LOL. Are there ads for grow lights in the back pages?
I might just have to "hit" the local newsstand to get a copy of that cover and smoke it.
"The White Zone is for loading and unloading only. If you got to load or unload go to the White Zone!"
Last summer my friend and I accidentally smoked the instructions that came with the rolling papers. I've gotten much better at it now.
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This comes about three (if not four) decades too late for me.
I've kind of dropped out from the toking fraternity about a decade ago.
my music collection increased tenfolds when I switched from drug-addicts to complete nutcases.
I grew up with it. My parents were hippies, and the house was always full of "sweet smoke". I was called a "dreamy kid" by my teachers, but I probably was just stoned out of my wits most of the time.
It should be clear to anyone who reads my posts that I'm not into drugs - hard or soft - at all. Nevertheless I welcome this.
Like alcohol, drugs - any drugs - can do you damage, some more so than others. And like alcohol, prohibition does not work, and plays into the hands of people like the Mafia and Mexican drug cartels. And the interesting thing is, the strict laws brought in in the U.S. against the use of drugs such as cannabis were largely to give the relevant enforcement agencies something to do, now that the job of hunting down and closing illicit grog shops and speakeasies had been taken off their hands.
There was a fascinating radio interview recently with a guy who had travelled all over the world researching the ways in which different countries have tackled the "drug problem". The most interesting country he visited was Portugal, where at one time a massive 1% of the population were classified as being addicted to heroin. You can imagine the amount of violent crime this spawned, and how much it impacted the rest of society. At a certain point the politicians from both sides sat down together, commissioned a panel of experts to recommend the best way to tackle the problem, and agreed to abide by their recommendations. Those recommendations were: Legalise it. Legalise it all. BUT... all that money that was previously being spent on law enforcement and prosecution - use that money instead for rehabilitation. So you had situations like the government saying to an employer "This guy has experience as a mechanic; he is a user trying to rehabilitate himself; so if you give him a job we will pay half his wages for you." Astonishingly, it appears to be working, so much so that some of those who campaigned most stridently against legalisation have come out publicly and admitted they were wrong.
As someone who has always felt that taking drugs does you more harm than good, this took me a little while to accept. The thing is, though, you can't argue with facts, with actual results.
Would something that worked so well in Portugal work as well in the USA, or in Australia? Maybe not... but I would like to see a very good explanation of WHY not, before the option was ruled out. Sydney and Melbourne have huge drug problems, and Perth is not so far behind.
Sadly, there's no way that would work in the U.S.
Music isn't about chops, or even about talent - it's about sound and the way that sound communicates to people. Mike Keneally
Care to explain why you feel that's the case?Originally Posted by Scott Bails
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None of the above is possible in the U.S.
Music isn't about chops, or even about talent - it's about sound and the way that sound communicates to people. Mike Keneally
I agree that it seems unlikely, but it's not impossible. It might have to take a different route to arrive at a similar destination.
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Well, we'll have to disagree on that one, Guy.
Music isn't about chops, or even about talent - it's about sound and the way that sound communicates to people. Mike Keneally
I think what Scott Balls is saying is that the idea is unlikely to ever get tried in the U.S., rather than saying it would not work if it WERE tried.
Yes, I realize that's what he's saying. Things change. If there is resistance to it I think it's ultimately down to corruption - too many people making lots of money either in the business or being paid off to look the other way.
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Well, yeah. Corruption, an absolute refusal to work with the other side ("You've cured cancer? Bah! We need a Congressional investigation!"), an absolute refusal to seek "expert advice" that doesn't fit an already determined agenda, and no interest in rehabilitation.
Music isn't about chops, or even about talent - it's about sound and the way that sound communicates to people. Mike Keneally
I don't really believe this. Coffee, tea, cocoa and nicotine are drugs as well; they just happen to be legal.
So really all I'm saying is that putting that corruption back into its place is not impossible. I am a cynic and yet I think we have to hold out some small amount of hope that we can someday start to create some accountability for our leaders. If we give up on that possibility I'm not sure what the hell we're doing in life, lol.
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I dunno.....this election season gives me absolutely no hope.
Music isn't about chops, or even about talent - it's about sound and the way that sound communicates to people. Mike Keneally
I disagree, but I am not going to get into that here.
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Primarily because of this part:
...some of those who campaigned most stridently against legalisation have come out publicly and admitted they were wrong.
"The White Zone is for loading and unloading only. If you got to load or unload go to the White Zone!"
Our newly elected PM made the legalization of weed in our country one of his platforms... At this point, I could care less. I believe that I am finally done with smoking weed forever. I've enjoyed it less and less each of the last times I have partaken. I can't even get drunk anymore. I'll have a couple of drinks to get a comfortable glow and cut myself off.
"Corn Flakes pissed in. You ranted. Mission accomplished. Thread closed."
-Cozy 3:16-
That's similar to how I feel, Yves. I just think it should be legal and not at all a big deal if I do decide to partake. The legislature in Vermont is working on it right now which, if passed, would be the first legalization of recreational use in the US approved by the legislature rather than ballot initiative. But it's not exactly a sure thing at this point. They've managed to put some good roadblocks up for themselves.
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What drives me nuts is when medicinal marijuana is illegal.
"We know this can help you, or give you comfort, but we can't make it legal because.....well, we don't really know why. But you can't have it"
Music isn't about chops, or even about talent - it's about sound and the way that sound communicates to people. Mike Keneally
I thought I saw something recently about the federal gov't officially changing their policy on the medical stuff. Not sure how that turned out.
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There is a case in point right here in my local neighbourhood. There is a shop called "Cloud 9", part of a franchise. They sell... flowers. And chocolate bars. And... pipes, and other "smoking paraphenalia". And... everyone knows they also sell something else, but that's only tacitly acknowledged.
Entrance, oddly enough, is via the back door which is on a laneway that runs off a side street, not via the shopfront on the main street.
Recently there have been calls from local residents for the place to be either monitored or shut down, due to the presence of loud, rowdy and ill-behaved people around the back entrance at late hours. the local MP says that she is "not a Prohibitionist but..." and goes on to share the concern of the residents.
in other words, the problem is not that people are buying and taking ^%@#*#&, the problem is that due to the way the place is set up, with the shop being forced to be discreet about its business, they are encouraged to form a kind of furtive subculture. In their minds they know they are technically breaking the law already, so why care about whether they are creating a nuisance with noisy or rude behaviour?
Do you see this kind of behaviour around tobacco stores? No. Do you see it near bottle shops? No. You see it around pubs - but that's the effect of the alcohol itself, rather than anything to do with the mechanics of getting it.The problem here is not to do with the drug; it's to do with the illegality of the drug.
And another thing: cannabis being illegal, a number of substitute products have emerged, which (I am told) have similar effects but are legal on a technicality because of the chemical composition which differs in some significant way from that of cannabis. Some "adult shops", whose main business is supposedly selling sex toys and pornography, seem to derive a large fraction of their income from these maryjane substitutes. All well and good - except that there is no quality control, there have been a number of serious illnesses and at least one death resulting from use of these products. Make something legal, and you can monitor it and control it. Recently a supermarket recalled cartons of milk because a batch had been found to be contaminated. Cartons still in the shops were taken off the shelves; people who had already bought cartons could return them for a refund. You could do that with marijuana.
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