Measure to Reschedule Marijuana-Federal

[Jhhnn]

opinion polls keep trending in the direction we need. last Gallup poll I saw had support among voters at over 85% on medical cannabis, & around 53% on outright legalization. just a few more medical states, a couple more legalization battles won, & a few more dinosaur politicians retiring/dying & we will be looking across the river at the Promised Land. like Moses, some of us will not get to cross that river, but the battle must still be fought. unless something horrible happens, the wall WILL fall. in my opinion, the biggest fight is yet to come. removing cannabis from drug-testing for jobs, I think, is going to be a much nastier fight than what we have seen so far. corporate pricks cannot discriminate against folks on the basis of race, national origin, religion, physical handicaps, etc. only folks left for them to kick are cannabis users, so they will really want to be able to kick shit out of us like they have been doing since Tricky Dick started this fucking "war on drugs". until there is a fair & reliable test showing intoxication instead of use, it will be an uphill fight...

The dirty little secret behind piss testing for pot is that it merely identifies criminals, us, and nobody expects employers to hire criminals or keep criminals on the payroll. It's a liability from a lot of different angles. When we're not criminals, it'll be hard to justify testing methods that never indicated intoxication in the first place.

What we need is a pinprick blood test like for diabetics & the right for people to demand it & to demand that the results override the results of urine testing. We really need more than that, but it certainly won't happen in my lifetime.

 

[Sam_Skunkman]

opinion polls keep trending in the direction we need. last Gallup poll I saw had support among voters at over 85% on medical cannabis, & around 53% on outright legalization. just a few more medical states, a couple more legalization battles won, & a few more dinosaur politicians retiring/dying & we will be looking across the river at the Promised Land. like Moses, some of us will not get to cross that river, but the battle must still be fought. unless something horrible happens, the wall WILL fall. in my opinion, the biggest fight is yet to come. removing cannabis from drug-testing for jobs, I think, is going to be a much nastier fight than what we have seen so far. corporate pricks cannot discriminate against folks on the basis of race, national origin, religion, physical handicaps, etc. only folks left for them to kick are cannabis users, so they will really want to be able to kick shit out of us like they have been doing since Tricky Dick started this fucking "war on drugs". until there is a fair & reliable test showing intoxication instead of use, it will be an uphill fight...

First of all there is a test that shows intoxication vs previous exposure, it is called a blood test.
Second, polls don't mean much unless they are only polling the less then half of the people that could vote, that do vote. Actual voters are older and more conservative then people polled, the polled include younger registered voters that will not vote but give their opinions, as well as the unregistered, they are the real majority.
-SamS

 

[rives]

First of all there is a test that shows intoxication vs previous exposure, it is called a blood test.

The last that I heard, blood tests could come up positive for 2 days to 2 weeks after last exposure, with the latter for chronic users. Do you have any information/links on this?

 

[Jhhnn]

First of all there is a test that shows intoxication vs previous exposure, it is called a blood test.
Second, polls don't mean much unless they are only polling the less then half of the people that could vote, that do vote. Actual voters are older and more conservative then people polled, the polled include younger registered voters that will not vote but give their opinions, as well as the unregistered, they are the real majority.
-SamS

I think you're right to a point, Sam. Sentiment varies by State, as do methods of voting. Oregon, for example, has had MMJ for many years & their vote by mail system creates a very high turnout. They have a legalization initiative pending, and the same sort of message employed successfully here in CO-

http://newapproachoregon.com/the-initiative/

 

[Sam_Skunkman]

The last that I heard, blood tests could come up positive for 2 days to 2 weeks after last exposure, with the latter for chronic users. Do you have any information/links on this?

