Posted on 07/09/2007 7:21:35 PM PDT by Eric Blair 2084
WASHINGTON -- News that Al Gore's 24-year-old son, Al Gore III, was busted for pot and assorted prescription pills has unleashed a torrent of mirth in certain quarters.
Gore-phobes on the Internet apparently view the son's arrest and incarceration as comeuppance for the father's shortcomings. Especially rich was the fact that young Al was driving a Toyota Prius when he was pulled over for going 100 mph -- just as Papa Gore was set to preside over concerts during a 24-hour, seven-continent Live Earth celebration to raise awareness about global warming.
Whatever one may feel about the former vice president's environmental obsessions, his son's problems are no one's cause for celebration. The younger Gore's high-profile arrest does, however, offer Americans an opportunity to get real about drug prohibition, and especially about marijuana laws.
For the record, I have no interest in marijuana except as a public policy matter. My personal drug of choice is a heavenly elixir made from crushed grapes. But it is, alas, a drug.
Tasty, attractive and highly ritualized in our culture, wine and other alcoholic beverages are approved for responsible use despite the fact that alcoholism and attendant problems are a plague, while responsible use of a weed that, at worst, makes people boring and hungry, is criminal.
Pot smokers might revolt if they weren't so mellow.
Efforts over the past few decades to relax marijuana laws have been moderately successful. Twelve states have decriminalized marijuana, which usually means no prison or criminal record for first-time possession of small amounts for personal consumption. (Those states are: Alabama, California, Colorado, Maine, Minnesota, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, New York, North Carolina, Ohio and Oregon.)
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...
I agree about changing pot laws. But Al Gore’s son, like Rush Limbaugh, is also apparantly an abuser of pharmies. Dopers will find their dope. So what then? Legalize everything? I like pot, but I don’t see easy solutions. I will say that I’m a better judge of my self interest than the gubmint.
I thought the accepted statistic in the medical community was that twice as many smokers contracted lung cancer as non-smokers. Since non-smokers contract it at a rate of 3.5 per 100 that means smokers contract lung cancer at 7 per 100.
My mother was involved all over the state regarding the subject and I have had first hand talks with many inmates myself who have gotten out into half way houses in an attempt to get over the drug dependence and they all mentioned the big role pot had.
Don’t try to peddle poison to the healthy and young, it isn’t the nice or right thing to do.
As I said I’m not recommending taking any drugs. You were the one who recommended drinking for recreation.
Rush offered some friendly advice to Al Jr. on drug dependency from his personal experience. He asked that we don’t tell anyone lest it ruin his well crafted reputation as an uncaring capitalist pig.
I’m a libertarian. Now you know the rest of the story.
People tend to say what you want them to say when they perceive there are bennies in it for them.
What you aren't saying is that the vast majority of pot smokers never have a problem with the law. In spite of the fact that it's illegal to possess and use in most places.
Great, so we should not be here excusing recreational drug use either. It’s bad stuff, let people avoid it please.
Well, no, but as I understand it, the research on it’s effects are pretty mediocre at best.
Of course if America thinks it has an obesity problem now...;)
I am also not excusing it. I am simply telling the truth about it. I don’t need to offer excuses for anyone else’s behavior.
There are of course some who hardly use and never get in trouble, but the violent offenders pretty much all had pot involved in their problems when they committed crime and had to go to prison.
You need to quit excusing recreational drug use as normal or excusable.
Recreational drug use is not a conservative behavior, it is a problem.
http://www.catholicrainbowoutreach.com/index.htm
Here is a prison ministry where it destroyed most of the men living there, go tell it to them and their destroyed families and disabled lives.
I am not excusing anything and it is disingenuous of you to keep saying so. The fact is there are many people who smoke daily, the vast majority of pot smokers, who never have problems with it legal or otherwise. I also doubt that most violent offenders smoke pot but if they do correlation is not causation. You can keep repeating that they do but it doesn’t mean a thing without statistical proof and some sort of evidence that pot causes criminal behavior as opposed to criminals being more disposed to using pot.
It’s like talking to a brick wall.
Most all violent offenders in California for rape, murder and such were on drugs and substances at the time that almost always INCLUDED pot.
Pot is a problem, not a blessing.
Quit treating a turd like a blessing.
That’s a joke right? Pot destroyed these violent criminals lives not the violence they perpetrated!?!? With help like yours no wonder there’s such high recidivism.
I don't believe that. Where is your evidence? I feel like I'm talking to a broken record.
Want to see drug abuse? Look no further than the medical/pharmaceutical establishment. When people need spreadsheets to keep track of medications, you know things have gotten out of hand.
I bet those violent criminals all had guns or knives too. Let's outlaw guns and knives they're obviously a curse.
See my post 29 to this link for the statistics of a fairly frequently cited survey conducted in Canada. The lifetime risk is more than either you or I initially sited. But a google search or medpub search will give lots of numbers that are slightly higher than your 7% figure, usually around 11%.
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