Not only has the WOD not stopped drug addiction,
it has had no effect on it.
Posted on 11/27/2015 12:01:54 PM PST by ConservingFreedom
[...] Last week a group of 12 House members led by Ted Lieu of California wrote to House leadership to push for a provision in the upcoming spending bill that would strip half of the funds away from the DEA's Cannabis Eradication Program, and put that money toward programs that "play a far more useful role in promoting the safety and economic prosperity of the American people:" domestic violence prevention and overall spending reduction efforts.
Each year the DEA spends about $18 million in efforts with state and local authorities to pull up marijuana plants being grown indoors and outdoors. The program has been plagued by scandal and controversy in recent years. In the mid-2000s it became clear that the overwhelming majority of "marijuana" plants netted by the program were actually "ditchweed," or the wild, non-cultivated, non-psychoactive cousin of the marijuana that people smoke.
More recently, overzealous marijuana eradicators have launched heavily-armed raids on okra plants, and warned the Utah legislature of the threat posed by rabbits who had "cultivated a taste for the marijuana." Last year the DEA spent an average of roughly $4.20 (yes, really) for each marijuana plant it successfully uprooted. In some states, the cost to taxpayers approached $60 per uprooted plant.
The program has also proven to be ineffective. The idea behind pulling up pot plants is to reduce the supply of marijuana, thereby reducing its use. In 1977, two years before the program's introduction, less than a quarter of Americans said they'd ever tried pot, according to Gallup. By 2015, after 36 years of federal marijuana eradication efforts, the share of Americans ever trying pot nearly doubled, to 44 percent. [...]
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Pot is a waste of court time and prison beds.
We haven’t stopped murder or robbery either. So?
Let’s see if you can describe the difference between marijuana use and murder/robbery.
Two-thirds of murders get solved - the proportion of pot 'crimes' that are even known to the authorities is assuredly several orders of magnitude smaller.
And murder and robbery violate rights, whereas pot growing, selling, and using do not.
There's just too much money to be made, and Uncle Sam wants his share.
I’d happily go for this so long as it’s coupled with a repeal of all the rights-raping legislation they’ve passed using the WOD as a cover.
I hate to see the kids using pot because there is a lot of evidence that it does interfere with the growth of their brains. I really do not care about what people over 25 do with their bodies.
New article on high potency marijuana as causing significant brain damage:
http://www.hngn.com/articles/154730/20151127/skunk-cannabis-associated-brain-damage-study-finds.htm
Is there a developing parallel to “Lead was to Romans as marijuana is to Western Culture?”. No doubt there are a multiplicity of such parallels.
Heavy drinking isn't good for the brain either ... but banning a drug, be it alcohol or pot, only encourages the making and use of more concentrated forms (in order to make concealment easier, and the act of getting a buzz quicker so less detectable).
Not only has the WOD not stopped drug addiction,
it has had no effect on it.
Kids have been reporting for years that they can get pot more easily than cigarettes or beer - which stands to reason, since only sellers of legal goods have incentive to 'card' buyers.
need some common sense
This brings to mind a headline I saw a number of years ago in “The Onion: “WAR ON DRUGS OVER - DRUGS WIN”
/johnny
What, spending $18,000,000 a year to combat okra and ditchweed isn't common sense?
Good luck.
Decriminalize it.
WOD = WOP = fail.
More freedom is always better. Less government is always better.
Do you think alcohol should be banned?
Right. Hope yer good.
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