I note that Maastricht still has grow-op problems, and the only reason for this appears to be that they still have not legalized/regulated production.

On a visit to Limburgh a few years ago I availed myself of Maastricht's coffee shops. What a bizarre process, i.e. going to the back counter to order a product which couldn't be placed on the menu, couldn't be legally stocked, but was de-facto legal to smoke within the cafe. Taking legalization 95% of the way without taking those final steps seems utterly bizarre.

My concern with decrim initiatives in general is that they don't solve the Maastricht problem: they do nothing to curb unregulated and dangerous production of pot by criminals. The Feds proposed legislation will result in the exact same situation here, (though that doesn't appear likely to make it onto the federal legislative agenda).

Until production is legal and regulated, or at least allowed within the home, this insanity will continue....

Everytime I ask someone who is in favour of legalizing pot, how they would go about it, they don’t seem to have given it any thought.

Who gets to grow it?

Who markets it?

Who regulate standards?

What about impaired use, how will we decide who is impaired and who is not?

Age limit?

Plus organized crime makes a lot of money on pot, they will not appreciate people moving in on their territory, so be careful when you set up your legal growop.

If only BC makes it legal then you will need laws to ensure that it is a crime to produce for the purposes of smuggling to another jurisdiction.

Will pot be another crop that will compete for space with foodstuff?

Will there still be a limit as to how many plants a person can have before they need a permit?

Will pot be considered and invasive nuisance plant and be banned in some areas?

If you are for legalizing pot I would like to see some comments on how you thing the nuts and bolts should be worked out.

Some criminals may go the route of well-known bootlegger, Sam Bronfman, and become legitimate businessmen.

The Bronfman reference reminds me of an amusing Mordecai Richler anecdote:
At some gathering, a daughter of Bronfman introduced herself to Richler and told him "You have done quite well for yourself, for the son of a tailor".
Richler, never one to kow tow or mince words responded: "And you have done very well for the daughter of a bootlegger"!
Recall Joseph Kennedy, patriarch of America's Kennedy clan ("America's royalty", "Camelot"), also made much of his fortune through bootlegging.He was esteemed at the time for importing genuine and quality French champagne and cognac,then competing with a Mr. McCoy who also smuggled in "the real McCoy".
It seems today's criminal master minds are likely to become tomorrow's establishment icons.
...Marc Emery for P.M. in 2020?

Particularly those in enforcement will find all sorts of problems in legalising pot.

If I was so inclined, I can now grow tobacco, and kill myself and others with it - all quite legally. If you think that is overstatement,
when taken to Emergency with a severe breathing problem two doctors found it difficult to believe that I had been a lifetime non-smoker.

At that time, there was unrestricted smoking in pubs and casinos and I visited both frequently and was inhaling much smoke first hand that hadn't even been filtered through the smokers' probably-rotting lungs.

I'm sure that there are many benefits from marijuana without smoking it. From all the discussion about the herb there is surprisingly little on its use other than its being smoked.

The reason there is no big push to legalise marijuana is anybody can grow it unlike liquor prohibition as few people could or would operate a distilory. So, there are no big corporations lobbying because all you need is a bowl of dirt and a seed.

For Colin,

Let people grow two or three plants in their house legally for personal use. No large grow shows, that should still be illegal, selling too -- crime is taken out of the equation, people interested can easily learn to grow their own.

But that is too simple isn't it, the government needs its grubby hands in there to protect citizens from themselves, wasting taxpayer money at the same time.

The argument is not wether marijuana is harmful or not, it is wether it is any more harmful than the many toxic substances legally available.

I for one honestly belive the solutions are simple, it is a concentrated act of misinformation that hides protects the status quo.

Let’s take a lesson from history. The Income Tax Act and evasion brought down Al Capone, not being convicted of any violent crime.

1. Allow people to grow their own for personal use. Just as we now can brew our own beer and wine at home ( after paying the taxes at the front end for the supplies ).

2. Don’t set an arbitrary number of plants allowed. Just set a tax rate for after-sale that is so onerous that no one will risk it. How many bootleggers of home made wine and beer do you know? Doesn’t happen because it falls under the Income Tax Act and Revenue Canada is highly effective at getting their mitts into any unreported income. People would be free to trade and give it away, just as they are with their homemade beer and wine. There is no limit to how much beer and wine you can make for personal use. It is, however, only for personal use. Revenue Canada makes sure of that.

3. The supply chain is in place. Marijuana seeds are legal. Tax them at the same rates as beer and wine kits.

4. Let Agriculture Canada regulate the seeds, just as they regulate all other seeds.

5. Don’t set an age limit. Let parents and current smoking laws for public places prevail.

6. Free up the now busy grow-op cops to go after hard drug supply.

7. Do not produce any “state-approved” for sale marijuana. People want it, they grow their own, or get friends to grow it for them.

8. I can’t believe I’m sounding like a libertarian?!!!!!!!!!

What does anyone think? Too simple? I think not.

We just need to remember all the vested interests there are in maintaining the dysfunctional status quo. Who wins?

1. Organized crime.

2. Police unions ( increased staffing to fight an undefeatable foe ).

3. Politicians ( by being able to duck the issue ).

4. The media ( loss of wonderful , stimulating public debate and crime beat issue ).

Who loses?

We , the public. See below-

1. Increased taxes to fight the losing battle.

2. Those who truly need marijuana for medical purposes.

PS.

Note that I'm not saying legalize pot. Like beer and wine, it should be a controlled substance. That's what beer and wine fall under for income tax purposes - controlled susbstance. Has a nice ring, don't you think?

Note that in Alaska, a hard core Republican State...

In Alaska, possession of less than 25 plants in one's own home or yard is protected under the Alaska Constitution right to privacy. Possession of 25 or more marijuana plants is a misconduct involving a controlled substance in the fourth degree and is punishable by a fine of up to $50,000 or five years in prison.

In Alaska, any possession within 500 feet of school grounds or a recreation center or possession on any school bus is a felony punishable by up to five years in prison and a fine of up to $50,000.

