Home was Vitoria, Spain for us for three and one-half months and I want to remember every detail. But the reality is, Home is wherever my family is.
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Thursday, January 2, 2014
Green Wednesday
Well it's official.
Recreational use of marijuana is now legal in the state of Colorado.
Let's all hotbox in a van down by the river to celebrate.
Interesting Facebook debate. (Side-note: Facebook is an interesting social media outlet regardless. I have over 400 'friends' on the site, but rarely if ever hear from more than a small percentage. So the reality is, I really only have maybe under 100 'friends' on the site, but I still feel like maybe more are reading my posts). Some are just not responding. Maybe stalking or 'creeping' as my teen calls it. Regardless, it is a sociological experiment in and of itself to determine what topics will draw a person out.
Friend is case in point. I post on there religiously, and he has not in nearly 4 years, ever commented on a post. Ever 'Liked' a picture, or wished me a HB.
It's just fascinating to me what finally compels people into response. What triggers their emotion. For some it's Duck Dynasty, Obama, George Bush, abortion or wars. For others it's the War on Pot (emphasis) that causes the opinions to be voiced.
Here's a link from the Northern Territory of Australia's government Website. Lots of links out there but I just liked their graphics better. :
The major health and psychological effects of chronic cannabis use, especially daily use over many years, remain uncertain. The following graphic outlines the likely major adverse effects - according to the available evidence.
Possible effects of long term heavy use which have not been confirmed by research include:
increased risk of developing smoking-related cancers
reduced educational achievement in adolescents and reduced work performance in adults in some occupations (National Task Force on Cannabis 1994:14-15)
There have been no documented deaths from overdoses of cannabis.
Some heavy users develop a psychological dependence on cannabis. They spend more time getting the drug and taking the drug. They have trouble cutting back. They keep using it even when it causes personal problems.
....also interesting to note is the diagnosed connection between heavy pot usage and the increased incidences of schizophrenia. If you are a pot-smoker your likelihood of becoming schizophrenic is three times as likely than if you were to drink or use opiates.
An interesting aside, yet so sadly relevant to our lives in Colorado, is the proven connection between excessive cannabis usage and the onset of schizophrenia. Heavy pot-smokers are three times as likely to suffer from schizophrenia.
Yes Beloveds...all three of the gunmen indicted in the three largest mass shootings in our nation's history-James Holmes,
Eric Harris
and Dylan Klebold,
were all heavy pot smokers.
Colorado may keep our guns, but we are medicating our youth into harm.
Since the days of Reefer Madness, scientists have sought to understand the complex connection between marijuana and psychosis. Cannabis can cause short-term psychotic experiences, such as hallucinations and paranoia, even in healthy people, but researchers have also long noted a link between marijuana use and the chronic psychotic disorder, schizophrenia.
Repeatedly, studies have found that people with schizophrenia are about twice as likely to smoke pot as those who are unaffected. Conversely, data suggest that those who smoke cannabis are twice as likely to develop schizophrenia as nonsmokers. One widely publicized 2007 review of the research even concluded that trying marijuana just once was associated with a 40% increase in risk of schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders.
One widely publicized 2007 review of the research even concluded that trying marijuana just once was associated with a 40% increase in risk of schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders.
Dang. Can't say that for alcohol.
Marijuana has its usage. I won't deny that it helps people who suffer from glaucoma (lowering eye pressure) cancer (stimulating appetite) or other medicinal purposes.
But like Oxycontin, it is a drug. And it is easily abused, and now widely advocated as a 'safe' drug. Denying the fact that smoking five joints of marijuana in a week constitutes the same lung insult as smoking 112 cigarettes a week. It is carcinogenic if not more so than regular tobacco. Dang. Can't say that for alcohol.
Can't even say that for tobacco.
Returning to our Facebook friends argument...his experience as a police officer showed that alcohol had been at the forefront of many of the crime scenes he was called to. He also found meth. He also found pot.
Sometimes he found all three. Was the meth more likely to be associated with the alcohol...or the pot?
