Posted on 02/03/2003 9:54:04 AM PST by MrLeRoy
As law enforcement lobbies members of Congress and state legislators coast-to-coast for more funds to finance the war against illicit drugs, Utah's Legislature considers liberalizing Utah's liquor laws.
As leaders obsess over how governments will help pay for the costs of medical treatment, Utah's Legislature is considering liberalizing Utah's liquor laws.
Someone should teach Utah's legislators that alcohol is the most abused drug.
Pretend for a minute that humankind had not discovered alcohol until Drexel distilled it in 2000. After years of testing, would the Federal Drug Administration allow it to be sold as a drink? At best, the FDA would place it under a restrictive prescription schedule, complete with a list of warnings against side effects and addiction potential.
Studies that tout alcohol's benefit on heart health illustrate that some "scientific" testing is actually designed to justify our habits. If Drexel had discovered alcohol and tried to market it as a heart medication, the FDA would have denied the proposal because of its dangerous and addictive side effects.
Ancient beers and wines had minor food value. In specific times and places, they were safer to drink than the waters. Through the ages, humans experimented with wines and spirits, not to improve their food value, but to increase their alcohol jolt.
The snobbishness surrounding wine consumption is misleading, for vintners are just as obsessive about high alcohol contents as are the distillers of whiskey.
Alcohol, with tobacco and marijuana are the big-three hypocrisies in the American war on drugs. Proponents of these substances would have us believe they are really good for us because they are (in the popular cliché) "natural."
This logic is laughable. Mankind has so hybridized the plants involved in wine and the various types of cigarettes that nothing is natural about any of the products.
For example, mankind has so thoroughly hybridized marijuana in the past four thousand years that the original plant probably does not exist anywhere on earth. People tinkered with it -- especially since the late 1970s -- to increase the psychoactive buzz, not its dubious medical properties.
Neither the war on drugs nor the medical crisis can be taken seriously when billions are squandered to treat conditions and illnesses caused by culturally accepted drug abuse. When we are really serious about decreasing medical costs and drug abuse, we will end recreational consumption of alcohol, tobacco and marijuana.
Such as?
See. Even your hero says druggies are losers.
See. Even your hero says druggies are losers.
See. Even your hero says druggies are losers.
I don't have the reading comprehesion problem that you seem to be afflicted with...
The conservative Republican governor stopped smoking dope and snorting cocaine decades ago and he hasn't had a sip of booze in 13 years.
Apparently to you, "once a dopehed, always a dopehead." What does that make GW Bush?
Then again, look at the state he was governor of. No exactly a bastion of conservatism.
Of course, the marijuana issue is not the only issue Johnson is conservative on. Seems to me he is or was more conservative than most of the other Republican Governors.
In office, he has cut taxes, reduced the state workforce, built two new prisons, raised teacher salaries and crusaded, unsuccessfully, for school vouchers. But he is well known for his vetoes. In seven years he has vetoed more than 700 bills passed by the Democratic-controlled legislature.
The tone of your post makes me think you are a democrat.
I guess I'm in pretty good company by agreeing with the former Governor then.
The tone of your posts leads me to believe you are you are a nanny state socialist.
These days, he gets high by running marathons and climbing mountains and hang gliding.
Mountain climbing and hang gliding are dangerous....maybe we need to ban those pursuits as well....after all, one does get a high from those activities.
Actually Johnson is a competitive triathlete, as am I. Along with my agreement with him on his conservative stances on these issues, I find that I have more in common with conservatives like Gary Johnson than I do with so-called "conservatives" such as yourself. In fact I don't believe you are a conservative at all, but that's just my opinion..
Not really.....
'Most users of marijuana are responsible users,' he said. 'They're not doing any harm to anybody... Having smoked it and given it up, I would ask you not to smoke pot. But should it be a criminal offense? No.'
I agree with this statement as well.
It's apparent to me that the tide is shifting in the "drug war", and those leading the way will be conservatives.
Interesting that you would agree with his recommendation that one should NOT smoke marijuana.
President of the US - much to the disdain of you democrats.
He has given up drugs. I doubt that you are a competitive triathlete and a drug user also.
I noticed that stunning victory in Nevada. In a state where every other vice is legal and practised to excess millions of dollars couldn't get pot legalized.
Although I was out of town, my wife told me that on Christmas Day there was a hugh legalize pot demonstration outside the King County Jail (Seattle). All of about 20 of your faithful stood out in the wind and rain protesting. If you can't drum up a crowd in Seattle for a demonstration you've got problems.
But should it be a criminal offense? No.'
Where have I said that I use drugs?
I'm a little out of shape over the winter, but I have no doubt I could still kick your azz in a triathlon, with or without drugs.
My guess is that if it was Christmas, most were home with their families.
Whoop de doo. I am really afraid. With drugs, you would be fish bait.
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