Should all drugs be legalized?

[Nick]

Its not upta us. Almost all legislators have partners back home who make damn good money defending drug dealers. No lawyer is going to pass law that diminishes the income of other lawyers.

First stop electing lawyers. Then we can see about legalizing drugs. We could still make drug dealing a civil offense, so that the families of the addicts could bring the dealer into court and sue for the cost of drug rehab. As it is, the lawyers get all the assets of the dealers for keeping them out of jail.

That might be true, but the real reason for the "War on Drugs" is quite simply because it's a free market with billions of dollars being exchanged and not a single tax on it.

[brokenhead]

If you can achieve enlightenment with mediation go for it.

Or with meditation.

[xerox]

...

[daybrown]

If you can achieve enlightenment with mediation go for it.

Or with meditation.

That's a flawed premise by those who think enlightenment is achieved only thru meditation.
Tell that to a Mayan Shaman, and he will say you are a racist pig. He, and his people have used sacred shrooms for thousands of years. The minds of he, and his people may not be wired up the same way yours is.

Already neurologist Ramachandran has discovered structural differences in the brain that account for different kinds of mental associations. The Fins did FMRI brain scans of their most violent prisoners and found a constricted neural pathway from the Corpus Collosum to the prefrontal lobes. When emotionally aroused, prefrontal lobe activity dramatically declines. They really do, as Ramachandran put it, "see red" because the primitive reptilian brain in the Corpus Collosum lacks the sophisticated color processing that developed in primates.

If meditation works for you, I dont have a problem with it; but to say that it works for everyone is bullshit.

[Tomas]

.

Cancer opens one's eyes to the many facets of marijuana

Diana Wagman on marjuana.

http://fairuse.100webcustomers.com/fair ... esE13.html

.

[daybrown]

Thanx Tomas. Another point about MJ. I live in an area that produces tons of Ozark Green. And you can tell the old stoners are still fairly functional while the old moonshiners- liver failure, diabetes, ulcers... whatever. I'm not aware of a single chronic condition caused by long time mj use.

A long term condition I am aware of, is how the partners of the vast majority of lawmakers, back in the home district, make tons of money off defending drug cases, and whatever the morality should be, lawyers are not known to pass law that reduces the incomes of their brothers at the bar.

This whole thread is pissing in the wind until we quit electing lawyers. One way to do that is to educate the electorate, which is fine in theory, but I dont see that it works in practice. The electorate is too lazy, stupid, and neurotic for education to be a significant factor in elections. The other way is total collapse of the economic political system which results in tyranny or anarchy, either of which will disempower lawyers.

[Laird]

I'm not aware of a single chronic condition caused by long time mj use.

Marijuana has been implicated in the onset of mental health problems revolving around psychosis, in particular of schizophrenia.[*] The introductory sentence of one of the pages that I've linked to below runs thus:

Last year, Netherlands researchers reviewed five studies and concluded that the use of marijuana (cannabis) approximately doubles the risk of developing schizophrenia.

It's probably more fair to say that rather than being "the" cause of the illness, that marijuana unlocks, triggers or hastens existing tendencies - for example one of the pages that I've linked to below quotes the conclusion of a study thus:

There is evidence for an association between cannabis and psychosis. It is clear that cannabinoids can cause acute transient psychotic symptoms or an acute psychosis. Also it is clear that cannabis can exacerbate psychosis in individuals with an established psychotic disorder. However, whether cannabis causes a persistent de novo psychosis independent of any other risk factors is not supported by the existing literature. More likely, cannabis is a component cause that interacts with other factors (e.g., genetic risk) to induce psychosis.

Nevertheless, I think that this qualifies it as the cause of a chronic condition - liver disease in alcoholics probably has a genetic component-cause too.

And how about lung cancer in those who smoke it rather than orally ingesting it?

[*] you can type "marijuana schizophrenia" into Google for a host of links but if you couldn't be bothered then here are two that I found through the first page of results Are Marijuana and Schizophrenia Linked? and Studies link marijuana, schizophrenia. Also very interesting is this (reasonably brief) transcript of the Australian TV show, Catalyst: Marijuana & Schizophrenia (20 February 2003).

