OPINION: Legal high, lower crime rates
This time of year always gets me excited. The holiday season gives me a warm-and-fuzzy feeling as I look forward to seeing family, enjoying Festivus and ogling at the beautiful Christmas trees decorated limb to limb with bells, lights and talking Capt. James T. Kirk Star Trek ornaments.
When I think of trees, I sometimes think back to a period in my life, not too long ago, that seems like another lifetime. I’m referring to a time when if I heard the word “trees,” I instantly thought about smoking pot — you know, marijuana.
Back then, Christmas had a whole different ringa-ling-ling to it. In fact, for me, any and every holiday was a great reason to get fully baked — Thanksgiving, Easter, Secretary’s Day and especially Arbor Day.
This is a touchy subject for a lot of conservatives, so I’d like to warn you that I only speak of this so openly because I’ve advanced to a stage in life in which I enjoy the milder things the world has to offer and abide by a set of voluntary suggestions called “The Word of Wisdom.”
Back in the day, though, I always told my pothead friends I’d someday be a great non-pot-smoking marijuana advocate, and I intend to live up to my prediction.
First off, I can confidently say I have enough experience with pot to be able to knowledgeably speak about it. That being said, I haven’t smoked it for more than two years and have no intentions of ever doing so again.
However, this doesn’t mean I’m going to turn my back on it and pretend it was some terrible substance that left me half-dead in a ditch, with heroin coursing through my veins and foam coming out of my mouth. It didn’t. And the beauty was when I wanted to stop smoking pot, I did. I didn’t have to go to rehab or cut down. I just quit.
I’m not ignorant. I know there are plenty of idiots that have done stupid things while stoned, and continue to give pot a bad name, but this doesn’t mean the problem is marijuana — lots of dummies do terrible things all the time, having never smoked pot.
Every time someone dies of a heroin overdose or kills people while driving drunk, I see news reports mention the dastardly, lethal narcotic marijuana was also found in the perpetrator’s system.
Can we please stop dragging pot through the mud in these stories? This would be like saying allergies may have had something to do with the death of a hiker who got mauled by a grizzly bear, just because there were flowers on the trail.
First of all, marijuana — specifically the major psychoactive chemical found in it, called THC (tetrahydrocannabinol) — bonds with fat cells in the body, which means it can remain in the system for up to four weeks, or possibly longer.
Therefore, just because a drunk driver had pot in their system doesn’t mean it had anything to do with their accident. I’d be willing to bet it had something to do with the alcohol. The driver could have smoked the weed three weeks before they ever got behind the wheel drunk.
Second of all, it’s true that a lot of drug addicts, alcoholics and generally unsavory people smoke pot. However, not all potheads are drug addicts, alcoholics or generally unsavory people. So, to all you non-believers, I’m sorry, but you can’t have your cake and eat it too. There are thousands, if not millions, of respectable, intelligent and God-fearing individuals who have smoked or still smoke marijuana.
Marijuana is not a gateway drug. What is a gateway drug? Is that like saying buying an expensive TV is a gateway to buying a hooker? Is it the same as saying playing Monopoly is a gateway for becoming a greedy capitalist who hordes money, underpays their employees and overcharges customers? Well, maybe. Regardless, this all sounds pretty ridiculous, doesn’t it?
If you’re willing, curious or dumb enough to try drugs, you’re going to try them — regardless of which one you tried first. Actually, alcohol is the first mind-altering substance most kids try, before they ever get stoned or smoke cigarettes.
The most important point I’ll make is this: Marijuana is a cash crop and it’ll grow anywhere. When you couple this with the fact that American pot smokers spend billions per year on their hobby, you end up with a great solution to a good portion of the national debt crisis.
Legalizing marijuana would circulate billions of dollars into the legitimate American economy, eliminate an entire sector of the black market and create thousands or millions of legitimate jobs.
Contrary to popular belief, most pot smokers are industrious, hard-working and responsible people who wouldn’t be criminals if it wasn’t for the fact that their harmless, victimless hobby is illegal.
Granted, punitive and draconian states like Utah would have to figure out a new way to regenerate all their fine-based revenue currently made by keeping non-criminals tied up in the legal system.
And the drug-counseling mental health facilities — in cahoots with judges and prosecutors — that profit millions by convincing regular people they have substance abuse problems would have to focus on harder-to-tackle, real-life problems like meth and heroin addiction; but what the heck, I say we legalize it.
There’s so much more that could be said, I just don’t have the space to say it. In the meantime, why don’t you put that in your pipe and smoke it?