Weed Whackers The anti-marijuana forces, and why they're wrong

National Review ^ | 8/20/2001 | Rich Lowry

[biblewonk]

That's probably best ;-)

[robertpaulsen]

Society benefits when the rule of law is enforced. Got an answer to my question yet?

[Wolfie]

And there are those, like myself, whe certainly aren't waitnig for some government entity to tell me its ok to smoke a plant. (Good article, though).

[RonF]

I'd like to see an argument why it is better for society to legalize yet another drug.

The same reasons society uses in judging whether or not to apply physical, vs. simply moral, force for anything: cost vs. benefits. We seem to think that the social benefits of tobacco and alcohol outweigh the undisputable costs of allowing them, so we just regulate them instead.

We actually tried making alcohol illegal, and found that doing so made some people into criminals who otherwise wouldn't have been and who weren't doing anyone else harm otherwise, and also provided funding to a criminal class who were doing a lot of people a lot of harm. So we ended prohibition of alcohol.

Weed seems to be following the same model. Making it illegal criminalizes people who are otherwise not executing crimes, and provides funding to people who do commit harmful crimes (at least, according to the latest anti-drug advertisements du jour). The same logic that applies to ending prohibition on alcohol seem to fit nicely to ending prohibition on marijuana.

[jodorowsky]

Society benefits when the rule of law is enforced

Great Mother Kali benefits when the blood of a dozen virgins feeds the power stones!

[biblewonk]

Answer this: How does it benefit society to put people in prison for marijuana possession?

I don't think that really happens very often. Weed is only sort of illegal.

[WyldKard]

Society benefits when the rule of law is enforced. Got an answer to my question yet?

So by your logic, Society benefits when anti-gun laws are enforced, or when any of the overly Socialist laws in California are enforced? By your logic, a law is good simply because it's a law? Is that what you are trying to say?

Again, we're talking about "laws" that violate the Constitution. So by what authority does the Federal Government have to criminalize a previously legal drug? Why aren't they respecting State Sovreignty on the issue? Why did it take a Constitutional amendment to ban alcohol, but that step got left out for marijuana?

Got an answer to MY question yet?

[vin-one]

along those same lines, I was talking with my daughter last night, about one of her friends and where she going to college. My daughter said, if weed is so bad for you,how can someone who partied so much in HighSchool, get a scholarship to UCLA,

What do you say to that, ummm, ummm, mj is bad mkay....

this girl who was known to party regularly, maintained above a 4.0 gpa, is getting scholarship for acheivements, and other grants.

I know what to say to my kid, but what does that say about the BS the gov't lays on these kids.

[WyldKard]

I don't think that really happens very often. Weed is only sort of illegal.

So why keep a law on the books that most drug warriors try to agree isn't being enforced anyhow? A pot smoker is far less a danger to society than a murderer or a rapist. Hell, an alcohol drinker is more dangerous to society than a pot smoker....

[gunshy]

BULLSPLATTER! It takes an idiot to take drugs and a bigot to agree that they are ok for society

The great majority of americans are drug users. Are you suggesting that these people are idiots? Prescription drugs kill far more people each year than does marijuana yet you do not want prescription drugs to be made illegal. Why not, they are far more dangerous.

[gdani]

Society benefits when the rule of law is enforced. Got an answer to my question yet?

So, it's now considered a "benefit" to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on a failed policy that has produced no tangible results except to shred the Fourth Amendment and make criminals out of those who prefer weed to wine or martinis?

[Crispy]

Its funny. You can kill yourself by drinking too much in one sitting. You never hear of anyone dieing by smoking too much MJ.

[Wolfie]

So why keep a law on the books...

Well, you know, there's the power to arrest (which, as the article points out, happens quite a bit, prevaricators to the contrary), fines, court costs, gotta pay the cop, ummm...let's see, oh yeah, the drug rehab industry, if treatment is forced on the arrestee. And last but not least, retaining the power to crackdown on the long-hair pinko commie fags if the zeitgeist ever swings back.

[Jonathon Spectre]

Society benefits when the rule of law is enforced.

Locate "society" in three-dimensional physical space for me.

Nazi Germany passed a lot of laws. Think all of them "benefited" "society"?

[RonF]

I must disagree. Cannabis is certainly a drug (well, it certainly contains one), as much as coffee (caffeine) and tobacco (nicotine). The issue here as far as I can see is, what is the proper way to deal with this drug? Ban it outright, allow unlimited use, or regulate it to certain uses? And, if the latter, what uses?

I realize this is difficult for many FReepers, but this is not a binary solution set; the response isn't either black or white, there are many shades of grey. For example, cocaine is banned as a recreational drug, but it is allowed as a medical one. Turns out coke has a unique property; it provides local anesthesia without causing tissue swelling, which is valuable in certain types of neurosurgery. On the other hand, nicotine, ethanol, and caffeine have limited uses for medicinal purposes, but broad recreational ones. And this is well recognized in our society, and others as well.

So, the question becomes, where does marijuana belong? In comparison to how we treat the use of other drugs, it just doesn't make sense to criminalize recreational use of it. Any argument that would criminalize marijuana would apply even more greatly to alcohol and nicotine, and the actual danger from them appears far greater than the supposed danger from tetrahydrocannabinol.

[tallhappy]

You melts are a sad lot.

[WyldKard]

Oh yeah..silly me. Ha ha. Logic and common sense must have fouled my thinking process for just a moment there...

[Dakmar]

Got an answer to my question yet? Several:
1) It would free up police to concentrate on real crimes
2) It would free up prison space to incarcerate real criminals
3) It would free otherwise productive citizens to engage in the workforce rather than rotting in a $40,000 a year prison cell
4) It could generate additional tax revenue, much the same as alcohol and tobacco

[RonF]

Society benefits even more when the rule of law is based on sensible law.