True, but at much much less levels then for recent smoking and real possibility of impairment. The police just need to use a cutoff point like done with alcohol, so they can tell it was not recent excessive use for a driver but use from the day before. The levels of old use are 10 or 100 times less, easy to see the difference. But as it it most test for 11-nor-delta(9)-carboxy-tetrahydrocannabinol which is the inactive metabolite that sticks around for weeks or months, gets stored in fat, and gets found much later, and gets people in trouble even though it is inactive, people lose their license in some states when found with this via a piss or other test.

http://www.canorml.org/healthfacts/drugtestguide/drugtestdetection.html

Blood Tests

Unlike urine tests, blood tests detect the active presence of THC in the bloodstream. In the case of smoked marijuana, THC peaks rapidly in the first few minutes after inhaling, often to levels above 100 ng/ml in blood plasma. It then declines quickly to single-digit levels within an hour. High THC levels are therefore a good indication that the subject has smoked marijuana recently. THC can remain at low but detectable levels of 1-2 ng/ml for 8 hours or more without any measurable signs of impairment in one-time users. In chronic users, detectable amounts of blood THC can persist for days. In one study of chronic users, residual THC was detected for 24 to 48 hours or longer at levels of 0.5 - 3.2 ng/ml in whole blood (1.0 - 6.4 ng/ml in serum) [Skopp and Potsch].

Note: THC blood levels can be measured in two ways. Most labs used by U.S. law enforcement report levels based on concentration in whole blood, but others report concentration in blood serum or plasma instead. Concentrations in whole blood are about half as high as those in serum/plasma. Therefore 0.5 - 3.2 ng/ml in whole blood = 1.0 - 6.4 ng/ml in plasma or serum. Unless otherwise stated, whole blood concentrations are reported here.

In another study of 25 frequent users, 36% showed no measurable blood THC throughout 7 days of abstinence, while the rest had at least one positive, though not necessarily on the first day. Six subjects (24%) had detectable blood THC after seven days at levels ranging from 0.2 to 1.5 ng/ml (that is, 0.4 to 3.0 ng/ml in serum) [Karschner]. There have been anecdotal reports of even higher day-after blood THC levels in chronic users, but these haven't been confirmed in controlled studies.

Unlike urine, blood test results can give a useful indicator of whether one is under the influence of marijuana. Studies have shown that high THC blood levels are correlated with impaired driving. An expert panel review of scientific studies on driving under the influence of cannabis concluded that THC levels above 3.5 - 5 ng/ml in blood (or 7 - 10 ng/ml in serum) indicate likely impairment [Grotenhermen]. The same review found no increased driving hazard at low levels of THC. Despite the fact that accident studies have repeatedly failed to find evidence of increased driving risk at low levels (1 or 2 ng in blood) of THC, numerous states and foreign countries have enacted "zero-tolerance" laws, treating any non-zero trace of THC as legal evidence for driving under the influence. Others have fixed, per se limits above which DUI is presumed, often with no scientific basis. However, most states (including California) don't have per se limits, but define DUI in terms of whether the totality of evidence (including drug test results) shows that the driver was impaired by marijuana or drugs.

Although high blood THC is a fairly good indicator of being under the influence, it is not infallible. Chronic users who develop tolerance to THC may in some cases drive safely with very high blood levels of THC. In one study, a subject with severe attention deficit disorder could not pass a driving test while straight, but performed well with a blood level of 71 ng/ml [Strohbeck-Kühner]. No similar phenomenon is known for alcohol.

Oral ingestion

Oral ingestion produces a much different THC blood profile than smoking. Instead of peaking sharply, THC rises gradually over a couple of hours to a plateau of around 2.5 - 5 ng/ml in blood (5 - 10 ng/ml in serum), then declines (see blue curve in Figure 5).

Blood metabolites
In addition to THC, blood tests can detect cannabinoid metabolites. Not uncommonly, labs report levels of THC-COOH, the same non-psychoactive metabolite found in urine. As shown in Fig. 5, THC-COOH levels for blood are similar to urine. They may be detectable for a couple of days after a single use or weeks in chronic users, and are therefore not a valid indicator of being under the influence. There is no scientific basis for treating drivers who have THC-COOH but not THC in their blood as being legally "under the influence."