[Carl G]

Laird wrote:

And how about lung cancer in those who smoke it rather than orally ingesting it?

What about it? Far be it for me to defend the use of Mary Jay, but I can't believe even a joint a day -- that's pretty heavy smoking -- could cause cancer. It in no way compares to what regular cigarette users do to their lungs. Do you have any statistics? Or are you just flapping your gums.

[Laird]

Do you have any statistics? Or are you just flapping your gums.

Just flappin' me gums mate, based on what I seem to remember a friend once saying to me. But now that you press me, I'll do a bit of googling to see if I can find anything. Brb...

...back. Yeah, from what I've just read[*] it looks like no conclusive link has yet been established and it's possible that there is no link at all - it even seems to be possible that there is a reduced risk - but it seems to also be possible that pot smoking does have a causative link to lung cancer. From one of the articles that I've referenced below:

The results suggest that long-term exposure to cannabis smoke, particularly when combined with tobacco smoking, is capable of damaging the bronchial system in ways that could one day lead to respiratory cancers. However, to date, no epidemiologic studies of cannabis-only smokers have yet to reveal such a finding. Larger, better-controlled studies are warranted.

On the other hand, the very first link that I googled came up with a 2006 Washington Post article describing "the largest study of its kind" that "unexpectedly concluded that smoking marijuana, even regularly and heavily, does not lead to lung cancer".

So on the whole your belief seems to be at the very least pretty defensible.

[*] I googled "marijuana smoking cancer" and plenty came up. I read Cannabis Smoke and Cancer: Assessing the Risk and Study Finds No Cancer-Marijuana Connection.

[daybrown]

The question is not whether mj triggers schizophrenia, but whether it does so more than any number of other factors. There are upsides as well that have to do with the chemical changes in the brain that contribute to creativity. Sorting it out is not going to be easy, but there are DNA markers for schizophrenia risk, so by all means warn those that have the markers. Lots of schizoids are also, or have been, very creative. YMMV.

Conversely, I've been told by those who had mind numbing jobs that mj makes it bearable; they can zone out while they work like robots. But in any case, were it legal, I dont see why vendors would not need to be bonded and carry insurance to cover the cost of damages to their customers. In this way, vendors would quickly pick up on the traits of customers that would be unprofitable to deal with. Let the families of the users get the money for treatment, rather than the defense attorney for keeping a dealer in business.

My last landlord in New Orleans was a defense attorney. Joe Marcal cooked up a deal with Judge Ginsburg to set a trail date way up, not hard to do on a crowded calendar. Then, every six months, move the date up again, paying the clerk of court not to notice the pattern. In really intractable cases, he'd arrange for the arresting officer to get a new job offer in LA or NY, or wherever, and then, when the arresting officer could not appear at the trial, charges were dropped.

This kind of thing goes on all over. They dont want to win the war on drugs, they want to milk it. Just like they want to milk the war on terrorism. The systemic corruption of the entire system, of which this is but one example, threatens the stability and risks economic crisis. Because of the American Malaise, the mass neurosis of the electorate, it all goes on, and will until, or if, there is a run on the dollar. Since so many other economies are even more corrupt, it may muddle along indefinately anyway.

[Laird]

The question is not whether mj triggers schizophrenia, but whether it does so more than any number of other factors.

I respectfully disagree. The question is whether marijuana is a significant trigger of schizophrenia. Evidence seems to suggest that it is.

There are upsides as well that have to do with the chemical changes in the brain that contribute to creativity.

Can you provide references for this? I've suspected it but have never found any evidence for it (nor have I looked).

Sorting it out is not going to be easy, but there are DNA markers for schizophrenia risk, so by all means warn those that have the markers.

Again, I don't know what references you're using but if they're correct then, agreed: warn those with the markers that they ingest cannabis at great risk.

Lots of schizoids are also, or have been, very creative. YMMV.

Conversely, I've been told by those who had mind numbing jobs that mj makes it bearable; they can zone out while they work like robots.

