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What should marijuana opponents do when their cause fails? A lesson from Prohibition
The Boston Globe ^ | June 23rd, 2018 | Stephanie Schorow

Posted on 06/23/2018 2:47:03 PM PDT by Mariner

Some day soon, even as sweet, skunky smoke drifts in from the streets outside, US Attorney General Jeff Sessions and other staunch opponents of marijuana may draw inspiration from a true believer named Morris Sheppard. After the repeal of national Prohibition in 1933 and until his death in 1941, the Texas senator embraced a yearly custom. A progressive Democrat often considered “the father of Prohibition,” Sheppard would rise on the Senate floor to rail against alcohol and call for a repeal of Repeal.

“It was a ritual,” Daniel Okrent, author of the 2010 book “Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition,” explained in an interview. “Clearly he didn’t expect anything was going to happen. It was paying homage to his cause.”

Sheppard, a proponent of bank reform and an advocate of women’s suffrage, may have been the country’s most sincere Prohibitionist, but he ended up on the losing side of history. As such, he faced a dilemma that may soon become familiar to another group of prohibitionists: marijuana opponents. When society turns away from a cause, how long should its supporters fight on? After committing themselves to a lengthy, even decades-long struggle, how can they simply let it drop?

On July 1, Massachusetts will join states such as Colorado, Washington, and California, whose voters have chosen to legalize cannabis for recreational purposes. The implementation of the law has been bumpy, not least because Sessions and the federal Justice Department still have the authority to crack down on cannabis use.

(Excerpt) Read more at bostonglobe.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: cannabis; depression; dopefiends; mania; marijuana; mrleroy; pot; potheads; prohibition; schizophrenia; wod
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To: Vision

“Alcohol and marijuana are nothing alike. “

Sure they are. It’s all a matter of dosing.

Most people have 1 or two drinks and stop. But MILLIONS have far, far more. And every day.

Yes, there are 10s of millions of habitual drunks.


21 posted on 06/23/2018 3:31:01 PM PDT by Mariner (War Criminal #18)
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To: Mariner

I don’t care if it’s legal or not. Legal or illegal, there are problems with either. Which way is best? Ya got me. When in doubt I tend to side with freedom. But I just don’t have a side that moves me on this one.

Many anti-pot people don’t care that much about whether it’s legal. It just makes them feel superior to curse the pro-pot people, just as that worked for the original Prohibitionists.

Do we have a Mothers Against Potheads Driving yet?


22 posted on 06/23/2018 3:34:53 PM PDT by SaxxonWoods (Hmmm.)
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To: exDemMom

“The problems of brain damage, loss of ability to be productive, criminal behavior, etc., are symptoms of addiction that are common to all schedule I drugs.”

You left out alcohol. Especially liquor.

Alcohol causes far more brain damage than marijuana. And it’s permanent, physical damage.

As for addiction, I watched an uncle in DTs for about 4 hours. It was damn spooky.

We got him to the hospital, but he almost didn’t make it.

Alcohol, and it’s withdraw, kills regularly and often.


23 posted on 06/23/2018 3:35:39 PM PDT by Mariner (War Criminal #18)
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To: Mariner

It reflects a trend towards the identification of sin with substances or objects rather than with acts and choices of souls.


24 posted on 06/23/2018 3:36:51 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Tryin' hard to win the No-Bull Prize.)
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To: SaxxonWoods

“Many anti-pot people don’t care that much about whether it’s legal. It just makes them feel superior to curse the pro-pot people, just as that worked for the original Prohibitionists.”

I agree wholeheartedly.


25 posted on 06/23/2018 3:37:07 PM PDT by Mariner (War Criminal #18)
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To: Mariner

Actually there are more restrictions on pot smoking than cig smoking even in states where it’s legalized. You can’t smoke it in public, and aren’t supposed to even be observed using it on your own property in Colorado for example.

Cig smokers can do both, if outside and not close to a doorway, etc.


26 posted on 06/23/2018 3:38:27 PM PDT by SaxxonWoods (Hmmm.)
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To: HiTech RedNeck

“It reflects a trend towards the identification of sin with substances or objects rather than with acts and choices of souls.”

Brilliant and insightful.


27 posted on 06/23/2018 3:38:37 PM PDT by Mariner (War Criminal #18)
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To: Mariner
Oh just stop already. I don't care if you take bong hits but don't get silly about it.
28 posted on 06/23/2018 3:39:35 PM PDT by Vision (Obama corrupted, sought to weaken and fundamentally change America; he didn't plan on being stopped)
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To: Vision

“Oh just stop already. I don’t care if you take bong hits but don’t get silly about it. “

I don’t use marijuana or alcohol.

But your argument is empty.


