Why stop at just marijuana?

[jimnyc]

Or would marijuana just be used as a stepping stone for the good drugs down the road? Why does Robertson support the legalization of marijuana, I wonder, and not heroin, cocaine, crack...


Pat Robertson: Pot should be legal like alcohol

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) -- Religious broadcaster Pat Robertson says marijuana should be legalized and treated like alcohol because the government's war on drugs has failed.

The outspoken evangelical Christian and host of "The 700 Club" on the Virginia Beach-based Christian Broadcasting Network he founded said the war on drugs is costing taxpayers billions of dollars. He said people should not be sent to prison for marijuana possession.

The 81-year-old first became a self-proclaimed "hero of the hippie culture" in 2010 when he called for ending mandatory prison sentences for marijuana possession convictions.


http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_PAT_ROBERTSON_MARIJUANA?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-03-08-13-11-19

[logroller]

I hear ya JImmy, I get a little perturbed when people only mention the high cost of enforcement as justification for legalization; when there is a social cost which begs consideration as well. If you look at how narcotics are classified bythe FDA,: medical purpose, potential for addition etc, clearly the reasoning for it being illegal takes other things into account (with no fiscal consideration). MJ isn't as addictive as say, heroin,( or even alcohol for that matter)-- but there it is, a Sch 1 Narcotic. I understand the slippery slope analogy, but it falls victim to the same reasoning that any number of substances would also: refined sugars, high fructose corn syrup, trans fats or processed foods. There needs to be some balance here; anarchy and social lethargy wont befall our society even if everybody smoked a joint at the end of the day. Not to say you should be able to show to work stoned everyday-- that'd be abuse, I'm against abuse. But prohibition doesn't really curb marijuana abuse nearly as much as its curbs its responsible legal use.

[ConHog]

Legalize MJ with the same safeguards and stipulations that tobacco and alcohol have.

But to be clear, very few if any people are actually sent to prison for simple posession of MJ.

[logroller]

Legalize MJ with the same safeguards and stipulations that tobacco and alcohol have.

But to be clear, very few if any people are actually sent to prison for simple posession of MJ.
Very few people are sent to prison for simple possession of any narcotic. PC1000 For example

[revelarts]

If not that many are going to prison then i guess we might as well make it legal , right?

That just follows seems to me.

But it seem the # of arrest are pretty high

....For the fourth year in a row, US marijuana arrests set an all-time record, according to 2006 FBI Uniform Crime Reports. Marijuana arrests in 2006 totaled 829,627, an increase from 786,545 in 2005. At current rates, a marijuana smoker is arrested every thirty-eight seconds, with marijuana arrests comprising nearly 44 percent of all drug arrests in the United States. According to Allen St. Pierre, executive director of the National Organization for Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML), over 8 million Americans have been arrested on marijuana charges during the past decade, while arrests for cocaine and heroine have declined sharply.

The number of arrests in 2006 increased more than 5.5 percent from 2005. Of the 829,627 arrests, 89 percent were for possession, not sale or manufacture. Possession arrests exceeded arrests for all violent crimes combined, as they have for years. The remaining offenders, including those growing for personal or medical use, were charged with sale and/or manufacturing.
A study of New York City marijuana arrests conducted by Queens College, released in April 2008, reports that between 1998 and 2007 the New York police arrested 374,900 people whose most serious crime....
http://www.projectcensored.org/top-stories/articles/20-marijuana-arrests-set-new-record/


I also read that a private prison corporation reported to a gov't agency that they were not concerned about their revenues going down in the next decade. The only thing that would change their projections and harm their business is drug legalization.

[revelarts]

Judge Questions Long Sentence in Drug Case

Nov. 16 2004 - In a case that has spurred intense soul-searching in legal circles, a 25-year-old convicted drug dealer, who was arrested two years ago for selling small bags of marijuana to a police informant, was sentenced on Tuesday to 55 years in prison.The judge who sentenced him, Paul G. Cassell of the United States District Court here, said that he pronounced the sentence "reluctantly" but that his hands were tied by a mandatory-minimum law that required the imposition of 55 years on Weldon H. Angelos because he had a gun during at least two of the drug transactions.