In Alaska, it is an affirmative defense to possession, manufacture or delivery that the offender is a patient or caregiver who is registered with the state for medical use of marijuana.

Hadn't considered the legal seed option, interesting but rather easy to circumvent.

I do find it interesting on the news last night.

story: Make pot legal
Next story: Suing the tobacco companies

Does anyone see the irony?

How about a law restricting the THC strenght of the plant? (hard to enforce)

maybe we need another 30+ years to study the situation....NOT.
As we are next door to the evil bastards in America's military/industrial complex who used the press to demonise marijuana so they could eradicate the thriving hemp industry and eliminate competition for the cotton, petrochemical, pharmaceutical, steel and other industries, we continue to be influenced by this evil cabal of tyrants whose business is the toxic destruction of nature and human liberty. This is not an anti-American sentiment...it is a reality that most people do not want to contemplate too much as it gets in the way of their enjoyment(read:enslavement)
of their SUV's/Prozac/Kraft dinners/Coors etc etc

The problem in the US with liberalization of pot laws by State lawmakers (such as Alaska, Calif., etc.)is that the US Supreme Court has just dealt a death blow to the States on this issue. The Court determined that Federal drug laws trump State laws. Anyone breaking Fed laws
can and will face Fed prosecution and sentencing, regardless of what his or her State wants to say about it!
More US drug war hypocricy:
The US Justice Dept. has suddenly and unexpectedly asked the judge in a case against US tobacco cos. to reduce the penalties to be imposed on big tobacco, from the $132 Billion expected, down to a tiny fraction: $10 Bill.
This stems from a case that found that the tob. ind. engaged in a 50 year conspiracy to mislead the public on health dangers of its products.
Worse: It has just come out that the gov'ts own expert witnesses against the tob. cos. were pressured to alter and soften their testimony!
The guy who came up with the $132 B. figure to
go to pay for smoking cessation programs, was urged to reduce the figure significantly. He refused. Another witness who who intended to testify on recommendations on limiting tob. advertising so it would be less likely to recruit young people was also pressured to soften her recommendations on banning "image" ads. Top Justice officials ordered the lawyers involved to soften their case, against even the gov't lawyers' wishes.
It looks like key figures in the Bush admin. likely wanted to return favours to a generous tob. ind. and ordered Justice to go easy. Bush is protecting the "dealers" of one of the most addictive, and likely the most deadly of all recreational drugs. Meanwhile, mere users of
other rec. drugs, that are less harmful than tob., are demonized, criminalized and thrown in jail. It's an insane situation, and I don't know why the US voter puts up with it by voting these creeps in (repeatedly).

Colin wrote:

See the following:

http://www.bcvaporizer.com/

Smoking is no longer the only option. These simple devices are a godsend, yielding about 10% of the particulate matter that results from combustion/smoking.

Prohibition is a waste of time, I'd rather give my money to a respectable businessman than an HA roid monkey using high schoolers as his distribution network.

Organized crime only benefits from making money off what the government is stupid enough to ban legitimate businesses from doing. Let all who smoke pot do so, as long as they are not putting others at risk.

And I don't want to grow plants, just like I don't grow lettuce, or raise chickens. I want to go to my licensed dealer, sit down in a coffee shop, and do what I want, just as if I wanted to go to a bar and have a drink.

As for age bans, I can tell you, MJ was much easier to get in high school than it would be nowdays. However, let the puritans have their way, tie weed and alcohol under the same act. Then reduce voting, drinking, and all to 16, and teach people to be responsible, rather than forcing them to be anything but.

Speaking of the Americans, I think one of the least compelling, most weak-kneed arguments against legalizing pot is that the Americans will freak out and take all sorts of terrible vengeance on us because of pot being smuggled into the States.
Never mind that they didn't do so when Canada didn't match prohibition of booze laws with them (much to the profit of Bronfman et al.), this time apparently they'd declare war or something, to hear some people (Rich "Piggie's Patron" Coleman comes to mind).
I've encountered flak from individual Americans on this and I would submit that dealing with their government is really just the same.
When they start yelling about pot going south, I start yelling about weapons and cocaine coming north. "Oh, well, yeah," goes the standard response, "We gotta do something about that." End of discussion. Works every time. Its amazing how gutless some of these macho right-wing type guys (Coleman again comes to mind) really are.

Exactly, relatively few people make their own booze, or grow their own tobacco, why the hell should pot smokers be expected to do otherwise?

Hey Colin - well I'll be your Huckleberry.

Who gets to grow it? Anyone who wants to. Any limits on number of plants or amount of prepared product or potency is silly. One less reason for police to take the battering ram to your front door on the word of your pissed off neighbour is a good thing.

Who gets to sell it? Here regulation is required. Commercial growers should be regulated.

Who gets to regulate it? Best to duplicate the rules on alcohol, they seem to work well. So the provinces, with some federal standards.

What about impaired use? Be careful there - there are ways to detect if someone is currently impaired, and then with marijuana there are ways to tell if someone has been impaired in the last month or so. I would hope that the laws would stick to current impairment.

Age Limit? Again I think it is best to duplicate the rules on alcohol. Obviously those rules haven't eliminated teenage drunkeness, but society is coping just fine I think.

Organized crime - don't worry, because your legal grow op won't be for sale, so gangs won't be offended. Marijuana is one of the biggest sources of income for organized crime. Give them a chance to go mainstream (like with the end of alcohol prohibition) and see what happens to related criminal activity. This would basically "drain the swamp" to borrow a neocon-terrorist-hunter phrase.

Smuggling - there would be regulated commercial producers - generating tax income and likely staying away from related criminal activity and not draining police resources, and then there could still be criminal production - a fraction of the current industry that would still require police attention which could be that much more focused.

Competing for space with foodstuff? I suppose marijuana would be a lucrative crop to plant at first, but regulation would set a bar for entry and I'm sure market forces would normalize things quickly. Remember that this would be for domestic consumption only - most definately not enough of a market to carpet the Fraser Valley for instance.

Limits on plants - mentioned above, that would just be silly.