Without revealing too much - because I value my privacy - I used pot semi-regularly in the past until I started to feel very vulnerable, exposed and paranoid whilst stoned. But before the high degraded like that its primary characteristic for me was novelty: I noticed new things about familiar situations, I found intriguing what I had previously found mundane and I arrived at apparently revelatory epiphanies. So I can see how mind numbing jobs could be made bearable - the drug would somehow make them interesting through novel thoughts. I can also see the link between pot-induced schizoids and creativity. One thing that I'm not sure of though is the nature of that creativity. I never made the effort to carefully review my "revelations" whilst sober. It's possible that they would have dissolved as per the story that David Hodges related where he had to live with a supposedly "profound" acid-inspired insight scribbled on his wall with a marker. I suspect that the creativity of pot is more insane than rational. I further suspect though that through discipline, that creativity could be channelled in more rational directions.

I think that I've partially achieved something similar with alcohol. In contrast to the insanity of the creativity of pot, I believe that the creativity of drunkeness is best characterised as "uninhibited". The natural tendency of the drunkard is to spew out the depths of their supressed (often for good, socially responsible reasons) thoughts. This often results in inappropriate or regrettable behaviour. Once a person recognises this, though, they can counteract it by bringing into their inebriation a will to review their intended behaviour by imagining how they would judge it whilst sober, and by acting on the results of this review. This technique starts to fail at higher levels of inebriation where it becomes increasingly hard to accurately imagine one's sober judgement and increasingly difficult to act on negative reviews, but at lower levels of inebriation it is quite effective. For example, right now I am moderately drunk and I am managing to resist the temptation to reveal personal details related to this topic that I know that I would later - when sober - regret revealing.

In relation to pot then, I imagine that "all" that it would take to achieve a more rational creativity would be to bring into stonedness the will to review one's thoughts based on what one imagines one would judge them to be when sober. I'm unable to test this hypothesis though given that these days pot completely debilitates me.

But in any case, were it legal, I dont see why vendors would not need to be bonded and carry insurance to cover the cost of damages to their customers. In this way, vendors would quickly pick up on the traits of customers that would be unprofitable to deal with. Let the families of the users get the money for treatment, rather than the defense attorney for keeping a dealer in business.

Sure - perhaps vendors would require that prospective clients have themselves tested for genetic psychotic tendencies.

This kind of thing goes on all over. They dont want to win the war on drugs, they want to milk it. Just like they want to milk the war on terrorism. The systemic corruption of the entire system, of which this is but one example, threatens the stability and risks economic crisis. Because of the American Malaise, the mass neurosis of the electorate, it all goes on, and will until, or if, there is a run on the dollar. Since so many other economies are even more corrupt, it may muddle along indefinately anyway.

I'm at heart an optimist having been brought up in a family where love, kindness and respect were the norm. I find it hard to empathise with people who are motivated by self-centred concerns rather than by a desire to improve conditions for all life on this planet. So I find it disheartening to think that perhaps thoughts such as those that you've expressed above are quite supportable. What is it do you think that binds some of us to the self-concerned exercise of power in opposition to the selfless exercise of power? Is it our family background? Is it genetics? Is it life experiences?

And, to bring this back on topic, can drugs affect our capacity for mutual respect and tolerance? I know that when I'm drunk I'm more likely to reach out to other people, but I'm also more likely in that case to aggressively defend my territory. When I'm stoned I'm more likely to be non-confrontational and mellow, but I'm also more likely to misinterpret other people's behaviour such that I retreat rather than engage.

[daybrown]

YMMV. I read a study of Harvard Freshmen. Those who metabolize alcohol differently can imbibe much more, but then go from slightly high to completely shitfaced. Its those who can drink a lot who later become alcoholics.

As for creativity, who is to judge artistic output? I dunno where we'd find a scientific study of such an ambiguous phenomena. I do know that mj was preferred by early jazz musicians, and it was thru the black players that it was introduced to whites. They have known the same uninhibitedness you refer to with alcohol, but mj dont affect fine muscle control.

Cannabis was used in Europe for millennia. During the Chalcolithic, they made a curious little four footed goat's head bowl. an example from more recent times was found in Amazon graves in the permafrost of the Altai, but in this case, the contents, hemp, was preserved. The Scythians usta make little tents, with hot rocks inside like a suana, then put the hemp bowl on- the heat vaporizing the resins.

