Anti-legalization group (Patrick Kennedy) continues reefer madness

[RainDog]

Honestly, I cannot tell you how disappointing it is to see members of the Kennedy family first spreading lies about autism (this truly irks since I have an autistic son), and now Patrick has given himself over to propaganda.

He's the equivalent of a copper-haired maiden in a bodice buster and prohibition is the big man he wants to bust its rippling muscles out of that tight, tight shirt.

...but I digress.

anyway...

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/08/29/anti-marijuana-group-feds-new-pot-policy-will-cause-more-driving-accidents/

A relatively new group, Project SAM, is warning the nation to brace itself for the terrible consequences of legal marijuana.

“We can look forward to more drugged driving accidents, more school drop-outs, and poorer health outcomes as a new Big Marijuana industry targeting kids and minorities emerges to fuel the flames,” said former Congressman Patrick Kennedy, a co-founder of the organization.

“This is disappointing, but it is only the first chapter in the long story about marijuana legalization in the U.S. In many ways, this will quicken the realization among people that more marijuana is never good for any community, which is what happened after the Ogden memo was issued in 2009,” added Kevin Sabet, the co-founder and director of Project SAM.

REALLY?

Apparently no, if someone doesn't pay you to lie about research concerning just such issues.

http://www.denverpost.com/ci_19437417

A 2011 Report shows fewer traffic fatalities after states pass medical-pot laws

The passage of state medical-marijuana laws is associated with a subsequent drop in the rate of traffic fatalities, according to a newly released study by two university professors.

The study — by University of Colorado Denver professor Daniel Rees and Montana State University professor D. Mark Anderson — found that the traffic-death rate drops by nearly 9 percent in states after they legalize marijuana for medical use. The researchers arrived at that figure, Rees said, after controlling for other variables such as changes in traffic laws, seat-belt usage and miles driven. The study stops short of saying the medical-marijuana laws cause the drop in traffic deaths.

Rees said the main reason for the drop appears to be that medical-marijuana laws mean young people spend less time drinking and more time smoking cannabis. Legalization of medical marijuana, the researchers report, is associated with a 12-percent drop in the alcohol-related fatal-crash rate and a 19-percent decrease in the fatality rate of people in their 20s, according to the study.

The study also found that medical- marijuana legalization is associated with a drop in beer sales.

I think SAM made a mistake choosing the heir of an alcohol fortune to speak about the dangers of legalization of marijuana.

Again, the only arguments available at this time are lies and, really, the most idiotic argument of all... liquor is legal. We don't need another legal substance. Well, if you simply look at stats about which one is safer, this is a stupid argument. When you see that alcohol usage declines, that indicates a net health benefit since alcohol is such a dangerous drug with so many negative consequences attached.

Oh, and look!

Another report indicates that, in 2013, so far Washington State traffic fatalities are down to their lowest levels since 1980. Recreational marijuana possession has been legal since Dec. 2012.

http://daily.sightline.org/2013/05/03/washington-car-crashes-decline-again/

we'll have to see if the trend continues, of course.

Another argument from the prohibitionists is that legal marijuana encourages kids to smoke more reefer.

oops! wrong again!

http://healthland.time.com/2011/11/03/study-legal-medical-marijuana-doesnt-encourage-kids-to-smoke-more-pot/

Despite warnings from opponents of medical marijuana, legalizing the drug for medical purposes does not encourage teens to smoke more pot, according to new research that compared rates of marijuana use in Massachusetts and Rhode Island after the latter state changed its laws.

Rhode Island legalized medical marijuana in 2006, but Massachusetts did not. “We wanted to pair these two states because they have so much in common culturally and geographically,” says Dr. Esther Choo, assistant professor of emergency medicine at Brown University’s Warren Alpert Medical School and emergency medicine physician at Rhode Island Hospital.

Choo’s analysis used data collected from 1997 to 2009 for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s annual Youth Risk Behavior Survey. The analysis involved nearly 13,000 youth in Rhode Island and about 25,000 in Massachusetts. In each state in any given year, the study found, about 30% of youth reported using marijuana at least once in the previous month. (iow, no change based upon change in the law.)

