Would you vote to end prohibition

[Dez]

on Cannabis? If no, then why?

[merwin]

1. Hell yes.

But I'd also vote to make alcohol/tobacco illegal :-)

[Dez]

2. That would be .. interesting.

All the tobacco companies and alcohol companies wouldn't like that.
We need to end prohibition. It's a complete failure, and it just destroys lives in the process.

[Occulus]

8. Actually, legalization could be

a way to reduce tobacco consumption. Compensate the tobacco farmers to stop growing tobacco and start growing the Green.

I think it was Philip Morris that once starting manufacturing packaging for packs of joins- I think it was for Canada. Maybe that was just a rumor. It's fairly clear, though, that the tobacco companies would be all too happy to grow and sell pot were they allowed to do so.

[merwin]

37. They'd probably put arsenic in that too though.

[bryant69]

3. To put it another way

"Would you liked to get flamed? Please present an argument against legalizing mary jane."

I support legalizing pot, but can understand why someone might not.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[bee]

4. abso-friggan-lutely. n/t

[whatever4]

5. Yes!

I want to see waving fields of cannabis!!!

Here's what I know:

Food - no one would ever starve again, it's virtually as nutritious as soy and cheap to grow, literally like a weed
Fuel - no more oil worries, no more foreign dependence, we could make bio-diesel and that runs in conventional diesel engines. Ordinary cars. And the emissions are healthier too, believe it or not, no sulfur or particulates to speak of.
Medicine - can't list all the ailments it helps with, because there are too many, migraines MS and aids-related conditions are only a few. It has also been shown to have cancer preventative properties (shrinks tumors, more than one study) and is non-addictive and non-toxic. Dosages can be increased, decreased or it can be stopped entirely, with no fatal withdraw. Need I say, no more overdoses or deaths from overdoses, intentional or otherwise. It has vast potential as medicine, with no known risks TO THIS DAY. If they could prove it to be hazardous in a study, they would have. They have tried, and failed. More than one doctor became an advocate for cannabis use after participating in those studies.
Paper, plastics, wood products and clothing - can be made from hemp, and it's actually better than cotton
Trees - if we used it instead of wood, we could stop cutting down trees, and maybe save our planet. Global warming makes this a consideration all on it's own, forgetting everything else; in the end it hardly matters what food, fuel, clothing or medicine we have, if we can't live on our planet.


Along with all these potential benefits are the facts that

* it grows virtually anywhere, world-wide, and needs little to no fertilizer

* it would UNDERCUT the drug companies, who currently seem to have lied to us about many of our medications and make VAST profits, which might not be so bad, but they don't seem to trickle down to cheaper or more effective medicine. Drug side-effects and interactions are REAL concerns for most people taking pain medications.

* HOW many people we have in prison over it, most convincing to me

* it is a nontoxic herb which humans have used since biblical times, and the reasons for criminalizing it were racists and spurious in the first place. It has never caused a problem, and is NOT addictive.

I can't say it enough, but after a while all I want to say to people is one thing:

Why is cannabis illegal?

Because you're being lied to. Again.

[whatever4]

6. In fact, http://www.norml.org/

Help us legalize it! :)

http://www.norml.org/

[Dez]

9. Loved your post!

We need to educate people.. oil will be gone someday.. I think that is when it will become legal. We will need fuel for our cars, and hemp is the way to go! It will be grown everywhere, again someday. Cannabis is medicine which is cheap to grow, and I can live with the side effects (high, and the munchies).

[whatever4]

13. Thanks, I agree, education!!

Join NORML! :)

One thing I hope I live to see is that it's made legal. I really do want to see waving fields of cannabis. And no more human suffering for no good reason, people in pain, people depressed, people hungry, even people poor. This would help so much, it becomes unbelievable. I think that must be the most difficult aspect of all this, in telling others and trying to educate; it's literally too good to be believed, and the benefits too many and varied to list very easily.

It's almost like, if it were just good for medicine, or just good for food, or just good for paper, plastic, wood products, etc etc. But the many different benefits sound...like a pipe dream. I think it's too easily written off, put together with the government propaganda and hippie-history of pot.

As if the hippies were wrong in the first place. Sigh. Shades of Vietnam.

Sad, because when the real history is looked at, the reasons that were given for prohibiting it, it ALL falls on it's face. Such a huge lie, such a huge price our nation is paying for it, even now, when we can least afford it.

[MN ChimpH8R]

7. Yes - instantly

One of the very stupidest of many stupid governmental policies.

And I haven't smoked it for 15 years.

[EnfantTerrible]

10. Of course.

There is absolutely no good reason why it remains illegal (or was ever criminalized in the first place). The hipocracy of this society, which allows and sanctions the sale of alcohol and tobacco, is an afront to any rational person.

It may be worth while to point out that we are the only industrialized nation that doesn't grow hemp because of our ignorantl policies connecting it to marijuana. The fact is that industrial hemp threatens too many industries with powerful lobbies: Timber, Textiles, Oil to name just a few. The argument that it is too expensive to process hemp is one so asenine that it's proponents should be embarrased. Any start up industry is going to be expensive until consumption can offset the cost of production. The US used to have a thriving hemp industry and many states counted it as a cornerstone commodity of their economies.