But in Europe hemp became an important fiber crop. "Canvas" for sails dates back to the Proto-indo-European cannabis. So much was grown for rope and rigging that the psychoactive qualities were lost. The Brits in India had to keep importing hemp seed because there was so much ganga pollen in the air. As you can imagine, it became a racist issue in that only non-whites used cannabis. So, it was a no brainer back in the racist 1930's to make pot illegal. It gave cops a handy tool to harrass non-whites.

So- likewise, different gene pools have adapted to cannabis, or- lost the adaptation. So, as you suggest from a public health perspective, the thing to do is have people tested, and then present ID to the vendor that there is no risk of damages. and- have them do the same thing at liquor stores and beer joints. Have bartenders get sued for selling to anyone with a DUI arrest record. Why cant they figure that out?

[Tomas]

.

Netherlands: Dutch police complain it is their right to smoke pot

Dutch Police Union chairman Hans van Duijn said the
new rules were an infringement of personal liberty.

http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v07.n1455.a04.htm

.

[Tomas]

.

Judge: Return marijuana to former Marine

In early 1991, Dickes was with 1st Battalion, 4th Marines, in Kuwait helping to transport Iraqi prisoners of war when one of them detonated a grenade that sprayed him with shrapnel.

http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v07.n1474.a04.html

.

[brokenhead]

If you can achieve enlightenment with mediation go for it.

Or with meditation.

That's a flawed premise by those who think enlightenment is achieved only thru meditation.
Tell that to a Mayan Shaman, and he will say you are a racist pig. He, and his people have used sacred shrooms for thousands of years. The minds of he, and his people may not be wired up the same way yours is.

Already neurologist Ramachandran has discovered structural differences in the brain that account for different kinds of mental associations. The Fins did FMRI brain scans of their most violent prisoners and found a constricted neural pathway from the Corpus Collosum to the prefrontal lobes. When emotionally aroused, prefrontal lobe activity dramatically declines. They really do, as Ramachandran put it, "see red" because the primitive reptilian brain in the Corpus Collosum lacks the sophisticated color processing that developed in primates.

If meditation works for you, I dont have a problem with it; but to say that it works for everyone is bullshit.

Hey, d.b., I was making a joke. The quote said "mediation." I was pointing out it should have read "meditation." But who knows? Maybe it was supposed to be "medication."

[daybrown]

Well hey, Brokenhead, I missed that. but ya, medication is certainly an option. For real too. There are schizoids who are only able to stay rational with the right level of meds. We assume, do we not, that enlightenment is only possible for rational sentient beings? Nobody expects kids or retards to ever become enlightened.

Altho- I remember, when I was taking psych at the U of MN, we went on a field trip and I saw a man, about 40, laying on a bed, who had never, in his entire life, ever made a volitional act. The actuality of the Vedic notion of 'non-action', a genuine Bodhisattavah. An IQ of zero, or infinity, depending on how you care to look at it.

I remember other saints, microcephalic, who smiled all the time, running on the primate system in the amygdala, who never, in their entire lives ever had an evil thot. There was no signifcant prefrontal lobe to entertain one.

[Sage]

If anyone wants a free market perspective by one of the greats, here is Milton Friedman on the case for legalization - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyystXOfDqo

[daybrown]

If anyone wants a free market perspective by one of the greats, here is Milton Friedman on the case for legalization - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyystXOfDqo

Waitaminit. I like what he has to say, but the case for legalization ultiamately hasta be made by lawyers in legislative bodies.

And those lawyers almost all have partners back in their home constituencies who make a damn good living off defending drug defendants. Hello? Anyone see a problem here?

Since when in the long history of law have lawyers done anything that reduced the incomes of their brothers at the bar? Milton is pissing in the wind, and you'd think he'd be smart enuf to figure that out.

The ONLY way to change the drug law from criminal to civil liability so that the families of addicts can sue for damages, is to quit electing lawyers to legislative offices.

[brokenhead]

The ONLY way to change the drug law from criminal to civil liability so that the families of addicts can sue for damages, is to quit electing lawyers to legislative offices.

This thought deserves its own thead.

