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Emerald Initiative fights marijuana use penalties
Published: Friday, April 17th, 2009
A new proposal called the Emerald Initiative is challenging campuses across the country to reduce penalties for students caught using marijuana. President Tilghman said in an e-mail that she had “heard nothing” about the petition and therefore had “no opinion ...(back to the article)
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Unaware? what IS she aware of? Take Michigan's lead!
I welcome the deluge of drugs coming across the border from Mexico because as the volume of drugs increases the likelihood that anybody is going to be busted gets smaller and smaller, in effect legalizing drugs. The idea that we can somehow stop drugs by turning our police forces into uncontollable paramilitary occupation forces dressed in black SWAT gear and traveling in armored vehicles and battering down innocent civilian's front doors at will in our own It's time for marijuana to be legalized. A group of 20,000 very serious policemen, prosecutors and attorneys have formed a group to legalize ALL drugs, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (http://leap.cc ) They see what happened when we legalized alcohol in 1932 as a good example of how drug legalization would work. We can't stop drugs. They're sick of chasing drug users and sending innocent people to prison for decades just because they like to get high. This foolish war on drugs has lasted 37 years and cost us over a TRILLION dollars and we are not an inch closer to stopping drugs. How many millions of Americans are we going to lock up in prison for decades? Legalize ALL drugs now. Mark Montgomery boboberg@nyc.rr.com
Waaah! Waaah! Waaah! De mean ole lib'rals is pickin' on me again! Waaaah!
Did we not learn anything from alcohol prohibition?
Marijuana prohibition has been an indisputable failure. Legalize it and take the money out of the black market. Marijuana is less dangerous than either alcohol or tobacco yet both of those substances are legal (and should be). Every year our prison system releases violent offenders to make room for non-violent pot smokers. That is just plain insanity. Think of how better society would be served if our law enforcement efforts were directed more towards dealing with violent individuals. We would also save millions of dollars on prosecution costs and jail expenses. Have you ever seen a "COPS" episode where the police were called out to an incident because someone was high on pot? How about because someone was on alcohol?
There is also substantial evidence indicating marijuana has numerous medical uses as well.
This is a plant, legalize it and regulate it. We need to look at this issue using nothing more than basic common sense. Isn't it time to drop the "Reefer Madness" stupidity?
Interesting blog. The Boomers passing the generational torch to Generation Jones may be a game changer in the movement to legalize weed. Obama, and many of his key appointees, are members of GenJones--born 1954-1965, between the Boomers and Generation X. Many top national commentators (from Newsweek, NBC, CNN, etc.) have spoken about the importance and relevance of GenJones as the new generation of leadership.
Jonesers are by far the biggest pot smokers compared to the other generations. While Boomers are associated with pot, it was only a small, albeit very visible, segment of Boomers who actually smoked pot back in the day. Govt. and independent studies show that Jonesers as teens (in the 1970s) smoked 15 to 20 times more pot than Boomers did as teens. And not only did Jonesers smoke much more grass than any other generation of teens in US history, but still today--in middle-age--smoke it a remarkable amount. The data is really striking.
Additionally, one of the key collective personality traits consistently attributed to Jonesers is their pragmatism; they are far likelier to put aside ideology and deal with drugs in a realistic and practical way.
If ever there was a generation of leadership open to legalizing pot, it probably is Generation Jones. And if there ever was a time that the country might be open to this change in drug laws, perhaps it"s now…
portugal decriminalized drug use in 2001 (although selling is still against
the law), and there has apparently been a decrease in drug-related criminal
activity. what we're also going to need if/when we do this is an increased
availability of treatment for those who want to stop.