[robertpaulsen]

"But even if a slight increse in strength is true, we don't see all alcoholics running around with a bottle of 190 proof Everclear in their hands."

You're assuming people buy alcohol for the same reason they buy pot. Not a good assumption. At all.

Look at the marijuana seed ads on the internet. They discuss the level of "high" you get, and how kick-a$$ potent it is.

Many people drink low-proof beer and wine, and very few liquor drinkers go for the 190 proof stuff.

[TKDietz]

"Many people drink low-proof beer and wine, and very few liquor drinkers go for the 190 proof stuff."

From the government statistics it appears that most of the marijuana consumed in America is lower potency "commercial-grade" marijuana, very few are buying the expensive marijuana equivalent to 190 proof alcohol. The average potency of all marijuana seized in the United States (both "commercial grade" and sinsemilla) is just barely higher than the average potency of commercial grade marijuana seized in the United States. If most people were smoking the much stronger sinsemilla, the overall average would be much closer to the average potency of sinsemilla instead. Most go for the cheaper weaker stuff, the "beer" of marijuana.

It should be pointed out that people can abuse the lower potency stuff and get really wasted just like they can abuse beer and get too drunk. There can be beer drinkers who are alcoholics just like there can be heavy potheads who usually only smoke the lower potency commercial grade pot. And just as it is with alcohol, the majority of those using the strong stuff probably aren't going nuts on it. They use a much lower volume of it than they would if they were using weaker stuff, just like most drinking strong wine or distilled spirits would consume less of those intoxicants than they would light beer. And just like a twelve pack of Busch beer is a heck of a lot cheaper than a 750 milliliter bottle of eighteen year old single malt Scotch whiskey, the weaker commercial grade pot is a heck of a lot cheaper than the fancy expensive stuff with an exotic sounding "name brand." People use less of it both because they don't need to use as much and because it's just too expensive to go overboard on the high dollar stuff very often.