Is it time to legalize pot and reduce the death rate of tobacco and alcohol?

[Greatest I am]

Is it time to legalize pot and reduce the death rate of tobacco and alcohol?

Tobacco kills more people than all other psychotropic drugs combined, excluding alcohol.

Our government policy should be to legalize the more forgiving drugs and make the less forgiving drugs illegal.
Addiction research and government reports for the last 100 years have exonerated pot and cleared it’s reputation as the safest and most forgiving alternative for psychotropic drug use.

The last vote in California for or against the legalizationof pot was defeated because of funding by the tobacco and alcohol lobby. In real terms, they were buying permission to kill the maximum number of humans with government collusion.

How much money per human life did alcohol and tobacco pay our government officials?

Is it time to do the moral thing and save the lives we can by making the less harmful psychotropic drugs legal?

Regards
DL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_mD6_oFpc0&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMpnywjj4oY&feature=related

 

[Osteve]

It's time to buy some "rope" and make a Y knot!

 

[acctnt shan]

Um, I saw "reduce" and "alcohol" in the same sentence and got sad

 

[Stone]

What's a 'forgiving' addictive drug?

 

[Accountable]

The gov't shouldn't be telling competent adults what they can and can't put in their bodies. Information, not legislation.

 

[fuel1316]

legalize it

 

[Stone]

don't legalize the use of pot for recreation, decriminalize it.

 

[Jaybird]

don't legalize, decriminalize.

Meh. I have a problem with decriminalization instead of legalization.

One of the largest problems we have when we make something illegal is the Black market. Where money is, violence and crime follow. Over 50,000 mexicans have been killed just across the border because of the war on drugs, and thousands in the US are sucked into illegal activities to assist in the drug trade.

If you decriminalize, but do not legalize, you maintain the black market. Drugs still have to come in to this country. People still have to get the drugs to 'market'. People will still die.

No. We need full legalization to resolve the problem. And then you can create real jobs in the industry.

I know decriminalization is a war cry for some in the Cannabis Community, but I think it is the wrong war cry.

 

[fuel1316]

i simply dont understand how anyone has the authority to pick and choose what plants grow and where. :\

 

[Jaybird]

I don't disagree with ya Fuel. It's a plant. It grew in the wild here. It was a major cash crop for quite sometime in this country.

But that is what happens when people 'give up' their rights to a central government under the auspices of 'safety'. :/

 

[fuel1316]

rose bushes cut you and lily flowers poison cats. BAN ALL THE PLANTS

 

[Jaybird]

Don't tell the government. Someone just may do it. :/

 

[fuel1316]

Don't tell the government. Someone just may do it. :/

oh god :24: getting rid of all the poison oak might be helpful. that shit sucks!

 

[Stone]

Meh. I have a problem with decriminalization instead of legalization.

One of the largest problems we have when we make something illegal is the Black market. Where money is, violence and crime follow. Over 50,000 mexicans have been killed just across the border because of the war on drugs, and thousands in the US are sucked into illegal activities to assist in the drug trade.

If you decriminalize, but do not legalize, you maintain the black market. Drugs still have to come in to this country. People still have to get the drugs to 'market'. People will still die.

No. We need full legalization to resolve the problem. And then you can create real jobs in the industry.

I know decriminalization is a war cry for some in the Cannabis Community, but I think it is the wrong war cry.

And yet the abuse of drugs on a large scale is a destabilizing factor in a society.
As bad as the morality of this nation already is.....it's a given it will be worse with no restrictions.
The problem with drug abuse isn't just that there is an existing violent criminal element, it's the further degradation of a society being driven for a growing desire of the pleasures the addiction initially brings.
The more acceptance is encouraged, the further the degradation.

Criminalization hasn't worked and legalization is the end game of a drug culture.

Decriminalization has worked well in Portugal.
This article is worth the read:
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1893946,00.html

 

[Stone]

i simply dont understand how anyone has the authority to pick and choose what plants grow and where. :\

Life is cruel

 

[fuel1316]

as well as legalization has worked well in amsterdam.

 

[Stone]

as well as legalization has worked well in amsterdam.

Read the article I posted......they just don't enforce the laws

Amsterdam is basically a tourist trap for 'high' minded people LOL!

 

[Stone]

as well as legalization has worked well in amsterdam.

Here's a quick google search showing things in Amsterdam aren't as rosy as NORML and other pot sites profess:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&....,cf.osb&fp=9970e3d003ee7d92&biw=1003&bih=729

 

[Jaybird]

And yet the abuse of drugs on a large scale is a destabilizing factor in a society.
As bad as the morality of this nation already is.....it's a given it will be worse with no restrictions.
The problem with drug abuse isn't just that there is an existing violent criminal element, it's the further degradation of a society being driven for a growing desire of the pleasures the addiction initially brings.
The more acceptance is encouraged, the further the degradation.

Criminalization hasn't worked and legalization is the end game of a drug culture.

Decriminalization has worked well in Portugal.
This article is worth the read:
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1893946,00.html

Yes. It works for the country, but it just continues the problem of enforcement at the borders and spills foreign blood for our citizens.

I understand what you are saying, but with full legalization, you can use the taxes to fund drug treatment centers.

Why should it be any different than alcohol?

 

[Stone]

Yes. It works for the country, but it just continues the problem of enforcement at the borders and spills foreign blood for our citizens.

I understand what you are saying, but with full legalization, you can use the taxes to fund drug treatment centers.

Why should it be any different than alcohol?

There was a Rand report out several years ago that addressed the problems of legalization from the angle of taxation and distribution.
It found reason to believe that crime would merely relocate into the realm of tax avoidance and profiteer from the difference in taxed price versus a cost to grow.
So the revenues from taxes were considerably off and the criminal element still involved in secret culturing of pot.
Naturally, this also offset the support the drug centers would receive.

Why should it be any different than alcohol?

Not only was Prohibition a failure, it demonstrated the inability of a society to protect itself.
The answer to your why is a 'negative'. Meaning....why duplicate failure?
It may come to that eventually, but that's a loss to and of society, not a benefit.

When the majority chooses to legalize pot, then the argument is over.
So far that hasn't happened on the recreational aspects of pot.