Banned in some areas? I suppose possibly. But remember that the stuff that sells won't be planted in fields, it will be grown in greenhouses.

How's that for nuts and bolts?

First rate, imho. I'd give it A+ :-)

If you are for legalizing pot I would like to see some comments on how you thing the nuts and bolts should be worked out.

Geez! I wuz hopin someone would ask that, Colin
In keeping with your mechanical metaphor, we got nuts and bolts aplenty, (Don’t go there!)
Larry Campbell stated it is a 3.5 BILLION dollar segment of our BC economy and certainly by removing the removing the profit motive organized crime will adapt to some other area.
As a Free enterprise Endeavour there are sufficient numbers of “mom and pop” operations already in business. Free enterprise legalization has the potential to further create a formal cottage industry some what on the order of Estate Vineyards and Wineries
Marijuana connoisseurs are organized to the degree where there are prizes for the efforts of the growers
The potential for spin off industries is enormous
It is not organized crime that needs watching but rather those industrialists who are responsible for the criminalization of a plant in the first place

what we have is what are basically international corporations, underground and illegal sure but similar, who profit from a globalized drug trade. the way to fight them is not to train people to be spies and go undercover or to get people to snitch on each other. the way you do it is you eliminate their sources of revenue. you have government regulated gambling. you have government regulated drinking. in some places you have government regulated prostitution. and now in some places you are starting to see some government regulated use of some psychotropics (the ancient natural ones i mean, for the new patented chemical ones it's wild wild west). these are the most effective ways of combatting organized crime.

we have otherwise law abiding people working underground who could beat a botany professor in a quiz game. we could let them use their skills to contribute to society and create a healthy domestic industry. yes there are vapourizers (which are great), but like people have always done you can also just eat it. there are a million and one ways to incorporate marijuana in your cooking. ever had a 'special' brownie? and there's currently a renaissance going on in the investigation of marijuana based tinctures and extracts. the oral spray sativex was just approved in Canada for further testing. smoking is definately not the only way to use marijuana, it's simply the most convenient.

anti drug hysteria is a 20th century fad that is starting to lose popular enthusiasm. let it go. its a fuitless waste of massive resources.

If marijuana ever becomes legalized,I imagine it will create a market looking much like the alcohol market does now. Large and small companies will enter, just as we now have large breweries supplying weasel p*ss, and micro breweries supplying real quality and variety.
I imagine the large players will be big tobacco companies who will create cannabis subsidiaries.
And just as we have lots of avid home brewers and amateur vintners, grow your own will be a popular hobby for many.Hydroponic stores will not only continue in business but will multiply in number.
It will at first be sold only through government liquor stores with special cannabis sections.Eventually, the government will allow small players to sell retail, just as independent beer and wine stores are granted licenses now.
The gov't will tack steep taxes on it which will keep a thriving parallel underground market continuing, a market existing as a way to avoid taxes. Just as some small time home brewers and distillers currently pay the rent by selling their brew, small time pot growers will sell to their friends at prices lower than the highly taxed gov't sanctioned product.
Obviously the profit margins for growers will decline drastically once the product is legal,
but high taxes may still allow profits to be made by amateur growers avoiding tax.
The illegality will no longer be in the growing, but rather in the tax evasion, or the unlicensed commerce.
Cannabis tourism will bring a steady stream of American pot heads north. Canadian tourism will
get a huge boost.Unemployment will plummet as thousands of new jobs will be created in travel, entertainment, hotels, retail.
Our gov'ts will become so rich from the new tax revenue we'll have the best social programs in the world! And the best and fastest healthcare!
The longest life expectancies! Life will be a bowl of cherries!

Although I am but slightly acquainted with what you refer to, Diogenes, particularly with regard to the cotton lobby, what I have been made aware of is downright sinister, unethical, and something the (frankly) brainwashed general public should be aware of.
I, for one, would certainly like to learn more. Perhaps you have a handy link? :-)

David - try a Google search for hemp + any of the following:
Lammont Dupont
William Randolf Hearst
Harry J. Anslinger
They were the 3 main players. There are thousands of links detailing the history of marijuana prohibition.

Or read the book "The Emporer Wears No Clothes" by Jack Herer (http://www.jackherer.com/).

Thanks, mikev. :-)

Speaking of plants... has anyone tried Salvia? My friend in Taiwan has raved about it and now my brother has been dabbling in it and is really enjoying it. It sounds quite fascinating, and yet not much known about it (mainstream anyway). I told myself years ago my experimental days were over but I'm so curious...

Fii: That store ( is it "Hemp BC?") on Hastings close to the New Amsterdam, runs a natural psychoactives counter at the back. The people who run it seem very knowledgable about legal plants from around the globe, and they sell many of them. Do you think they sell this Salvia? What is the drug's effect?

Whew- well, according to my brother and friend in Taiwan, a sort of out of body experience, a total release of the ego. Should be done with a "sitter" at first, though now they both do it alone. My bro's first time he shouldn't have done it alone- he called me rattling on about the spiritual beings he was surrounded by and how good it felt to be talking with them, but obviously he was a bit freaked, too. He has it under control now and it almost sounds like a form of meditation. The friend in Taiwan does it with his eyes closed, lying on his bed, and he also says it's like you lose your body and is similar to magic mushrooms. I guess like pot, too, it depends on where you are coming from and the environment you do it in.

The store I mentioned previously has been selling
some kind of legal psychedelic I've forgotten the name of. The lady who helps run it said they get a lot of DISsatisfied customers, apparently because it's very easy to have an experience so strong as to be hard to accomodate. She was trying to emphasize to people to use it sparingly, as lots of bad trips were reported, so much so, she said she was considering stopping selling it!
I have no idea if this is the stuff you are talking about. Where do you find yours?

Thanks too for describing the effects.
It's actually been years since I used any psychedelics. I had some wonderful, what I would call mythological/magical psilocybin experiences in the BC wilderness I will always treasure. I seem to have adopted a gentler approach to spiritual exploration since, and now seem content with my daily Taoist meditation and other practises. Still, I'm curious about natural substances that have positive effects on brain chemistry, and I use 5HTP and SAMe, from my health supplements store, that I know help balance my neurotransmitters.I no longer suffer depression or lack of mental energy. They are excellent alternatives to prescription
drugs such as Prozac, Zoloft and the like.

Mikev

Thanks for the comments, interesting food for thought, but I still don’t see it being some sort of utopia. To be honest I am presently opposed to legalization, but acknowledge the problems with the current system.

I still don’t see the gangs letting go of their hold on the market easily, to much money at stake. At some point market forces would take over, but for anyone starting a commercial growop for sale would be considered a competitor. I don’t buy the Mom and Pop bit about the current situation, back in the early 80’s yes but not now. I have seen the underbelly of this beast and it ain’t pretty.

For hemp to viable as an alternative resource for clothing, rope, etc. You will need large quantities to ensure a consistent supply, therefore would it replace an existing similar crop or replace a less profitable crop such as Canola or a food crop? We have a limited aquiculture land base and it will be a factor to be considered. To reduce pilfering it would be good to breed a hemp crop that is low in THC and would be exempt from various restrictions.

I also see us facing in 20 years the same dilemma with pot as we do with cigarettes. Spending a fortune to reduce use by education to prevent health risk. Also I see the need to introduce filters to prevent ingestation of combustion products.

Another moral issue, 2nd hand smoke would be a hallucinogen, which would infringe on other people more so than tobacco (as opposed to a health issue) and booze. Therefore I don’t see it being a free for all, but subject to quite a few restrictions.

Frankly I can’t stand the smell and wonder how people can demand the right to ingest something that if their were exposed to the same chemicals in their work would likely sue their employer.

Colin wrote: "2nd hand smoke would be a hallucinogen". No kidding. The last Sonic Youth concert at the Commodore, for instance, had so much pot smoke in the air, you could not help but get high, whether you wanted to or not!

The hemp plant is already low in THC. Hemp and marijuana are two different varieties of cannabis sativa. You'd have to smoke pounds of the stuff (hemp) to get high.

Utopia is a bit strong, I agree.

So what do you think the gangs will do? Launch armed attacks on legal regulated growops? I'm imagining that for the most part the gangs will do what they are doing - produce for export. Meanwhile some of their people will 'surface' and start legitimate domestic businesses. Of all the marijuana grown in Canada, considering how much flows south, it must be much less than half of the entire crop that gets consumed domestically. It's the domestic portion of the crop that we can deal with. For criminal organizations who grow for export, nothing will change, the police will still come for them. For the domestic market, I have to disagree - there definately are a lot of Mom and Pop kind of operations happening.

Hemp is an entirely different matter (and we've been growing it in Canada since 1998 - http://atn-riae.agr.ca/supply/3307_e.htm). Hemp is most efficient to grow in fields, that's why you see it mostly on the praries (where I don't think we're running out of room!), and plus it will also grow well in land unsuitable for other crops. I doubt that BC can compete very well in growing hemp.

Don't get me started on cigarettes. You could compare actual tobacco to marijuana, and no they're not entirely harmless. But don't bring up the fertalized, processed, preserved, even-burning, formaldehyde-for-flavour crap that they sell in packs at the store. They talk about the chemicals you find in cigarettes, but they don't mention how many of them are additives not found naturally in tobacco. Tobacco is not beneficial for you, but today's manufactured cigarettes are downright engineered to be extra toxic. It's nice to sue the tobacco companies for hiding how addictive cigarettes are, but I'd love to see someone sue the government for knowingly allowing the tobacco companies to inject so many known carcinogens into a cigarette and then sell it at the corner store - Health Canada on the warpath while Agriculture Canada is complicit? What a mess.

And as for second hand smoke, I'm not suggesting that it's OK for you to go grocery shopping and find the clerk at the till puffing on a fattie. Restrictions on smoking in public places and workplaces make good sense and should apply to smoking anything, not just cigarettes. Restrictions on public drunkeness make good sense and should apply to any type of public intoxication - no toking at the local playground for instance. I'm imaging you will be freee to partake in private at your home, and that there will be Amsterdam style coffee shops with a vapourizer at every table or Arab style hookahs to gather around, licensed similarly to bars & pubs. As for the Sonic Youth concert, obviously that's not an argument for keeping current laws intact. The only way to wipe that out is to make the laws much much harsher - would that be worthwhile?

Great questions, I'm having fun here!

ps marijuana is not a halucinogen.

Bob 999- I've never smoked Salvia. My brother gets it at the Kensington Market in Toronto. I'm not sure where the friend in Taiwan gets it...? Perhaps he has seeds sent from England, as he has his own plants at home.

Fii: You piqued my curiosity.
Thanks for your info.

Mikev
How long do you think it would be before additives begin to creep into legal retail pot? Once legal it would be subject to the same market forces as tobacco and I would not be surprised that those same companies got into the act of selling pot.

My comment about the gangs is in regard to the first few years, the gangs make a lot of money on pot and would set up legal shell companies to try to maintain control, anyone getting in their way would be harshly dealt with. I suspect this situation would only last for the first 10 years or so.

Actually the pot on the street is already laced with additives. I was treating a young fisherman off of a boat near Comox who was complaining about chest pains and coughing up blood. I asked him about drug use and he repeatedly said that he had only smoked pot in the last few days. Later when I described his symptoms to an Instructor in the ambulance service, he told me that much of the street pot is laced with rat poison to give it extra kick. This guy had spent many year working East Vancouver, so I believe him and it fits with the symptoms I saw.

By the way anyone using Coke or crack should hear a recording of their heart while high, it ain’t pretty.

Thanks for the information on Hemp, did not realize it was already been grown out there.

But I still think pot smells like the backend of a 3 day old roadkill skunk.

http://www.rednova.com/news/display/?id=151565&source=r_health

Good link, Rick. I remember reading that some queen way back used mary jane to cure menstrual cramps... makes sense; get that nice, relaxing feeling going on; after all, Midol and all the pharmaceuticals used for the same purpose are muscle relaxants.

