What's the point of arresting & imprisoning pot smokers?

[mopaul]

and what's the point of arresting and imprisoning someone who has a few joints on him? or someone with a quarter of a pound of the stuff on him? or someone who sells it to her friends? or someone who buys it by the pound? or growing it for your self, or to sell at a profit? or lighting one up at the bar with your drunken friends? or smoking a bowl at night over a good book and a shot of brandy? or having a few puffs for breakfast lunch and dinner? or a little taste of bud to lighten the burden of chemo? or to beat back old man depression? or just because it fucking feels good to smoke one with your loved one before bedtime and it aint' hurtin' nobody?

[LostInAnomie]

1. Word!

eom

[seabeyond]

4. "Word!"............................ LOVE it

ya, whats the big deal

[H2O Man]

2. Because

it's against the law. It wouldn't be against the law if it weren't bad for you. Very bad. Lots of serial killers got started on pot. Cereal killers, too, who have forensic munchies from the addictive properties of the demon weed. It also increases the chances that males will grow breasts, or at least grow pot, and laugh at President Bush when he tells them to kill other people. Arlo Guthrie smoked pot, and he let down this country when it was time for him to serve in Vietnam.

[Cooley Hurd]

60. And it makes you play the piano maniacally...

Faster! FASTER!

[H2O Man]

70. How many lives lost?

What about the potential for this spreading beyond piano? What if human beings and young people begin to play with their organs faster and faster? The confusion that results from smoking this unnatural product and listening to communist-inspired music, such as Jim Morrison's lyrics, "Go real slow, you'll like it more and more," will create driving hazards far beyond cell phones.

[tnlefty]

3. I have no idea. I'd take weed production and consumption any

day over the problems that this state has with meth labs and meth users. Let them smoke pot I say. Let us all smoke to cope with the remainder of the bush* term.

[tridim]

5. Didn't you hear?

If you smoke pot, you'll go crazy and kill your parents. Oh, and black jazz musicians will steal all the white women.

Obviously, there is no point since pot is good for you. Gawd would agree.

[ryan_cats]

59. LOL

If you smoke pot, you'll go crazy and kill your parents. Oh, and black jazz musicians will steal all the white women.
LOL!

Wasn't that the theme to Reefer Madness?

[murray hill farm]

6. Well..yeah!!

It is regular tobacco and cigs that should be illegal...we know that hurts and kills a hundred thousand or so each year in the usa....probably more...so if that is OK to sell..and probably subsidized to help the company's grow even more tobacco..even though it is well established that it is a poison that will kill...then why do we imprison someone who has a few joints on ones person...so silly....so typical.

[firefox]

24. Tobacco killed 5 million in 2000

The Center for Disease control sure does a terrible job of informing us on the deaths attributable to tobacco. You would think they would have a simple chart, but no. You can find out a few years back that 442,000 Americans dies from tobacco.

About six weeks ago the numbers for tobacco deaths for 2000 were released. It said there were 5 million tobacco deaths worldwide in 2000.

The War on Drugs is a tool of Empire. It was the drug war that shredded the Constitution long before the Patriot Act and the bogus War on Terror. Law is only important in suppressing "the herd" and building a police state.

What is funny is that in 1914 when the Harrison Act was out to prohibit things, the pharma industry said it was not addictive. Of course it was in half the medicines at the time and they were defending their bottom line. Now the pharma industry wants medicines with patents that can prop up profits and have their servants in government stop all research. Many states had MMJ laws in the 70s, but all of a sudden after thousands of years of service to mankind, pot became no better than dirt to medicine. Now just what changed.

Pot should be legal. That is a no-brainer. The criminals are in government, which is pretty much a no-brainer too. Square is round, black is white, prohibition is freedom- don't you know.

They have to lock you up to protect you and serve you. Protect and serve. They got to do it. It's for your own good.

[porphyrian]

7. This may be the least-supported law since prohibition...

...which is what it essentially is. Is there really anyone left on the planet that believes pot is the evil that the "war on drugs" propaganda frames it to be? Is it just because so many of us ignore the law that very few people put much effort into changing it?

[Warpy]

21. Parents

They may have smoked weed in high school and college, then put away childish things when they got jobs, got married, got mortgages and got respectable.

They look at their kids and want to control them, and part of that means not allowing them to take the same risks they did.

So parents are the ones who overwhelmingly support the stupid and ultimately doomed prohibition of one of the plants god/earth/mother nature gave us to ease our pain.

This is why legalization is going to be an uphill battle.

[porphyrian]

38. Only a parent who hadn't thought things out would think this way.

First, only the lamest parent uses federal law to raise their kids. If you have to resort to federal law to control your children, you probably shouldn't have any to begin with.