Another blood metabolite not shown in Figure 5 is 11-hydroxy-THC, a psychoactive byproduct produced when THC is processed by the liver after oral ingestion. While not detectable at appreciable levels in smoked marijuana, 11-hydroxy-THC shows a similar blood profile to THC after oral consumption. The presence of 11-hydroxy-THC may therefore be used as an indicator of recent oral use. However, most blood tests don't bother to check for 11-hydroxy-THC.

Figure 5 - Blood plasma levels of THC & Metabolite



References:

(A-B) Smoked dose based on data from M. Huestis , J. Henningfield and E. Cone,M. Huestis , J. Henningfield and E. Cone.
(C) Oral dose based on data from B. Law et al.

 

[rives]

So what? Californians are clearly more enlightened today, 18 years later. If they're not, then the CA MMJ community has done a poor job of selling cannabis in general. That's particularly true in light of the very thin veneer MMJ puts over what would be described as recreational use most anywhere else.

Having read the comments, few concern themselves with MJ at all, let alone with legalization.http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2010/1011.gravois.html

That little fire started by a grower the other day is now just a bit shy of 12,000 acres with 2,300 firefighters working on it and it's estimated at 51% containment. 8 homes and 10 outbuildings burned, 68 structures threatened, mandatory evacuations, 1 dead.

35,000 plants destroyed from a nearby cartel grow.

The popularity of mj cultivation and legalization is taking a pretty serious hit in Northern California right now.

http://www.redding.com/news/local-news/agents-find-more-marijuana-plants-in-big-bend-area

http://www.redding.com/news/local-news/firefighters-push-to-make-progress-on-bully-fire-friday

 

[Jhhnn]

That little fire started by a grower the other day is now just a bit shy of 12,000 acres with 2,300 firefighters working on it and it's estimated at 51% containment. 8 homes and 10 outbuildings burned, 68 structures threatened, mandatory evacuations, 1 dead.

35,000 plants destroyed from a nearby cartel grow.

The popularity of mj cultivation and legalization is taking a pretty serious hit in Northern California right now.

http://www.redding.com/news/local-news/agents-find-more-marijuana-plants-in-big-bend-area

http://www.redding.com/news/local-news/firefighters-push-to-make-progress-on-bully-fire-friday

You realize that there was no legal growing involved. The only reason that illegal growing occurs in Norcal is because the law is unenforceable. The prevalence of illegal growing is large because the profit margin is fantastic.

Until such time as national legalization occurs, prices & margins will be extremely attractive to illegal operators.

I am confident that there is a price point where legal growers can make sufficient profit to basically eliminate the incentives for illegal growing. That price point will obviously be much, much lower than currently in place. Tobacco, for example, a very labor intensive crop, currently fetches growers $2/lb.

http://www.weather.com/news/agriculture/tobacco-crop-20121120

Realistically, there is no other way to stop illegal growing short of a police state. We have to take the flow of black market money out of it.

Realistically, we need to also recognize that it will negatively impact the economy of Norcal in no small way.

 

[rives]

You realize that there was no legal growing involved. The only reason that illegal growing occurs in Norcal is because the law is unenforceable. The prevalence of illegal growing is large because the profit margin is fantastic.

Until such time as national legalization occurs, prices & margins will be extremely attractive to illegal operators.

I am confident that there is a price point where legal growers can make sufficient profit to basically eliminate the incentives for illegal growing. That price point will obviously be much, much lower than currently in place. Tobacco, for example, a very labor intensive crop, currently fetches growers $2/lb.

http://www.weather.com/news/agriculture/tobacco-crop-20121120

Realistically, there is no other way to stop illegal growing short of a police state. We have to take the flow of black market money out of it.

Realistically, we need to also recognize that it will negatively impact the economy of Norcal in no small way.

Certainly I understand that they were illegal grows. However, the only reason that the law is currently unenforceable is because public sentiment has swung around and the eradication efforts have been largely defunded.