Another slant...from the Pacific Standard no less
Marijuana: the Gateway Drug (to Nicotine)
New research suggests that smoking pot promotes an even more dangerous addiction.
High school stoners have all kinds of pseudo-scientific theories about the harmlessness of cannabis. You can’t smoke yourself to death, the argument goes, the way an alcoholic can drink herself to death. Unlike meth, pot is a natural gift of Mother Gaia; unlike heroin, it’s not physically addictive; and unlike cigarettes, it’s not laced with formaldehyde. Some of these ideas are valid—it’s true that fewer than 10 percent of pot smokers will become clinically addicted—while others are, ahem, rather “doobieous.”
As legalization efforts gain traction around the country, there’s new demand for hard evidence on the health science of pot. (Marijuana is now licit in Washington and Colorado, and medical marijuana is sanctioned in 16 states, plus Washington, D.C.) Parents nervously await the dinner-table conversation in which they have to explain why it’s alright for them to roll a joint, but, as with booze and lotto tickets, their seventh-grade daughter has to wait till she’s 18. It’s a tricky topic to finesse, and an even harder policy to enforce. In his work, David Sedaris describes how drug laws went from strict to lax in his family: “‘No smoking pot’ became ‘No smoking pot in the house,’ before it finally petered out to ‘Please don’t smoke any pot in the living room.’”
Research from the National Institute on Drug Abuse, published last month inNeuropsychopharmacology, offers parents a new argument against lighting up: exposure to THC, the primary psychoactive compound in pot, encourages nicotine dependence. In other words, marijuana may be a “gateway drug” to cigarettes, which are far more addictive, and kill far more users, than the green stuff.
Marijuana is a young man’s game: Between work, kids, and the realization that “Adult Swim” really just isn’t that funny, many of even the heaviest pot smokers give up the habit by adulthood. Conversely, smoking cigarettes, like playing tennis, is a lifelong sport: According to the CDC, cancer sticks are responsible for 443,000 American deaths annually—more than HIV, drugs and alcohol, car accidents, suicides, and murders combined. The healthcare costs associated with smoking approach $96 billion.
Researchers at the NIDA exposed rats to THC for several days, and a week later offered them the ability to self-administer nicotine. Just 65 percent of control rats became addicted to self-administering nicotine, while 94 percent of THC rats did. The nicotine had a higher “reward value” for the stoner rats, too, leading them to work harder to get it.
These findings contrasted sharply previous NIDA research into the “gateway mechanism,” where THC-exposed rats were no more likely to develop cocaine or heroin addiction than non-exposed rats. The gateway hypothesis itself is widely accepted; as any recovering addict will tell you, little highs easily lead to bigger ones. But what psychologists don’t understand is whether the gateway is primarily neurological or behavioral. That is, does a pot smoker become a heroin junkie because her brain’s pleasure centers have been rewired, or simply because her boyfriend is a drug dealer and she runs in a high-risk crowd?
The recent NIDA study is important because it demonstrates that, even if THC doesn’t promote a neurochemical gateway for heroin and cocaine addiction, it does for nicotine.
Films such as “Requiem for a Dream” and “Blow” will continue to scare the bejeezus out of teenage stoners considering experimenting with heavier stuff, but the truth is, cigarettes are the more dangerous killer.
Parents and potheads, take note.
....
Marijuana and Alcohol. Cigarettes. All three have been legalized. All three have been given the federal stamp of 'approval' for recreational or medicinal purposes (strike that-cigarettes ).
If he sees marijuana (legal) and alcohol (legal) and maybe even cigarettes (legal) at the scene of a crime...then the only logical step would be to legalize the fourth spoke of the wheel...meth. Because as he says, both meth and pot and sometimes tobacco are present at a crime scene usually involving alcohol.
It's time to legalize all of them. Really.
The tax revenue gained by legalizing the retail sales of pot, just as in the end of Prohibition, created a huge tax boon for the government. It is only a matter of time before the legalization of all drugs will create a world of greener parks, larger schools, and better roads.
Schools we can flunk out of. Roads we can crash our cars on. Parks where we can park our Chevelles and smoke our joints.
It's a greener world through rose-colored glasses...
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