[cryptical]

"More people died last year from eating spinach than smoking pot."

[2banana]

Did you ever notice that of PC logic:

Cigarette smoking is evil and should be banned and criminalized.

Marijuana is cool and good and should be legalized.

[SJSAMPLE]

You can grow it at home and they can’t tax it.

If the goobermint could guarantee a taxable revenue stream, it would be legal. Just like alcohol and cigarettes.

[Hemingway's Ghost]

This new report serves as a wake-up call for parents who may still hold outdated notions about the harms of marijuana,'' his announcement said.

They always threaten the higher potency of MJ these days, but then frame the issue as an "it's for the children" one---patently forgetting that the high-potency grass is probably out of the typical yute's price range.

[Jonathon Spectre]

Conservatives who support the Insane, Racist War on (Some) Drugs are a big part of the problem.

[AppyPappy]

No one believes that.

Shoot, we paid $30 an oz for Columbian. The cops didn’t care about it when it was cheap.

[Huck]

No way you can get an 8th for 20. Not even dirt weed. Coupla grams will cost you 50...er, according to information I read somewhere.

[robertpaulsen]

"a group of middle-age, middle-class folks ..."

Most quit smoking marijuana by their late 20's, early 30's. Even among marijuana users, these clowns are oddballs.

[Brilliant]

“Among them: a couple of lawyers, a couple of city administrators and an arts administrator...”

In other words, a bunch of Democrats.

[roaddog727]

“Marijuana-related emergency-room visits increased from 45,000 in 1995 to 119,000 in 2002, the most recent comparison available, federal drug officials say.”

And how many Alcohol related ER visits were reported last year? Hmmmmmmmmm?

[Badeye]

‘One group at least modestly turning away from marijuana is middle- and high-schoolers, ages 12 to 17. The percentage who have used pot at least once dropped from more than 20 percent in 2000 to about 17 percent in 2005, federal researchers say.’

ROTFLMAO! Uh huh, cause we know the 12 - 17 crowd is completely and totally honest on all matters great and small....(chuckle)

The marijuana laws are based on bigotry and racism, folks. Look up Anslinger’s testimony in the 1930’s before congressional committees and see for yourself.

My favorite is Anslinger telling the congress ‘marijuana makes the black man uppity, and causes him to desire white women, to the point of raping them...’

(rought paraphrase)

[MarineBrat]

I don’t mind if they legalize weed as long as at the same time they allow me to discriminate against people who smoke it for being stupid.

[CharlesWayneCT]

I’m not sure more people died from spinach than Pot, because I can’t find statistics on people dying from pot. But of course, last year was the tainted Spinach year, and there are a LOT more people who eat spinach regularly than smoke pot regularly.

There’s no reason to believe that pot, if it was a normal as spinach, couldn’t also get contaminated and kill people. Of course, spinach won’t naturally harm you, like Pot can.

[HamiltonJay]

For good or ill, people from all walks smoke weed. In fact, 40.1 percent of all Americans 12 years old and up admit having tried marijuana at least once -- and 6 percent acknowledge having used it in the past month, federal drug surveys show. The FBI says 786,500 people were arrested for it in 2005, the latest figures available.

SO, lets get this straight, 60% of the people have never touched the stuff, and 94% of the people have not touched it in the last month.. but its use is as common as Beer? Oh I don't think so, this story is a complete sham.

Someone lights up a joint at my dinner party, they are promptly asked to leave and will never be at my home again. The only places I've been where pot is found are parties with people you are absolutely unsuprised if they didn't light up.

I've never looked to my left or right and seen someone I would not expect smoking pot, dragging on a J.

[M203M4]

Like sex (between consenting adults), drinking, and smoking (tobacco), MJ should be fine as far as the government is concerned if smoked on private property (including businesses, both as per the rules of the proprietor). IMO, public parks, sidewalks, roads, publicly financed stadiums, and so on, are fair game for selective prohibition of substances and activities as determined by popular local standards (as imperfect as democracy is) - it becomes our business only when they make it our business; actions performed in public space are involuntarily foisted upon other individuals. That is to say, the WOD should be ended, but the change should be short of full legalization.

And before some moron confused individual states that the above implies that rape should then be legal if committed on private property: rape, murder, theft, assault, etc are crimes with real victims (having had their negative rights infringed) regardless of location, and the role of the state to help protect individual liberty supersedes private property rights and freedom of voluntary association in such circumstances. When you endorse the notion that the government should play a role in securing POSITIVE rights, you are endorsing Marxism. If you cannot formulate a rationale for a particular law or regulation in terms of the protection of individual negative rights, the law has no place in society.

[Cedar]

(future update:).....millions of citizens now are free to enjoy pot legally while they absorb a single web page for hours on end...LOL

[A CA Guy]

But we have prisons full of murderers and other violent crime offenses that mixed pot with other stuff on a regular basis.
It is a gateway drug.

Better to practice conservatism, stay away from the cr@p and live a productive recreational drug free life.

[jmc813]

White House drug czar John Walters, not surprisingly, sees it differently. In April, his office released an analysis from the University of Mississippi's Potency Monitoring Project that said the level of THC -- the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana -- has more than doubled since 1983, from 4 percent to 8.5 percent.

Walters is a schmuck. All this shows is that you have to smoke less to get the desired effect. Isn't this a good thing?

[sargon]

IMHO, anyone who believes the State has the right to imprison a human being for owning the wrong plant, simply does not understand human Freedom.

It’s just ludicrous to grant any State such arbitrary power, whether enabled by a democratic majority or not...

[csvset]

If weed were legalized, it'd be interesting to see how that impacted price. Would there be conglomerate corporate growing operations ? I'd expect some folks would be happy to be able to just grow their own supply. How many users would be inclined to grow their own?

I did a search for weed images and found this site, Weedseedshop.

They have some pics of some pretty flowers.

[Lady Jag]

I wonder if the author knows that article is a farce and omplete waste.

The wealthy, Cops and lawyers always have the best pot, always have and always will.

“More people died last year from eating spinach than smoking pot.”