My friend just got busted in the "Yukon's biggest ever" drug bust- 225 lbs of pot, worth half a million dollars. Some humourous reporter worked out how many joints that would roll- 55,000 or so. Haha... don't have the details on my friend as of yet, but wow, I wonder who he's working with. Someone is making loads of cash off the stuff.

Re. the Red Nova link. What a joke Bush's war on drugs is considering there is a tape recording of a phone conversation, the contents of which were reported in some mainstream papers, where Bush implies that he used to use it. He never denied tapes authenticity.
There were lots of Cocaine rumours swirling around Dubya too relating to his "bottle" days.
What hypocricy. He's content to criminalize and jail people who do exactly the same things he has done himself.
Too bad about your friend, Fii. He might look on the bright side and feel fortunate he's not in the States where he'd likely see 20 years in the joint. Or worse, Indonesia, where dealers can receive the death penalty for "poisoning our youth".

The web is full of stuff like this:
http://www.zpub.com/sf/history/will2.html
which shows the conspiracy to make hemp products, of which marijuana is only one, illegal. This was accomplished in 1937 (or thereabouts). What I'd like to know is how they got the whole bleedin' world on this bandwagon......

How did the whole world hop on the bandwagon?
There were other influences besides cotton and lumber lobbies. Like Opium. Concerns about Opium began to stir back in the 1800s in both the East and West.But it wasn't till close to WWI that hysteria grew against Opium (fuelled in Canada by anti-Chinese sentiment).Around that time, stricter laws were enacted, which got ever stricter as years went by. Spillover effect caused suspicion of other psychoactives to grow, and Cannabis got caught up in the same net.
Medical use of both drugs was very common, pre-hysteria, but spillover, pressures against medical use, caused Cannabis to be eliminated from medicine entirely, while Opiates, as the best pain relievers around, were retained but played a smaller and smaller role as an ingredient in common medicines.
One of my favourite collectibles I have is a handwritten physician's personal notebook of an Aurora, Ontario doctor dating from the 1870s.
He had a sideline of mixing and selling his own medicines ( a common thing for doctors of the time). A recipe for Chlorodyne, for treating cholera, diarrhoea and stomach pain, had 12 ingredients, including "Tr. Cannabis Ind." (tincture of Cannabis Indica) as well, as "Morph Mur." (Morphine)
Many recipes have "Tr. Opii" (tincture of Opium) as an ingredient.Many ingredients are herbals such as aniseed, cassiae, sassafras, campor gum, cloves, capiscum and rosemary.
It's interesting how medicine in Canda of 2005 resembles, more and more, the medicine of 1878!
Now we're returning to medical use of Cannabis, and herbal medicine in general is making a big come back.

If I remember correctly the Boxer rebellion was an attempt by the Chinese government to prevent the British from promoting the use of opium in the Chinese population. The British were trying to get around the strict laws and punishments regarding the use of Opium, as the Chinese knew what the effect of large drug use has on society.

Similarly the Incas also had strict rules on the use of Coco leaves and abuse of it that prevented you from being able to work was punishable by whipping.

Another example of the dangers of the overuse of drugs is Somalia, where the chewing of Khat has created significant social issues. I believe the Congo wars also have a significant drug problem attached to them

yeah additives in retail pot suck. there's pretty good awareness though of how fertalizer and pesticide use affect the taste and the ash residue and produce side effects like head aches. awareness of things like that is growing rapidly in society, and not just relating to agriculture - lead in the paint, leaching pvcs, synthetic carpets, alternatives to chlorine and the like in drinking water, asbestos, radon, automobile emssions and smog. clean marijuana will be in demand, tobacco is just an insulated genetic mutant freak of an industry.

i'm thinking that criminal elements will be kept out of the industry just like they're kept out of most industries - with anti money laundering laws. if buddy from the slum all of a sudden wants to buy a few million dollars worth of farmland and spend millions more building greenhouses i hope it will occur to someone that there's a question to be answered about where the money is coming from. turning everything legitimate means record keeping and accountants and lawyers and audits and such. hopefully all that makes it that much easier for the authorities to regulate. i'm not saying it will be impossible for a gang to muscle around in the marketplace, i'm just saying that it will be harder than it is now.

marijuana for menstrual cramps? i was reading the latest canabis culture magazine and it talks about how women dont just use marijuana during pregnancy to releive nausea and increase their appetites, they actually use it *during* labour for stalled births to get the mother relaxed. it also reportedly has a beneficial impact on milk production.
(http://www.cannabisculture.com/cgi/issue.cgi?num=58 - "cannababies", but you gotta buy it to read it)

great annecdotes on traditional remedies!

yes the boxer rebellion - didn't it go like china wanted to eliminate drug use in it's population, like most countries do today, but thanks to the western powers they ended up with the 'colony' of hong kong (joining macao), and the other 'treaty' ports. then came the boxers http://www.smplanet.com/imperialism/fists.html. then came repeated rape by the japanese. what a crappy century for them, but things have been sure been turning around for the past few decades. the only colony left now is taiwan, we'll just see what happens next i guess.

i think that the prohibition of marijuana in canada was no big deal (because we didn't have any hopped up mexicans / jazz musicians going around ravaging white women like they apparently did down in the USA), and it was just tacked on to laws prohibiting opium, which was a huge deal (thanks to kkk-belittling racism against the chinese - riots through chinatown in vancouver february 24 1887 and september 8 1907 - look up the asiatic exclusion league), simply to 'harmonize' with the USA.

ps personally i think the closest thing to marijuana smoke is *really* bad body odour.