Secondly, it's not like pot is difficult to find or get caught with. By keeping the law as it is, they aren't scaring their kids straight, they're risking getting themselves into serious legal problems, and eliminating their child's chances of going to college with any federal funding. If a parent really doesn't want their kid to smoke pot, tell them the truth about it (which they'll find out anyway from friends) and tell them why they are opposed to it. If the kid isn't going to listen to them anyway, at least they'll find out that the parent wasn't lying and trust can be built.

[Pepperbelly]

66. that is not the biggest impediment at all ...

Rather it is a tripod of insanity based on greed.

1) Treament community. They make tons of money because of this shit. Everything from 'treatment' facilities to drug testing labs.

2) Law enforcement has a sweeeeet gig. There are tons more of them than we need because of this stupid prohibition, they get to take cool cars and shit from people, and when they leave, they get juicy gigs in sector 1.

3) Organized crime. There is no inherrent reason for pot to cost more than greens or cocaine to cost more than sugar. It is because of the risk. If the risk is removed, via legalization, the profit is removed and what is now a lucrative business becomes just another agri commodity.

[Old and In the Way]

73. This parent would rather his teenage kids experiment with pot

than alcohol. Experimenting is part of the rite of passage....and the mix of kids, cars, and booze scare me far more than smoking dope.

But the reality is, it is a political crime. Progressives/liberals are far more open to accepting and using pot. I'd be interested in the statistics of incarcerated pot smokers, by political affiliation. I suspect that they are overwhelmingly Democrat/Green on the spectrum.

Stupid that the Democratic Party doesn't make decriminalization of pot a party plank. There is no political benefit in supporting these antiquated, pro-Republican laws.

[amazona]

8. profit motive

Who profits?

Just about everyone. The extra cops and security personnel hired. The entire drug testing industry. The re-hab industry. The prison industry is now run for profit, so pot smokers can be converted into convenient and profitable slaves. Gov't entities that can seize people's property. Too many people at too many levels are making money out of imprisoning pot smokers.

You need to take the profit motive out of arresting pot smokers but I'm not sure of any peaceful way to do this. All that comes to mind is making it too expensive for society to waste time and money chasing pot smokers but how do we do this? Pot smokers are a pretty peaceful laidback bunch. Alas, if you are perceived as harmless, you are perceived as an easy victim.

This won't change in our lifetime, I'm thinking. If anything, it will escalate. But alcohol prohibition wasn't brought to a halt without a lot of lives lost on both sides. I fear it won't be any different with pot. Sorry.

The conservation movement is a breeding ground of communists
and other subversives. We intend to clean them out,
even if it means rounding up every birdwatcher in the country.
--John Mitchell, US Attorney General 1969-72

[Discord]

20. The government will be making much more...

.. by taxing it and having it ditributed by licenced distributors. Don't think for a sec the tobacoo industry is chomping at the bit to market the shit out of it the second it becomes legal. The staff in the DEA will still have tons of funding chasing around drug cartels and busting into chem-labs well into the next century. Not to mention the overall value to wide ranges of industry as well. I pray that sometime in my lifetime I will at least see the decriminalization of it, even if not the actual legalization of it for public consumption. The value it could hold to the economy and the feint opposition it has against it, gives me some hope. Unfortunately no politician wants to have that target sign mounted on thier foreheads as being pro-drug and essentially ruining thier political careers. It would have to be a widespread movement supported by many members of congress along with some pretty hefty political rallying from supporters.

[Squeech]

49. Disagree

Civil forfeiture is a great deal for local police departments. They can confiscate any money you have, or any chattels you have, as long as they can claim with any degree of plausibility that you acquired it by dealing drugs. Nothing resembling due process is required, and the process of trying to get your property back essentially consists of proving a negative-- "No, I never dealt drugs, dammit!"

So this is pretty much free money for the cops, who always think of themselves as underpaid-- and, now that they're also supposed to be first responders to terror, actually do need more resources. They're not going to give that up without a fight.

[amazona]

61. squeech is correct

I know an autistic/Asperger's type man who had over $20,000 seized. He has never done a drug in his life and wouldn't even know how to get any drugs. He didn't get the money back either, because there is no proof required in civil forfeiture. They even told him outright they knew he wasn't guilty of any crime: Sir, nobody is accusing you of anything, but we believe this money could have been involved in a drug crime. Say what? So they really believe that money grows legs and makes deals all on its own and then hops back in your pocket for a nap at the end of the day.

No, they knew they were stealing from a helpless person.

The story in the news that always angered me about this was the poor woman who lost her shack in Hurricane Hugo and when FEMA gave her $8,000 to replace it, the Florida state police seized it as "drug proceeds." They knew damn well what it was and where she got it. They also knew a woman who had to live in an $8K shack and didn't even have a checking account could not afford to hire a civil forfeiture specialist to fight for the money. Legal costs are into the five or six figures to fight forfeiture so the LEOs can steal the smaller amounts of money without fear of any court battle.