[daybrown]

The ONLY way to change the drug law from criminal to civil liability so that the families of addicts can sue for damages, is to quit electing lawyers to legislative offices.

This thought deserves its own thead.

OK, I'll do that.

[Tomas]

.

US Slapped for Seizing Former JFK Sailboat

The US government had no right to seize and auction off a sleek, 22-foot sailboat that once belonged to a teenage John F. Kennedy, a federal judge has ruled in a case that stemmed form a drug investigation.

http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v08/n062/a07.html

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[Tomas]

dele

[sear]

"You are 'free' to roam within the confines of its ever increasing constraints." xerox

Thank you xerox.
The usurpation of Liberty in Drug War is an intrinsic absurdity.
It's a Founding principle of the United States that Liberty is an unalienable right.
Unalienable means, not to be separated, given away, or taken away.
Yet they punish the exercise of Liberty as a crime.

How on Earth can the exercise of an unalienable right possibly be a crime?

Preposterous!

"Marijuana has been implicated in the onset of mental health problems revolving around psychosis ..." Laird

Perhaps.
I'd want to review the study methodology before I accept your characterization of the conclusion.

For example, how did they determine cause & affect?

Did the marijuana promote the psychosis?
Or are those already predisposed to psychosis more likely to attempt to self-medicate with marijuana, or other drugs, legal or not?

And I suspect NFL players suffer more harm from their football activity than dopers do from smoking themselves into oblivion.
If the government nanny-State is going to protect us from ourselves; why is it allowing the apparently substantially more serious harm of NFL conduct?
If protecting citizens is the objective, shouldn't they have a War against Football? (and rappelling, & scuba diving, and parachute jumping, and hang gliding, and spelunking, and ballet dancing, and ...)

The U.S. Drug War is a monumental waste of time and resources.
It has rendered "the land of the free, and the home of the brave" the Western nation with the highest per capita incarceration rate.
Disgracefully hypocritical.
End the martial oppression, or stop singing the song.

The sanity check that Drug War doesn't work is that for most of American history there was no Drug War. And during that time, the drug problems were less costly to society than now.

Don't take my word for it.
Just read what one of the U.S. Drug War policy making king-pins had to say about it.

"In 1960 in this country [U.S.] there were only 4,000,000 people in the entire nation who had ever used an illicit drug at any time in their life. By 1990 we had 80,000,000 people in this country who had used illicit drugs at any time in their life, and the numbers who became hard core, frequent users were proportional and commensurate." DEA Administrator Thomas Constantine

In other words; what we're doing is clearly making matters worse. Therefore we must do more of it.

"The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of [their own] folly is to fill the world with fools." Herbert Spencer

[sear]

PS

Heavy cannabis use 'damages gums'
Gum disease
Gum disease is widespread in the adult population
Heavy cannabis smoking is a major cause of gum disease, research suggests.

An international team tracked the dental health of 1,000 people born in Dunedin, New Zealand, in 1972 and 1973.

They found heavy cannabis smoking was responsible for more than one-third of the new cases of gum disease among the group by the age of 32.

The Journal of the American Medical Association study follows work linking cannabis use to mental health problems, and lung disease.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7226969.stm

Just say no to drugs.
Just say no to Drug War.

The most persuasive reason not to drink too much Saturday night, is the headache you'll have Sunday morning.
Statutory augmentation of the negative affects of drug abuse ought not be necessary.

How ironic that those that favor Drug War don't believe the consequences of drug abuse are sufficient on their own; that the negative affects must be severely augmented in law, to restore wholesome order to god's plan.

Bizarre.

[Dave Toast]

Horizon on BBC2 was a good one last night. It was all about a new scientific classification of the respective dangerousness of popular street drugs, published in the Lancet a while back: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6474053.stm. It's currently being presented to the UK govt with the aim of laws being modified accordingly.

Interestingly, they reckon that if alcohol were introduced today, it would receive the same Class A ranking as smack and charlie.

Anyways, I mention this because, when talking about weed and schizophrenia, the program referred to a study in New Zealand that has found the gene and its incidence in the population. Here's an article I found about it: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/sto ... d=10122930. I'm sure you'll find more detail if you want to research it.