Cannabis Legal

Why would hemp growers turn over all their product into drugs when industrial hemp has so many uses and is so profitable? That doesn't make sense at all. That's the equivalent of someone during Prohibition arguing "If we legalise alcohol, then all the farmers will grow their wheat for the sole purpose of making beer and we won't have bread any more!" In any case, cultivation of industrial hemp is illegal in the US. Anything made from hemp that gets traded there is imported - there is no domestic hemp industry there.

Kind of like the scare stories making the rounds now about how, if we make the switch to ethanol, there won't be any corn to feed the poor.
A friend of mine, who is a computer systems analyst by training sought to trace a couple of these stories making the rounds on the Internet. He managed to find out that these particular warnings seem to come from people who have a connection with various oil companies......
 
Years ago I saw an Australia doco called 'The Billion Dollar Crop' about the industrial uses of dope, and apparently the shit is fantastic. What struck me was that it can be used as a substitue for wood in the production of chipboard and all those other pressed wood products, without modification to the factories that make it. The building industry alone could use tons of hemp based building materials, saving miles of forest and plantation trees. With some clear headed direction industrial hemp could be both a gold mine for farmers, and an environmental godsend.

As for the THC, the Australian experience is interesting, we now test drivers for drugs, I've licked the thingy. Also despite the media sensationalism about drugs, drug crime isn't a major offence, a fine and maybe some community service if you get caught with small amounts of drugs. The cops do go after the traffikers and manufacturers, but not everyday stoners and the like.
 
People say marijuana ruins lives, but it seems to me that throwing people into prison for mere possession is what really destroys lives. I think if marijuana was decriminalized there would be less violent crime, because we would have more room in our prisons for dangerous offenders.
If marijuana really is as dangerous a drug as the moralists say, we should treat smokers like we do alcoholics. Why treat sick people like criminals? It's inhumane.
If we feel we have to incarcerate marijuana smokers, it would be better to establish a parallel prison system for them, with specialized camps where they can "detoxify" and serve their sentences safely, instead of housing these mostly nonviolent people with vicious gang members, rapists, and murderers, where they are certain to be victimized.
Someday, future historians will be horrified by the savage cruelty inflicted on peaceful, patriotic and otherwise law-abiding Americans by remorseless moralists, and at how long we let it go on.
 
People say marijuana ruins lives, but it seems to me that throwing people into prison for mere possession is what really destroys lives. I think if marijuana was decriminalized there would be less violent crime, because we would have more room in our prisons for dangerous offenders.
If marijuana really is as dangerous a drug as the moralists say, we should treat smokers like we do alcoholics. Why treat sick people like criminals? It's inhumane.

I too, support legalizing most drugs, but mainly because I'm all in favor of letting idiots kill themselves off. There must be controls of course, driving under the influence of anything needs to be punished extremely harshly.

However, marijuana supporters claim, I believe them accurate, that marijuana is not really physically addictive in the same sense as cocaine or even nicotine. It is psychologically addictive of course, but then so is good food, sports, or video games. As such, if it is really as dangerous as moralists say, then its use cannot be blamed on sickness or addiction but only on stupidity and irresponsibility and thus perfectly suitable for criminalization.

Really, if marijuana is legalized, not that much would change. We won't get drug tourists like the Dutch and so avoid its problems but also don't get the revenue. A reborn hemp industry will be profitable and create jobs, but its not going to revitalize the economy. A few more idiots will screw up their minds, but not that many.
 
Legal marijuana could mean better understanding of it. It stops becoming this mysterious thing. Its just another way to relax and have fun and people will be familiar with it and know to do it in moderation and not drive while high. No biggie.

Like with alcohol. I'm talking from an American's standpoint here. Kids who have strict parent and don't have access to alcohol tend to over indulge when they do. I've seen this personally. Kids who can get alcohol without too much difficulty and are fully aware of what it is and the consequence know when to stop and limit themselves.

In my state, California, we legalized marijuana for "medical purposes" but the federal govt still bands it. For all practical purposes you don't have to worry about getting caught with a small amount by local or state police they'll just confiscate it unless you really piss them off then they'll use that as an excuse to arrest you. If you have a really big operation to sell and come under DEA notice then you might be screwed. But even then not always. In a case a short time ago the judge and jury had no choice but to convict a mom and pop growers who had a license from the city to grow. The judge gave them 1 day in jail. The jury said they wouldn't have been convicted at all if the license to grow had been allowed as evidence.
 
http://everything2.com/e2node/Marijuana%20Myths

^Everyone who is talking about how cannabis will lead to the downfall of society.

Seriously, weed is possibly the most overrated drug in the world in terms of its effects. I'm stoned right now (not very much, of course, but still) and obviously I'm still able to type properly and form coherent sentences. A person stoned is just a person in a slightly altered state where they might giggle a lot and might be very calm. But this is all sort of off-topic. I've got all kinds of weed rants, though... But remember; France has a higher rate of drug use than the Netherlands -- why is this?

Anyway, hemp is great stuff, but as someone mentioned you can't smoke the stuff that's good for industrial purposes and vice versa. I think it would improve our economy, however, because it's really efficient.
 
If they weren't the ONLY country in the world with those "coffee shops" they wouldn't have the "drug tourism" to their country.

If people could buy it anywhere the only people going to the Netherlands would be going to see the country and visit the musems. And if they outlaw it, then they'll see a return to that.