29 posted on 06/23/2018 3:41:44 PM PDT by Mariner (War Criminal #18)
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To: Mariner

Banning an object or a substance is a poor stand-in for a robust belief in God and the consequent ability to “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” It might, however, be the only thing that a highly materialistic society can do to keep order. Singapore, as an example, is sparkling clean and crime free, in part, because it does crack down so terribly on these things.

“Reefer madness” might better be understood as but one form of “Forgetting-God madness.”


30 posted on 06/23/2018 3:43:31 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Tryin' hard to win the No-Bull Prize.)
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To: Mariner

The article makes a good point about pot prohibition going local. Even here in the SF Bay Area, which is about as pro-pot as you can get, there are recreational shops in the big cities but not in any of the suburbs. I don’t see that changing any time soon.


31 posted on 06/23/2018 3:43:35 PM PDT by Behind the Blue Wall
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To: Mariner
Well maybe you should since you’re so passionate about marijuana discussion yet have no idea what you're talking about.

Me, smoked a bunch. It's not like alcohol, it's bad for you, it shouldn't be legal.

32 posted on 06/23/2018 3:44:04 PM PDT by Vision (Obama corrupted, sought to weaken and fundamentally change America; he didn't plan on being stopped)
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To: Mariner

I quit debating the stoners years ago. They use the same tired arguments.

Drug use is a huge problem today with the youth. The argument that pot is harmless is a fantasy.
End of rant. Now you stoners can bash my post ( if you can remember what I said).


33 posted on 06/23/2018 3:44:26 PM PDT by shelterguy
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To: Artemis Webb

Prohibition of Alcohol is a case study in the cherry picking and twisting of statistics. A case study in fake news.

As a direct result of 13 years of Prohibition, alcohol use declined bigly. With it, cirrhosis of the liver and other alcohol related diseases and deaths dropped dramatically. Domestic violence dropped bigly.

The Al Capone style murders existed in the US, and especially in Chicago, long before prohibition and long after it ended.

In 1968 a Chicago street gang murdered 7 people on my block alone. Those murders involved solely money and control of extortion of money. There was no alcohol or drugs involved in any of them.

Prohibition did not cause an increase in crime. What it did was give J Edgar Hoover the opportunity to build a very political FBI.

I am amused at those who think the politicization of the FBI is something new. I read the FBI (and local police) reports on those who, like me, were investigated prior to draft into the Army in the 64-67 era. The FBI was extremely political back then, doing favors for both elected and unelected power brokers.

Currently alcohol is the #1 correlation in gun death and injury, both suicide , murder and accidental. Alcohol is the #1 correlation in knife death and injury, in boating, RV, snomobile, skiing and recreational tragedies. Alcohol is the #1 correlation in domestic violence, in unwanted pregnancy, in rape. Across the board, Alcohol is the #1 correlation with social problems in American society.

I don’t have the solution. But let’s be honest about the problem. Guns don’t kill people; People kill people... mostly people who have been drinking kill people.


34 posted on 06/23/2018 3:45:51 PM PDT by spintreebob
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To: Vision

I smoked more than my fair share 40 years ago.

Then got smart.


35 posted on 06/23/2018 3:47:04 PM PDT by Mariner (War Criminal #18)
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To: shelterguy

You have committed the fallacy of the excluded middle. Now can you keep your own mind together long enough to grasp that? If you can’t, you as a hypocrite are no help.

And I must be quite the “stoner” for never once having ingested or smoked any pot. Now that is sarcasm in case you missed it.


36 posted on 06/23/2018 3:47:48 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Tryin' hard to win the No-Bull Prize.)
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To: elpadre
Pot and alcohol are different.

How? Everything you go on to say can be said of alcohol.

I have seen bright students become dull and failures after going on pot. I have seen some of them graduate from pot to harder stuff and become tragic sta tistics. It is NOT a victimless drug. The user is the victim.

37 posted on 06/23/2018 3:48:02 PM PDT by NobleFree ("law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the right of an individual")
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To: shelterguy

“The argument that pot is harmless is a fantasy.”

No rational person attempts to make such an argument. If they try, they should be immediately dismissed as an irrational idiot.


38 posted on 06/23/2018 3:49:05 PM PDT by Mariner (War Criminal #18)
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To: spintreebob

Certainly you are free to present the unpicked cherry tree, but it just seems you’ve picked some sour grapes instead.

To handwave that “oh, crime existed” is to visibly dodge the question of its magnitude and severity and causes of involvement.


39 posted on 06/23/2018 3:50:15 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Tryin' hard to win the No-Bull Prize.)
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To: Mariner
You got smart but wish the stupidity and waste of time on the rest of the country with the approval of the Federal government?
40 posted on 06/23/2018 3:50:49 PM PDT by Vision (Obama corrupted, sought to weaken and fundamentally change America; he didn't plan on being stopped)
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