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In last weeks debate, Joe Biden says he would not make marijuana legal until further studies are done and he was met with criticism by Sen. Booker. I’m not sure that Sen. Booker’s criticism was appropriate (I’m not saying that Sen. Booker’s stance is wrong, I’m only opining it). Marijuana is a popular drug that most people see as harmless and should be legalized. I think that they couldn’t be more wrong. I think that marijuana, if legalized, would destroy the middle class and poor people. Cheeseburgers and pizza are harmless but yet we have the worst obesity problem of any nation, do you know why, because cheese is mildly addictive and acts on the same neuro-receptors as heroin. BRB, making a myself a cheese melt (I’m not).

Marijuana is much more addictive than cheese and the problem will be more exasperated by the fact that this country doesn’t run on Dunkin but on compulsion. All these ads on every single electronic device are meant to make you want. They flicker, they’re bright, they’re shiny, they grab your attention and they’re repetitive (that should be illegalized). There is a prevailing thought that people that get addicted are people that have weak minds, that is a myth. Addiction has no boundaries and while some people will try it once only and some might do it in their college years and not really inhale, others will become addicted even though they might have strong minds. Just because it didn’t affect you that way doesn’t mean that it won’t affect someone else in a more dangerous manner.

The other problem of note is playing in courts today. Juul is defending themselves against State Attorney Generals because they targeted minors in their adds and because they made flavored vapes that would appeal to minors. The States are contending that Juul acted irresponsibly, which they did, in my opinion.

Lets add another wrinkle to this, people have died from vaping, but not from vaping nicotine but marijuana. They vape the same two products with the same two external additives, the only difference was the nicotine and marijuana. The people that vaped the marijuana became really sick with some dying while the ones vaping nicotine, did not. The news has reported that vitamin E might have been the culprit but it is my belief that came at the urging of the marijuana lobbyists, that also is an opinion.

The fact is that marijuana is a money maker. Marijuana has produced large amounts of income and some people will overlook the side effects, if they can rationalize it, to rake in the income that comes with the legalization of marijuana. That’s sad and it’s also greedy. Marijuana addicts roughly 10 percent of the people that try it (and that’s a rough estimate given by the NIH, it could be higher because studies are limited, but it won’t be lower), legalizing the product would mean that up to 30 million people could use the product. That would mean that 3 million people could get addicted to the product. If we play Russian roulette with addiction, we can say that about 80 percent (2.4 million) of the people that would end up addicted would come from the middle to lower class (poor). That addiction would eventually lead to these people to lose their homes, jobs and their families would be irrevocably harmed, but its ok, because you made that extra revenue that you are now using to treat the problem. You can also honestly say that some, couldn’t give you a number, of those people only did the drug because you legalized it.

I say, keep marijuana illegal. Reduce the sentencing guidelines for the users and force them into rehab. Make the penalties for pushers stiffer and go after the cartels. If, in your heart of hearts, feel like that marijuana is safe and would boost the economy (it won’t) then have a designated place like an Amsterdam. Maybe make it legal just in Las Vegas, hell, almost everything else is, and split the proceeds with the 50 states equally. I think that would be the responsible thing to do.

In a good note, cigarette use is down to 278 billion cigarettes from a high of 631 billion in 1980. The difference was that politicians and activists started to say that cigarettes are deadly. They prohibited television ads for cigarettes and raised the age to buying cigarettes to… 21? …18? One of those and they also started school programs depicting the use of these products as extremely harmful. So what I say is, if you are going to legalize marijuana, at least you have the game plan to reduce the consumption to a couple of hundred billion blunts when it starts ruining our country.

Don’t choose money over morals, you’ll forever regret it.

Let me add that it won’t stop illegal sales of marijuana, it will increase it. That dime bag that costs $50 at the legal dispensary, will still only be a dime bag at the corner. You are going down the same path as cigarettes but with more profit for the illegal vendors and the cost of stopping the illegal distribution, which will also come from the legal dispensary back doors, will cost you more than you will profit. It is not a worth while endeavor, it seems that learning from past mistakes is not a thing that we do. Cigarettes are an anchor in our society that create more problems and costs than the tax can cover, why would you think that a more addictive substance would prove to be the answer to your problems. Your adding another element to a shit sandwich, BLT – blunts, lard and tobacco. Our healthcare system is already overridden with problems from the lard and tobacco, which produce cancer and heart problems, you now want to add a third element in order to fix it? Doesn’t that sound crazy?

More importantly, I told my son it’s not Ok to do that shit, and you’re telling him it is, so, stop it, stop it right now.

And this not a referendum on Sen. Booker’s decision, their are plenty of politicians on both sides that feel legalizing the “green gold”, “purple haze”, “pinner”, “pacman”, “Nixon”, “Maui Wowie” or “juana”, “maria”, “mota”, “yerba santa”, “queso verde” (I just made that last one, lets see if sticks) is an appropriate way to feed the tax man, it isn’t, again, in my opinion.