The sound of her voice is like scraping a nail along a car hood.

Yes, I suppose. But his questions are perfectly valid, and he just seemed to get more and more angry as his time ran out - which I can completely understand. The lady was stalling big time.

A more appropriate thing for him to do would be to just start out:

"Why the hell is the DEA going after Medical Marijuana?" etc.


There is some special interest group behind the whole anti-med-jane right now, and it's a bit disturbing. If they'd just legalize it and let legit companies grow the stuff, and then tax it, everyone would be better off. Less jail time, money spent. More tax revenue. More sick people helped. Less good people arrested for trying ot help those sick people.

It's sick and twisted to, in one sentence, claim that medical marijuana helps and should be between a patient and doctor, and in the next, order growers and dispenseries (which are legal by the state law they are in) to be attacked an confiscated.

Seriously, that shit is happening right now. All over the USA, state's have legalized medical marijuana and licensed people to grow it to benefit the sick. Then the feds come in, arrest the grower, confiscate all their plants, etc. It's wrong on so many levels.

Appropriately, he made me hard.

Is he the kind of dick that leaves piles of dismembered corpses in Mexico and Columbia in his wake, or the kind of dick that is trying to ask a few very fucking reasonable questions while the head of the DEA runs out the clock refusing to answer basic questions?

I agree with alot that has been said about drug policy. But the way he went about addressing her seemed very aggressive. You can ask tough questions like a professional with out acting like a big fuckwit.

^ 5 for Blue. Michele Leonhart is the one gunning hard for the dispensaries, make no mistake.

Neither side. This whole thing is a sideshow.

Yeah he definitely does a disservice to his cause with that line of questioning. He wasted all his time beating around the bush when he could have just asked some direct questions and made the point we all knew he was alluding to.

I think the public is starting to agree that spending DEA and police resources on marijuana crimes is far less worthy of their time than harder drugs. Yelling at the head of the DEA feels good but it doesn't make marijuana advocates look particularly appealing.

Perhaps this is a naive foreigner question, but isn't the DEA just the drugs police? By that I mean, don't they enforce the drug laws another part of the government creates? If my assumption there is correct, it seems aggrivatingly pointless to grill the head of the DEA on the morality of weed.

Hooker, you are correct. However, this woman is ultimately responsible for deciding what amount of resources to devote to any particular cause.
That being said, the primary debate here seems to be "why is so much of the -Billion DEA budget being invested in pursuit of Marijuana trafficking?
THAT being said, this guy was rambling aimlessly. I could've done a better job making the same point, as could most semi-literate high-school students.

If there are no good, compelling reasons to legalize pot I suppose there are no good compelling reasons for alcohol to be legal either. Or sugar. Or caffeine. The 3 things I just mentioned ARE LEGAL, TAXED and they cause the majority of health problems in the US. Pot is illegal, not taxed, and has never resulted in a death by overdose in a human. This issue has nothing to do with the negative effects of pot and everything to do with politics, racism, and grinding more prisoners through the (increasingly privately owned) prison system.

Everything has killed at least one human at some point.

Is there a metric for how addictive something is? It's a genuine question that I'm sure I could answer with some Googling, but I'd rather just ask it here and be done with it.

Well that's why he said death by overdose. You could die by various stupid things you do while inebriated, but the amount of marijuana it would take to overdose is just impossible to realistically consume, and as far as I'm aware hasn't occurred. That doesn't make it safer than Aspirin, but in terms of overdose it is.

There have been a lot of studies about the addictiveness of marijuana and I believe it falls under psychologically addictive and not chemically addictive. It's much easier to kick than heroin, cigarettes or alcohol as the only effects from stopping usage is a few days to a week of grumpiness as your serotonin levels return to normal.

to spike:I can't find the damn link. but there exists a study done by NIDA (national instutute on drug abuse. but don't be fooled they're the same fucks that say pot is a gateway drug and just as dangerous as crack) and a prof at berkely who made a list ranking addictive drugs on their harm, payoff/reward and how addictive they can be. topping both lists was nicotine. anyway I'm not sure where I'm going with this but studies have been done trying to pinpoint such things. I'm just curious what the point of your question is.

oops also. No One has Ever died from a THC overdose. It's not 100% impossible but for all intents and purposes it is fucking impossible.

36,450 deaths last year in the US by drug overdose.
How many of those were pot? Zero.
Illegal? Hmmm...it IS very dangerous.

(fun fact 50% of those deaths were by painkillers)
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/all-about-addiction/201112 /us-drug-overdose-deaths-are-increasing

The problem with these hot box bars being that...?

If it ever went legal here in the US, it'd likely be heavily taxed (good thing) and would only be allowed in someone's home or designated smoking joints (hah!). OUI's would still apply to anyone caught in public while high, and you damn well better not drive while high.

But people will do it... and we'll all know because they'll be driving like grandmas to taco bell at 2am.

Most of the THC isn't even in second-hand smoke, and you'd have to be in a small space with no ventilation for a long period of time for it to have any effect on you - being allergic probably wouldn't help. In fact there's placebo effect in play and the same effects are seen with non-inhaled drugs. Furthermore, inhaling a lot of smoke of any kind can get you "high" because you're being deprived of oxygen.

Surprised it took so long for someone to mention tobacco, basically one of the deadliest substances on the planet statistically, which is legal and taxed without a second thought.

Even caffeine kills people. You never hear about that though.

Before the drug war, drug use was a minor, isolated problem. If people needed help, they got it from a doctor or a therapist. It was one of those things that most people would have never heard of.

Then they start advertising this shit in schools. I want some fucking compensation, these assholes promised me I'd see a gorilla in the mirror if I did LSD. That's false advertising. Pee Wee said crack would make me cool. Does not work.

Thing is, we already live in a world where dangerous drugs other than alcohol, tobacco and caffeine are legal. You can buy DXM, N20 and LSA from your local grocery store. When people get hurt on that stuff, it's their own fucking fault, not the substance's. That's how it should be for everything.

Hooker: The problem being that you could go in for a burger and fries and come out not as coherent as you wanted to be otherwise. I'm pointing out that someone getting boozed up next to me has no effect on my own mental faculties, and smoking tobacco has no short-term effect other than making me smell like an ashtray.

It's something to consider when it comes to regulation if it were to be legalized.

"Honey, I don't know what happened. We went to the site, and somehow I got soooo highhhhhh giggle giggle cough"

Bro, we need to talk.

I'm sure McDonalds won't want their restaurants to smell like pot if marijuana becomes legal. I think it would be pretty easy to avoid contact highs.

I want a Quarter Kilo with Cheese

"and smoking tobacco has no short-term effect other than making me smell like an ashtray."

Addict talk, this is 2012. Come on.