim Egan of the New York Times. It makes a case in favor of eliminating the criminality associated with the possession of Marijuana in the US. The States of Washington & Colorado have moved in this direction.

“There remains the big question of how President Obama will handle the ‘cannabis spring’. So far, he and Attorney General Eric Holder have been silent. I take that as a good sign, and certainly a departure from the hard line position they took when California voters were considering legalization a few years ago. But if they need additional nudging, here are three reasons to let reason stand:

Hypocrisy. Popular culture and the sports-industrial complex would collapse without all the legal drugs that promise to extend erections, reduce inhibitions and keep people awake all night. I’m talking to you, Viagra, alcohol and high-potency energy drinks. Worse, perhaps, is the $25 billion nutritional supplement industry, offerings pills that make exaggerated health claims and steroid-based hormones that can have significant bad consequences. The corporate cartels behind these products get away with minimal regulation because of powerful backers like Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah.

In two years through 2011, more than 2,200 serious illnesses, including 33 fatalities, were reported by consumers of nutritional supplements. Federal officials have received reports of 13 deaths and 92 serious medical events from Five Hour Energy. And how many people died of marijuana ingestion? Of course, just because well-marketed, potentially hazardous potions are legal is no argument to bring pot onto retail shelves. But it’s hard to make a case for fairness when one person’s method of relaxation is cause for arrest while another’s lands him on a Monday night football ad.

Tax and regulate. Already, 18 states and the District of Columbia allow medical use of marijuana. This chaotic and unregulated system has resulted in price-gouging, phony prescriptions and outright scams. No wonder the pot dispensaries have opposed legalization — it could put them out of business.

Washington State officials estimate that taxation and regulation of licensed marijuana retail stores will generate $532 million in new revenue every year. Expand that number nationwide, and then also add into the mix all the wasted billions now spent investigating and prosecuting marijuana cases.

With pot out of the black market, states can have a serious discussion about use and abuse. The model is the campaign against drunk driving, which has made tremendous strides and saved countless lives at a time when alcohol is easier to get than ever before. Education, without one-sided moralizing, works.

Lead. That’s what transformative presidents do. From his years as a community organizer — and a young man whose own recreational drug use could have made him just another number in lockup — Obama knows well that racial minorities are disproportionately jailed for these crimes. With 5 percent of the world’s population, the United States has 25 percent of its prisoners — and about 500,000 of them are behind bars for drug offenses. On cost alone — up to $60,000 a year, to taxpayers, per prisoner — this is unsustainable.

Obama is uniquely suited to make the argument for change. On this issue, he’ll have support from the libertarian right and the humanitarian left. The question is not the backing — it’s whether the president will have the backbone.”

QUESTION:  Should Canada decriminalize Marijuana use?

QUOTE: "The prestige of government has undoubtedly been lowered considerably by the prohibition law. For nothing is more destructive of respect for the government and the law of the land than passing laws which cannot be enforced. It is an open secret that the dangerous increase of crime in this country is closely connected with this."

- Albert Einstein

LEMONS TO: Billy Bob Clinton for smoking Monica but not inhaling!

      

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