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This may not be appropriate for the Wyoming forum but I have known a couple of people that were dying on cancer chemotherapy that started using marijuana so they could overcome the nausea induced starvation. They did not starve to death but recovered and their cancers are in remission. This justifies having marijuana available in an open and legal manner. People should not have to break the law to save their lives because some frightened people are afraid of everything.
I think my state, New Hampshire, which does allow medical marijuana, should remove the restrictions on MJ and legalize the sales in the State owned liquor stores as we do with booze. IMHO the problems of public MJ usage is far less than the problems created by the criminals supplying the stuff illegally.
You've stated your justification for the medical use of MJ. And acknowledge that your State has allowed this legal use where folk don't have to "break the law" to obtain, possess, and use it.
So to further allow MJ use per your "criminals supplying the stuff illegally" argument isn't really about MEDICAL use ... it's simply about getting stoned.
I watched the "medical use" process in Colorado. From a practical standpoint, everybody who wanted legal MEDICAL use of MJ had access to it; there were many "doctors" who would write a prescription for same on the slightest pretext. All you had to do was to head over to their clinics and know the right words to say as far as your "medical condition" that would be alleviated by having access to MJ ... "muscle spasms", "back pain", "joint pain", etc ... and a prescription was written on the spot. It really was a "wink wink" medical process. It's how my friend's youngsters got legal access to MJ to sit around and get stoned to the point of being functionally wasted; ie, non-functional.
I am also considering the possibility of allowing the opiates to be legal without prescription. I realize these drugs are very addictive, on the same level as nicotine and alcohol, but I still think that the criminal activity costs society more then the addicted. I also realize the excessive use of opiates can result in the death of the user. So can alcohol and we tolerate those losses. Some of the revenue obtained by the state sale of these drugs can be used to help addicts the want to stop learn how to do so.
The fallacy here is that self-medicating with opiates has historically lead to other society problems. Many folk who would spend their lives in a stupor and physically dependent (addicted) to these drugs are not able to support themselves, and turn to other means for survival ... like burglaries, robberies, or public assistance. I, for one, choose to not want to have to support their habit and addiction, even if your tactic would be to make it much less expensive for them to indulge.
The outcome is still the same, dependency upon others. It's a choice society can make, but my vote is to not support those behaviors and the folk who would indulge ... and I've seen enough of them through the years to have seen the devastation and trail of problems they've created.
As a contractor, I've hired a lot of folk for decades through such temp agencies as Labor Ready. I get to see these drug-addled folk frequently enough to know whereof I speak. For the most part, they're pretty messed up folk and real consumers of all the public assistance programs they can get their hands on. Their personal habit and dependency is very consumptive upon the rest of us in terms of housing, food, medical assistance, clothing, and enough money to meet their other real needs. Not to mention the burden they place upon the legal system, or the broken families/homes, or the violence that seems to be part & parcel of their existence.
I can only surmise from your comments above that you've never seen this side of society and the druggies that inhabit it. It's not a pretty picture, and one I wouldn't advocate as lightly as you do with an outlook that these folk will simply fall prey to their own demise from their abuse.
The fact is that their dependency is very costly to everyone else and society at large around them.
IMO, Enabling them as you advocate is the height of stupidity given the well-known outcomes from such drug availability.
PS: for several years, I dated women who were either pyschologists or lawyers who had a lot of contact in their practices with the druggie crowd; this is a really huge business and drag upon society resources. The tales that they had to tell of violence, self-destruction, and adverse affects upon others inflicted by the druggie folk in the system was heartbreaking. Many of these druggie folk were otherwise talented individuals but on a totally wrong path that use a lot of other people's resources to destruction.
As well, I was visiting with a neighbor the other day about his welding/fencing business and mentioned that my "best" labor ready worker ... a skilled certified welder ... just got sent back to prison to finish out the last 18 months of his incarceration because he'd busted his parole by getting a DUI. My neighbor observed that he'd seen a lot of such talented people with dependencies in the oil patch through the years and he had no sympathy for them for years. For that matter, neither does the industry; drug testing and random drug testing is now the norm in the business as a condition for employment.
PPS: until the day comes that the destruction and damage to others done by drug-addled or dependent folk can be completely made whole, I see no justification to enable easy access to that lifestyle. Again, I've personally been damaged by folk under the influence ... either by car accident, thefts from my business (tools and materials), burglaries from my cars at my residence in Denver, and customer cars in my lot behind a fence. My children, under the custody of my ex, lived in a neighborhood where drug use/dealing was common, and my kids grew up terrified of their neighbors ... kids who should have been playmates, but were instead part of the drug culture of violence and theft. My kids learned the hard way that you couldn't leave your bicycle out on the front porch, not for a minute, let alone in your front yard ... because it was stolen immediately. They grew up in terror of having their "stuff" stolen from their house ... which got burglarized a half-dozen times in 4 years. (Recently, now 25 years later, the cops finally busted the house across the street from where the kids lived for awhile ... and recovered a bunch of items stolen from my ex's house as part of tracking down merchandise that was in that basement gathering dust all these years. In addition to TV's and audio gear, the cops identified a couple of my kid's bicycles ... now fit for my grandchildren.
