Putting More Pot in the Melting Pot
By: Joshua Hehe
Tags: America, Drugs, Marijuana, Medicine, Politics

Since Colorado legalized recreational marijuana back in 2012 Denver has surpassed Amsterdam as the cannabis capital of the world. There are now more marijuana dispensaries in Colorado than there are pharmacies, liquor stores, and coffee shops. Of these sales, medical revenue far surpasses that of recreational. People purchase about 60 tons of weed for help, while they only purchase about 20 tons for fun. Part of this is due to the fact that cannabis has been available for patients since the year 2000, plus the tax rate is much, much lower on medical marijuana than it is on recreational marijuana. Regardless, the point is that pot is a very valuable commodity.

There is just so much money to be made from marijuana. If the American government would finally legalize weed at the federal level, then the country could generate as much as 10 billion dollars in tax revenue every year. Instead hundreds of thousands of people are arrested on marijuana charges each year. This costs the taxpayers a great deal, and there is an important racial component to mass incarceration as well. All the way back to Richard Nixon and Harry Anslinger, and continuing on to this very day with Donald Trump and Jeff Sessions, the ridiculous war on drugs wages on in spite of popular demand. So, the DEA is just going to keep on doing as much as it can get away with.

Among citizens here in the US support for marijuana is quickly outpacing the opposition. More than half of the nation wants to legalize marijuana. In 1969 a Gallup poll showed that only 12% of people wanted weed to be legal. This has risen all the way up to 60% in the last half-century. Now, in 2018, the majority of Americans want marijuana to be made legal. However, rather than properly representing their constituents, elected officials choose to do what they want instead. In spite of the facts, the officials just look the other way on this. The President and Attorney General are completely against marijuana, even though Donald and Jeff have to know it’s all bullshit.

Study after study finds that marijuana is far less harmful than alcohol and tobacco which are both legal products. The booze and cigarette companies lobby as anti-marijuana advocates. Cannabis is a serious threat to both of those industries. The reality is that someone would have to smoke almost 1,500 pounds of weed in about 15 minutes in order to induce a lethal response, and that’s completely impossible. Granted a more refined product like wax or oil would take less. Either way, as a safer alternative to most drugs, Big Pharma and other mega money makers spend like crazy to keep marijuana classed as an extremely harmful controlled substance. This way Americans will keep smoking, drinking, and popping pills rather than just eating a pot brownie to help them feel better.

The arguments that the opponents present are completely absurd. For instance, contrary to the fake news circulating around these days, recreational use among teens does not increase with legalization. Plus, marijuana is no more a gateway drug than beer, but people can buy it right off the shelf. Also, when medical marijuana enters a community, the number of addictive painkiller prescriptions goes down, while recreational weed reduces the use of heroin. The rationale behind the war on drugs is based on misinformation, particularly in regards to weed. People all across the country are suffering needlessly because power hungry politicians want to hold back progress by regulating the wrong things.

As the most pertinent example, the horrendous “Schedule 1” classification of marijuana causes severe problems between state and federal laws. For instance, businesses that distribute marijuana struggle to operate successfully because they are often infringed upon by the federal government which views them as a kind of criminal enterprise. So, cannabis entrepreneurs are forced to do all of their business in cash because using a bank would be considered laundering. They literally pay their employees and taxes with envelopes stuffed with money. That’s ridiculous. The war on drugs should not include marijuana.

The whole thing is perpetuated and perpetrated by propaganda. Pot does not make people crave heavier drugs like heroin which can be highly addictive and often lethal. On the contrary, getting stoned is far less harmful than getting drunk, but lots of places still sell alcohol. We might as well be saying that drinking coffee leads to cocaine addiction. There’s so much fake news out there about everything, and this is just part of that. As another example, one particular bit of misinformation claims that marijuana causes cancer, when in fact it can be used to help treat it.

The truth is that bud works to improve the symptoms of nausea and vomiting in cancer patients. It even works to treat chronic pain in suffers, and is much safer than addictive opioids. Regardless there are people in states like Indiana that are denied treatment with cannabis for no good reason. Many are forced to turn to dangerous prescription drugs in order to alleviate their pain or they just have to suffer. It’s so sad. Cannabis could be used all across the country to help patients with sleep apnea, MS, seizures, or even fibromyalgia, but it isn’t. To make matters worse, there are so many veterans suffering from PTSD that could easily be helped by marijuana but the VA is a federal institution that can’t administer cannabis to patients.

The narrative is just all wrong for all of this. People need to get the facts straight. The only truth that I can actually find in the arguments from the opponents is that there is evidence, albeit quite limited, that marijuana use can lead to poor academic achievement, unemployment, lower income, or impaired social functioning. So, the solution to this is simply to make marijuana like alcohol and only sell it to people who are 21 or older. There’s a very important marketing aspect to this too. As we legalize marijuana companies have to resist Big Tobacco by not packaging mentholated joints with filters in boxes and everything else. Also, edible candy needs to look as unappealing as possible. Cannabis is fine without the influence of greedy corporations and none of this stuff is for children. Plus, pot should just always come in pesticide-free bud form anyway.

More importantly, this should also be done in conjunction with the issuance of evidence-based warnings about the product. For instance, people shouldn’t be allowed to operate heavy machinery while they are high. Women should not be smoking pot while they are pregnant. Plus, anyone that might be predisposed towards schizophrenia should not use marijuana at all. With that being said, pretty much everyone else should be allowed to possess and consume weed, if they so choose. There is simply no good reason to keep THC-based products out of the marketplace in America. The use, or even abuse, of marijuana should be a personal choice, plain and simple.