Wednesday, April 20, 2016

Oh hey look, it's 420!

Potheads of the world rejoice!  Yeah, you can get high as fuck and talk about metaphysical crap and the smell of the color nine, and all that crap, and think you're really, like, DEEP and stuff...

But in reality, you look and sound like this:



Yes, I know there are medical marijuana users out there.  Got it.  Duly noted.  The 20 year old, dreadlocked, hemp-wearing pot smoker I lived next to in Seattle did NOT have glaucoma or any other medical issues that would have required the use of THC.  If you're in chronic pain, then I don't begrudge you any chemicals that can help you live a normal live.

But that's about 1% or less of the actual marijuana users in this country.  The rest of 'em?  Just wanna get high.

"But Dave, what's wrong with that, huh?!  Why do you care what they do to themselves?!"

Because I, and the rest of the bill payers in America, are the ones who have to pay to pick up the pieces.  Just like the three-pack-a-day smoker who drinks a fifth of Jack Daniels most likely doesn't have the money to pay for his open-heart surgery and liver transplant, the drug users of today are going to be the ones sucking up all the resources later in life.  And the people like me, who quit smoking, who work out to stay healthy, to make healthy choices so that we can be happy later in life, will be the ones who end up paying for it in one fashion or another.

Remove the cost from society, and I say that people can do whatever they wish.  But if I'm going to be forced to pay for it (and we're paying for it today, trust me) then I'm going to oppose any expansion that would force me to pay even more.

Besides, habitual use of marijuana lowers your intelligence.  Want proof?  I say we round up a bunch of Bernie Sanders voters, and a bunch of Ted Cruz voters.  Poll them:  Who smokes pot?

The Sanders voters are toking up daily, I'd bet you all the cash in my wallet.  Cruz voters?  Not so much.  Ta daaaa!  Point made!

5 comments:

Francis W. Porretto said...

-- Because I, and the rest of the bill payers in America, are the ones who have to pay to pick up the pieces. --

So what you're really exercised about is that the Omnipotent State taxes you to pay for their medical care? Doesn't sound to me like you've got a problem with cannabis heads, but you've surely got one with the Omnipotent State.

Ragin' Dave said...

Absolutely, and I freely admit it. While I'm against drug use in general, it's the fact that we're forced to pay millions of dollars a year to treat the drug users in hospitals, in clinics, in higher costs due to theft, etc etc etc that really bugs me.

Working at the hospital in Seattle opened my eyes. Even at my small little community hospital, there were MILLIONS of dollars spent on drug users who had done themselves in, that were never going to be paid back. You want to know why an asprin costs ten bucks? Because Joe the Crackhead ate up $500,000 in medical care because he was too high to change his shorts after he shit himself, and the resulting surgery, medication and hospital stay to take care of the MSRA infection he got have to be paid for somehow.

I'm not going to say that I don't care if you want to flush your life away with drugs. I do care. I'll try to help you if I can. I'll pray for you. But I don't want to pay for the end result of your choices. Which is what is happening today all over this country.

Drumwaster said...

As one of the 1% (side note: why am I ALWAYS on the short end of long odds?) you refer to, I managed to use medical marijuana while successfully running my own construction company (fibromyalgia, arthritis, migraines, and much more), and arguing online in favor of 95% of all conservative positions (such as Federalism, and how the Federal Government does not have the authority to limit ANY substance self-administered, and that, under the 21st Amendment, such decisions are up to the States, and their respective counties and cities, just like those "dry counties" we had agreed upon a while back). I have argued and defended those principles consistently, cogently and (sometimes) comically, so I doubt that it has somehow made me a bad person, or has made me a secret alcoholic or something.

Now if said person is harmed by his intake, his neighbors are NOT responsible for any degree of the costs of retrieval, rescue, repair and/or rehab.

If people prefer those laws, or abhor the cultures such laws encourage, they will vote with their feet, and we will have empirical evidence to use when arguing about whether those States on the other side are wrong. An argument the Feds should stay out of.

JMAO

Drumwaster

Ragin' Dave said...

Drum - I think we can agree that there's a big difference between someone who uses marijuana to manage pain, and someone who gets perma-baked and sits around his apartment giggling at the word "cheese". I have no problem with medical marijuana, just like I have no problem with other prescription painkillers. I do have a problem with a culture that says it's OK to get high as a kite on a daily basis.

I would point out that the arguments I make against most drug use are the same arguments I would make against drinking a pint of vodka every day. Constant intoxication can only lead to bad results. But there's a huge difference between having a glass of scotch at night, and having the entire bottle. I'm not going to argue against scotch, because it's not the scotch that's the problem. Marijuana isn't the problem, it's just a symptom.

Drumwaster said...

Oh, absolutely... it isn't the substance, it's the addiction. The kind of personality that could get addicted to eating ice cubes.

But my problem is that the Feds learned NOTHING from the fiasco of Prohibition, and how it is impossible to ban something that can be made at home by anyone who can read step-by-step instructions.

And I would shut down any Agency whose job it is to violate the Tenth Amendment.