Not only is dope illegal, it should be

Note Cindi's column today about Sheriff Lott and Michael Phelps.

Originally (in a somewhat condensed form), it was going to be an editorial -- that is, an expression of the consensus of the editorial board as a whole. Trouble is, we didn't reach consensus.

We were all in agreement that the sheriff was right to drop the case, and inadvisable to have taken it as far as he did. We agreed that the law should be applied equally, but that there was no case here, and discretion would dictate that the sheriff's department's resources would have been better spend elsewhere.

We also agreed that had Phelps been caught in the act, and in possession -- say, if the cops had raided the party -- he should have been prosecuted. The law is the law.

But then, we had a disagreement. Warren and I wanted to say that not only is the law the law, but it should be the law. We agree with Cindi that we don't need to have nonviolent offenders in our prisons -- they need treatment and probation, not jail time. But Warren and I believe marijuana possession should still be a crime; Cindi isn't convinced of that. She's not sure what she thinks, but she is inclined to believe it should be regulated more the way alcohol is.

We didn't get deeply into WHY we thought what we did. We were too busy scrambling to rethink tomorrow's page, turning the piece into a column (as you should know, signed columns reflect the opinion of the writer; unsigned editorials the board view) and making other changes on deadline.

But I'll tell you one reason I think the way I do. And it's the classic case of personal experience shaping one's views, so be aware. You've probably read about how heavy use of marijuana can mess with the development of an adolescent brain. Well, I've seen that up close. Someone very close to me started smoking dope heavily when he was about 12. Over the next decade you could tell that something had gone wrong with a bright and engaging kid. For one thing, he didn't grow up. Up until the time he died at age 30, he still talked like a kid. He was very credulous, having trouble telling between what was likely to be true and what was not. He lost connection with the truth. He turned to petty dishonesty in pursuit of drugs (eventually going well past marijuana, of course). He never kept any job for long. He did several stretches in jail (for trying to pass forged prescriptions, not for anything violent). Eventually, his habits led to his early death.

Note that I'm not saying m.j. was a "gateway drug" for him. I'm saying that cannabis itself did something to him at a critical point in the development of his brain and personality that caused him to fail to be the adult he would otherwise have been.

So do I think that cannabis is worse than alcohol? No, I don't think so. Each is worse in different ways. But society made the decision a while back that it was NOT going to ban alcohol; it's too ingrained in our culture. So we do what we can with regulating it, taxing it (and by the way, in SC we tax it MUCH more heavily than we do tobacco, in case you were wondering) and keeping it out of the hands of kids. We do NOT have to make the same concessions for loco weed; the case just isn't nearly as strong. Maybe if Jesus had turned the water into Panama Red, dope would have the same central role in our culture that wine does. But he didn't. His very first miracle was to affirm the central role of alcohol in a sacramental celebration. And I cite that not to make a religious or theological point, but a cultural one. Humans stopped being hunter-gatherers so they could grown barley to make beer, or so I'm convinced. We just can't root it out.

Anyway, I'm meandering now. What do y'all think? Not all at once, now...

Comments

[Greg Flowers]

Pot can do bad things to people, alcohol can bad things to people, philosophy and religion can do bad things to people. It is not the job of government to protect people against themselves. I don't use pot, but how about if we legalized it, let the major tobacco companies get into the business, undercutting the price of the illegal dealers thereby taking a bite out of crime and standardizing quality. (see modern alcohol industry v. moonshine) Tax the product heavily and use the revenues for drug education and, where needed, treatment. Selling to children would remain illegal like alcohol and tobacco (18 not 21) Clear out the court and prison systems a little bit.

[bud]

Brad, do you have one shred of evidence to support your claim. Could it be that the kid was just plain messed up for some reason other than the pot. Heck, maybe he was snorting glue on the side or drank too many Mountain Dews. Besides no one is suggesting it's a good idea for 12 year olds to smoke pot any more than it's a good idea for 12 year olds to drive, vote or drink alcohol. Can't we at least stick with the premise that we're talking about adults here?

I'll go even further than Cindi on this one. Not only do I think pot should be legal but I don't think juries should convict pot smokers under the current laws even if the evidence shows their guilt. The law is so bad it should just be ignored by folks who have a bit of common sense.

Can we all at least agree that medicinal pot should be legal? There really is no valid argument against that.

[Lee Muller]

Legalizing pot and taxing it heavily just puts the government in competition with the other smugglers and dealers. If it were legalized tomorrow, the government would never catch up to the gangs. They would just be another drug gang in a new drug war with competitors.

Government should not be selling, or making most of the money from the sale of, dope, liquor, cigarettes, gambling and prostitution.

Good government encourages good behavior. That does not mean moralistic initiatives to ban or punish cigarette smoking and beer drinking. It means not being in position to encourage vice.

Back in the 1930s, marijuana and cocaine were legal, then illegal, but not a big problem. They could be bought legally at the drugstore with prescriptions. The handful of users in Columbia were known by name, and monitored. The police records are still there in journals.

The reason it was not a problem was social stigma. Government is relatively impotent compared to social stigma. Lack of stigma for drug abuse, alcohol abuse, coarse behavior, and irresponsible sex is what is missing today.

[bud]

Maybe if Jesus had turned the water into Panama Red, dope would have the same central role in our culture that wine does. But he didn't. His very first miracle was to affirm the central role of alcohol in a sacramental celebration.
-Brad

Your argument just lost any hope of credibility with this. Religion should not even be a consideration in this debate. And I'm sure there is some religion that DOES treat cannibus in a religious context.

[jessup]

"His very first miracle was to affirm the central role of alcohol in a sacramental celebration."

Good God

Tying Jesus to booze.

The inescapable point here being that if he were about in the land today that he'd be the owner of a liquor store?

[jessup]

http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/457/nevada_clergy_support_marijuana_legalization

Hey bud,

This may answer your question.

[bud]

Here's a nice article about marijuana in a religious context. Hindus, among others, have used it in religious ceremonies for centuries.

http://www.thc-ministry.net/marijuana-religion.html

[Mab]

Do y'all not think our Native American shamans burned a bud or two (get it, bud!?) in those peace pipes?

The herb comes out of God's green earth! It was not cooked up in some laboratory by greedy pharmaceutical companies.

Jesus had the forethought that if he turned all the water into Panama Red, they would have nothing to treat their resulting cottonmouth. Brad, you gotta think it thru, dude.

I'm with you, bud, on the misguided 12-year old kid -- there may have been some pre-existing conditions that "urged" him along the path he chose.

[Weldon VII]

Bud, your spell of "delimna" over on the Detroit bailout thread seriously undercuts your marijuana argument, not to mention the "cannibus" you planted here.

Still, if I hadn't seen cannabis play opening act for the smack that turned an acquaintance into a flesh-covered skeleton, I wouldn't think there was a dilemma here.

Pot ruins some people. Alcohol ruins others.

That flesh-covered skeleton, though, was the most muscular fellow in a clique of mostly nerds I hung with at Carolina, and there was another guy on my hall there, a guy I played in a band with briefly, who did at least a brief tour on Bull Street thanks to dancing with Mary Jane, so I'm with Brad. Keep it illegal.

The most marijuana ever did for me was make me laugh at a terrible movie. Thirty-five years later, I'm still not convinced that's a good thing.

[Mab]

I'm allergic to it myself. But there's not a good enough reason I couldn't grow it in my garden for those not afflicted by said allergy.

Except that it's illegal -- while all those loopy chemicals that come from the pharmacy aren't.

This so-called illegality is cutting into my ability to stimulate the economy, people...

[bud]

Brad and Weldon, I don't believe personal anectdotes have any persuasive power, especially on this issue. There are just too many unknowns. I personally don't know of a soul that's had any long term problems with pot. In fact I don't know anyone my age that still smokes it. It's mostly a passing fad.

I just saw a show about mountain folks in eastern Kentucky. They were addicted to a wide variety of drugs. But one of the most damaging substances was Mountain Dew. It rotted folks teeth out and caused a wide range of disorders from obesity to diabetes. Folks were putting the stuff in baby bottles! After watching that show I was ready to ban Mountain Dew! But of course all that was anecdotal and proved nothing.

There have been clinical studies that show different things but mostly that pot is not terribly addictive and that the health risks are far less than for alcohol and cigarettes. I believe a far better case can be made to ban the Catholic Church than to keep pot illegal. I don't know of anyone who smoked pot and committed the heinous crimes that the Catholic Clergy did. Frankly this isn't even worthy of debate. Pot should be legal, period.

[Brad Warthen]

You mean Mountain Dew the soft drink, or mountain dew the moonshine?

And hey, I didn't link Jesus to wine. He did. That was his very first miracle. Of course, it reads like it wasn't his plan to make that his very first miracle. His mom nagged him into it. But he still did it. He didn't turn the water into Gatorade; he turned it into wine. And really GOOD stuff, too, they say.

That said, I would venture to say that more people get messed up on alcohol in our society than cannabis, just because it IS so ubiquitous. When there's no law against staggering from bar to bar getting increasingly loaded, eventually someone's going to get behind the wheel of a car, or go home and beat his wife, or die of cirrhosis. Not to mention getting fat and all that entails. (So which is more fattening -- the carbs in beer, or the munchies?)