I'm very angry about this, and it is not because I smoke pot. I don't. It isn't just drug users who are harmed, it is ALL of us who struggle to put a little bit of savings together in case of disaster.

The conservation movement is a breeding ground of communists
and other subversives. We intend to clean them out,
even if it means rounding up every birdwatcher in the country.
--John Mitchell, US Attorney General 1969-72

[crispini]

65. True, true.

There was a pot grower that lived on my street; he owned four houses and was growing and storing pot in them. The cops busted him and all four houses were subject to forfeiture. Now, in the neighborhood, my street is know as "pot house street." Doesn't seem to have stopped the other neighbors from smoking though; sometimes I walk down the street and catch a big ol' whiff of it. Can you tell I live around a buncha hippies? :7

[Discord]

83. You missed the critical point of the post

The "War on Drugs" would be largely unaffected. This about marijuana specifically. As that is less harmful and has many positive uses even long past recreational use. Where many people have a much harsher reaction to other drugs, most people just simply don't seem to care about pot use. The seizures made with reguards to pot compared to other drugs would be but merely a small fraction of the overall money seized in drug raids. Sorry, but pot growers and sellers "rarely" are in the economic level of cocaine, and chemical drug sellers. I say rarely, because I know that if you look around hard enough, I'm sure you could find a few isolated cases. But in general, anyone who makes enough selling pot to make that much money is probably selling other drugs as well. Doubt they sieze that 7 figure home and 3 Beamers from that pot dealer down the block. And OMG, they got an old tractor and run down farmhouse from that grower in Seattle. That'll keep that war on drugs funded for the next 15minutes or so with that big haul. (ok ok... the last bit was some sarcasm...couldn't resist. :P )

[KingoftheJungle]

9. To prevent blacks from voting and putting the youth into the system

[Enquiringkitty]

15. The 18 to 25 population in this country is still the largest voting

block. Statistic show that if every member of that block voted the same way on the same issue, they could vote in or out anything they wish. They need to get out and make themselves heard. We'll have to lock up the "Young Republican"....get the stoned and lock them in a closet with a volunteer transvestite. They will learn something about themselves and we would get some really good things passed.

[H2O Man]

27. Not true.

It may be the biggest potential voting block. But it is not even close to being the biggest block. The 18 to 25 year olds remain the single weakest voting block in our society.

[American Tragedy]

45. Better turnout would certainly have a great impact on current politics.

We're still far outnumbered by the baby boomers, but if we all became a consistent and powerful voting bloc, politicians would have to address the issues of the youth, and probably become more sympathetic to liberal and non-conformist lifestyles.

It would generally work to the benefit of the Democrats, too, judging from the last presidential election. The only time I know of when they haven't mostly gone to the Democrats was in 1972, due to McGovern's catastrophic campaign.

But for some reason a lot of Americans seem to be absolutely horrified at the idea of walking into a gym, stepping behind a curtain, and pressing the button for Dem, Rep, Libertarian, Green, Prohibition, Know-Nothing, Hemp, or anyone else. I guess it's just too much to ask.

[skids]

63. Let's set this straight.

Pure population-wise, GEN-X is at a par now with boomers and will soon outnumber them. That's due to an echo from the baby boom and due to the younger overall age of immigrants. The echo is stretched out, so not all the new voters fall into "GEN-X" (I'm inter-generational myself so I know this all too well.) It is more like a rolling thunder clap, with GEN-X being the leading edge. Most importantly, the peak of this group was not old enough to vote in 2004.

http://www.ageworks.com/textbook_demo/gero200demo/week2/week2b.htm

So the youth vote is still waiting to come into it's own.

Now as far as the size of the active voting block, that depends on whether you believe the exit polls. From what I've seen so far comparing actual polling book demographics to the exit poll results, the demographics in the exit polls cannot be trusted, as the youth vote was underweighted from actual totals by about 3 to 4 %. However, you'll notice that even the weighted polls show us a different story than we are led to believe by the media.

This is the "final adjusted" exit poll numbers nationally:

18-29 (17%)
30-44 (29%)
45-59 (30%)
60 and Older (24%)

... at first glance the table seems to say young voters voted only half as much as the next age group. That's patently deceptive. The lowest age group only covers 12 years, while the next age group covers 15. In addition, GEN-X is conveniently stuck this year with it's older brothers and sympathetic trans-generationalists (like me) sharing the 30-45 year-old block with the tail end of the boomers so it's hard to tell what the real turnout rates were for those of us with receding hairlines.

