^ Lol @ the "Dear Mom..." ad. "Dear Mom, in college I used to drink a lot and get fucked by random guys. It was pretty crazy! Now I just get high and masturbate." And good for Oregon. Just wish it would happen at a federal level. Or in the states around here. Aside from Milwaukee and Madison, Wisconsin is heavily Republican. Illinois is pretty split down the middle.
^lmao in cali.. i don't know if its legal or not but every major LA district you go to, there seems to be weed shops.. and prescriptions.. i've heard of kids getting it for 40$ not to mention one of my buddies works there.. he gets paid 3,000 a month, and lots and lots of weed of course.. but fucking cigarettes seem to be getting BANNED literally -__-
This is all above and beyond the medical use. We've been medical use legal for a decade now. This is total legalization and taxation of the weed. We decriminalized possesion back in the early 80's.
Remember the Obama administration has already stated it will fight states on the legalization issue after going back on their word about letting medicinal marijuana be. But it's not like the candidate who doesn't even drink is going to be any better though. *sigh*
True. It's on the ballot in WA as well and will certainly be interesting to see what happens. I'm sure it will go down in a place or two, but it will win in at least one state, and will certainly prompt an interesting state-v-federal fight... Edit: One interesting thing is that up until a few months ago, in WA liquor was only sold in state run shops. The pot legalization team was kind of counting on the old system of state-liquor to become the new distribution network for legalized pot but now there will have to be a new plan for how pot sales in WA will operate should it win.
As we've debated many times before, I'm still uneasy about legalization. It's bound to increase use, hell even I might start smoking it again. And the last thing we need right now is a bunch of unemployed, stoned people. Maybe if the country wasn't in such a sad state right now I'd feel differently.
My position has changed a lot on legalization. If the legalization effort stops at marijuana I'd be fine with it now. A small number of new people might start smoking (like that slacker MSP ), but overall I doubt it would make a huge difference. Just be sure to tax the living shit out of it and I'm on board.
Everybody jumps on the taxation thing, but as easy as pot is to grow I think the estimated revenues are way, way too high. The day after legalization Home Depot and Lowes will be sold out of potting soil and grow lights, and the federal government will spend 30% more on bureaucracy than is earned via taxes. Oh, and vehicle accident rates will go up and high school graduation rates will go down. EDIT: That's my fear anyway.
Dude, weed is easier to get than alcohol for most teens. Legalizing and controlling it's distribution will actually make it harder for teens to get and thus if anything will have a negative correlation with graduation rates.
Also, growing weed that isn't brown shit is actually somewhat of a careful, costly process. I knew a person who had a grow many years back, he spent something like $1500 for the lights and all the nutrients. Bottles and bottles of nutrients. I don't know why so many people think that you can just throw seeds in the ground and you'll have 6 ounces of weed in a few months. A friend of a friend was trying to sell the weed plant he had growing in his backyard for $50 before he "went away". Dude didn't even know if it was a male or female. I tried explaining that the plant was useless and wasn't going to give him shit, but he disagreed with me and seriously thought it was worth something. You can't argue with people like that so I just nodded and said "yup."
I have to agree with both these guys. And anyone that's ever going to smoke and is unemployed is alreasdy smoking it, I can almost bet the farm on it.
Problem is more social than governmental with alcohol in America. The drinking age needs to be lowered and America need to move beyond the Protestant/Puritanical stigma against alcohol. Introduce teens to alcohol earlier and in a more socially responsible way and you'll see a drop in binge drinking and more pervasive social abuse. Hopefully that's going to happen in the future given America's increasing secularism. Not to mention (which Matt and others may be able to attest to as well), the craft breweries here in Colorado are very family friendly. I personally feel this helps kids understand responsible alcohol use. What does this have to do with marijuana? Legalizing it and legitimizing it removes (what little) social stigma that exists around it and encourages more responsible use. Plus, tax it and throw the funds at schools. Then your social delinquents are supporting those that are really getting an education.
The state lotteries were supposed to help fund schools as well. Just saying, there are tons of potential pitfalls and unintended consequences.
That's real true. our state lottery is nothing but a sham. This also holds true to the tax on tobacco, and will hold true to the tax collected from non-compliance to obamacare. Those funds go to anything other than what was used to sell the public on the tax/fee/concept.
It's funny you say that, but I can see where you're coming from as you're a resident of Colorado and a former resident of California. There is still a huge social stigma around marijuana in a large chunk of the country. Mostly from old white people, as well as religious people, and so forth. Unfortunate, but that's the way it is. Go to Utah, or the Bible Belt, and take a vote on whether marijuana is "bad"... you'd be surprised at the way some people still think. Reefer madness!
Sure, that's why I'm saying to use them as extra funds not funds that the state depends on. Still use property taxes and what not to fund schools to guarantee income but then have this extra pile of money for emergency repairs, facility upgrades, moving schools over to a digital curriculum, etc. Aaaaaactually, as the Greatest Generation dies off, the largest barrier to legalization is Generation X (aka MSP and most of the parents on here) because they've still got children living at home and did not have as positive a view on marijuana from 18-24 as Millennials do. Of course there's a FiveThirtyEight article for that:
I don't worry about my kids and drugs, and least of all pot. And my attitude about pot from 18-24 was to smoke as much of it as I could!
It is a big question mark for sure. There's really no way to tell what will transpire until full legalization is tried. What is happening now is not working at all, that we can be sure of.
Yeah, the current system is broken. But it's just important to keep in mind that not everybody opposed to, or at least concerned about, legalization does so from a place of ignorance. Life experience and having seen many, many well intended things turn to shit is the opposite of ignorance. Yeah, because they've lived a little and have seen what drugs, even pot, can do to people's lives. Again, not ignorance, but real world experience and maturity.
I come from the camp that's lived the ravages of alcohol and overuse of pot. I can garranty that there are no violent criminals in the justice system that are there because they smoked out and killed/beat someone. Even if legalization happens, I seriously doubt that i'll be tempted to get high. I've grow accustomed to living life without the use of anything that fuzzes up my brain and I like it that way. I do however, know that the substance is here to stay and we're wasting way too many resources to fight a battle that can't be won. All the while, there are way more worse things we could be putting those resources towards. for instance: What was once the hot rebellious act for teens of sneaking off to smoke a joint/bowl/bong, is now turning towards prescription drug abuse. the fact that it is/was illegal to obtain, possess and use alcohol while under aged never stopped any teen I know of from doing just that. If I could trust that we'd have a federal level agancy that could untertake a task and do it well, I'd suggest putting those resources to building the family unit resulting in less desire for teens that want to escape into drugs. But it seems our government can't figure out how to get out of a soaking wet brown paper bag without fucking that up. The family unit is the building block of our nation. We are witnessing the results of slip in priority of the family in favor of building a huge(r) government and the kids are the ones who are going to suffer. summation: whether or not it's legalized, the weed is not the problem. The whole legalization debate is all another of a humongous list reguarding the act of treating the symptom and not the disease.