My point here is that public opinion is subject to change. These counties are seriously discussing making outdoor grows illegal. People are already very tired of having their lifestyles impacted by shitty neighbors who are large-scale growers, and with things like this fire taking place, it makes a very effective sales tool for the powers-that-be to get their funding increased. And by the way, most people associate these types of grows with recreational usage, not medical.

How difficult do you think it would be to contrast the cost of this fire to the cost of rigorous enforcement? This fire will probably cost in the $10's of millions in suppression costs, in addition to the loss of life and property as well as massive water usage during a drought. A "police state" beyond our current sorry state is completely unnecessary - it would be a very simple matter to find these grows. We aren't talking about a few plants here and there in a guerrilla grow. The option exists to use anything from existing satellite overflights to drones to find them if people demand it, and God only knows that law enforcement would love to be turned loose on the "problem".

I think that it comes back to medical usage being the most effective long-range tool for legalization. Public sentiment is a will-o'-wisp, and most of the people who vote are not in our ranks. However, if the scheduling issue was taken care of so that wide spread medical research could take place, it would be a pretty simple matter for the benefits of the plant to be widely recognized by the general public.

 

[armedoldhippy]

"you have given out too much positive Rep. please wait 24 hours to do Rives right" that aint word for word what it said, but it was damn close...

 

[mofeta]

I think that it comes back to medical usage being the most effective long-range tool for legalization. Public sentiment is a will-o'-wisp, and most of the people who vote are not in our ranks. However, if the scheduling issue was taken care of so that wide spread medical research could take place, it would be a pretty simple matter for the benefits of the plant to be widely recognized by the general public.

QFT

This is in complete harmony with my thoughts on this matter.

 

[Jhhnn]

Certainly I understand that they were illegal grows. However, the only reason that the law is currently unenforceable is because public sentiment has swung around and the eradication efforts have been largely defunded.

My point here is that public opinion is subject to change. These counties are seriously discussing making outdoor grows illegal. People are already very tired of having their lifestyles impacted by shitty neighbors who are large-scale growers, and with things like this fire taking place, it makes a very effective sales tool for the powers-that-be to get their funding increased. And by the way, most people associate these types of grows with recreational usage, not medical.

How difficult do you think it would be to contrast the cost of this fire to the cost of rigorous enforcement? This fire will probably cost in the $10's of millions in suppression costs, in addition to the loss of life and property as well as massive water usage during a drought. A "police state" beyond our current sorry state is completely unnecessary - it would be a very simple matter to find these grows. We aren't talking about a few plants here and there in a guerrilla grow. The option exists to use anything from existing satellite overflights to drones to find them if people demand it, and God only knows that law enforcement would love to be turned loose on the "problem".

I think that it comes back to medical usage being the most effective long-range tool for legalization. Public sentiment is a will-o'-wisp, and most of the people who vote are not in our ranks. However, if the scheduling issue was taken care of so that wide spread medical research could take place, it would be a pretty simple matter for the benefits of the plant to be widely recognized by the general public.

So you advocate jailing marijuana growers?

You realize, I hope, that such grows are occurring all across the country in remote places that have the right mix of climate & water. You also need to recognize that suppression efforts would need to be forever or as long as suitable black market profit can be made. Then there's the problem of what these enforcement officials will be doing when it's not growing season.

The people of CO just cut through all the crap. Not just stoners, but the majority of voters. Everybody acknowledged the truth all along, that the vast majority of users do it too get high. We acknowledged that the health risks were small while the social and economic costs of prohibition were more than we could stomach. We passed A64 with the help of a lot of disparate interests & viewpoints because we all believed that it would be immensely better. Today, by nearly all metrics, it is and will very likely continue that way.

It's a profoundly different conversation than the one controlled by prohibitionists & MMJ advocates. Prohibitionists have no argument when we use their states rights/ personal freedom/ individual responsibility rhetoric against them, particularly when we back it up with tax revenues, facts & figures.