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"I have no choice," Judge Cassell said to Mr. Angelos, who seemed frozen in place as the extent of the sentence became apparent.
The judge then urged Mr. Angelos's lawyer, Jerome H. Mooney, not only to appeal his decision but to ask President Bush for clemency once all appeals were exhausted. He also urged Congress to set aside the law that made the sentence mandatory.
Judge Cassell said that sentencing Mr. Angelos to prison until he is 70 years old was "unjust, cruel and even irrational," but that the law that forced him to do so had not proved to be unconstitutional and thus had to stand. The sentence was all the more ironic, he said, because only two hours earlier he had been legally able to impose a sentence of 22 years on a man convicted of aggravated second-degree murder for beating an elderly woman to death with a log. That crime, he argued, was far more serious.

Mr. Angelos's wife, Zandrah, who sat in court with the couple's two boys, aged 5 and 7, began crying. "He might as well have killed someone," she said bitterly, wiping her eyes, referring to her husband. "He should have done worse than he did if he was going to get 55 years."
The question of Mr. Angelos's sentence was at the center of a debate as to whether it was fair to send a minor drug dealer to prison for 55 years when a murderer, rapist or terrorist, according to the same sentencing directives, would ordinarily receive no more than about 25 years...



http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/17/national/17sentencing.html?_r=1

[logroller]

If not that many are going to prison then i guess we might as well make it legal , right?

That just follows seems to me.

IF prison were the ONLY punishment for illegal acts, then yes; but its not. Simple' drug possession is a petty crime-- deserving of punishment, but the punishment should fit the crime--fines, mandatory drug counseling etc. Whether or not possessing marijuana is justifiably criminal is a wholly separate issue from how it should be punished.

[MtnBiker]

Legalize MJ with the same safeguards and stipulations that tobacco and alcohol have.



An important safe guard with respect to alcohol is law enforcement's ability to test alcohol levels in a body because of suspected driving impairment. How exactly does law enforcement test for marijuana in this context?

[logroller]

An important safe guard with respect to alcohol is law enforcement's ability to test alcohol levels in a body because of suspected driving impairment. How exactly does law enforcement test for marijuana in this context?

How do they do it now? Eyes, speech, walk the line-- established grounds for additional testing, e.g. a blood/urine test.

[MtnBiker]

How long can marijuana be in a persons system to show up on a blood or urine test? Several days?

Imagine, "I'm going to smoke this joint, but I won't take the risk to drive for a week in case I am pulled over."

[jimnyc]

How long can marijuana be in a persons system to show up on a blood or urine test? Several days?

Imagine, "I'm going to smoke this joint, but I won't take the risk to drive for a week in case I am pulled over."

DWW - Driving While Wasted - and I've been there a time or a thousand! Ooops.... They can make an educated guess based on the tests, but the only true test I'm aware of is a urine test or blood, neither of which would determine the time it was smoked (at least that I'm aware of). Or if you reek of it, and the smoke is pouring out your windows, and from between your lips, and perhaps out your nostrils, then I think it's a given.

[logroller]

How long can marijuana be in a persons system to show up on a blood or urine test? Several days?

Imagine, "I'm going to smoke this joint, but I won't take the risk to drive for a week in case I am pulled over."

I was wondering that myself. THC, the psychoactive cannabinoid causing impairment last ~60 minutes, and was discernible from the inactive THCOOOH, the inactive metabolite which stays in the body for weeks.
http://www.idmu.co.uk/images/stories/bloodtest/fig4.png