There is absolutely no reason why hemp shouldn't be produced and federally supported in this country. Marijuana shoud be legalized as well and regulated. The revenues generated from regulation and taxation would more than cover the costs of reclaiming our now abandoned industrial hemp industry.

[Kazak]

11. Wanna turn me into a one-issue voter?

:thumbsup:

...just kidding, btw...

[meganmonkey]

12. Yes, please!

[noonwitch]

14. Yes, we need the revenue that a weed tax would produce

Not just for rebuilding the Gulf Coast, but we could use it to fund substance abuse and law enforcement programs that focus on hard drugs.

[Dez]

16. Nice point!

Use tax dollars to rebuild a city, I like it!
We could raise millions, raher than spending millions to warehouse people in prisons. There are NO positives to the drug war.

[anarch]

15. but why? The "War on Drugs" is working out so well...

for the drug-war profiteers.

And prohibition is so clearly an effective policy....

As a matter of fact, I remember "voting" (well, ok, petitioning) for just the chance to put marijuana (medical, of course) on a ballot in DC. If I remember correctly, there was a massive popular response in favor of it, but the whole effort was shot down by Congress (see the unconstitutional Barr Amendment).

I suspect we will see a push for legalization when the tobacco companies start losing money on tobacco, and thus have to find a new way to generate revenue. Until there is big money behind the effort to end prohibition, the puritanical mindset will prevail....

[blonndee]

17. Yes I would, and so would my RW dad. Even he's come to

realize the WOD is a useless racket.

[titoresque]

18. Yes and.....

I do not partake of the herb. For me it's a "gateway" to other very bad things in my life, however I do think pot and hemp have more benefits to society than negative and should be explored and used.

I watched the "hemp revolution" a couple years ago and Im just disgusted that we are not using hemp as a fuel source.

[LeftyMom]

19. absolutely

Hemp material is awesome. If industrial hemp were grown in the US, it would be cheaper and I could use it more. :) Yay!

[Dez]

20. What would it take for a vote to be taken??

I mean, give us PEOPLE the right to say we want the laws changed, rather than being held captive by our corrupt politicians! I want to VOTE on the matter.

[LeftyMom]

32. Beats me

Here in CA we could do it as an initiative but that would just tie the matter up in court until the feds over-ruled it (states' rights my ass!) On a national level we're kinda fucked because there's no national equivalent to the initiative and no congressperson wants to be the first to drop the whole "war on drugs" thing for fear of being creamed in the next election.

[Dez]

36. We need to write our crooked politicians

and tell them we're fed up with this evil war! Who here has written such a letter, other than me?

[tblue37]

21. YES!

And I never even use the stuff.

[maxsolomon]

22. NO

the quality would go down!

[Dez]

23. Grow your own

and you will have quality herb.

[libertypirate]

24. overgrow.com -- It's not like rocket science! /nt

[Dez]

26. Yea, it's just a weed..

a very beautiful weed too!

[maxsolomon]

39. durr

i hope you all aren't serious. i wasn't.

[Richard Steele]

25. Let's just say I am already "voting with my dollars", knowhutImean?

Of course, anyone who has studied the issue
already knows that cannabis prohibition
is a ridiculous scam which serves
absolutely NO legitimate social purpose.

[Dez]

28. War on cannabis is cruel

and it's time it stopped!

[MadHound]

27. Yes, and I'll go you one better.

Make all drugs legally available, pot, meth, heroin, what have you.

It is time to stop this useless, oppresive, War on Drugs.

[Dez]

30. I agree!

We need to stop persecuting our drug users .. SOME drug users. It's legal to be addicted to some, but not others.. makes no sense.

[JVS]

29. Probably, but I'd like to know if there is a test to determine...

if someone is DUI with marijuana.

[Dez]

31. No. are their eyes red?

No test yet.. they determined you are DUI if it's in your system.. could have been in your system for a month! but they will charge you with DUI. So much for justice!

[charlie]

33. Shouldn't be hard to do

Red eyes, dilated pupils, and a resting pulse rate of 90 are pretty good indicators. The first can be hidden, but not the last two.

[Dez]

34. This is not why it's illegal though

the cops would figure something out, WHEN it becomes legal. But, we all know that the major problem is with alcohol, NOT cannabis.

[charlie]

38. No, I didn't say that

The stoner is the guy doing 25 on the freeway, paranoid that he's about to be pulled over. The drunk is the wild yahoo driving every which way but straight. It's pretty clear which is far more dangerous. But, coming up with a quick check for suspicion of cannabis DUI shouldn't be difficult.

[ernstbass]

35. In a heartbeat!!

[mandyky]

40. My senior term paper in 1973 was on legalizing marijuana

I haven't changed my mind, and see it as a revenue booster for our economy.

[sypher]

41. Yup then....

tax the hell out of it.

Of course I wouldnt concern myself with those high taxes. I would have my own crop :hippie: