‘Medical’ Marijuana: There Must Be an Epidemic of Glaucoma in the ‘Hood

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Want to read something laugh-out-loud funny? This woman’s account of a guy who bummed a ride home after her local college class is worth a read if you enjoy, uh, authentic urban dialect.

The highlight of the story — which occurs in Los Angeles, we can gather — is a visit to a legal “medical marijuana” vendor “off Crenshaw somewhere.” Da Tech Guy points out how this story shows the way in which California’s legalization of marijuana for “medical” purposes has basically allowed the state to gain tax revenue from a hitherto illegal market. It is obvious from the woman’s story that “medical” marijuana is being sold to people whose only disease is a desire to get high. Otherwise, we would have to imagine that there has been an epidemic of glaucoma in, uh, low-income urban communities.

 

156 comments

  7. “I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence, or insanity to anyone, but they’ve always worked for me.” — Hunter S. Thompson

  8. I am totally embarrassed that I let myself get into a discussion
    that other people just can’t accept one simple fact:

    There are no FDA approved, double blind studies, years of
    trials or research that can be replicated (that’s how drugs get approved for human use in America) that proves that pot (being smoked) has medicinal benefits.

    That’s it.

    Not much more to it.

    Doesn’t matter how you feel about the drug laws, the above
    is a fact.

    Doesn’t matter that the federal government may be preventing
    the above research from being done, the above is a fact.

    This isn’t about individual liberty and personal rights.

  9. So, you’re a big-government fan, then? If the government refuses to study something then that’s the end of it?

    Sad.

  11. RSM writes a modest piece about a chronic problem and the comments turn into a bloodbath.

    I was entertained, Mr. McCain. Thank-you.

  12. I don’t accept what the government says about marijuana any more than I accept what the government says about global warming. Both issues are being politicized and that’s never good for science.

  13. From the Fortune url I quoted in my top-level comment:

    In 1986 the FDA approved a synthetic version of what has long been recognized to be the main psychoactive ingredient of marijuana — delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC. After rigorous testing, the FDA found THC to be safe and effective for the treatment of nausea, vomiting, and wasting diseases. This lawful, Schedule II drug, trade-named Marinol, is taken orally, by capsule.

    The trouble is, for many patients Marinol turns out to be inferior to good old-fashioned pot. Smoked marijuana is much faster acting and, as a consequence, easier for patients to control in terms of dosage. The patient inhales as much as he needs and then stops. In contrast, with a THC pill the patient can easily ingest more than he can handle.

    “Oral THC is slow in onset of action but produces more pronounced, and often unfavorable, psychoactive effects that last much longer than those experienced with smoking,” according to a 2008 report published by the American College of Physicians. (Incidentally, the FDA-approved warnings for Marinol — pure THC — do not flatly forbid patients from driving under its influence. Rather, they simply caution patients not to do so “until it is established that they are able to tolerate the drug and to perform such tasks safely.”)

  14. Here’s the point that you deliberately missed.

    Government regulation and laws can be extremely arbitrary and incredibly burdensome. Very few laws and regulations are about helping people.

    Or do you think GE didn’t benefit when government regulated high wattage low cost incandescent bulbs out of existence?

    You should read about Hearst and DuPont and their man Harry Anslinger. Terrifying stuff.

  16. Alcohol has been known to make people stupid too.

    Where do you draw the line? This can be banned but that can’t be?

    I’ve got pagans who regularly tell me that conservatives should never be allowed to vote again. Should I listen to them?

  18. Theoretically speaking, they are if you become an inmate in any one of various institutions. Belts are also illegal in those same places. That is why we have all those idiots who wear their pants around their knees.

    I know…apples and bananas, but there ya go.

  19. Some of the original anti-marijuana Hearst propaganda was extremely racist.

    They even started using that foreign word “marijuana.” Before that it was just hemp.

  20. *grins* Good point.

    It kind of ties in though. If objects are illegal in prison, what happens when they become illegal “outside?”

    Does that mean we’re all imprisoned? Does the government look at us like inmates?

  22. For starters, the origins of the war on drugs (post-prohibition) can be traced to the 1930s to a man named Harry Anslinger. Marijuana had been outlawed in other regions of the United States prior to this, but it would be Anslinger who would truly cast the criminalization of substances in a remarkably frank and open light. Those who were suspicious that making substances illegal based on what sorts of “undesirable” people were using them had their suspicions confirmed by Anslinger.

    Quotes attributable to Anslinger include (and there are certainly more than these): “Reefer makes darkies think they’re as good as white men.” “You smoke a joint and you’re likely to kill your brother.” And my personal favorite, “There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the U.S., and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz and swing result from marijuana use. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers and any others.”

    http://www.cbsnews.com/news/column-war-on-drugs-merely-fights-the-symptoms-of-a-faulty-system/

  23. The libertarian part of me says that if people want to be stupid, and f(ornicate) themselves up with drugs, let them. Trouble is, I’m married to a pediatric RN, and I get the horror stories from the hospital, and she has said that she has never, ever seen a case of child abuse — and the abuse has to be hospitalization bad before she sees them — in which drugs and/or alcohol, usually and, not or, were not involved.

    The vast majority of adults will wind up with child care responsibilities at some point, and drug use is not a victimless crime at that point. Even if there is no child abuse in the home, drug use makes people poorer, and that puts the children of drug users in poverty.

  25. Child abuse is already a crime. If you wanted to make it a worse felony if drugs or alcohol were involved, I would support that.