That could help a little bit but I still really think having it legal is the right way to decrease its use.
 
If they weren't the ONLY country in the world with those "coffee shops" they wouldn't have the "drug tourism" to their country.

If people could buy it anywhere the only people going to the Netherlands would be going to see the country and visit the musems. And if they outlaw it, then they'll see a return to that.
I sort of doubt that. I mean look at what has happened with the recent restrictions on operating hours. Footpads and independent pharmaceutical distributors have taken to loitering around the closed "coffee houses" and selling to and/or mugging late comers. By this example if you decrease legal access a black market forms to fill the now undeserved market which brings along more violent criminals. Also I don't think that the absence of "coffee houses" will bring in more sightseers (those interested in the culture and history will show up regardless of drug opportunities". What will happen is those their primarily for drug reasons will not visit and possibly see the sites while in town. Thereby depriving the economy of both their drug dollars and their impulse spending.
 
Years ago I saw an Australia doco called 'The Billion Dollar Crop' about the industrial uses of dope, and apparently the shit is fantastic. What struck me was that it can be used as a substitue for wood in the production of chipboard and all those other pressed wood products, without modification to the factories that make it. The building industry alone could use tons of hemp based building materials, saving miles of forest and plantation trees. With some clear headed direction industrial hemp could be both a gold mine for farmers, and an environmental godsend.
this is kind of what the original post was about

i know attempting to dictate the direction of information exchange in a place like this is a bit of a paradox, but this is kind of the direction i intended the discussion to take, perhaps i should of formulated the original post question differently

obviously more people would smoke, on average, and perhaps a few people would smoke too much, as they do now

its just that that particular application of cannabis seems to me the least functional and more importantly, the most inconsequential and irrelevant
in fact so inconsequential it need not even be seriously discussed, other than for health issues, let alone sanctioned by law
so people smoke, they smoke tobacco too, dont they
i mean hey you can buy bottled hard liquor with 50% alcohol in most supermarkets, so what in the name of the bodily liquids of Christ on wood, is the big problem?

yea people would smoke grass, good for them, god knows i never say no to the occasional smoke amongst old friends, or the occasional drink, or a strong cup of coffee for that matter, but what consequence is that to anyone?

what of other uses? especially after more than 70 years of technological and industrial development? pressed wood substitute is a good example, but apparently you can form much tougher and elastic material than chipwood and maediapan from cannabis fiber, such as biocomposite mass

or the use in the paper industry
here something from the omnipresent Wikipedia;
"In 1916, USDA Bulletin No. 404, reported that one acre of cannabis hemp, in annual rotation over a 20-year period, would produce as much pulp for paper as 4.1 acres of trees being cut down over the same 20-year period. This process would use only 1/4 to 1/7 as much polluting sulfur-based acid chemicals to break down the glue-like lignin that binds the fibers of the pulp, or none at all using soda ash. The problem of dioxin contamination of rivers is avoided in the hemp paper making process, which does not need to use chlorine bleach (as the wood pulp paper making process requires) but instead safely substitutes hydrogen peroxide in the bleaching process. ... If the new (1916) hemp pulp paper process were legal today, it would soon replace about 70% of all wood pulp paper, including computer printout paper, corrugated boxes and paper bags."

is this real or is the information problematic?
 
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this is kind of what the original post was about

i know attempting to dictate the direction of information exchange in a place like this is a bit of a paradox, but this is kind of the direction i intended the discussion to take, perhaps i should of formulated the original post question differently

obviously more people would smoke, on average, and perhaps a few people would smoke too much, as they do now

its just that that particular application of cannabis seems to me the least functional and more importantly, the most inconsequential and irrelevant
in fact so inconsequential it need not even be seriously discussed, other than for health issues, let alone sanctioned by law
so people smoke, they smoke tobacco too, dont they
i mean hey you can buy bottled hard liquor with 50% alcohol in most supermarkets, so what in the name of the bodily liquids of Christ on wood, is the big problem?

yea people would smoke grass, good for them, god knows i never say no to the occasional smoke amongst old friends, or the occasional drink, or a strong cup of coffee for that matter, but what consequence is that to anyone?

what of other uses? especially after more than 70 years of technological and industrial development? pressed wood substitute is a good example, but apparently you can form much tougher and elastic material than chipwood and maediapan from cannabis fiber, such as biocomposite mass

or the use in the paper industry
here something from the omnipresent Wikipedia;
"In 1916, USDA Bulletin No. 404, reported that one acre of cannabis hemp, in annual rotation over a 20-year period, would produce as much pulp for paper as 4.1 acres of trees being cut down over the same 20-year period. This process would use only 1/4 to 1/7 as much polluting sulfur-based acid chemicals to break down the glue-like lignin that binds the fibers of the pulp, or none at all using soda ash. The problem of dioxin contamination of rivers is avoided in the hemp paper making process, which does not need to use chlorine bleach (as the wood pulp paper making process requires) but instead safely substitutes hydrogen peroxide in the bleaching process. ... If the new (1916) hemp pulp paper process were legal today, it would soon replace about 70% of all wood pulp paper, including computer printout paper, corrugated boxes and paper bags."

is this real or is the information problematic?
Yes from what I have read the paper bit is true. In fact one of the reasons it was first banned is due to the fact that an exec from a major paper and wood goods manufacture had the ear of the proto-Drug Czar and basically lobbied like there was no tomorrow for a federal ban.
 
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