Prop 203 Passes: Medical Marijuana to Be Legal in Arizona
(istockphoto)
(CBS/AP) If opponents of medical marijuana thought voters in Arizona would defeat Proposition 203, they must have been smoking something.
On Saturday, Arizonans narrowly approved the measure, which will legalize weed for people with certain diseases.
Final vote tallies showed that Prop 203 won by a tiny margin of just 4,341 votes out of more than 1.67 million votes counted.
"Now begins the very hard work of implementing this program in the way it was envisioned, with very high standards," said Andrew Myers, campaign manager for the Arizona Medical Marijuana Policy Project. "We really believe that we have an opportunity to set an example to the rest of the country on what a good medical marijuana program looks like."
Arizona is the 15th state to approve a medical marijuana law. California was first in 1996, and 13 other states and Washington, D.C., have since followed suit.
The Arizona measure will allow patients with diseases including cancer, HIV/AIDS, hepatitis C and any other "chronic or debilitating" disease that meets guidelines to buy two and one-half ounces of marijuana every two weeks or grow plants.
The patients must get a doctor's recommendation and register with the Arizona Department of Health Services. The law allows for no more than 124 marijuana dispensaries in the state.
Backers of Prop 203 argued that thousands of patients faced "a terrible choice" of suffering with a serious or even terminal illness or going to the criminal market for pot. They collected more than 252,000 signatures to put the measure on the ballot - nearly 100,000 more than required.
But all of the state's sheriff's and county prosecutors, the governor, attorney general and many other politicians came out against the proposed law.
Carolyn Short, chairwoman of Keep AZ Drug Free, the group that organized opposition to the initiative, said her group believes the proposed law will increase crime around dispensary locations, lead to more people driving while impaired and eventually lead to legalized pot for everyone.
What do you think? Will the whole country go to pot?
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If we look deeply into the matter we will see that America first made Marijuana illegal as a publicity stunt to gather votes by many politicians. Stating the crime was caused by Marijuana and that a majority of Minorities commited their crimes while under the influence of Marijuana. Some politicians even went so far as to state that Marijuana was "Evil" (meaning, it had some sort of mystical power of making individuals commit crimes and beahve in ways they normally wouldn't). Marijuana simply releases a chemical known as THC that binds to our nuerons temporarily releasing chemicals such as endorphins that allow us a state of general euphoria, lessening pain, and stimlating the gastrointestinal reponses (aka The Munchies).
This means, those who are to sick to hold down food can eat, and those with debilitating or chronic pain can relax. As for myself I am glad that enough of Arizona saw fit to allow use of this natural pain reliever in this state. I may finally find reprieve from my constant pain now.
Pragmatic libertarians (minimal-statists) and "true" Conservatives agree that many, if not most, of society's problems are caused by government usurping choices that could better be made by individuals and that government is just about the worst way of doing almost anything. Where libertarianism normally parts company with "fake" conservatism is over moral issues. But a true conservative would have no problem with agreeing, that what people do with their own bodies, and especially in the privacy of their own home, should be supremely their business, and that anything else would entail ignoring the basic tenet of limited government.
Fake-Conservatism on the other hand has much in common with socialism; Both Leftists and Fake-Conservatives appear to harbor the belief that nature does not exist and that any human can be anything he wants to be, or can for the "greater good", be "re-educated" into being. Leftists therefore think little boys can be conditioned into preferring dolls over toy soldiers, and similarly Fake-conservatives believe that adults can be coerced into choosing alcohol over marijuana. A true conservative, just like a pragmatic libertarian, would immediately reject both ideas as nonsense.
If you support prohibition then you are NOT a conservative.
Conservative principles, quite clearly, ARE:
1) Limited, locally controlled government.
2) Individual liberty coupled with personal responsibility.
3) Free enterprise.
4) A strong national defense.
5) Fiscal responsibility.
Prohibition is actually an authoritarian War on the Constitution and all civic institutions of our great nation.
It's all about the market and cost/benefit analysis. Whether any particular drug is good, bad, or otherwise is irrelevant! As long as there is demand for any mind altering substance, there will be supply; the end! The only affect prohibiting it has is to drive the price up, increase the costs and profits, and where there is illegal profit to be made criminals and terrorists thrive.
The cost of criminalizing citizens who are using substances no more harmful than similar things that are perfectly legal like alcohol and tobacco, is not only hypocritical and futile, but also simply not worth the incredible damage it does.
Afghani farmers produce approx. 93% of the world's opium which is then, mostly, refined into street heroin then smuggled throughout Eastern and Western Europe.
Both the Taliban and the terrorists of al Qaeda derive their main income from the prohibition-inflated value of this very easily grown crop, which means that Prohibition is the "Goose that laid the golden egg" and the lifeblood of terrorists as well as drug cartels. Only those opposed, or willing to ignore this fact, want things the way they are.
See: How opium profits the Taliban: http://*******.com/3ytnxun
Prohibition provides America's sworn enemies with financial "aid" and tactical "comforts". The Constitution of the United States of America defines treason as:
"Article III / Section 3. Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort."
Support for prohibition is therefor an act of treason against the Constitution, and a dire threat to the nation's civic institutions.
The Founding Fathers were not social conservatives who believed that citizens should be subordinate to any particular narrow religious moral order. That is what the whole concept of unalienable individual rights means, and sumptuary laws, especially in the form of prohibition, were something they continually warned about.
It?s time for us all to wise up and help curtail the dangerous expansions of federal police powers, the encroachments on individual liberties, and the increasing government expenditure devoted to enforcing the unworkable and dangerous policy of drug prohibition.
To support prohibition you have to be either a socialist, ignorant, stupid, brainwashed, insane or corrupt.
* The US national debt has increased at an average rate of $3,000,000000 per day since 2006.
* The unemployment rate has increased by 7300 per day since 2008.
* The loss of manufacturing jobs has been 1400 per day since 2006.
* Without the legalized regulation of opium products Afghanistan will continue to be a bottomless pit in which to throw countless billions of tax dollars and wasted American lives.
* The hopeless situation in Afghanistan is helping to destabilize it's neighbor, Pakistan, which is a country with nuclear weapons.
* The mayhem in Mexico has deteriorated so badly that it?s bordering on farcical.
Anyways, it seems that our country is indeed on its way to legalizing marijuana, among other drugs, like psilocybin. Because of how much information we now have access to, the citizenry is waking up. The drugs we once thought only hippies and criminals use are now the drugs that seem to be extremely effective against the worst of conditions. As the amount of people with the right information grows, there will continue to be a shift in this country toward legalization.
However, the fact that our government is wishy-washy about something as obvious as Don't-Ask-Don't-Tell repeal, shows that we might be waiting quite a while.