Posted on 09/18/2016 5:52:44 AM PDT by Kaslin
There's a reason marijuana laws don't work: There is no compelling reason for them to work.
Marijuana is not a dangerous drug. Used in moderation, cannabis has few ill effects; used in excess, the intoxicant has fewer and less severe side effects than alcohol. It's not in a class with opioids that can kill users. There has been no known lethal human overdose of marijuana. The California Medical Association supports state Proposition 64, which would legalize, tax and regulate marijuana for recreational adult use. There is no compelling public-safety interest in government's ban on adult recreational use -- not in a free country.
It's time for California to cut its ties with ill-conceived federal and state drug laws that ban adult recreational use and thus consign marijuana cultivation and sale to criminal gangs. Just as the mob grew powerful thanks to the American prohibition of alcohol (which failed to douse the public's desire for spirits), drug gangs have flourished thanks to Washington's war on drugs. By legalizing marijuana, not simply decriminalizing its use, California can move the trade out of the shadows to a place where the state can regulate and tax it. As Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, a proponent, told The Chronicle's editorial board, "The goal is to end the black market."
Criminalization of marijuana also feeds a public contempt toward the political system. When they were young, Presidents Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton flouted the law, partook of the weed and got away with it. If they had been arrested and convicted, their life paths may not have led to the White House. An arrest on drug charges can prevent young men and women from winning security clearances needed for some jobs but not, apparently, for the position of commander in chief. Alas, when Clinton, Bush and Obama were in a position to do something -- to end a crusade that disproportionately hurts young people of color -- they could not be bothered.
In that spirit, many statewide officeholders in California (including Newsom) refused in 2010 to endorse Proposition 19, which would have legalized adult use of marijuana. Then Colorado and Washington legalized recreational use in 2012 and it became clear California would follow suit. Newsom saw the light. He and political operative Jason Kinney now frame marijuana legalization as a "social justice" issue -- yet it remains a social justice issue from which most Democrats run. No other statewide officeholder has endorsed Prop. 64, although Gov. Jerry Brown, who trashed Prop. 19, teased the editorial board this month by offering that he was "mulling" the 2016 ballot measure.
Let me be clear. In 2016, Californians don't go to prison -- or even jail -- for holding small quantities of marijuana. (Possession of less than an ounce of marijuana isn't even a misdemeanor in California anymore -- it's an infraction, punishable by a $100 fine. Prop. 64 would require that minors caught with an ounce or less attend drug education or counseling programs and perform community service.) State laws against marijuana were wrong when they led to jail time; now that getting caught can end with a $100 ticket, they're a waste of resources and feckless.
Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Dublin, has endorsed Prop. 64. As a former prosecutor, Swalwell need not fear being labeled soft on crime. In 2014, I asked him if he thought legalization would drive up usage. Swalwell answered, "Honestly, no." Newsom has been careful to frame himself as not pro-marijuana as much as anti-Prohibition. He knows that laws against pot are not the only threat to teenagers; heavy marijuana use can change the structure of their brains and sabotage their success as adults.
As the Prop. 64 meeting ended, Newsom told me how much his wife and he hate secondhand marijuana smoke. As the election looms, readers have sent me the occasional email warning that legalizing pot could increase squalor on the streets of San Francisco. They warn that with legalization, downtown could smell like pot smoke -- as if it does not already. Yes, San Francisco has more than its share of medical marijuana dispensaries. Sorry, esteemed reader, I answer, booze and heroin are the downward drivers on San Francisco sidewalks, not marijuana. Pot plumes work like the fog that comes in on little cat feet and cools the bay, except it brings relief to the nose. In a city that reeks of urine and the pungent smell of stagnant sewers, marijuana smoke has become San Francisco's deodorant.
It looks to me like they are tending a crop of kale, or some leafed salad plant in that picture, not marijuana.
Tell that to the Colorado police. Such absolute total nonsense.
Those plants on the left look like broccoli or cauliflower.
Legal or not-I honestly don’t get it how anyone can smoke that stinking weed
Marijuana is going to be legalized in Cali. Hard stop. I”m surprised it didn’t pass last time. With it being legal in WA and CO and the world not ending as a result, there is just too much money to be made for states to turn up their noses. It’s like casino gambling in that regard. WA, CO, AK, OR, and DC all have legalized marijuana for recreational use. The genie is out of the bottle as it were and it’s not going back in.
The 10th amendment allows states to do stupid things as well as smart ones. This is and should be a state issue. If folks want to bake their brains, then I don’t view it as the Fed’s business.
I agree, they should make it legal to smoke that kale or even marijuana. It might make the left coast folks more sensible or at least give them an excuse.
California needs to legalize so they can take some of the pot-homeless-vagrants that came to Colorado for legal weed.
Some people lick toads or stick needles in their arms, people will to all sorts of noxious things to get high.
I have never eaten Kale and don't know how it tastes. I have never smoked marijuana, but I have smelled the fumes when other people did, and it stinks.
>>I have never eaten Kale and don’t know how it tastes. <<
It tastes like spinach.
Cthulhu would not care for it.
(How is that for tying 1 thread drifts together???)
I think the big question is, “Should California Make Marijuana Mandatory?”
That is, through their mischievous incompetence, arrogance and greed, their state government is rapidly returning California to its natural condition, as is found in the hilarious Steinbeck novel, “Tortilla Flat”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tortilla_Flat
If marijuana is just freely available, half the state will soon be reduced to the level of a companion novel, also by Steinbeck, the also very funny, “Cannery Row”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannery_Row_(novel)
However, if they do the smart thing, and make marijuana *mandatory*, soon everyone, from street vagrant to governor, will behave in a much more relaxed and comfortable way, as do the characters in Tortilla Flat.
Kale is more fibrous than spinach and is more likely to cause you digestive gripes. However, it is much better for dragons than spinach is.
LOL - good one!
“Such absolute total nonsense.”
You’re disregard for factual reality is noted.
Vote Trump 2016
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