With the general public, some people just need to be shown, and that's exactly what we're doing.

The current HOR bill pending in the Senate is a tacit admission that cannabis does not belong on schedule 1. The efforts pending in CO show that it doesn't belong on any schedule, that it never did.

 

[rives]

So you advocate jailing marijuana growers?

You realize, I hope, that such grows are occurring all across the country in remote places that have the right mix of climate & water. You also need to recognize that suppression efforts would need to be forever or as long as suitable black market profit can be made. Then there's the problem of what these enforcement officials will be doing when it's not growing season.

The people of CO just cut through all the crap. Not just stoners, but the majority of voters. Everybody acknowledged the truth all along, that the vast majority of users do it too get high. We acknowledged that the health risks were small while the social and economic costs of prohibition were more than we could stomach. We passed A64 with the help of a lot of disparate interests & viewpoints because we all believed that it would be immensely better. Today, by nearly all metrics, it is and will very likely continue that way.

It's a profoundly different conversation than the one controlled by prohibitionists & MMJ advocates. Prohibitionists have no argument when we use their states rights/ personal freedom/ individual responsibility rhetoric against them, particularly when we back it up with tax revenues, facts & figures.

With the general public, some people just need to be shown, and that's exactly what we're doing.

The current HOR bill pending in the Senate is a tacit admission that cannabis does not belong on schedule 1. The efforts pending in CO show that it doesn't belong on any schedule, that it never did.

Oh, what a cutting, intuitive strawman argument. Misconstrue much?

The point is that regardless of whether or not mj deserves it's current, or any other, scheduling, the reality of the situation is that it is Schedule 1.

The reality is that the infrastructure is already largely in place to come down on these grows like a ton of bricks.

The reality is that the only thing standing between that and our current murky status is the good will of a bunch of voters whose patience has already been sorely tested and it wouldn't really take a great deal more for them to flop the other way.

Now, the idea that all of the informed voters in the country have gathered together with an exclusive population of compassionate growers in the Great and Wonderful State of Colorado to join hands, sing Kumbaya, and lead the rest of the nation into a utopian future centered around cannabis? Sorry, that's not reality.

The reality is that this fight is based on incremental gains that we had damn well better take when we can get them, and through the process of successive approximations, hopefully end up where we all know we should be.

 

[rolandomota]

lol

lol

um whatever man i will say this once you can do what you want no matter what the law is. you just have to be careful they are full of shit and they know it mj legalization is inevitable. and whats with all this limit bullshit they dont limit how much alcohol or tobacco i can buy only the time of day i can buy it this is ridiculous. just grow and smoke and if you sell or share then you have a very good chance of getting caught so forget all that let the people who can sell legaly do it if you want a good amount of stuff then just grow and stfu. share at your own peril.
i would rather see people suffer than risk a jail sentence that and i want to smoke comfortably without any moochers bothering me or buyers they can go waste their money elsewhere.

 

[Jhhnn]

Heh. And the reality of it all is that MMJ has existed in several states since 1996, schedule 1 classification being meaningless in that regard. I'll grant that it has inhibited research, no doubt.

Kumbaya? Really? You need to resort to false characterizations wrt what we're accomplishing here in CO? We're not really different, we're just first among many, thanks to some brilliant minds who formulated A64, mindful of the need to create a broad coalition to achieve legalization.

MMJ advocates have necessarily granted credibility to prohibition with the whole "Oh! oh! oh! it's not get-high, it's *medicine* that people need!" routine. They allow that it's not suitable for the general population, but just for sick people. Yeh, that, & we both know it to be true. You have to argue that it has benefits which override prohibitionist arguments, but only for a very small # of people, and only if their authority figure doctor recommends it.

Obviously, an enormous # of lies, games & fabrications have been constructed around that, given that perfectly healthy people can obtain that permission by knowing who to pay, particularly here in CO, anyway. Other places, apparently, people have to be near dead & suffering from a very narrow range of conditions to get it at all. There is also an enormous secondary market, where "patients" re-sell their "medicine" for a profit.