But we tried prohibition of alcohol, and ended up deciding that's not what we wanted, so the best we can do is regulate and try to minimalize the ill effects of alcohol. The last thing we need to do is legalize any other substances that make you high. We've got enough problems.

One last point, and this is just a digression: How come we hear so much about medicinal marijuana, in the smoking form? Seems like the best way to deliver it as a medication would be THC pills. Which I believe is already legally available under the brand name Dronabinol. Or is there something I'm not following?

Also, for the person who said they're allergic -- I can identify. Stuff makes my nose run, just being around it. Also, I seem to have read that it's about as carcinogenic as cigarette smoke. And y'all know how I feel about that. If tobacco weren't legal, and someone was trying to make it so, I'd be against it, for all the reasons I want us to raise the tax on it.

Another point to consider: Just as nobody ever needs to smoke a cigarette, nobody ever needs to smoke a joint (unless I'm wrong about the Dronabinol thing, and there really is some medical condition that only a toke will relieve).

[bud]

Mountain Dew the yellow/green soft drink.

[bud]

It may not be possible to swallow pills if the condition being treated is nasuea. Supositories may work but smoking is best.

[Workin' Tommy C]

Cindi missed the most obvious point: this was all about Leon Lott getting face time on national television and being written about in the AP and newspapers across America. He saw the chance for his fifteen minutes of fame and took it despite the prima facie idiocy of even looking as though he will try to make a case based on a photograph and the testimony of students with questionable sobriety at the time of the incident.

As for the drug laws, it should be up to the states with no interference from the Federal Government (except for their enforcing our borders cutting off the drugs flowing into the country).

Personally, I'm against drugs of any type and believe there have to be laws against them. How they're punished is another matter however and I'm against the Federal government leading this idiotic "War on Drugs."

[Birch Barlow]

The most persuasive argument I have heard for legalization of marijuana is that it would force out drug dealers on the streets and replace them with legitimate business.

I think this would have some positive effects. Legitimate business wouldn't be selling to underage kids. Otherwise normal citizens would no longer have to associate with potentially danerous criminals. A young male with all the odds already against him has one more reason to stay in school and away from crime when drug dealing is no longer more profitable than getting a job.

Let's not create unnecessary demand for a black market like we did with the prohibition of alcohol.

And just to tie all the current events back together.

[Mab]

THC pills would take away the God-given right and pleasure of smoking. Additionally, the pill form would put production right back in the hands of the greedy pharmaceutical companies -- not the selfless farmers of this friendly herb.

Some approach sharing a toke as a social gesture, much the way the Indians gathered 'round it socially, peacefully, even religiously.

It is a tried and true placebo for recovering alcoholics and should be dispensed medicinally at all A.A. meetings.

My allergy consists of the insomnia that marijuana creates. Days and days of insomnia. More research is needed in this area, because while some may find it relaxing -- others are merely inundated with more things to think about. Many of us, as you may agree, DO NOT need more things to think about.

[Weldon VII]

Bud, when your life becomes the anecdote, you think different.

[KP]

I would think the point of recovering from alcoholism is not spending your life high, escaping destructively from your troubles. Replacing one drug high with another might preserve your liver but otherwise seems like treading water.

I'm with Mab, though. All m.j. did for me was make me spend hours and hours obsessively examining a small spot on my white trousers. I decided I could do without more small stuff to obsess over.

[Mab]

KP, it's more like a dry happy hour, not perpetual escapism. The people who had no control once they took that first drink, in contrast, know when to say when -- and go on about their business. And I mean, business.

I haven't seen any destructive aspects, whatsoever. But -- I am talking about adults. Minors would be a different matter altogether.

[Lamont]

Before god turned water into wine..he gave his blessing for marijuana becacause its an herb!!

Genesis, Chapter 1, verse 29

And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.

[Aunt Esther]

Lamont...we're comin' to join ya honey...

[Granny Clampett]

It might not cure your rheumatiz,but it'll make ya happy ya GOT it!

[blue bunny]

OMG I agree with Bud on something.

the current prohibition is a waste of time and resources.

[O. B. Server]

re: "Humans stopped being hunter-gatherers so they could grown barley to make beer, or so I'm convinced."

I gave a groan as well when I read this piece.

I'm also convinced that the very illegality of cannabis caused his friend to come into contact with other illegal substances like coke and heroin and speed.

Heck, just living in many repressive U.S. communities made me want to smoke all the cannabis I could, as soon as I could.