California: 2010 Elections - Page 4

1% of the 36,961,000 Californians, which is about 369,000 people give or take. There are also their family who also have genetic risk and should watch out. Drug companies will not put out a drug if they knew that it would affect people for far less than 1% because they knew that it could affects hundreds of thousands and probably sue their ass out of business.


You don't get it do you? Lot of people who voted against prop 19 people not against legalization of marijuana itself but against prop 19 for various reasons such as it being poorly written, which LA Times made it clear as to why they came out against it along with tons of other major California newspapers, to in my case, not doing anything to protect people at risk.


And btw just out of pure curiosity , what the hell is with the arbitrary 21 and over rule? Why discriminate against the 18 to 20 age group?

See, I don't understand that. I could see the use staying the same or going up, but not down. Everyone I know who smokes are going to continue doing it, legal or not.

The same exact way that you deal with an employer that is an alcoholic, or that smokes tobacco.

i will send you information about schizophrenia and marijuana use compared to alcohol abuse because you seem to not understand that alcohol is MUCH worse and frequently abused by schizophrenics (and those with a pre-disposition, because that is all that we are talking about, it has been proven that marijuana does NOT cause schizophrenia.)

as for Prop 19, first you say you are against it bc of the schizophrenic studies, then because of the workplace drug testing confusion, and now because it was "poorly written". can you think for yourself at all? you basically sputtered out most of the hysteria created by the Times and various other media outlets word for word. why would you believe everything you read in the LA Times? it is widely known that they distort the truth and have outside interests since they got bought out.

im really curious what was poorly written about prop 19?
we have already discussed why the drug testing fears are unfounded, what else you got?

why is alcohol age limit 21 and over? same reasons for legalization.

i just don't understand how anyone can be on the same side as anslinger and the others that caused marijuana to be illegal, and why people wouldn't jump at any opportunity given to repeal these horrible laws. did you know that one of the reasons marijuana was made illegal was becuause it created competition for paper production from trees. If marijuana was kept legal, we wouldn't have had to clear down acres of forests for paper like we did in such a short amount of time...(many many many more horrible reasons prohibition was wrong, do your research please)

having a 21 age limit and is a lame reason to keep prohibition laws

http://norml.org/index.cfm?Group_ID=3383

Portugal is a good example of what happens when drugs are decriminalized :

http://www.time.com/time/health/arti...893946,00.html
http://www.scientificamerican.com/ar...riminalization
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=10080

When considering marijuana specifically Netherlands deserves a look too:
http://www.drugpolicy.org/news/05_04_04dutchdecrim.cfm
http://mensnewsdaily.com/2010/09/03/...ear-mongering/

Analyzing the RAND study...http://stopthedrugwar.org/speakeasy/...ijuana_legaliz

Lets legalize it here, I would like to see if my stoner friends give it up

And I've yet to see anybody here advocating that alcohol is not bad for schizophrenia. Stop trying to pull a red herring.


I already stated originally I was going to the ballot blank before I found out that it is not cover under the smoke free workplace. Like I said, I had reservations about opening marijuana being made more easily accessible because that is another catalyst that will place them at risk but I was going to leave the prop alone anyway until I realize that second hand smoke could place them at risk through no fault of their own.

As for prop 19 being "poorly written", that's reason of LA Times. Stop putting words in my mouth.


The point of having the 21 and over limit was to reduce consumption of alcohol among young people. Is there any particular reason why we should reduce the consumption of marijuana in young people between 18 to 20 because it looks nice on the initiative? Particularly when you're giving me the idea here that there is no "negative side effects" and that popular reason, "they could get it anyway"?

It's funny that you're pulling out all these inane guilty by association reasons to try to persuade others go over to your side. Being on the same side as anslinger. The ban being a racist law when you yourself claimed that Planned Parenthood had help you in another thread, which anti-abortionists would argue that it is a racist organization.

I could report an employer smoking tobacco to Cal/OSHA for breaking the law. Whatever made you think that they could do anything about marijuana?

I checked out the link and walked away with 1. It's all just speculations then and 2. "RAND tries to pretend that it’s a nonpartisan and unbiased research center, but as long as it employs people like Rosalie Pacula, who has acted time and again like the RAND Drug Policy Research Center is her own personal tool for opposing legalization, it is an organization with absolutely no credibility" from the link they provided, which is really another smear and guilty by association argument. That's basically the same refutation that Richard Lee used in the Fora video and I don't find it convincing at all.