    I see it as similar to crimes committed using guns. The answer to that problem is not to ban guns.

  28. Okay, we’ve moved beyond marijuana and into general drug use. That’s a whole ‘nother kettle of fish with it’s own issues. I could get into that, but it’s going to make this thread much longer.

    I don’t think child abuse happens only with drugs or alcohol involved, but I don’t have anything other than anecdotal evidence.

    The reason why illegal drugs are expensive are because government has banned them. The same thing happened with alcohol.

  36. The problem comes down to Original Sin. As long as man is afflicted with the problem, self destruction will be a problem.

  38. Here I am a barbarian because no one understands me.

    Ovid, a pre-Christian Roman, was in exile in Tomis (modern Romania) where no one spoke his native language.

    A few friends of mine who got advanced English Lit degrees before the total PC Gramsci-pocalypse of the Humanities throw this quote around all the time when describing conversations with Feminists.

    A modern interpretation of this was the “Dr Lexus” scene in Idiocracy (audio NSFW)

    youtube.com/watch?v=rRQijskAMp4

  39. http://www.bbc.com/news/health-31310685

    The English already have. Of course the cavet is that you if you have children in the car then you will be cited, no kids no citation.

    Supposedly there are polls that support the idea that we outlaw smoking in cars if you have children present.
    http://health.usnews.com/health-news/news/articles/2013/07/23/poll-us-adults-support-smoking-ban-in-cars-with-kids

    In CA they have banned smoking in your own home if you share a wall with someone else
    http://abcnews.go.com/Business/california-town-bans-smoking-condos-apartments-share-walls/story?id=20955196

    Seriously wouldn’t be surprised at all to see it banned outright except in a wind blown field without a shelter soon for some folks and even then the citations would still be for smelling like smoke.

  40. Funny story. Although you can still find hotels with smoking rooms, most have banned in room smoking. You have to go to a prescribed location to enjoy a smoke.

    I was in a hotel with the no smoking rule. I did not smoke in the room. They tried to charge the 250 dollar cleaning fee because the maid smelled the “smoke” on my dirty laundry and thought I had broken their rule.

  42. Well if you’re going to be pedantic, then I will play the counter-pedant. It takes a sample size of 30 to even begin to have some meaningful statistical significance, and people don’t count up that many anecdotes before coming to a conclusion.

    Rather, it is natural and instinctive to use a rule of three: once a happenstance, twice a coincidence, three times a pattern. That’s short 27 anecdotes for them to be data.

  43. I almost sympathize with banning cigarettes. Almost. As I grow older, I’ve gotten more sensitive to certain odors. I can barely stand walking down the soap aisle in the supermarket. Most cigarettes smell pretty vile to me. But a good cigar brings back very nice memories, and a good pipe tobacco reminds me of my grandfather.

    Still, where does it stop? There’s a hot sauce factory that’s being sued by a neighborhood association. There are restaurants that have had complaints about smelling up the neighborhood.

  44. I think some universal physical constant must’ve changed, because now I’m agreeing with you again, lol.

    You’re right, I think. Too much of anything is bad for people, so where do you draw the line? There are people who have killed themselves drinking a lot of water. Frankly, I can’t trust the government to draw any kind of line. They’re too stupid, and too focused upon their own greed to understand implications even 5 minutes into the future.

    The solution to management of “too much” is self-discipline, but there is an acute shortage of that. The media is not only NOT helping these situations, but arguably causing them via mainstreaming and normalizing the abnormal (to include unhealthy familial relationships, especially in the case of fathers and alpha males).

  46. Actually, having been a smoker of the “Evil Weed, Ganga, Mary Jane, Left Handed Cigarettes”, and its newest colloquism, ” The Chronic”, for better than 30 years, I can attest to the fact that smoking weed does in fact make one stupid.

    This is especially true when you consider the advances in cultivation of the plant. The THC levels are so much stronger than they were back in the 60’s and 70’s when weed became so popular.

    With “trade names” like Night Train, White Widow, Purple Haze and Bio-Diesel to name a few, its no small wonder that Marijuana is as popular today as it was back in the early days of Flower Power, free love and rock’n’ roll.

    Smoking Pot makes you stupid, affects your short term memory and does have detrimental effects on ones internal organs with chronic use.

  47. How much Viagra is used medically and how much recreationally? If using some sativa helps you through the day, how much different is that from taking Prozac, Zoloft or Xanax? Is smoking some indica at night morally different from taking Ambien?

    This is all a moot question. Colorado now collects almost twice as much tax revenue from cannabis as the state does from alcohol. Every bureaucrat and politician and government employee will know that soon and they’ll legalize it just to tax it.

  48. Not illegal yet. Wait until Empress Cankles confiscates gun, whenpeople start killing other people with shoelaces. Next thing you know, it’s all velcro for you, buddy.

  50. Dude, the CDC – a government bureaucracy – doesn’t do those types of studies (at least, UNBIASED studies) on pharmaceuticals that are FAR more harmful than mj. We know this because people drop dead from pharmaceuticals all the damn time, rather than from mj. That’s why there’s caps on what you can sue pharmaceutical companies for, and how much (if anything). Hell, they literally hide data on the dangers of abortions, in order to maintain a political agenda. Screw their agenda, I say.

    Who in their right mind would invest these corrupt losers (i.e., the entire government) with even MORE power over us? I sure wouldn’t.

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