I have to switch track here and talk just about North Carolina because it is one of the only places where poll-book demographics have been released by the SoS's office so it is the only data I have unpacked.

Let's rehash those numbers for North Carolina, and I'll include the raw exit poll results for comparison:

                 raw            weighted
Age  - :       3 voters  0%
Age 18 - 24: 224 voters 10%    18-29  14%
Age 25 - 29: 175 voters 08%
Age 30 - 39: 453 voters 21%    30-44  33%
Age 40 - 44: 265 voters 12%
Age 45 - 49: 279 voters 13%    45-59  30%
Age 50 - 59: 365 voters 17%
Age 60 - 64: 179 voters 08%    60+    22%
Age 65 - 74: 169 voters 08%
Age 75 - :    68 voters 03%

First note the split in the raw numbers between the 20-39 group (transgenerationalists and the oldest of GEN-X) and the 40-45 age group (boom stragglers.) It is pretty much an even level of turnout when compared to the population pyramid.

Next, you'll note that the final total was derived from the raw total by weighting up seniors and weighting down the youth vote. According to NEP's own report, completion rates were extremely low among seniors in NC, so weighting them up is to be expected. However, completion rates among the young were lower than the middle-aged, so why they were weighted down while the middle-aged group was not is, as yet, a mystery to me. Unless you'd like some tinfoil with those french fries in which case the mystery is less surprising.

Unfortunately the NC SoS didn't release age-based demographics, but from what I have seen by comparing the other demographics collected from poll-books (a.k.a. the "drudge list" in some places) the exit poll's demographics are way out of wack with who really showed up to vote.

So, as usual, you cannot trust a single word that the MSM has to say, even on something as seemingly mundane as exit poll sound bites. The youth vote did not punk out, they were there full force, and any attempt to say otherwise by the pundits is an attempt at manipulating their voting behavior or social attitudes towards them (or just utterly shoddy reporting.) IIRC (my memory is hazy) Michael Moore covered this deception shortly after the election.

[KingoftheJungle]

81. I meant putting youth into the system...criminal databases and drug courts

[FizzFuzz]

10. authoritarianism is another factor.

Just control and morally lead those misbehaving masses.

also racism/classism. "Cracking down on crime" and "War On Drugs" are white authority code speak for "keep the poor, trouble making minorities in their place so the world is safe for white upper classes".

[reichstag911]

11. The point...

...is to keep the police state beast fed and watered. If violent crime -- much, if not most, of which derives from the fact that recreational, non-alcohol, non-tobacco, drugs are illegal -- were to be mostly eradicated, there would be no way to justify the huge forces of the country's paramilitary police departments. They want those brownshirts ready and armed as the first line of their defense for when order begins to break down, as it seems it will do in the not-too-distant future.

[timtom]

12. Amen, brother!

I wouldn't be a bit surprised to find myself toking up again in the next couple of years, after the kids are grown.

God knows I could use it, after the last 23 years...

[stellanoir]

13. There's no point whatsoever. . .

pot smokers are totally non violent and more than mostly, most lazy,.

They are only incarcerated to enrich the private companies that own the prison systems.

Our judicial system is a total travesty at this point.

They make $30,000 to $60,000 per inmate which is far more that these guys were mostly making in the first place.

Martha, of course, is another matter entirely.

And Ken Lay, who impoverished innumerable employees of their pensions is allowed to walk free.

[Enquiringkitty]

18. Most things that are fun, are sins; most sins are crimes according l

to the law; pot is fun, therefore pot is a sin and since sin is translated into law as a crime, pot is a crime. You an I both know that this is a circular argument but that is how Washington does things...."Now entering Washington DC: Please leave your brain at the bridge."

[MadisonProgressive]

57. There seem to be a bunch of FUN THINGS

that either kill you, jail you, or turn you into a big tub-o-lard. Life just isn't fair!

[mahatmakanejeeves]

14. They hate America.

You've been reported.

[Burma Jones]

16. So they can learn advanced criminality in the joint.

and have their life screwed up so crime is all they have left to them....

[BigBearJohn]

17. because "demand" raises the price

Plus the forbideen fruit is always the most delicious

[Les BOOGIE]

19. probably cuz the alcohol, tobacco & pharmaceutical industries

want it that way. Joe Six pack only has a certain amount of disposable income. When lottery tickets became legal beer sales dropped.

[applegrove]

22. Well there is a problem right now in Canada. And the solution is

I think to decriminalize smoking the stuff (or legalize it) but way criminalize the growing of it. So the government regulates the people who can grow it and then sells it with tax. Then the police don't have to risk life and limb so much to police it all.

That sounds like a great plan to me. Cuts out the bad guy. So the criminals will resort of robbing the warehouses like they do cigarettes... but only if the taxes are too high to make it profitable for them.

