|
Marijuana 
Tue Sep 21, 2010 at 00:04:27 AM PDT
|
|
There are roughly FIVE groups interested in YOU not smoking pot (or at least not doing so legally):
1. The pharmaceutical industry
2. The alcohol industry
3. The cotton industry
4. The prison industry
5. Culture-warrior conservatives who can score political points with the issue
And one of them - the alcohol industry - is now openly spending to defeat California's Prop 19, the measure that would legalize pot in California.
The reason why you can't smoke pot is because you're supposed to take pharmaceuticals or drink until you pickle your liver while wearing cotton clothing (and all the pesticides that go with it) instead of hemp. And if you smoke or grow pot or sell pot - as many do - you go to jail, keeping the prison industry fat and happy.
This is an incredibly, INCREDIBLY personal issue to me. The most important person to me in my life (and if you guess who, don't say it - and never EVER reveal to this person's parents that you read this story on my blog) smoked pot for years to take the edge off of his anxiety. No, it wasn't good for him. But neither was a lot of what he did. Neither is drinking or taking prescription drugs. And he was in a lot of emotional pain and did not know how else to deal with that pain.
Then he was arrested on felony charges. I won't go into the details, but that had all kinds of effects on his life, because felons are second class citizens. And he had to stop smoking pot to avoid future legal trouble. Ultimately he found a legal way to cope with his anxiety - an addictive prescription drug that should have probably never been prescribed to him - and within a year, he killed himself with that drug accidentally.
If pot was legal, he might be alive today. Pot may not be good for you, but it certainly won't kill you. Pharmaceuticals and alcohol will.
I will never know if he would be alive today if he was not arrested for pot. Maybe. Maybe not. But there's a chance. There's hope. And if that's the case, then I think it would be fair to say that the criminalization of marijuana is directly responsible for killing him, and ruining my life.
|
|
Discuss
:: (16
Comments)
|
|
Mon Jul 27, 2009 at 09:25:43 AM PDT
|
|
My experience with our country's drug policy (and I expect yours too) is like the story of the blind men touching the elephant. Each man touched a different part of the elephant, and when asked to describe it, one described the elephant's side, one described its tail, others described its ears or its trunk, but none of them were able to understand or describe the entire elephant. Ryan Grim's new book This Is Your Country on Drugs: The Secret History of Getting High in America is the tool you need to understand the entire elephant of America's drug history and its drug policy.
|
|
There's More...
:: (6
Comments, 768 words in story)
|
|
Mon Apr 13, 2009 at 14:28:23 PM PDT
|
|
|
|
Discuss
:: (0
Comments)
|
|
Sat Apr 04, 2009 at 15:41:05 PM PDT
|
|
It might be an April Fool's joke, but Grist has a great article called The straight dope on local, organic weed. And you know what? I don't care if they are trying to be funny. I think the point is right on. As a San Diego resident ("I can see Mexico from my house!"), the Mexican drug cartels are a little too close to home for me and I would LOVE if the U.S. took away a major source of their funds by legalizing marijuana and allowing Americans to grow and smoke our own weed.
On the question of legalization, I say that the "gateway drug" argument is entirely invalidated by the fact that alcohol and cigarettes are legal, so clearly our society has nothing against the legal consumption of bad-for-you gateway drugs. Legalizing pot would boost the economy, reduce the number of people in our jails, and allow our cops to focus on more important things. And legal or not, I think that local and organic is the way to go :)
|
|
Discuss
:: (29
Comments)
|
|
Tue Mar 31, 2009 at 17:00:00 PM PDT
|
Here's what's on my plate today:
- Food & Water Watch takes on kindai tuna. Blue fin tuna is tasty and overfished, so does that mean the solution is farming it? FWW says no and I agree.
- According to Meatingplace, the USDA wants more safety regulations on delis and butchers. Apparently retailers don't do a good job with record keeping, making it hard to trace problems once they occur. The article also noted that "a person is seven times likelier to die from listeria after eating deli meat produced by a retailer than by a federal plant."