Harder & Rietbrock[xi] noted the effects on plasma levels and intoxication produced by smoking different strengths of ‘joint’ at different intervals, finding that the effect of a strong (9mg) reefer would last around 45min, or if smoked continuously a recovery within 100 minutes, with a continuous high if smoked hourly with a recovery after 150 minutes. Weak (3mg) and hemp (1mg) reefers produced lower levels of intoxication and more rapid recovery times.
Chesher[xii] summarised that the inactive metabolite THC acid, formed in the liver from metabolism of THC, appears after THC in blood, and if present when the a subsequent dose is smoked, higher concentrations would ensue. He commented: “analytical data that provides a value only for the metabolite can only be validly interpreted as indicating recent consumption of cannabis ... a matter of hours or days. For this reason quantitative determination of only the metabolite is of no value to determine possible impairment.”...
McBay[xli] compared THC and THC-COOH levels in a study involving smoked marijuana cigarettes. THC-acid levels increased steadily following smoking, but were still detectable long after intoxication would have ceased. Plasma THC levels declined rapidly following cessation of smoking, but were almost all still over 10ng/ml one hour later, and in the range of 1ng to 10ng/ml 2-4 hours after cessation of smoking.

Reeve et al[xlii] compared plasma THC levels with performance on the roadside sobriety test, finding that failures were associated with levels over 25-30ng/ml. Sticht & Kaferstein[xliii] estimated that the blood THC concentrations produced in a 70kg person smoking 15mg THC would peak at 7-8 minutes, after 30 minutes between 14-42ng/ml, and at 60 minutes between 7.5-14ng/ml.

Although there are many papers reporting plasma THC levels, there are no papers which unequivocally relate plasma THC levels with overall consumption. Most have been experimental studies matching short-term THC levels with perceived psychotropic effects.

Menetrey et al[xliv] proposed a ‘cannabis influence factor’ (CIF) value, which relies on the molar ratio of main active to inactive cannabinoids, finding a CIF “greater than 10 was found to correlate with a strong feeling of intoxication. It also matched with a significant decrease in the willingness to drive, and it matched also with a significant impairment in tracking performances.” Giroud et al[xlv] concluded “The cannabis influence factor (CIF) was demonstrated as a better tool to interpret the concentrations of THC and its metabolites in blood in forensic cases and therefore it was proposed to assume absolute driving inability because of cannabis intoxication from a CIF > or = 10. Additionally, a higher CIF is indicative of a recent cannabis abuse.”
source (http://www.idmu.co.uk/drugtestcan.htm)

[Trigg]

unlike tobacco or alcohol, mariguana isn't habit forming. It isn't a "gateway drug", and unlike alcohol where your drunk for hours afterwards, mj lasts for an hour at the most and then you're all but normal.

[DragonStryk72]

Or would marijuana just be used as a stepping stone for the good drugs down the road? Why does Robertson support the legalization of marijuana, I wonder, and not heroin, cocaine, crack...



http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_PAT_ROBERTSON_MARIJUANA?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-03-08-13-11-19


Well, with heroin, cocaine, crack and other narcotics, they're narcotics. They build both a tolerance and they are addictive, neither of which is true of marijuana, which is not physically addicting(anything can be mentally addicting, just ask sex addicts). As well, marijuana's high produces much the same effect as alcohol does, although it does have the added munchies thing with it.

Now, meanwhile cigs are physically addicting, as is alcohol. Both develop tolerance, you can poison yourself with alcohol, while cigarettes give you cancer. Pot? Nope, same amount that got you stoned off your ass in high school gets you stoned off your ass now. So if we're looking at it logically, then of the three, pot is the least potentially harmful of the three, along with being the only one of the three to not be physically addicting or build a tolerance.

Pot got illegalized back when were blaming drugs that've been around for thousands of years for people being dipshits.

[logroller]

Best example I've ever heard premised?


You ever sucked d**k for some marijuana?


http://youtu.be/uUPHlAbAf2I

[ConHog]

unlike tobacco or alcohol, mariguana isn't habit forming. It isn't a "gateway drug", and unlike alcohol where your drunk for hours afterwards, mj lasts for an hour at the most and then you're all but normal.

Marijuana certainly IS addictive. That isn't the point though, because many things are addictive. Pornography, gambling, booze, tobacco, etc etc. if you're predisposed to addictions. That doesn't mean we make them illegal.



I share Jim's concern about testing for being under the influence while driving but I think the standard sobriety field tests with further blood tests if needed could handle that.