We've initiated a whole different dialogue here in CO. We claim no "benefit" for only the sick but rather the right of every adult to use a relatively harmless intoxicant on the basis that it pleases us. Yes, it *is* get-high that can be used in a responsible fashion. We pay taxes to exercise that right, agree to some constraints as well. If prohibitionists want to counter that, then they must show concrete harm, reference the facts & figures created from cannabis use in a legal environment, compare them to the facts & figures already available from when cannabis was illegal.

In that, their position is utterly destroyed. We always knew it would be if we could demonstrate the truth. Expect a rout over the next few years.

I expect Obama & Holder to take some initiatives after the election. They are keenly aware that they head a WoD intensely racist in implementation if not in intent & clearly intend to change that if they can. This half-assed "don't enforce the law" measure originating from the HOR may well give them the impetus they need to do so.

 

[rives]

MMJ advocates have necessarily granted credibility to prohibition with the whole "Oh! oh! oh! it's not get-high, it's *medicine* that people need!" routine. They allow that it's not suitable for the general population, but just for sick people. Yeh, that, & we both know it to be true. You have to argue that it has benefits which override prohibitionist arguments, but only for a very small # of people, and only if their authority figure doctor recommends it.

You are missing the point.

As implemented, the mmj farce is foolish. However, as a sales tool for the vast majority of the voting populace, it is far more acceptable to them to think that they are casting a vote for Aunt Mabel to be more comfortable during her chemo treatments than it is for them to think that they are enabling their neighbor's basement-dwelling progeny to maintain his foggy perception of life.

Now, if widespread medical research was made possible, the treatments that would almost assuredly flow out of that would do much to alleviate the idea that we are simply adding another societal ill when too many already exist.

Again, the reality of the situation is that the legality of cannabis has little impact on recreational use - I've been smoking pot for about 45 years now, and it hasn't been much of an issue anywhere along the line. Since '96, it has been widely available to damn near anyone in California that has a hankering for it. On the other hand, even with as loose as the controls have gotten, we still have had virtually no medical research done with it because those institutions have to play by the rules.

 

[Jhhnn]

You are missing the point.

As implemented, the mmj farce is foolish. However, as a sales tool for the vast majority of the voting populace, it is far more acceptable to them to think that they are casting a vote for Aunt Mabel to be more comfortable during her chemo treatments than it is for them to think that they are enabling their neighbor's basement-dwelling progeny to maintain his foggy perception of life.

Now, if widespread medical research was made possible, the treatments that would almost assuredly flow out of that would do much to alleviate the idea that we are simply adding another societal ill when too many already exist.

Again, the reality of the situation is that the legality of cannabis has little impact on recreational use - I've been smoking pot for about 45 years now, and it hasn't been much of an issue anywhere along the line. Since '96, it has been widely available to damn near anyone in California that has a hankering for it. On the other hand, even with as loose as the controls have gotten, we still have had virtually no medical research done with it because those institutions have to play by the rules.

I acknowledge that MMJ has had the effect you claim. Never doubted it. It's been extremely effective in the battle of perception. So successful, in fact, that CO & WA have moved well beyond that. You grossly underestimate the effect that is having, not just here but all across the nation. MMJ has brought us to the tipping point and just a little beyond. This is a much bigger & very closely observed social experiment than any performed in a lab. We are the pilot program for much broader legalization in places that are or will soon be ready for it. And we're getting it right. Every day we get it right we get more converts. We're taking MMJ with us, as well.

It's not about the availability of rec cannabis at all, no matter how you try to brush away the real issues. It's about the fact that people get busted all the time, pay fines, go to prison, lose their property & occasionally their lives over it. It's about the fact that artificial scarcity creates black market opportunities & irresponsible people exploiting that, like the guy who started the fire in CA or the Mexican Cartels who exploit it at multiple levels.