I hadn't heard about ancient Incans having to enforce "drug laws" on coca chewers!
I have read that Peruvian native mountain porters amazed some Western observers by demonstrating amazing strength and endurance - while chewing coca through their day. But like most things in life it's possible to overdo it, I suppose. I wonder if the khat situation is a genuine problem drug or a problem in the minds of certain authorities.
It's almost funny that today's Empires are likely to have wars against drugs (creating a large "industry" of drug law enforcement). In the old days Empires had wars FOR drugs: The Brits wanting to force China to buy their opium.
The Dutch had similar policies with their Dutch East Indies (Indonesia) , promoting opium use, to keep those guilders flowing in.
I wish I had been a Vancouverite long enough ago to have experienced the pleasures of Vanc. opium dens! I've read that as late as the late 1960s certain Chinese restaurants had private back rooms emitting pungent aromas (other than food) that elderly Chinese men would stumble out from with bemused looks. Now it's all white powders, best avoided. I agree with Dr. Andrew Weil who says plant drugs are a lot less harmful when the actual plant or its natural constituents are what's taken. Once you start using chemistry to isolate chemicals and strengthen effects, you're likely to end up with something much more harmful to the user, says Weil.

BTW, that was 225 kg- 100 lbs, but still... what was he thinking?!

I know 100 kilos = 225 pounds,approx., which may be what you meant (you reversed it).
I'll bet he was thinking he could make some easy money.

yeah... um, you'd think I was high or something...

My brother just did a fantastic painting (he is a painter but for the last few years has been doing video game stuff to, ya know, pay the bills) re: "salvia space". I wish I could show it to you Bob,... it sort of shows the ego being pulled away as one falls into a meditative state.

All successful civilizations have had laws governing the use of drugs/alcohol.

Coco leaves chewed in small quantities does help the body assimilate more oxygen, and also dulled the drudgery of life on the lower rung of the Inca world. Life was strict, there was also punishments for getting a woman pregnant less than two years after the birth of a previous child. In Lima there is a small but intriguing museum that has artefacts that they do not display elsewhere because of the graphic sexual nature of the statues, this museum has booklets on the daily life of the Inca, wish I could remember the name, but it was over 10 years ago I was there.

Coco leave also help with the symptoms of altitude sickness. However it was not just the coco that helped the Peruvians. These people have evolved to survive in high and harsh climates, you will notice that the Indians are stocky with oversize chest cavities with higher lung capacity than your average person.

I not sure if the Nepalese had a similar plant.

Colin: Thanks for the info. about coca.
I'm not the least bit interested in Cocaine, but I'd sure be interested in assessing coca's effects on myself! I wonder, was Coca venerated in the way that peyote is so venerated by certain aboriginal groups?
Similarly, I'd avoid Heroin, but have become interested in opium, which is legally available in Canada, in the sense that any seeds for growing any large-pod poppy varieties sold in gardening stores, result in opium yielding pods.Also, dried poppy pods are legally sold for floral decoration. It's simple to make tea from pods or stems: opium tea. Mm,mm good!
The Inca statues you mention remind me of some strange images from ancient Mayan codex books I saw reproductions of. They had some odd rituals surrounding the piercing and bloodletting of genitals.
I recall a National Geographic mag. from the early '70s with a story on Nepal. It showed a pic of a woman with a large black object in her hands with the caption :"a woman makes a paste from the cannabis plant." It was a huge chunk of hashish! I'm guessing the Nepalese have used
the drug for centuries, but if they use any herbs to aid endurance, I doubt that that's the one!
Fii: Your brother likely knows about this already, but the Huichol natives of Mexico have
the most colourful, beautful art. It frequently
is of mythological images as seen in Peyote visions, peyote being central to their religious practise. There are some good books available of their art.

You are allowed to bring back a small amount of coco leaf tea. It might to available here in Canada.

Interesting just quickly scanned an article in the Metro that the Coco plant has been given special status as a “significant cultural item” (or something similar to that) in Peru that allows people to plant and harvest it. There was some concern about the law protecting the drug trade.

I'm sure the US DEA won't be happy about the Coca law. I'm glad to see Peru is not kow towing to US drug "philosophy".
We know how hypocritical US drug policy has been anyway.When it suits US interests, the US has aided and abetted big time drug dealers. In Laos, the Opium trade received US blessing in return for Laotian hill tribe help in fighting the Viet Cong.
In Afghanistan, when the mujahadeen (Osama and other mujahadeen soon morphed into the anti- American Al Qaida)were trying to oust the Russians, the opium trade again received US blessing, as the trade helped finance that war.
On occasion, CIA planes have even been used to help transport drugs. The US gov't is a drug policeman by day and a drug dealer by night.

just what is it that all you dope smokers are trying to escape from anyway?

Escape from?
Maybe from the social conservatives' no-fun dictatorship police state plans they're itching to have put in place for Canada. I call it their "guns,jails and jesus agenda"

bobb; you must be into some pretty good stuff if you believe the crock you just wrote. 'no-fun dictatorship police state'. lmao.

I don't believe it will ever come to pass, because the majority of Canadians would not stand for a gov't run by social ultra conservatives. But this doesn't mean there isn't a sizeable minority (Alberta's a hotbed),made up largely of evangelicals, who want want strong "law and order" where morality is not left to personal choice but is enforced by strong legislation. There are many who'd love to see a return to homosexuality being
a criminal offence,and all illegal drugs being made even more illegal, and Christianity once again being taught in public schools (I recall the Lord's Prayer and hymn singing in my public elementary school in the '60s).
Many of those who'd like to see eradication of the presence of "dangerous" drugs, are the loudest proclaimers of their right to have unrestricted presence of "safe" firearms in their possession.
Thank Goddess Canadians do not think like Americans in sufficient numbers to actually elect a Canadian version of George W's administration! I think we're safe! Now, pass that joint.

Bobb999

What I have found out about dealing with the right, is that they are a diverse group, just like the left. In fact I would say that most Canadian’s are a bit of both, leaning left on some issues and right on others. A concept that seems lost on our political parties.

Some rightwingers see drug use as a personal moral choice and do not want to see laws prohibiting that choice, others see it as a cultural/social issue. I am in a moral dilemma in this regards. To be bluntly honest I despise drugs and put drug dealers in the same social status as child molesters and serial killers. But I also believe that people should have personal choices about what they do to their bodies. The problem I see with any drug is when the addiction overrides a person’s ability to make informed decisions. Then the drugs begin to affect not jut that person, but their family, and everyone that comes into contact with that person.