The reason my ex finally left that area was due to the house next door setting a trap for a pizza delivery ... the deliveryman came to the door and was shot/killed, simply for a pizza. That's not gang violence or drug turf wars violence, that's drug addled stupid behavior. Allowing that family to kill somebody over such a trivial thing is, IMO, tantamount to what you're proposing by legalizing drugs. Other folk's lives are being placed at risk. Too bad that you haven't seen these costs to society to understand what you're advocating in your ignorance. I have seen this, repeatedly, and it's not acceptable at all.
Or do you think that I'm just being a 'fraidy cat and alarmed at simple inconveniences which present as part of the druggie culture?
I don't believe that the risks of other losses and deaths are justified by allowing folk to get wasted for their pleasure or escape from reality ... or whatever their rationalization is to do so.
brancalf at least the "Pot heads" don't come on here an outright lie. Did you read Old Town's post?
Had I been caught lying like that I would have disappeared from the thread. Instead you must be used to it and simply switch the subject to something else. Having lost all credibility however I pass through to the next post.
WestGuest - They won't give it up... Wyoming is caught between the liberal Colorado and the libertarian Montana. We can go on and on about the crime in Colorado that existed way prior to legalization and we can ramble on about expensive alternative drugs that only aid the pharmaceutical companies and provide less help than pot.
We can talk about Hick waffling on pot and on fracking and it doesn't matter. The flavor of the tread is that legalization will lead to even more pot heads instead of sensible regulation. But, it's cool, because medicinal marijuana will become a reality very soon at the federal level with bipartisan support. And, then perhaps, the Wyoming "pot heads" can add to their state's economy instead of adding to their neighbors.
I love this state and the bias of the few does not override the live and let live code in Wyoming.
We already have a medicinal form of marijuana. Marinol. You don't get high with it, though, so dopers aren't interested.
You should really educate yourself on the properties of cannabis and the benefits of CBD. Whole plant medicine is a better alternative than marinol, read up on the entourage effect.
Also, Marinol can cause a high. Why would you take a man-made, lab synthesized pharmaceutical when you can just buy some cannabis?
Marinol side effects
Get emergency medical help if you have any of these signs of an allergic reaction to Marinol: hives; difficult breathing; swelling of your face, lips, tongue, or throat.
Stop using Marinol and call your doctor at once if you have:
mood changes, anxiety, panic, paranoia, extreme fear;
hallucinations (seeing or hearing things that are not real), nightmares;
confusion, unusual thoughts or behavior;
problems with speech, ringing in your ears;
pounding heartbeats or fluttering in your chest; or
a light-headed feeling, like you might pass out.
Common Marinol side effects may include:
feeling "high";
nausea, vomiting, stomach pain, diarrhea;
weakness;
depressed mood;
muscle pain;
eye redness, vision problems; or
flushing (warmth, redness, or tingly feeling).
This is not a complete list of side effects and others may occur. Call your doctor for medical advice about side effects. You may report side effects to FDA at 1-800-FDA-1088.
So feeling high is considered a bad side effect of Marinol? Hmmm. People better stay away from dope then for sure.
Perhaps you ought to educate yourself on the listing of side effects of most medications and why they have to be on there.
No. You said that pot heads aren't interested because they can't get high off it. You are wrong.
A lot of side effects for rx drugs are scary, that's why the commercials for them are 30 seconds of what they do and 3min of side effects.
With the nations dependency on rx drugs, a lot of them opioids that are addictive and deadly, cannabis is a relatively harmless alternative for a lot of what ails those same people on expensive, addictive, deadly RX drugs.
I get it, you are a prohibitionist, fine. With all the studies that have been done/are being done, with more and more people coming out in favor for not only medical cannabis, but full on decriminalization, you and the majority of posters in this thread, will be standing on the wrong side of history. The Genie is out of the bottle, and it isn't going back in. Anyone willing to do the legwork, keeps an open mind, reads the studies, can tell that the propaganda that's been pushed for 70+ years has been not only wrong, but defies common sense.
That you country boys and girls want to continue to support the drug cartels, and increase your taxes to support the incarceration of non violent drug addicts, instead of actually helping people with real drug addictions get off the drugs, is a pretty good definition of mentally defective.
I don't think we should incarcerate so many people for simple drug violations (except for dealers).
However, the idea that if you are against legalization you support drug cartels is complete nonsense.
The drug cartels are EMPOWERED by legalization. They have even more incentive to send more drugs here. Legalization will NOT put drug cartels out of business. But it will incentivize them.
I don't think we should incarcerate so many people for simple drug violations (except for dealers).
However, the idea that if you are against legalization you support drug cartels is complete nonsense.
The drug cartels are EMPOWERED by legalization. They have even more incentive to send more drugs here. Legalization will NOT put drug cartels out of business. But it will incentivize them.
That is completely wrong I don't see any liquor gangs operating it is all regulated. Sure a few people may brew without a license but 99 percent of the population buys from legal producers and shops. People who are against legalization support the gangs by giving them power over a market that should be run by legit businessmen and not criminals.
I don't think we should incarcerate so many people for simple drug violations (except for dealers).
However, the idea that if you are against legalization you support drug cartels is complete nonsense.
The drug cartels are EMPOWERED by legalization. They have even more incentive to send more drugs here. Legalization will NOT put drug cartels out of business. But it will incentivize them.
If cartels were empowered by things that were legal and regulated, there wouldn't be cartels.
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