My only question is about mental health risks. How does pot change the brain long term. Does it traumatize the brain as other drugs do and cause needless mental illness?

Anyone? :shrug:

[Enquiringkitty]

23. I can tell you that pot DOES NOT effect the brain like some other drugs.

Pot has an emotional effect...it is less addictive than tobacco or caffeine.It DOES NOT destroy brain cells like you have been told and it DOES NOT change the chemical balance in the brain. It alters the firing of electrical impulses in the brain and slows them down by alter the MOVEMENT of dopamine in the brain (that is way they use to call it dope). It is not physically addictive. Reactions and perceptions are slower so functions at , say, the work place would not be up to par and reactions in an emergency such as sudden breaking in a car,would be slower. but that is the same as drinking which we can't do at work or driving either.

[firefox]

26. They used to call soft drinks dope

Back 70 or 80 years ago, they called soft drinks dope. People thought it a waste of money to buy a bottle of sugar water for a few pennies.

[Enquiringkitty]

28. Before the late 50s, coca-cola had a small amount of cocaine in

it as a result of the use of the cocoa bean. It was originally sold in drug stores for head ache relief.

[firefox]

41. Coca-cola still has coca in it

I know this is hard to believe and when I mentioned it at marijuana.com with a link to NarcoNews over a year ago, they did not even believe me there. You can search the net and find very little on it. The claim has been repeated again at NarcoNews in an article dated January 28, 2005. Of course Coca-cola denies it. The article is titled "Peruvian Drug Control Agency: Coca Cola Buys Coca Leaves"- http://www.narconews.com/Issue35/article1159.html

[K-W]

55. They remove the cocaine before using the leaves.

But interestingly enough they do use the leaves still.

[applegrove]

39. I hear pot is very dangerous if you drink & smoke as it suppresses

the ability to 'vomit' and thus you can easily die of alcohol poisoning. I think of the college croud and those of us who were desperate to get out of any social situation in high school and drank to excess.

But glad to hear that it doens't effect the brain in long term ways. Any link on that?

Also - there is a town in Canada where ski bums and mountain people congregate. Many people there smoke dope and it has aparently the lowest crime rate ... that would be other than the growers itself.

Something has to be done because it is just killing our police. The growers apparently are armed to the teeth and are such a big danger. We need to legislate our way out of this mess.

PS I am sure cocaine was not good for people.

[crikkett]

50. I would suggest that drinking to such an extent is what's dangerous

for crying out loud. Although I've read that for some people, mixing alcohol and pot triggers a temporary, but drastic reduction in blood pressure.

I want to join a medical study on whether pot lowers blood pressure.

[applegrove]

78. Obviously that is binge drinking and a sign of trouble. I was not

suggesting that I did that (anymore). But binge drinking is an empidemic in some high schools & Universities. Would be good if instructions come with the government packaged (or government approved grower's packaging).

I just don't want to see any new rash of deaths - eh? Alberta this past weekend is enough. But it looks like the Liberals may waffle on the issue.

[Chico Man]

79. From personal experiece.....

I used to smoke a lot of weed, and it began to give me pretty bad anxiety. I went to the doctor and he said I had fairly high blood pressure.

I have since stopped smoking weed, which has in turn given me more energy and motivation, and less anxiety. I've been eating very healthy and excercising quite regularly. I've gone to the doctor and my blood pressure has returned to normal.

To me, marijuana is very addictive, at least mentally. My pendulum is swinging from a lot of it to none at the moment. I hope some time in the future I can be somewhere in the middle ground where it does not take over my life like it did and I can enjoy it occassionally.

[applegrove]

85. This is what I would like to know more about. The few times

I tried it as a kid really, it put me right to sleep. But something has to be done to stop the illegal profit and danger inherent in the drug. I mean if it is not very dangerous then make it legal & free up the ressources to go after something else.

But I still do not have enough info on the long term effects or the effects on some kids.

[firefox]

42. A storm is brewing in Canada

I am one that believes that the possession and cultivation laws have been struck down by the courts in Canada and that only Parliament can enact new ones. I say prohibition is dead in Canada and I write about it here in this thread at HempCity- http://www.hempcity.net/forum/viewforum.php?f=41

Medpot.net put up over 100 articles from around the world yesterday and today. It is the best single source for cannabis news on the Internet- http://www.medpot.net/forums/ It is not highly populated, but it still puts up more articles than anyone else, including duplicating what goes up at cannabisnews.com. I hope some of you can come join us in watching the death of cannabis prohibition in Canada.

The Liberals who rule with a coalition government just are having their conference in Ottawa this Friday, Saturday, and Sunday to discuss things including cannabis policy. The last figure I read said that 54% of Canadians are for Free Cannabis. The government has introduced a phony decriminalization bill that would fine pot possession but inflict up to 14 years for cultivation. Even under our alcohol prohibition we did not go after the consumer, so this is still harsher than what people think of under alcohol prohibition. Plenty of high prices and turf wars with government fining people and seizing profits from growers that benefit from the high prices.

