Both sides of the legalize Marijuana argument courtesy of CBS

NO:
Common Sense Says, "No Thanks!"
Guest Column: Stephen Baldwin & Kevin McCullough: America doesn't want its pot.. American potheads do!

Sure the debate is raging presently, but it's as fictional in its need as whether pigs can fly or whether Superman was or was not faster than that bullet.

In the modern trumped up controversy over whether marijuana should be legalized for the masses, the biggest canard of all is the supposed demand that exists. As a team that produces a weekly talk radio show now heard on 195 stations, we can earnestly say one thing is definitively true in the discussions we've launched about the revival of the "Should pot be legal?" question: "America doesn't want its pot... American potheads do!"

Almost to a person, callers to our broadcast who have asserted the need for weed's legality are also toking up on a regular basis.

Considering that Stephen starred in "Biodome," one of the more famous marijuana movies of all time, and that he has testified to smoking enough of the substance prior to his conversion to Christianity to fund a third world junta or two, we are able to compare the pleas of the modern marijuana movement and measure them for what they are--cries of economically struggling potheads who want to get high cheaply, next generation be damned.

Nothing could be more foolish and nothing could be more unnecessary.

We have no desire to prevent doctors from prescribing specified care, or authorizing specific treatments for patients that simply cannot find any more compassionate or effective means. We do, however, also recognize that the medical community has expanded its array of treatments in instances for cancer and other diagnoses that might render the need for marijuana completely useless.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/05/11/opinion/main5007690.shtml?tag=main_home_storiesBySection

YES:
Make Marijuana Legal
Guest Column: The Drug Policy Alliance's Founder On Why Marijuana Should Never Have Been Made Illegal In The First Place

Marijuana should never have been made illegal in the first place.

Ask why it was made illegal - by many state governments and eventually the federal government during the first four decades of the past century - and the answer cannot be found in expert medical testimony or any objective assessment of the costs and benefits of prohibiting marijuana.

In many western states, it was simply a matter of prejudice against Mexican-Americans and Mexican migrants, with whom marijuana was popularly associated. Rancid tabloid journalism also played a role, as did Reefer Madness-like propaganda and legislative testimony.

We know the result. Marijuana became dramatically more popular after its prohibition than it ever was before. Over one hundred million Americans have tried it, including the three most recent occupants of the Oval Office. Billions, perhaps tens of billions, of dollars are spent and earned illegally on it each year. Marijuana is routinely described as the first, second or third most lucrative agricultural crop in many states. And taxpayers are obliged to spend billions of their own dollars each year in support of futile efforts to enforce an unenforceable prohibition.

Clearly marijuana prohibition is unique among American criminal laws. No other law is both enforced so widely and harshly yet deemed unnecessary by such a substantial portion of the populace. Police made roughly 800,000 arrests last year for possession of marijuana, typically tiny amounts. That’s almost the same number as are arrested each year for cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, Ecstasy and all other drugs. Meanwhile recent polls show that over 40% of Americans think that marijuana should be taxed and regulated like alcohol; and it’s closer to 50% among Democrats, independents, adults under age 30, and voters in a growing number of western states.


http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/05/11/opinion/main5007650.shtml?tag=main_home_storiesBySection

For the record I'm for Cannibis legalization. :smoke:


on edit: Limited the opinion columns to be on the safe side. Click on the links for further reading.

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

Christians like to make a big deal of their "testimony", e.g., all the bad shit they did before god clued them in.

What part of "freedom" and "pursuit of happiness" do they not understand?

ummm- EVERY study has shown that minors can obtain pot much easier than they can obtain alcohol or cigarettes. (dealers generally don't card)

"...for every criminal it would prevent from being sent to prison, dealing with the increasingly prevalent use by underage users would be doubled or even tripled..." "...as well as give the pushers a new line of clientele".

the point is- if it were legalized, "dealers" would disappear- how many people do you see selling alcohol or tobacco on street corners to kids?

Alcohol usually required finding a willing adult to buy the booze for you.

It's about adults making their own choices.

Obviously written by a complete square. And what's wrong with a drug leading to enlightenment?

I seriously do not think capitalism could withstand legal cannabis.

The reformed pot smokers on a mission are always multiple substance abusers who had to go full tilt the other way to simply survive.