From Reason.com:
A truth the candidate won’t tell
Steve Chapman | February 4, 2008It’s a brave position, and therefore exceedingly rare among practicing politicians. Which may be why it didn’t last. Before the day was over, the Obama campaign issued a statement saying he thinks “we are sending far too many first-time non-violent drug users to prison for very long periods of time” but “does not believe that we should treat offenses involving marijuana with a simple fine or just by confiscating the drug.” Recently, he had told a New Hampshire newspaper, “I’m not in favor of decriminalization.”
This episode reveals that as a candidate, Obama is more fond of bold rhetoric than bold policies. But it also proves the impossibility of talking sense on the subject of illicit drugs during a political campaign. That course of action would mean admitting the inadmissible: that the prohibition of cannabis has been cruel, wasteful and fraudulent.
Cruel because it leads to the arrest of nearly 700,000 people a year for mere possession of a substance that is comparatively benign. Wasteful because it expends billions of dollars in police, court and correctional resources that could be deployed against dangerous predators. Fraudulent because it hasn’t solved anything: According to the federal government, nearly 100 million Americans have tried the stuff.
It’s sad that someone that has admitted to doing this and more feels that he came out of it alright but that the rest of us cannot be trusted to do the same.For a brief second it looked like he had the intestinal fortitude to stand up to the politics of lies and fear.It was not to be as the forces of oppression made it too difficult for a true and reasoned response.The best we can hope is that the real Obama is not the coward that the political creature has become.
Blacks and Hispanics make up 20 percent of the marijuana smokers in the United States, but comprise 58 percent of the marijuana offenders sentenced under federal law last year.
“ITS NOT A BLACK OR WHITE ISSUE, Mr. OBAMA –
ITS AN AMERICAN ISSUE”
We Have body Parts Meant to Take in Cannabinoids!!!
These are Our CB1 and CB2 Cannabinoid Receptors and they help Regulate many important body functions using naturally occuring cannabinoids present such anandamide (or “arachidonoylethanolamide”) and governs many vital bodily functions including:
* appetite * bone density * mood regulation * reproduction * blood pressure * Learning capacity * motor coordination …
One of the major functions of this system is the protection of nerve cells from damage by over activation of neurotransmitters.
Marijuana is Distinguished From most other currently illicit drugs by the locations of its brain-receptor sites (cb1/cb2 cannabinoid receptors) for two predominant reasons:
(1) The lack of receptors in the medulla significantly reduces the possibility of accidental, or even deliberate, death from THC (in Fact- Theres never been one death from marijuana in the history of man),
~ and ~
(2) the lack of receptors in the mesocorticolimbic pathway significantly reduces the risks of addiction and serious physical dependence. As a therapeutic drug, these features are God’s greatest gifts.
~ Luis Hirschlieb