Everything is in an uproar now that 4 RCMP officers were killed last Thursday by a bad ^ss that had stolen a lot of car parts. The officers were not there about his pot plants, but once the guy killed the four of them and himself, the spin machine called for tougher sentences on cultivation. They are fighting public opinion in this and it is an interesting study in Canadian media going on.

[amazona]

62. supposedly pot protects against Alzheimer's

Sounds like to me that the changes in brain are therefore positive. Having this disease in my family I would naturally like to see any possible treatment legalized and made easily available.

The conservation movement is a breeding ground of communists
and other subversives. We intend to clean them out,
even if it means rounding up every birdwatcher in the country.
--John Mitchell, US Attorney General 1969-72

[Zorra]

25. Because if herb was not illegal they would need another reason to justify

having millions of cops, lawyers, judges, prison guards, and other justice system related employees (not to mention tens or maybe hundreds of thousands of jails and prisons) to control us and prevent us from overthrowing corporate governance.

COMMON SENSE
Legalizing marijuana allows police to focus on violent crimes
By Amanda L. Stevens| RAW STORY COLUMNIST
snip---
In the past year, the population in America’s jails and prisons has grown to 6.9 million, including those on probation and parole. A 1999 study showed that 60,000 individuals were behind bars for marijuana use. This cost taxpayers $1.2 billion.

Nor does it reflect the number of individuals or the amount spent on those who had their probation or parole revoked for marijuana use. In total, in prosecuting and policing individuals with regards to marijuana, between $7 billion and $10 billion was spent — and that’s just last year.

Ninety percent of those cases were for possession only.

There are more arrests made on marijuana charges than violent crimes combined. These violent crimes include assault, rape, robbery and murder. To put it simply, this is unacceptable.

http://rawstory.com/exclusives/amanda/legalizing_marijuana_violent_crime_731.htm

(I don't use the herb anymore, but I used to. It just got boring for me; but also, the side effects of smoking the flowers of perdition resulted in my becoming functionally illiterate, and also caused other side effects similar to those mentioned by H2O man in his post, so I just up and quit smoking herb one day)

[Enquiringkitty]

31. Have you ever sat around the house with friends and talked about politics?

All of the emotional "tack-ons" that politicians use to back up their stupid theories seem real clear. Your mind goes through the issues slow enough to really think about what you are saying and what you are going to say next. Also you have to listen very carefully to what someone is saying to you ( you..."uuuuh, huh?). anyway, you see through the bull and it dawns on you what they really said in that news conference.

[Enquiringkitty]

32. The prison statistics are outrageous! And they keep complaining about

prison over crowding. Really stupid.

I used it for 13 years regularly. I stopped because the type of career I went into at that time paid very well and did many random "pee-tests" a month. At the time, the money was more important to me than the pot. I have had no effects from my years of use...no memory problems, no lack of concentration....nothing. Everybody is different though.

When I retie I plan to go back to it because I like it.

[Capn Sunshine]

29. PROFIT

The prison-industrial complex needs fresh meat.

The alcohol lobby views it as a threat. They have ever since the 30's.

No one can figure out how to make money on it except dealers.

[Enquiringkitty]

36. You are right about the alcohol industry see legal pot as competition.

[crikkett]

52. esp. considering it's a weed and grows wild

why buy beer if something better is growing right outside? oh, yes, and hemp makes a great paper, and is a renewable resource so the timber industry hates it too, and makes a great cloth so watch out, cotton! And the seeds produce a nice oil.

I was told that airplanes spewed hemp seeds (yes, marijuana) in the 40s onto fields thruout Wisconsin, to grow rope for the Navy.

[DawgHouse]

30. Pointless! n/t

[Ironpost]

33. Its a cash cow for our judicial system simple as that, I think

[me b zola]

34. The prison industrial complex

:grr:

[donsu]

64. bingo - got to keep the private prison money flowing

it's like a tourist town bed tax.

I wouldn't put it past private prison corps. to pay off cops to keep their jails full.

[Conservativesux]

69. Whatever would the prison-guard unions do without pot smokers ?

Probably be kicking thier dogs and beating thier wifes even more, thats what!

[meganmonkey]

35. Well, we're soooo dangerous. I should be in jail myself, before I cause

the downfall of amurkin freedoms :eyes:

I mean, sitting here on the couch and all, petting my doggie and reading DU, I could really do some damage to society. Especially since I am only a couple steps removed from the grower of said substance and it isn't even being transported between states.

