legalize cannabis

I covered a large part of this so without addressing my opponents argument let me sum up his viewpoint. My opponent fails to realize that he's contradicting nearly every argument that he brings to the table , he's going against pure common sense and then contradicting that and he doesn't seem to realize it. He is using a number of words in a number of different ways and still coming back to exactly the same point that he's already contradicted. To summarize. I claim there are negative effects of cannabis, my opponent says no there isn't any whatsoever,then he contradicts it,by saying this "Serious addiction of cannabis only accounts for 9% of said". Now if I had said there was negative effects for everyone that smokes it then my opponent has an argument . I however never said that just that there are negative effects involved , my opponent agrees with this , so why does he still argue the same point? ? I then say that by making it freely available to the general public by legalizing it ,it exposes it to more people. My opponent says it doesn't , then again contradicts his own argument by saying this "This is not ALWAYS true" and this "People do not want to go to the dark side of society for cannabis, they would rather jump through a few regulatory hoops by purchasing legally than suffer jail time. " Then I give two further examples of people who would smoke it here, "What about people in villages towns and areas that don't have a drug dealer whatsoever and have entirely no access to drugs? " and here "What about people who say I've always wanted to try it so here's my opportunity? " and my opponent mocks my two examples . Making the claim that in every country where cannabis is available it's also available in every single village or town. He would have a point if I had used the word "City" however I'm not stupid enough to believe that it's not available in every city. He also seems to brush over the point that these type of people "What about people who say I've always wanted to try it so here's my opportunity? " Do not exist" . So I've given two examples of the type of people who would try cannabis if it became legal ,he's given one himself , yet he doesn't even realize it. So my opponent brings to the table two contradictory arguments one argument is that "there is entirely no negative affects of cannabis and by legalizing cannabis no one extra would be exposed to it" Then without realizing it he then argues "that nearly one in ten people who use cannabis suffer serious addiction and by legalizing it more people will use it" I agree with my opponents second argument and I will add that this clearly means that by increasing the number of users we are increasing the number of people who will suffer serious cannabis addiction. Then my opponent say's it would bring greater tax revenue,but he wants to use that tax revenue on lowering income tax ,which again lowers the amount of tax revenue over all,he also want's to use that tax payers money to pay of government debt and also use it to fund things "like addiction centres" that we are increasing the need for in the first place. As this point I would like to provide a link regarding cannabis addiction . http://www.cannabisaddiction.co.uk... Then my opponent argues that by legalizing cannabis we are stopping it getting in illegally. When the precedent shows with regard things such as alcohol and cigarettes that the more taxes increase on these things the more demand there is for these things illegally. . http://www.nice.org.uk... He then also argues that by legalizing cannabis we are stopping people from being addicted to the highly addictive drugs that they're already addicted too. This is a contradictory argument in the very same sentence "However, it logically follows that if cannabis were to be legalized, people would be subject less to hard, addictive drugs like heroine/cocaine/meth" Again not only is it a contradictory argument ,it's exactly the same as arguing that if we only made lager legal it would stop people wanting spirits. Then he contradicts himself again by using the fact that I showed how government waste money ,particularly in using taxpayers to pay of government debt, when that's what he wants the cannabis tax to do in the first place, "this extra tax revenue could be used to make a surplus on the national debt" However seeing as he doesn't like one out of the TWO links I posted here's a further one. . http://moneymorning.com... What my opponent seems to be oblivious too is that the judges of this debate don't live in a little bubble like my opponent and most of them do actually realize that the governments cannot be trusted to spend taxpayers money wisely. My opponents tax argument fails on the facts that firstly the governments cannot be trusted to spend that money wisely Secondly by his own admission that he want's the governments to waste that money , Thirdly, it's not even that much in the first place all things considered and fourthly it could even end up costing us more money, as previously argued by myself. . http://www.matrixbookstore.biz... He also argues the governments will keep tax low on it when again precedent says different. As I mentioned he brings one half reasonable argument to the table the fact that it will create jobs,however as I argued the number of job's is in dispute and regardless if we're using this argument we may as well argue for the legalization of all drugs and completely ignore the negative effects of them as my opponent is attempting to do with regard cannabis. At this point I would further like to add another argument to the equation. Having cannabis in shops will certainly increase the number of robberies as criminals would steal the drug and sell it on street corners or whatever the case may be also people have some extra valuable thing to steal to fund any addiction they may suffer with,again we have precedent for this fact www. nacsonline. com/NACS/NEWS/FACTSHEETS/INDUSTRYISSUES/. . In summary on the two side's we have this. PRO: It will create job's and make some people happy. CON'S It will expose more people to addiction It will expose further people to mental health conditions. It could end up costing us in the long run It could leave the possibility for the government's to have more money to abuse It will likely increase the demand for more illegal drugs to be brought in as tax increases It will certainly increase the number of robberies. There are a couple of "coulds" in my argument I agree ,however there is precedent for my "coulds" as we see in the pattern of the same areas (government spending) etc My opponent's "coulds" I have eliminated from the pros for the very reason he has entirely no reason to state them ,no precedent whatsoever and he contradicts them anyway. My opponent's argument would gain more credibility if he would freely admit things rather than contradicting himself at every turn. If he would freely admit the negative effects of cannabis and counter that with a positive . Rather than trying to sweep the negatives under the carpet and end up contradicting himself. Plus if he would not make light of my personal experience on the subject and recognize that personal experience is an important factor in this case. For the judges to this debate the issue is not whether you WANT to see cannabis legalized the issue is whether you decide that there's any REAL reason to legalize it.