More than anything else, it's a way for America to come to peace with itself. Americans smoke pot, a helluva lot of it. We always will. Legalization is the only way to come to terms with that- terms beneficial to everybody, not just to med patients & their overpriced providers.

 

[rives]

Oh, it is certainly inevitable. Just like it was inevitable in 1972, 1996, 2010, 2012.... How many of those came to fruition?

Jhhnn, you suffer from the misconception that the majority of people think like you do. Unfortunately, most of the social inequities that you list are largely irrelevant to the vast majority of the great unwashed. People are willing to vote to facilitate relief from a disease that they stand a good chance of getting. I don't think that the same attraction exists to enable other people to get high.

 

[Sam_Skunkman]

So you advocate jailing marijuana growers?

You realize, I hope, that such grows are occurring all across the country in remote places that have the right mix of climate & water. You also need to recognize that suppression efforts would need to be forever or as long as suitable black market profit can be made. Then there's the problem of what these enforcement officials will be doing when it's not growing season.

The people of CO just cut through all the crap. Not just stoners, but the majority of voters. Everybody acknowledged the truth all along, that the vast majority of users do it too get high. We acknowledged that the health risks were small while the social and economic costs of prohibition were more than we could stomach. We passed A64 with the help of a lot of disparate interests & viewpoints because we all believed that it would be immensely better. Today, by nearly all metrics, it is and will very likely continue that way.

It's a profoundly different conversation than the one controlled by prohibitionists & MMJ advocates. Prohibitionists have no argument when we use their states rights/ personal freedom/ individual responsibility rhetoric against them, particularly when we back it up with tax revenues, facts & figures.

With the general public, some people just need to be shown, and that's exactly what we're doing.

The current HOR bill pending in the Senate is a tacit admission that cannabis does not belong on schedule 1. The efforts pending in CO show that it doesn't belong on any schedule, that it never did.

The pending efforts in CO will do nothing to change the Schedule 1 status of Cannabis under federal law. And everything that has happened in CO can be gone in a minute if the Feds want to do so for whatever reasons, like a new anti-Cannabis president after 2016. None of the changes in CO or WA are really legal under Federal law they are just tolerated, so far....
If it never belonged on Schedule 1 lets get it removed or rescheduled, while we are at it change Cannabis to being controlled by the states more like alcohol is...
-SamS

 

[Jhhnn]

Oh, it is certainly inevitable. Just like it was inevitable in 1972, 1996, 2010, 2012.... How many of those came to fruition?

More diversion. It's not inevitable- it's here, right now. Other States are poised on the cusp of legalization, Oregon among them. The Obama Admin enables that entirely.

Jhhnn, you suffer from the misconception that the majority of people think like you do. Unfortunately, most of the social inequities that you list are largely irrelevant to the vast majority of the great unwashed. People are willing to vote to facilitate relief from a disease that they stand a good chance of getting. I don't think that the same attraction exists to enable other people to get high.

The attraction for a lot of CO voters was tax revenues vs expenditures on enforcement in a war they know can't be won & that they know really doesn't need to be won. The attraction lies in legal jobs & entrepreneurial opportunities. The attraction lies in their pot smoking adult children & other family members staying out of trouble by not becoming ensnared in the black market production & distribution network. The attraction lies in cutting off funding for Mexican cartels.

Enable other people to get high? They know that prohibition isn't stopping anybody any more than alcohol prohibition stopped people from drinking. They're not enabling, they're accepting reality, making the best of it.

There is little political will to maintain prohibition. What there is crumbles in the face of successful legalization here in CO. Our peaceful, orderly & sensible success wins them over every day. We take the uncertainty out of legalization. We're making legalization a very attractive proposition for what's becoming a broad majority in short order. In that, we're past the point of no return.

 

[rives]

The Obama Admin enables that entirely.

Jesus.

You are so thoroughly indoctrinated in your own bullshit that it defies belief.