You'd think the gov't would WANT the enormous tax revenue they could get by regulating this stuff.

I guess the prison industry is more powerful than the pot industry right now. I like to believe that within my lifetime this will change...

:smoke:

Smoke 'em if you got 'em!!!

[understandinglife]

37. None. Same applies for those who grow it. And, I have never smoked....

....anything or grown any smokable substance.

Best thing to do is legalize it and tax it. And, obviously, if you really want to 'solve the drug' problem, you begin by taking the profit margin out of the market -- and we all know how to do that.

Peace.


"DO YOU ENJOY BEING A CITIZEN OF THE ROGUE, RUTHLESS SUPER_POWER?"

[American Tragedy]

40. Authoritarianism and the prison-industrial complex. Oh, and racism.

"Most marijuana smokers are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz and swing, result from marijuana usage. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes."

-Harry Anslinger, first director of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics

[spanone]

43. Been asking that question for thirty five years.

[Blue_In_AK]

44. No point at all

I've been smoking it for almost 40 years and haven't killed anybody yet...nor did it lead me to smoke crack or shoot heroin. I'm just a peaceful, gentle, hippie grandma.

[mopaul]

46. my granny chewed tobakky

it's fun to think about all those mellow stoned out grandmas and grandpas, there are millions of them. can't put them ALL in jail.

[Occulus]

74. Bet you never did anything but pot, either.

Same as me- not for as many years; I'm much younger, but still. I've been offered coke, heroin, and meth, and repeatedly declined each. I simply won't do a drug I know can kill me, but I will do a drug I know I can't OD on.

That said, I also smoke and drink a beer now and then. I started getting exposed to nicotine when I was a baby, for God's sake....


... yeah, I know, I need to quit. I think that's something I need to get up the nerve to do, as I don't know that I have the determination to do it, yet.

[Blue_In_AK]

76. Well, I did do some other stuff when I was younger...

...but I always seemed to have a good healthy aversion to things that could REALLY do me some damage, or at least knew how to say "this far and no more." There's no way anyone could have ever gotten me to smoke crack or shoot up anything. I had too many people close to me get involved with those things and ruin their lives or die ... it's just not worth it.

[shadowknows69]

47. can't think of any reason

We gonna head into the kitchen, make us something goo to eat.
make ourselves a little high, make the whole day complete.
cause we gonna lay around the shanty mama, and put a good buzz on.

Well there's nothing to do, and there's always room for more.
fill it, light it, shut up and close the door.
cause we gonna lay around the shanty mama, and put a good buzz on.

Now pass it to me baby, pass it too me slow.
take some time to smile a little before you let it go.
cause we gonna lay around the shanty mama, and put a good buzz on.

every night and day if I can help it lord, we gonna lay around the shanty mama, and put a good buzz on.


best song ever written:
"Shanty"
-Jonathon Edwards

[Cooley Hurd]

48. Someday, and I hope that day is soon...

...we'll be able to walk in the sunlight with our bongs held high and say, "Ich bin ein Stoner!"

Now, if we can only get Snoop Dog, Willie Nelson, Woody Harrelson, Matthew McConaughey and Bob Denver elected to congress...

[lonestarnot]

51. It's the economy "stupid". (No insult intended) We have prison people,

prison guards, counselors, cooks, cleaners, we have probation officers, we have their supervisors, we have the probation department clerical staff, we have cops, we have judges and their staffs, we have court's staff and writers, we have security, and so on and so forth. THEY ALL NEED JOBS! The economy needs these pot smokers in jail so they can get paid! Sorry legalization is not going to happen as long as it is economically beneficial to have it illegal.

[crikkett]

53. To re-educate them & save their souls

People who see through organized religion & think for themselves are a danger to society.

[ixion]

54. there is no point, other than to foment the police state

and harass the denizens.

[Fleshdancer]

56. For privatized prisons, the point is $$$$. n/t

[ryan_cats]

58. Chris Rock said it best

I think Chris Rock said it best. The government doesn't want you to do your drugs, it wants you to do their drugs.

It makes no sense. Either alcohol and tobacco should be illegal or pot should be legal. How many people smoke pot and kill people on the road? I don't see people strung out on buds and robbing a bank for their fix either. Stupid law.

[drummer55]

67. cause we have to stay #1 in the world for number of people in prison

The u.s. is tops

751 people out of 100,000 americans are in prison.

more than ANY other country in the world.


land of the free baby.


wake up.

[Conservativesux]

68. They have to keep the prison/industrial labor force numbers up....

...slavery is illegal now, but prison labor isn't.

Besides what would the police do if they were not chasing down pot smokers, enforce the laws that really need enforcing?

Hah!