As a society we are already struggling with two legal drugs, alcohol and cigarettes. Would the legalization of pot just move problems from one arena to another? I could live with pot being legalized for consumption at home and in places designed for it’s consumption, I personally do not want to be exposed to it every time I go out. But I would like to see the offences for the manufacturing and sale of harder drugs to be raised, with an education program to reduce the use of crack and other drugs. Despite what the people like to say, it’s been my personal experience that people do often move into other drugs from pot. So this would ease my worries.

bobb; you're full of shit.

is that all you've got sirjohna? you really are one stupid dork..we put forward ideas and opinions and, in my case, call you out for the asshole you are and all you can come back with is the adult version of a 6 year old saying .. am not- you are.
You do know that the real john a macdonald married his first cousin so I want to know.. are you an inbred descendant or do you take after Gary sir john Carlsen the sleasebag rat snitch we are reading about in the local news? Or is it a lot of both?

colin..there you are again making fallacious statements about MJ. You have stated in other threads about your 25 years in the military and coast guard so I can see how your thought processes have skewed in a perverted fashion... but to say that:

", it’s been my personal experience that people do often move into other drugs from pot"

just shows that you have been hanging out with too many braindead, FBI & DEA ass kissing mounties. The theory of MJ as a gateway drug is so full of holes that no credible grug expert advances it anymore..just right wing, American cop show watching wanna be's like you.

Sleep
Actually it comes from experiences of having 4 of my school friends die of drug overdoses, growing up in decade where most young people smoked pot and did coke. Not to mention treating people on wreck beach, fishing fleet, small coastal communities through my work, ride alongs in ambulances. Plus taking my friend’s son to the hospital during an overdose and watching him cheat on his detox.
I have known cops, soldiers, pot smokers, drug dealers, and normal everyday people. From these life experiences I have formed my opinions.

Not to mention my father ran a Heroin half-way and I got to see the dirty side of drugs at the age of 8. My father was an MLA for the NDP in 1967 running with Tom Berger and helped with the writing of the Medicare bill.

So spare me your crap about jack booted RCMP thugs. I happen to know one these “thugs” who received serious burns on his hands who pulled a young kid out of a burning car and was previously a decorated SAR tech in the military.

sleeps; you're full of shit.

colin
Every year in this country we read about dozens and dozens of mounties who are up on charges for everything from theft to rape and these are only the ones that are public knowledge. This is a thoroughly corrupt force who have adopted corrupt US drug policy thinking.

The main problem with the Mounties is that their leadership has become political and will do almost anything to satisfy their masters. The rank and file with some exceptions are pretty damm good.

If you want jack booted thugs, I suggest that you go to Central or South America. I recommend Peru (from personal experience), the police there are both brutal and corrupt with a few exceptions. You will find that the RCMP here are actually quite tame in comparison.

gee colin...it would seem that you are the one throwing the phrase 'jack booted thugs' around..but I would have to agree with you..the mounties are jack booted thugs and you are so right about the rcmp leadership..you will recall that mulroney appointed Norman Inkster as top mountie so Inkster could keep BM apprised of all the criminal investigations in progress of BM's MP's. You should read ex-mountie Rod Stamler's book on the subject...yes there are good mounties but they need to scrap their thoroughly discredited drug policy thinking.

Colin: If you think drug dealers are on a par with child molesters, maybe we should start throwing tobacco co. execs in jail for pushing their addictive deadly dope while lying for years about the risks, and lying about their advertising designed to recruit kids to smoking (eg. the cartoon character "Joe Camel" in the States).Or how about the pharma execs who hide data showing drug risks they prefer to keep hidden about their products (suicide rates among children taking prescription anti-depressants is a recent example). I'll bet many of the problems your father saw among addicts at his junkie halfway house had more to do with the illegal status of the drug than with dangers inherent in heroin itself. Giving alcoholics their drug of choice as "harm reduction" wouldn't work because chronic alcohol abuse is very damaging to body and emotions, and makes people less functional. Harm reduction (such as safe injection sites) does work for heroin because, if properly administered with attention to dosage and clean needles,, heroin itself does not damage the body at all, and addicts can be quite functional and lead normal lives. Personally, I believe opium is safer/preferable to heroin.
As for pot being a "gateway" drug, the same argument can just as easily be made about tobacco or alcohol. Most pot smokers start with beer and cigarettes as their "gateway" to pot.
Maybe you'd say "yeah but most beer drinkers don't progress to pot", which might be true, but then most pot smokers, I'd argue, don't move on to heroin or crack, either!
Some of our legal drugs are as dangerous or more dangerous than many of our illegal drugs.
I agree with you that the right is made up of diverse views. Earlier I was focussing on the evangelical, social cons crowd who I believe do mainly preach a "keep drugs illegal" line.
I agree with former US Secretary of State George Schultz,a conservative and Republican. He has stated publicly that the drug war is a failure and a waste of money.He says drugs should be legalized or decriminalized and treated as medical, not criminal problems. And think of all the potential tax $ that gov'ts are missing out on!
I have a view on opium that says that if opium was legalized, many self medicating alcohol abusers would discover opium to be much preferable/less damaging than booze, and is a comparatively "sober" drug compared to alcohol.
An opium addict can be more functional than a boozer.As long time opium addict Jean Cocteau said "opium and alcohol are mortal enemies".
That is, for many, the two don't mix, and a rejection of alcohol in favour of opium is a likely scenario. Heroin addicts might discover opium to be a safe alternative to heroin. An opium tea drinker's risk of dying from an OD is virtually nill.There is a theory that some opiate users may suffer from a lack of the body's natural opiates, endorphins, and are self medicating, attempting to remedy a metabolic deficiency others don't suffer from.
If coca was fully legal and available, perhaps those drawn to more damaging stimulants like crack or meth would find coca a safe alternative.
I'm not an expert on police thuggery although I and my girlfriend were once mistakenly "taken down" by a Vanc police dept. SWAT team. I walked out of my apt. to find in the hallway 5 cops and three loaded rifles aimed at me . They proceeded to subject us to the whole nine yards of a typical SWAT op. We received no apology for the VPDs error. It all a stemmed from a drunk in the apartment across the way who imagined she saw someone with a gun hop onto our apt. deck and into our apt. - all B.S.
I hadn't heard that the Mounties tend to be worse than other forces. The most chilling cop story to me is the Saskatoon PD's habit of dumping drunk natives with insufficient clothing miles from town in the dead of Sask. winter to die. That dept. had serial killers for cops, to "serve and protect". And it looks like no one is likely to ever go to jail, despite the fact there were multiple such killings over a number of years. I've never heard of the Mounties being this bad! And as far as corruption, Toronto's PD seems to have one of the worst records in Canada. I'm not sure the RCMP deserve as much criticism as some other forces do deserve.