These results are consistent with a 2005 analysis conducted by Mitch Earleywine, associate professor of psychology at the State University of New York–Albany, for the Marijuana Policy Project. He found that between 1996 — when California passed its medical marijuana law — and 2004, previous-month pot use by ninth graders declined by 47%. That was a slightly steeper decline than seen nationally during the same period, and Earleywine found a similar effect in all of the medical marijuana states he studied.

Paddy - drop the over-the-top fiction, please.

[madrchsod]

1. a long time ago i was driving 65-70mph then....

i took a hit of some black hashish from nepal. lo and behold i looked down at the speedo and i was going 55...

legalizing pot isn't going to change much of anything. kids that smoke now are`t to much different than i was . then and now the biggest killer of youth is hard drugs. pot is not the gateway drug, it`s the persons mind that is the gateway.

[SoLeftIAmRight]

2. In 1979 John-John came to the University

In 1979 John-John came to the University of Montevallo. I was the person assigned to greet and escort him. He treated me like I was a commoner. He was a year younger than me at the time. After his talk he opened the floor to questions. I asked about a house bill that would have eased the penalty for possession. His response was not just no, he went on about law and order. For those that remember those days President Carter was not a drug warrior. Kennedy was.

[Rex]

3. So how is it that Colorado isn't in flames yet?

Washington burning to cinders with all the people in charge of the big machinery on 'reefer madness'? How can states still function day in and day out now that the REEEEEEEFERRRR MADDDNESSSS is legal...obviously all people, in those states started smoking pot no matter what they were doing and no matter what time of the day it was! Everyone just standing out in the street like zombies on reeefferrr madness!!!!

Yes sir!

[mick063]

4. Patrick Kennedy can kiss my ass.

I don't drink a lick of alcohol. Can't stand the effect. I don't impose on people who do.

But if there was a substance to rail against, alcohol should be the one.

[RainDog]

5. It sort of makes my mind go... huh?

Democrats are supposedly open to information, even when it discounts their biases. It's not easy to get beyond those biases, often, when we have a stake in them.

But he's just out-and-out lying.

Or else he's ill-informed.

I wonder how much he gets paid to lie like this on national television?

What makes his lies any different than the foaming-at-the-mouth craziness that gets Pat Robertson on tv?

[mick063]

6. This is all due to the confiscation of property laws that enforcement agencies profit from.

Last edited Fri Aug 30, 2013, 02:36 AM - Edit history (1)

A terrible law in my opinion.

Why?

Because it isolates enforcement agencies from the pain of low government revenue using conventional revenue methods. For example, it could make them less sympathetic to the call for higher taxes upon the wealthy if they do not directly feel the consequences of the lower tax revenue. Enforcement is less motivated to present an image worthy of tax payer investment like other government agencies are. They can simply rob more drug offenders to finance their operations and lose a needed dependence upon satisfying the taxpayer.

It is like paying mercenaries through the "spoils of war" method and creates a great deal of temptation to focus on revenue creation at the expense of crime prevention. With such a reward system in place, there is a powerful, perpetual political movement to maintain the criminalization of drug offenders as opposed to the treatment of drug offenders. If you wonder why we incarcerate more people than any other Western nation, I just laid it out to you. Our enforcement agencies are dependent upon non violent crime for a sizeable chunk of revenue.

I also fear this "spoils of war" conditioning as it presents a force more easily coopted by powers other than local taxpayers. This goes for the "federalization" of forces as well. I want local police departments to report to, be accountable to, and paid for by the citizens they directly serve. The further detached they are, the less dependent for revenue they are, the more susceptible they are to not feeling accountable to the citizens they directly serve.

[RainDog]

12. the abuse of asset seizure law

seems like a way some LEOs have financed their depts.

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/08/12/130812fa_fact_stillman

If you read that link, you'll want to cry. or throw up. or throw something.

[bhikkhu]

9. The group gets smaller every year

and education on the issue is the best approach.

I know in my state the last referendum educated a lot of people who had never thought seriously about legalization. It failed by a slim margin, but most people are resigned (at least) that it will pass the next time. When you don't have the facts on your side its hard to win for very long.

[B Calm]

10. That's good news! I think us baby boomers retiring

and wanting legal pot is helping too.

[Scuba]

11. As always, follow the money.