coyotecall Loc: New Mexico

Though I don't use pot anymore (too many side effects for me) it DID help me quit drinking to excess. When I used it I used it with a goal in mind....not to get "high" but to put whatever situation I was wrestling with in perspective, some might say, "to cool out". I also used it to pursue some spiritual understandings and to this end it worked well. My drinking has tailed off to perhaps one or two drinks a week..maybe. Just lost my taste for it after a bladder cancer scare. I have to agree with the driving under the influence concerns, though pot users as drivers are nowhere near as dangerous as drivers who are drunk. "Adding another drug to the mix?" Well, MJ has been around for hundreds of years (thousands?) the reasons for legalization are simple, it's about decriminalization of course so I don't see why there's a complaint about N.J. doing it. The feds should get out of the picture altogether. Putting people in jail for MJ use is pointless (as is putting any addict in jail). These people need treatment not incarceration. I've lost one kid to heroin and it didn't start with MJ, it started with booze, then pills, then meth, then the needle. She might have survived had she gone to pot. (literally). And, finally, "distracted driving" IS the real problem....oh, and by the way, they can't get stats on increased accidents in Colorado being connected to pot use since there's no way to measure influence. Try driving in Denver, it's worse than Chicago and it's not because everyone is stoned....just too many people.

Blaster34 Loc: Florida Treasure Coast

Downtown Denver, poster city of homeless, addicts, druggies, dregs.... for reasons not to legalize pot

Sirsnapalot Loc: Hammond, Louisiana

For as long as I can remember, insurance companies have always charged more for the higher risk premiums,
If you have ever had to buy insurance for a teenage male you know what I'm talking about. So as far as insurance companies are concerned, by adding another legal intoxicant, won't help sway their opinion about high risk and there go's the argument about pot being safer than booze. Now is that fair?, don't know but it is fact!

Daisy Dog

WOW! You would have thought there would be at least one photo of a joint in these diatribes.

JeffL Loc: New Jersey

A bunch of polarized viewpoints, as usual. Until four years ago I was very anti-drug. Not much of a drinker, didn’t get the whole pot subculture at all. I was invited by the mayor to checkout a cannabis dispensary soon to open in our town. Four year later, I have counseled over 3,000 patients on the benefits of cannabis to alleviate the symptoms of the ailments or treatments they were experiencing. I’ve had patients whose cancer tumors have shrunk, MS patients who have left their wheelchairs behin and are walking, epileptic patients whose multiple seizures have dramatically declined or stopped, and many patients who have gotten off opioids that were destroying their bodies and lives. Some benefits have been subtle, others dramatic. Contrary to popular, and ignorant, opinion, the vast majority of these patients do not want to get high. They just want to be able to function. They just want to feel normal again. The perception that the presence of THC in a driver’s blood is a definite indication that they were driving stoned is false. That cannabinoid can be in your blood for up to 30 days after last use. BTW, according to the Centers for Disease Control, the government agency which keeps track of overdose deaths, in 2015 over 88,000 Americans died from alcohol related deaths, over 33,000 from opioids, 480,000 from tobacco related deaths, and 0 (zero) from marijuana. The number of deaths from opioids is expected to almost double in 2018. Marijuana is not a gateway drug, nor is it nearly as addictive as any other drug, including alcohol and tobacco. So, why is there so much antipathy toward a plant that helps many? Government propaganda since the 1930’s.

Kmgw9v Loc: Miami, Florida

Using that logic, alcohol should be as illegal as pot.
Short-sighted analogy at best.

Blaster34 Loc: Florida Treasure Coast

Alcohol has been around for sometime, the increase in the homeless, druggies and other dregs in downtown Denver occurred since pot laws were passed...not short sighted at all

Kmgw9v Loc: Miami, Florida

Nice to hear from someone who has first-hand experience with "reefer madness"

Daisy Dog

That's all wonderful but I just want to get high.

roxiemarty Loc: Florida

Thank you Jeff for your insight. I have two friends that have gotten so much relief from the cannabis, and no longer are on the opiates. One of them had a broken neck and has been in a wheelchair for the last 20 years, and the other is a friend of my daughter; a 37 year old young man with Muscular Dystrophy. And it really helped my friend when she had cancer treatments and was dying. She didn't want to take the morphine and miss her last few months of life. And she didn't need it, the morphine, nearly as much. The pot alleviated alot of her pain and stress. So I understand where you are coming from. There are alot of misconceptions out there about this.

Kmgw9v Loc: Miami, Florida

And you have evidence that the presumed increase in the homeless druggies in Denver is directly attributable to the relaxed pot laws, and no other social- economic factors? Who conducted the studies?

roxiemarty Loc: Florida

Thank you Kmg! Misconceptions and fear. One opinion among many.

Blaster34 Loc: Florida Treasure Coast

Nah, nothing as scientific as how well pot works, just visited many time over the last few years while son was undergoing transplant therapy...just the general degeneration of the city was obvious. But then again we all have our opinions and neither will likely change

roxiemarty Loc: Florida

These problems are evident in every major city in our country. Even St. Augustine Florida has these problems. Most states have NOT legalized it, for medical or recreation. Just my opinion. Like you, we all have one. Do you travel much? I see these problems all over our country. Alot of Veterans out there, homeless and down on their luck. I deal with helping feed these people for the last 19 years. It has really made me take notice of the many people living on the fringes of society, in wooded areas and cars. Some are families! So I'm not so quick to judge. I'm sure they didn't choose to all go to Denver to freeze their butts off just to smoke pot. And the stuff isn't free. So, I will continue to have my opinion on the subject.

coyotecall Loc: New Mexico

Have to agree. Read "Chasing the Scream" about how the gov. made MJ a monster in the 20's and 30's.....and so on up until now. Anslinger (not sure of the spelling of his name right now) like Hoover, made a reputation based upon creating monsters which only he (they) could hold at bay, and thus make him (them) indispensable and in power.