Posted on 09/06/2002 8:59:47 AM PDT by MrLeRoy
It's enough for a big thumbs up ... or a big light up, if you prefer.
Canada should legalize marijuana use by adults, a Senate committee recommended Wednesday. The report comes on the heels of a two-year study of public policy relating to pot.
The present system of prohibition on marijuana just doesn't work, the committee found. Obviously, the committee learned something from early 20th-century history, when alcohol was prohibited in the United States. Then, prohibition simply gave gangsters a product to move and people to shoot.
Instead of the current system that penalizes people for having small quantities of pot on them, there should instead be a regulated system for marijuana, perhaps like our current system for alcohol, the committee determined.
"Scientific evidence overwhelmingly indicates that cannabis is substantially less harmful than alcohol and should be treated not as a criminal issue but as a social and health issue," said Senator Pierre Claude Nolin, the committee chair.
It's true that taking pot still involves the harmful intake of smoke, which the committee recognized. But, as the committee pointed out, it's more of a health issue than anything else.
In addition, making pot legal would clear the way for our police to tackle other, more harmful crimes relating to the public good. Really, would you rather see a pot smoker or a child molester behind bars?
Whether the federal government will ever adopt the Senate recommendations is up in the air. Hopefully the feds won't throw up a smokescreen on this to cloud the issue, and goes ahead with legalization.
You're an admitted New Dealer. Your opinion on what constitutes conservativism no longer matters. But thanks for the input anyway.
Maybe you could tell us how the federal War on Drugs is a legitimate conservative issue then?
I don't worry about mattering to those with such superficial libertarian intellects.
Science is probability. Any scientist will tell you that to assume that the current body of knowldege about anything is complete and definitive is folly. You cannot deal in probablity without also dealing in possibility.
Science has to be OBJECTIVE predictable-probable-facts-LOGIC(finite/rational)---
I find little objectivity in the reasoning behind our current policy toward marijuana. Mostly it's overblown hyperbole that seems to be designed to distract attention away from the means by which it is accomplished, and the unintended consequences.
Science must limit itself from the political-ego/subjective lower CARNAL material/animal world!
Do you think research commissioned and paid for by the DEA and conducted under the supervision of professional bureaucrats who's jobs are dependent on the outcome is going to be objective?
Science is law/design---CREATION!>p> Evolution/LIBERALISM is manmade myth/legend---FICTION/fantasy/denial!
Liberalism is the belief that a constitutionally limited federal government will interfere with the establishment of an elite ruling class and central planning and control.
Seriously...you need some foundation---do you have one(sand/gas)?
I have one. It's called the Constitution. FDR's New Deal Commerce Clause is anathema to it's intent, and I will not support it, or any policy based on it.
Why do we need alcohol? Why not ban it?
If you cant enjoy life without mind-altering drugs, then you're sure not living right!
Why is it the government's business whether someone is "living right"?
Oh, so the pot tax would (at least partially) replace income tax, and when and if they filed they could deduct the pot taxes from their IRS bill? Weird, but OK.
These were the Classical liberals...founding fathers-PRINCIPLES---stable/SANE scientific reality/society---industrial progress...moral/social character-values(private/personal) GROWTH(limited NON-intrusive PC Govt/religion---schools)!
Where you and I diverge is on the Evolution/Communism thing. You seem to view Darwin and evolution as the beginning of the end for enlighted, moral civilization, while I think Marx, class struggle, and the "dictatorship of the proletariat" are the true dangers.
God bless you, I think we both have a common enemy in the BRAVE-NWO.
I never said that. But your inability to respond to what I do say is duly noted.
Pot is much less addictive than the legal drugs alcohol and tobacco. If you're really concerned about addiction, you'll refocus your energies on getting those banned.
Marijuana isn't physically addictive. Next please. (Btw what makes you think we'd have more addicts, history shows that use goes up with drug wars)
Incidentally, alcoholism exploded shortly after the Twenty-First Amendment became effective.
I assume you are ok with alcohol and tobacco being legal. Does that mean you are in favor of alcoholics and the 1000s of people who die from tobacco each year? Of course not.
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