Heating Up for the Elections

In the upcoming elections in November, one of the most contentious ballot issues will be solved. If proposition 19 passes, California will become the first state to completely legalize marijuana. All adults over the age of 21 would be able to carry up to an ounce of weed without having to worry about the cops busting them. If legalized it is estimated that California could save up to 7.7 billion dollars on law enforcement and make 2.2 billion on the taxes they could apply to it. The amount of pot related arrests would drop by up to 60,000 per year. It has recently been backed by retired police chiefs, judges, and other state officials. Even if it passes, the Californians are probably far from being able to finally legally light up due to the Drug Enforcement Administration who will most likely persuade the government to make a legal challenge against the proposition. It could be years before this proposition could become a law.

Some believe that the costs of controlling marijuana production and sale will cost us more than it will benefit us. These people also believe there are many dangers in the decriminalization of weed. Alex Wodak and Colin Drummond explain that there are several social costs to this too. If it is legalized, they believe many will become less productive in their workplace which in the end will cause the economy overall to respond negatively. Policymakers in the US also agree that marijuana is a dangerous drug. They feel that it is a stepping stone to other, worse drugs which can cause real harm to the body, such as cocaine and heroine. Some other negative effects are short term memory loss, difficulty thinking and problem solving, lack of coordination making one prone to injury, inability to perform complex tasks for a limited time, distorted senses, reduced athletic ability, elevated heart rate, and anxiety/ panic attacks. The President opposes the legalization of marijuana. When asked if he thinks if the legalization of marijuana would benefit our economy he responded, "The answer is, no, I don't think that is a good strategy to grow our economy... I don't think it's the right route for the American economy."
for more information- www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DanBLgI_g0

The McLaughlin Group has a few thoughts about it. First of all they believe that it shouldn't be legalized on the federal level and should be approached state by state. The group thinks that wherever the debate comes up on the state level it will be passed and legalized for that state and so far this seems to be true. They don't think Obama will choose to show ant interest in this because the health care reform has enough complexity involved in it already. One lady thinks that Governor Schwarzenegger is the only one who could dare to take this on. They seem to like the idea of taxing marijuana to help the economy of California, and they go to point out how Milton Friedman thought it would benefit our economy. Lastly they point out that the legalization of marijuana would be safer than the underground sales which occur now. Other debates like this go on daily regarding this subject. There are thousands of people on each side of this heated subject.

GreenGro Technologies has their own views on medical marijuana. They grow medical marijuana in 14 different states, including: * Alaska * California * Colorado * Hawaii * Maine * Michigan * Montana * Nevada * New Jersey * New Mexico * Oregon * Rhode Island * Vermont * and Washington. These 14 states and DC all have different limits on how much medicinal marijuana can be possessed at each time. Just recently a study was done in Pennsylvania and it was found that 80% of the population supports the legalization of medicinal marijuana, so they might not be far behind. These regulations have to do with ounces of weed and the number of plants one has. Their company has done a lot of research regarding which diseases marijuana can help relieve the symptoms of of even help heal. These diseases include: * tourette syndrome * post-traumatic stress disorder * alzheimers * multiple schlarosis * parkinsons * glaucoma * autism * cancer * schizophrenia. This company obviously is pro-legalization because this is how the company runs. "The newest results showed that medical marijuana: helps prevent the natural neural degradation from neuro-degenerative diseases, inhibits/slows cancer cell growth, and its as effective as atypical antipsychotics in treating schizophrenia"(GreenGro, 6).

Here are some statistics I found regarding the subject:
= marijuana cannot cause permanent mental illness
= marijuana is not addictive
= marijuana is considered the #1 gateway drug
= the average age of experimentation is 14 years old
= 97.5 million Americans have tried smoking weed
= since 1996 the percentage of 8th graders who had tried marijuana has dropped almost six
= since 2005 over 300,000 people have used marijuana for its medicinal purposes

If you are interested and have a minute or two, these two videos really helped me develop a basis of information on this debate...
- www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2ezdiwaaLI
- www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLQPtZs5TP8&feature=related