bobb999

"There is a theory that some opiate users may suffer from a lack of the body's natural opiates, endorphins, and are self medicating, attempting to remedy a metabolic deficiency others don't suffer from."

Well that is interesting, I will have to dig up some information on this.

I do agree with your comments about what executives from the Pharmaceuticals and tobacco did. I find it morally repugnant and they need to be punished. Strip them of their assets and give them hard labour. The problem of course is proving in court that they did it in full knowledge.

The reason I despise drug dealers is that they exploit peoples addictions for their own profit and often coerces addicts into committing crimes to pay for their habit. They cause suffering in full knowledge of what they are doing and do it for profit. There may be a few dealers with a “heart” But having seen friends who have owed dealers money, they were terrified of being badly beaten or killed. Dealers have also been known to go after other family member to collect money owed to them.

This is the only reason that I even consider the legalization of drugs, is to reduce the damage done by these parasites.

Congrats to colin for finally offering a sane viewpoint on the realities of both ends the drug business...all that nonsense you wrote about MJ must look pretty ill considered in retrospect. MJ has been persecuted because both it and hemp were impossible to monopolize and were providing way too much competition for competing industries. The outlawing of MJ and hemp is a perfect example of the depth of evil that personifies the American military/industrial complex. Outlawing hemp has left us with a dependance on toxic petrochemicals which has given us a world dominated by Imperial America. To offer a simple perspective: you have the Republican Party protecting the tobacco industry, which is responsible for 400,000 annual deaths in the US alone, while they wage a war on MJ - the safest drug on the planet..and you have Harper and CCRAP, who can't wait to form government so they can implement the Republican agenda in Canada.
Who are the more dangerous parasites?

'The outlawing of MJ and hemp is a perfect example of the depth of evil that personifies the American military/industrial complex.'
great blather sleeps. you hear that one in a commercial drive coffee hut last welfare wednesday?

surejerksoffalot, who has trouble admitting he is Moron Lyencourt's bumboy, is struggling with the fact that no one will hire an inbred pedo like him which explains why he spends all his time on a left wing site trying to pick up other right wing pervs...I've offered him cash ($5000) to come out of his closet but his gutless nature won't allow him to pick up the first honest earnings he will likely ever make.

sleepswithhisbrother; bash any gays lately you sick piece of shit.

Time to clear the air...I obviously don't give a damn what sirjerkoff thinks but I don't want to offend those that feel my crude posts aimed at sirjerkboy are homophobic. They were not. I ask you to reread the posts and keep in mind the following: I believe that many openly gay people are vastly superior people compared to the average joe. I subscribe to the "two spirit" belief of many First nations people who see GLBT's as highly evolved.
On the other hand you have many gays, whether in or out, who, for a variety of reasons, are deeply disturbed or otherwise conflicted. Surejerksoffalot is one of these sad bastards. While most of the inner turmoil that these people suffer is the result of hypocritical intolerance and persecution by straight society, it is hard to feel compassion towards creeps like jerkboy and others who champion right wing philosophies. No doubt a form of Stockholm Syndrome is partly responsible for these sorry assholes supporting ideologies that are inherently detrimental to people of their sexual persuasion...obviously there is major denial at play here...but when they behave antisocially I believe they need harsh reality checks.
I'll let that sink in before I offer detailed insights into my assertions that sirjerkoff is an inbred, homosexual pedophile.
Some constructive feedback would be nice (not from you sirjerkoff) or maybe you don't appreciate a new comer to this site taking shots at your pet whackjob.

as if anyone's going to contribute feedback to a sick piece of gay-bashing shit like you.

Sleep
Anyone reviewing your posts would see a large number of crude sexual comments directed at anyone who disagrees with you and would question your own issues around sexuality. On any other forum I have been on you would have been booted for your personal attacks. Perhaps if you stuck to dissecting a persons comments and ideas and avoided personal attacks, people would pay more attention to your ideas and not be put off by crudity. It is supposed to be a fundamental concept of the left to allow people the freedom to express themselves in an environment safe from fear of harassment and ridicule. I can see by some of your posts that actually have some useful input and ideas, put they are completely lost in the noise you create.

thanks for the input colin
I agree that my analysis of sirjerkoff and clubofrome contained coarse, seemingly irrelevant content but I am not yet done with revealing the thinking behind my observations and will also subsequently link their twisted psyches with mainstream neocon ideology....in other words, I intend to show how neocon politics attracts the perverted scum of society.
You have asked what my qualifications were in earlier posts and while I responded to you with tongue firmly in cheek, I did not offer clues to my identity more out of concern with the resulting impact on my safety after posting my analysis of SJO's fragile mental state...more to follow.

psst..colin..the action is now in a thread in the views section tiltled " another blow to the big box"

Wow. This thread sure has deteriorated since I was last here 5 days ago. A high school mentality of meanness and "you're a fag" insults has spoiled it.It's now about as lively and appealing as putrescent fish!
To those who haven't yet "graduated from high school", I hope you'll graduate beyond juvenile trash before again posting.

bob...you need to slow down your toking..it's getting in the way of your ability to discern my critique of sirjerkboy's various shortcomings. Terming SJO as an 'homosexual' pedophile denotes a clinical distinction between molesting male children as opposed to female children.
Your attempt to belittle my level of education speaks volumes about your own struggles with matriculation.