Ben Kilmer raised the point that legalization of marijuana would

1. take away the stigma of it, which could increase consumption.
2. Allow advertising of it, which could increase consumption
3. allow the growing and production of marijuana legally (this is currently NOT the case in Netherlands. They "tolerate" the use of it, but growing and supplying it remains illegal, which is why the price remains high due to the legal risk of bringing to the market.) and making the cost of producing go down and this will be reflected in the price the consumer will pay.

Maybe they should start attacking the actual points being made.

I'll check out the rest of the sites you provided later.

Nice! you STILL failed to address why we should keep racist and greedy laws prohibiting marijuana....

The reason i mention alcohol when talking about schizophrenia and marijuana use is because in order to understand substance abuse with this disease and its effects you have to look at the whole picture. When compared to marijuana alcohol is much worse and frequently abused by schizophrenics than marijuana. If we made decisions based on what is best for schizophrenics we should be fighting hard to prohibit alcohol. The whole point you are missing is that the association between schizophrenia and marijuana use is not basis for keeping this plant illegal.

As for linking the LA Times reasons against 19, you are a parrot and it is sad that you believe(and many other Californians) these blatant lies.

finally why the HELL would you need to bring up Planned Parenthood in this conversation at all? FYI me getting birth control at planned parenthood has NOTHING to do with the prohibition of marijuana, prop 19 or legalization of drugs at all. (btw an organization can not be compared to a law, FAIL)
This is the most evidence that you are absolutely clueless about prohibition of marijuana and are once again drawing at straws for anything you can grab onto to defend your support of prohibition. (the prohibition that began because it "drives mexicans and blacks to commit crimes"...and other horrible non-supported reasons).

Im finished discussing this with you malcontent. We will have legalization in California and eventually the entire USA, sorry that you can't understand why.

You really ought to stop feeding me all those red herrings, they're really not vegetarian.

The fact alcohol is more harmful to schizophrenics does not mean that 1. marijuana is not harmful to them, 2. you weren't telling others harmful misinformation that could jeopardize somebody's health for sakes something used for recreation and 3. both alcohol and marijuana should be legal. Or illegal. It at most means that our drug policies toward marijuana and alcohol are inconsistent. I'm afraid I don't spend that much time worrying about alcohol but I guess if they're ever going to consider banning alcohol, I will listen to the arguments of the proponents of the ban with an open mind. I can't say I'm happy to add another drug to the existing legal mix.

But that you've convinced me of the evils of the bottle...


Uh, you were accusing me of believing their reasons for their oppositions to be my own. I didn't read anything about how it would affects the workplace (more like from the California Chamber of Commerce) or extensive details on the effects of marijuana of schizophrenics. But then I'm only subscribed to their weekend papers... If you're really that easily confused, maybe you should consider laying off something...


I pointed it out because as anyone had spent time arguing with anti-abortionists extensively probably knows, that's one of the arguments they like to come up with. From the silly ones anyway. And nobody who is prochoice cares.

I don't give a rat's ass that Margaret Sanger used PP to advance her racist eugenics agenda when the organization is doing tons to help disadvantaged women and their children many of which are blacks get low cost and free health care just like I don't give a rat's ass that the original intent of the ban was racist when it works toward my ends.



All the reasons for me to donate to the opposition the next time around.

By the way, using the Netherlands and Portugal as examples to show that we should legalize marijuana is kind of a bad argument because their drug policies are not good parellels to what the proponents are trying to do with Prop 19, which would make California a place with the most liberal marijuana policy in the modern industrialized world.

*Both countries decriminalized marijuana. Neither of them legalized it. Decriminalization does not mean legalization. And as people probably knows, it has been decriminalized already as of Oct 1st.
* It's still illegal to grow marijuana in a large scale in both countries so the Rand Corp study's still holds. In fact, the Dutch are getting tough on cracking down on the plantations.
* Portugal still legally discourage people from smoking marijuana but fining them or by sending them to rehabilitation programs.


The lowest marijuana user rates in the world are actually in Asia, where strict marijuana laws are still in place (1.5% in Japan, 0.3% in China and 3.6% in HK). Maybe the Dutch and the Portuguese are doing something right and their approaches are worth a look. But saying that liberal policies automatically means fewer drug uses is a hasty conclusion considering that there are countries with strict policies and even lower drug user rates.

starting a thread in the heap to have others join in on this discussion...