- Civil Eats has a nice post about foraging for morel mushrooms. I've never tried foraging for morels but I sure enjoy eating them!
- What are you to do if you're a locavore in Phoenix? Civil Eats has a few ideas. (As a frequent visitor to AZ myself, I'd recommend to any tourists, DON'T eat the ornamental oranges, but DO eat prickly pear fruits. Just, um, don't actually touch the prickly pear cactus yourself. I've tried. In addition to the big, visible pricklies there are tiny, invisible ones on there too.)
- Starbucks is shutting down 200 stores in the U.S. Pardon me if I don't shed any tears.
- Last week Obama laughed off the idea of legalizing marijuana. Apparently America's online population doesn't think it's so funny.
- Marion Nestle comments on antioxidants as a marketing tool. I'm with her on this - fruits and veggies contain antioxidants. You don't need a label to tell you that.
- The Green Fork features a fantastic review of Whole Grains for Busy People, a cookbook that definitely seems work checking out.
- The Atlantic tells about life after a gastric bypass. All I can say is that it sounds absolutely miserable. Of course, I doubt anyone has too much fun within the first two weeks after ANY surgery, gastric bypasses included. For the writer's sake, I hope life - and eating - get better with time.
- Great one by Ezra Klein. He says (about "organic" Oreos): "These cookies think you're very stupid." Indeed.
- IATP chronicles the life of a beginning farmer. In the latest episode, spring has sprung.
- Blackwater wants us to call it Xe (pronounced "Zee") and AIG is contracting with PR firms to give its image a boost. Small surprise that the peanut industry is also jumping on the rebranding and PR bandwagon. Of course, in this case I kind of don't blame them. AIG on the other hand...
|
|
Discuss
:: (7
Comments)
|
|
Mon Feb 23, 2009 at 21:58:07 PM PST
|
|
I was sad that my brother wasn't alive for Obama's inauguration, but man... if there was ONE THING I wish my brother would be alive for, it would be this. California, deep in debt, is finally broke enough to do something that makes total sense: legalize pot and tax the shit out of it.
The plan is to legalize it for people over 21 (like alcohol), to save money from policing and locking up pot heads, and to make money from a marijuana tax. Tom Ammiano is the brave (and SMART) man who introduced the bill, AB 390. The tax would be $50/oz.
Ammiano, a Democrat in his third month as a state lawmaker, said taxes and other fees associated with regulation could put more than a billion dollars a year into state coffers at a time when revenues continue to decline. (Source)
God, I hope this passes.
|
|
Discuss
:: (16
Comments)
|
|
Tue Feb 17, 2009 at 22:00:00 PM PST
|
|
I'm talking about marijuana, of course! Sure it's not typically something you eat - unless you're making brownies (in which case you should invite me over) - but it still falls loosely under the topics covered on this site. It's a plant. It grows. And I don't see why a plant should be illegal. How can human laws ban nature? (Well - that's a whole 'nother topic because clearly we try to overrule nature with our laws all the time!)
Obama just picked out his "Drug Czar," Gil Kerlikowske, the Seattle Police Chief. Like many, I'm hoping that this selection signals a new era of drug policy that will involve leaving the potheads the hell alone. The article Czar Struck: Obama's Brilliant Pick for Drug Czar says:
And nationally, Kerlikowske could be a drug czar who pushes to lift the federal ban on funding needle exchange, stops the medical pot raids in California, overhauls our nonsensical anti-drug commercials, and enthusiastically seeks funding for drug-treatment programs.
The brilliance of Obama's pick for drug czar is not just finding someone who is open to new strategies, but someone who nonetheless holds undeniable qualifications as a cop. Nobody can claim Kerlikowske is a public-health nut who doesn't know the impact of drugs on the streets. Like many Americans, he agrees that drugs should be illegal. But he understands the place for low priorities and public health-and he's willing to step back where enforcement alone has failed.
|
|
There's More...
:: (15
Comments, 251 words in story)
|
|
|
|
|
|
