That said, lawyers make a living out of engaging in sophistry, and monopoly courts don’t have a great track record of considering the letter and intent of the law; if the Constitution can be twisted to allow the government to do what it wants, then 19 can probably be twisted in favor of more government power too. It’s never wrong to be suspicious of the state.

I’m inclined not to trust some of the 215 architects, and even medical growers and dispensaries in general, on this one. They have a nice little oligopoly going, and if you are able to charge black market prices with legal protection then you have a strong incentive to lobby in favor of the status quo.

I think it’s not clear that Jack Herer would’ve continued to oppose 19. His children seem to think otherwise, and they brought up the point that he initially opposed 215 because it didn’t go far enough, but he ultimately campaigned for it because it was an improvement over the previous system. I’ll try to find some sources for that letter on Monday.

Was I wrong to be suspicious of the state?

Personally, I get pretty foggy when I smoke, but it’s not an issue for me since I use it to sleep. I could never smoke in the middle of the day and get away with it at a high pressure job; she’s an entirely different breed. Besides, even if you could tell when she had medicated, it still works better than, and is far safer than Benzodiazepines. She’s able to function 100%, which isn’t the case with Benzos. I have no doubt that the anxiety medications of the future will be cannabis derived.

To everyone who is about to claim “but marijuanas makes yous paranoid” understand that there are two species of medicinal cannabis plants; generally the paranoid and/or racing thoughts are triggered in novices by strains that are mostly Cannabis Sativa, rather than Cannabis Indica which is the calming, pain reducing variety.

I have to call you out on this. If we had the opportunity and I’d place a gentleman’s bet that I could tell which woman, from a line of 10, had been smoking pot all day long within a minute or so of some light conversation. If I was wrong, that may help change my perception, and we’d both win.

Where I work, I can tell who has been smoking cigs, who has been drinking, and who has been taking prescription pain pills – your pupils … your pupils always give you away. If someone is smoking weed, I’m not aware of it, but we do have random drugs tests.

http://www.drugwarrant.com/articles/why-is-marijuana-illegal/
“Marihuana is a short cut to the insane asylum. Smoke marihuana cigarettes for a month and what was once your brain will be nothing but a storehouse of horrid specters. Hasheesh makes a murderer who kills for the love of killing out of the mildest mannered man who ever laughed at the idea that any habit could ever get him…”

“Marihuana influences Negroes to look at white people in the eye, step on white men’s shadows and look at a white woman twice.”

As for alcohol being cooler, it’s all a matter of degree. I’d rather have a conversation about economics with a stoned guy on a couch than deal with some Bro who is so hammered he yells every word he speaks and then breaks my coffee table by stumbling over it. Admittedly there’s still some major differences in public perception of it, but personally seeing someone with a drink to me says “party guy” and seeing someone with a joint leans more “intellectual” –even Ted Danson. But there’s a wide range of difference between your average Budweiser chugger and your average Brandy sipper. Just as there’s a difference between the person who takes two hits and can’t have a functional conversation about anything other than Spicy Doritos, and the person who smokes and wants to engage you in a conversation on philosophy. The latter is much less amusing to the general public.

Or maybe it has to do with how they both make you feel subjectively. Having a drink or two will definitely make you feel cooler, more suave, more confident. Taking a couple hits, especially for the novice, is more likely to give you a bit of anxiety; maybe it makes you a bit more self-conscious about that goofy intonation you add to some words, and that weird thing you do with your hands while conversing, which is decidedly not cool.

Personally, I smoke heavy strains before bed for my insomnia in order to avoid getting dependent on gross chemicals like Ambien. My girlfriend SWEARS by it as the fastest acting and best possible anti-anxiety alternative to Xanax. She smokes ALL DAY LONG but you would never know it by her demeanor, and her job is even exceptionally heavy on organization; it really does affect everyone differently.

People have been conditioned over thousands of years to regard alcohol as acceptable. Both religious and secular groups have produced and consumed alcohol since there were religious and secular groups. Jesus turned water into wine. Paul told Timothy to have a drink. Didn’t monks create beer? Or was it Champaign? Or both? What surprises me the most, is how pot smokers often overlook the historical differences between drinking alcohol and smoking pot, and wonder why society so readily accepts one over the other.

I wonder why we didn’t see the public outcry against making pot illegal as we did when the feds tried prohibition? Anyone have any good links on the history of pot in the USA? I think pot will be legal fairly soon in the USA as the economy drags and drug wars move further into the heartland.

This bill sought to regulate marijuana like alcohol. Alcohol is subject to a patchwork of local ordinances, and it’s taxed to heck as well. If California voters reject a bill that regulates marijuana like alcohol, then why should we expect them to pass a bill that regulates marijuana like tomatoes?

I would love to see the complete dismantling of cannabis regulation, but failing that I can accept that a system where pot is legalized and taxed is at least an improvement over a system where it’s illegal and people can be fined for possessing it and imprisoned for growing it.

It really wasn’t a very good legalization bill, it was a “Tax and Control Cannabis” bill just as the name of the bill said…….maybe thats true maybe it isnt

i cant figure out why anyone would still tolerate illegal cannabis….over a decade ago it was estimated that 70 million had tried it??? and the club of the state still being used against drug users and sellers.

drano has a warning label, put the same on drugs along with bilboards, etc concerning risks and leave people alone and let the state look for serious issues like violence, fraud, thefts etc.

Given C’s information above, had I lived in CA, I would have thought about voting against it.

Plus pot was much cheaper since you could buy a bag, sell half of it, and then smoke it for free. This was very difficult to do with alcohol since it was much bulkier and more regulated.

Of course then crank became even cheaper and more available then alchohol or pot was….

I don’t support people smoking pot. Smoking it is decidedly unhealthy, certain small percentage of people have negative physiological effects from it because it IS a mildly psychotropic drug, and it does reduce your capacity for logical thought.

It’s pretty much bad all around, except for usage on very rare occasions.

But between people smoking it and the police state and prison system… I’d have to say that getting thrown in jail is infinitely worse for your well being then smoking a joint on the weekend. Nobody is doing anybody any favors by having it illegal.

The drug war in general is pretty much horrific on multiple levels.

Lets think about the things that can easily be solved by making it (and most other drugs) legal:
* Get rid of throwing people in jail for what they consider a good time.

* Support local industries; ie pot growers and pharamists

* Solve most intercity crime. When only criminals can sell drugs and make billions of dollars… then criminals will do what criminals will do when they control a multi-billion dollar international industry: run it very innefficiently and spend most of their time killing themselves and most other people that get in their way.

* Dramatically lower police office budgets, get rid of the majority of prisons… save billions of dollars in the anti-drug war.

* Get rid of pretty much all the negative elements in nothern Mexico, take all the money from the gangs. Pretty much eliminate most of the negative effects of having a open border with Mexico.

* Solve Afghanistan. The only really profitable industry in Afghanistan is poppies. Then instead of having the curious task of simultaneously ‘freeing’ a people while enforcing laws that will effectively cause them economic collapse and starvation. Instead of being such assholes to everybody we can actually admit what is going on (completely beyond our ability to control it one way or another) and allow these people to rebuild their own country.

* Be able to spend money on stuff that really works: Treatment. If you want to get the maximum benefit from money spent against drug usage then the best way is to convince people how stupid and self destructive this usage is in the first place.

etc etc etc.

Because of our country’s blindness and fantasies about the way people should live, the way people want to live the drug war is turning major cities into shitholes while providing the criminal element a billion dollar industry that they have no competition in. It’s a crime against the natural state of human beings to take away their ability to have recreational drug use.