So it seems that once a month I feel the need to spout off about our bullshit “Drug Control Policies” here in America. Of course there are bad drugs out there causing harm and some people should be locked up for selling and distributing them but the hypocrisy of calling Marijuana a class I felony on par with cocaine and heroin is fucking preposterous. Especially when I can go to the store and pick up a bottle of grain alcohol and a pack of cigarettes that’s the real crime. What else? …It’s treating a symptom and not a cause… it targets blacks… it puts non-violent offenders in a dangerous environment where they learn to be criminals… one dollar of treatment saves 7 in the penal system… it ties up our courts… it has made drugs more potent and increased violence and decreased the price… get it?

Now that I’ve got that out of the way, A GLIMMER OF HOPE! Representative Barney Frank (D-MA) and 6 other Reps have recently introduced H.R. 5843 known as the Act to Remove Federal Penalties for the Personal Use of Marijuana by Responsible Adults which would make it federally legal (as opposed to our lovely Cali freedom) to possess up to 100 Grams of Marijuana for personal use.

Actual text:

Notwithstanding any other provision of law, no penalty may be imposed under an Act of Congress for the possession of marijuana for personal use, or for the not-for-profit transfer between adults of marijuana for personal use. For the purposes of this section, possession of 100 grams or less of marijuana shall be presumed to be for personal use, as shall the not-for-profit transfer of one ounce or less of marijuana, except that the civil penalty provided in section 405 of the Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. 844a) may be imposed for the public use of marijuana if the amount of the penalty does not exceed $100.

To me this seems like a GENEROUS amount of weed. 100 grams is about 3.5 oz, or just under a QP. But I guess they needed a number large enough to last through Bonnaroo or something?

Well I’m all for it and I’m planning to write my senators in Nebraska asking them to support it. (And you can too). Our current system imprisons 800,000 people a year, most of them non-violent “offenders”. According to CNN someone is arrested for Pot every 38 seconds. This shit can ruin peoples lives, and over what? A drug that has never, ever killed anyone? A personal choice? YOUR PERSONAL FREEDOMS!? Weak.

Now trip balls on this 70s Hanna-Barbera anti-drug spot!

I know I may be preaching to the choir here.

But why don’t we as hard working (some of us), voting (some of us) , tax-paying (some of us) citizens have the right to choose whether a relatively harmless plant is illegal or not? What would result be if we as a society were able to vote on that? I mean, California has obviously voted it legal for medicinal purposes (because we’re cool), yet it remains illegal on a federal level. Denver recently voted to legalize marijuana and the vote was 54-46% in favor. And everyone knows that kids don’t vote. So this must have been responsible adults willing to let people make their own decisions about what they put into their bodies. The other 46% can fuck off as far as I’m concerned. But Denver is a pretty good representation for the US in general. The city is fairly liberal (i’d go so far as to use the term “Laid-back”), yet Colorado as a whole is a conservative state. That represents the US to a T. Conservative in the middle and thinking on the coasts. So how do we get this on a ballot? Let’s let the voters decide! The evidence for it’s legalization is certainly there. Especially if you compare it to alcohol.

I love booze. And I don’t wish it to be illegal, but Americans are fucking morons when it comes to handling its liquor. Like how many people lately have told me that they have been a victim of drunk drivers? (4 so far this year) I personally have had 2 vehicles DESTROYED by drunk drivers. My first car when I was 16 was a piece of shit (naturally), and was rear-ended by a pair of drunk drivers. That car could drive all night on only a 1/4 tank of gas (which was just under $1 a gallon back then; oh, it makes me moist thinking about it). Also, the first car that I bought on my own, paid off a loan of $7,000 for, drove 130,000 miles and babied for 7 years died exactly as I’d predicted it would. I told my friends, “One day, a drunk driver is going to plow through this car and total it, and I will be nowhere near it.” And sure enough I’m 100 miles away from school visiting home and i get a call at 2am from my best friend Marker telling me that my car parked in front of the house is dead and some fucking underage kid drove through it. The kid was drunk and all I got for my totalled car was $2,200 from his insurance company.

The truth is that there are 3 million crimes committed in the US every year are ALCOHOL related. Every half hour someone in America is killed by a drunk driver (17,602 in 2006). And where are the marijuana fatalities? Its impossible to overdose and die from weed and yet somehow 1 in 7 drug prisoners is in the pokey for Marijuana. Who were these people hurting? Its not like people were getting robbed so a junkie could feed his pot habit, ya know?

All that the anti-marijuana side has is that “It’s a gateway drug, it leads to worse things”. Well, no asshole, its just the first drug that people do, after alcohol of course. If someone is an addict then they are so before they do ANY drugs. Not many people jump straight into Cocaine and Heroin.

I have an uncle Mike. (But don’t we all?) He had the record for most DUI convictions in my hometown. (I think it was over 8). Thats disgustingly impressive. Every few months our family would hear about him getting arrested and we knew what it was for; one time he even drove his car into “The Old Town Boot Barn” on 4th street. Funny, yes. But stupid. One time he almost died and i visited him in the ICU, full of tubes, cut to shit. Something had gone in and out of his eye socket nearly blinding him. He switched to Meth sometime in the late 90’s. He is in a constant cycle of Addiction, Arrest, and Recovery. Once he gets released from Jail he is back on the pipe and subsequently arrested. My grandpa (from another family) is a former Sheriff who works with Trustees in the prison and says that Mike is a hard worker and good guy when he is in jail. But then he gets out and inevitably fucks up. Because he is an addict. Pot didn’t do that to him.

One time in 2001 I was living in an AMAZING house with MY BEST FRIENDS IN THE WORLD (and one crazy guy). And Uncle Mike found out where I lived and came to visit. He was fried. He was only 45 at the time but looked like he was 60. Missing teath, bald, yet none of his 3 brothers were. He looked like my Grandma, 66 did when she died. He was disgusting. And people are trying to tell us that Marijuana is the same kind of drug as Meth, Coke and Heroin? Show me who’s face I can spit in for trying to tell me that kind of BULLSHIT.

Right now good people are getting arrested for growing PLANTS! They are getting locked up for shit that grows naturally upon the earth. Pot doesn’t ruin lives. Stupid, oppressive, pointless fucking laws do.