[Nothing Without Hope]

71. I'd say the reasons are political

First, it's one more thing to rev up fear about, so that it's easier to move toward a total police state with the permission of the citizenry who want to be "protected." Hey, those legions of dope-smoking fieeeeeends are scary if you're a mind-controlled Rethug. EEEEK!

Second, it's an officially criminal act, and if arrested for it or if evidence is obtained that COULD be used for an arrest, the target person is now controllable. They can't run for public office or be too loud in their dissent of the administration, or else this "criminal" background can be brought up to discredit them. Even better if they have been in -- gasp! -- PRISON for it. The Rethug forces have done a good job brainwashing people on the idea that pot is as much of the hard drug scene as heroin and that only morally dissolute people would smoke it. Great for blackmail or other manipulation. You can bet it's a favorite to have in dossiers of blivet** administration opponents.

Funny how we don't hear as much about cocaine - but then that's a favorite of the blivet**.

[Zomby Woof]

72. my guess

Probably to keep the world's Doritos supply in balance.

[mistertrickster]

75. Anybody know where I can score an o-zee? JUST KIDDING!

(for the sarcasm-impaired). Seriously, I haven't smoked reefer for over twenty years, but looking at Bush's "Amerikkka" makes me want to toke up, turn on, and drop out.

Not that I will . . . I plan to fight these bastards with every fiber of being.

[leftofthedial]

77. to protect our great nation from them somday becoming President

er, never mind.

[Rex]

80. In the Bible made out of hemp

4:20 - And God gave the herb to man to do with as he pleased, and all were happy in the Garden.

[Beam Me Up]

82. HOW MARIJUANA WAS PROHIBITED AND WHY:

EXCERPTS FROM
The History of the Non-Medical Use of Drugs in the United States
by Charles Whitebread, Professor of Law, USC Law School


<long historical snip>

The Marihuana Tax Act of 1937

<snip>

When we asked at the Library of Congress for a copy of the (Congressional) hearings (on the prohibition of Marijuana), to the shock of the Library of Congress, none could be found. We went "What?" It took them four months to finally honor our request because -- are you ready for this? -- the hearings were so brief that the volume had slid down inside the side shelf of the bookcase and was so thin it had slid right down to the bottom inside the bookshelf. That's how brief they were. Are you ready for this? They had to break the bookshelf open because it had slid down inside.

There were three bodies of testimony at the hearings on the national marijuana prohibition.

The first testimony came from Commissioner Harry Anslinger, the newly named Commissioner of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics (son-in law of the DuPont family, by the way).

<long, interesting snip>

So, over the objection of the American Medical Association (i.e., they were opposed to marijuana prohibition), the bill passed out of committee and on to the floor of Congress. Now, some of you may think that the debate on the floor of Congress was more extensive on the marijuana prohibition. It wasn't. It lasted one minute and thirty-two seconds by my count and, as such, I will give it to you verbatim.

The entire debate on the national marijuana prohibition was as follows -- and, by the way, if you had grown up in Washington, DC as I had you would appreciate this date. Are you ready? The bill was brought on to the floor of the House of Representatives -- there never was any Senate debate on it not one word -- 5:45 Friday afternoon, August 20. Now, in pre-air-conditioning Washington, who was on the floor of the House? Who was on the floor of the House? Not very many people.

Speaker Sam Rayburn called for the bill to be passed on "tellers". Does everyone know "tellers"? Did you know that for the vast bulk of legislation in this country, there is not a recorded vote. It is simply, more people walk past this point than walk past that point and it passes -- it's called "tellers". They were getting ready to pass this thing on tellers without discussion and without a recorded vote when one of the few Republicans left in Congress, a guy from upstate New York, stood up and asked two questions, which constituted the entire debate on the national marijuana prohibition.

"Mr. Speaker, what is this bill about?"

To which Speaker Rayburn replied, "I don't know. It has something to do with a thing called marihuana. I think it's a narcotic of some kind."

Undaunted, the guy from Upstate New York asked a second question, which was as important to the Republicans as it was unimportant to the Democrats. "Mr. Speaker, does the American Medical Association support this bill?"

In one of the most remarkable things I have ever found in any research, a guy who was on the committee, and who later went on to become a Supreme Court Justice, stood up and -- do you remember? The AMA guy was named William C. Woodward -- a member of the committee who had supported the bill leaped to his feet and he said, "Their Doctor Wentworth came down here. They support this bill 100 percent." It wasn't true, but it was good enough for the Republicans. They sat down and the bill passed on tellers, without a recorded vote.

In the Senate there never was any debate or a recorded vote, and the bill went to President Roosevelt's desk and he signed it and we had the national marijuana prohibition.

<another big snip>

...if you want to read the whole thing, you can find it on line at: http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/history/whiteb1.htm

[Discord]

84. Amazing!

But not surprising.

Thanks for the post!